If you want something cultural to read, I recommend postings numbers one and two of Nikos Salingaros week, over at 2Blowhards.
The postings are interesting. But even better, in my opinion, are some of the comments. I’ve posted tangential comments of my own about the “New Urbanism”, briefly on Transport Blog, and at somewhat greater length at my Education Blog. Meanwhile here are bits from two of my favourite of the Blowhard/Salingaros comments, so far.
First, here is “Tom”, replying to something Michael Blowhard had said about suburbs:
You are so right about the zoning, transportation department, fire department rules ossified since the 50’s creating inevitable horrible suburbia. I have done work in suburban areas and the results are completely predetermined by setbacks, maximum lot coverage areas, single use zoning, minimum parking space numbers and transportation department road standards. This is where the problems with modern architecture really are – a socialist/utopian attitude towards city planning. Even in many areas where they object strongly to this kind of thing, the solutions are always increased regulation – appearance reviews, stricter zoning, etc which just makes the problem worse. The reason all suburbs in america look the same is because there are two (i believe) companies that publish model codes for towns that they just buy off the shelf. The role of new urbanism should be fighting these standards.
But I am nervous about blanket condemnations of any kind of architecture. Modern architecture is not quite the force for evil in the world that I keep reading on this blog. That said, modernist urban planning is as bad or worse than has been expressed. What we need to be worried about is any totalitarian vision for architecture or urbanism. A strong town or city has the capability to absorb any style of architecture or building type, but any utopian or totalizing scheme will always destroy the city. Hitler and Speer’s megalomanical plan for Berlin (dispite it’s neo-classical style) was not a good thing regardless of how much Leon Krier liked it. We need architecture and urban planning that is anti-utopian and anti-totalitarian, not necessarilly anti-modern.
And second, here’s Michael Blowhard himself, commenting on posting number two, having a go at A. C. Douglas:
… I don’t know about you, but I have a hard time reconciling ACD’s language with his implicit claim that he’s the reasonable one here. Um, to say the least: his words seem to me to be dripping with irrational fury. Castigations, imprecations — hey, son of a gun, that’s the language of the offended religious nut! I’ll resignedly point out, feeling slightly wounded, another anomoly — that ACD, despite his habit of presenting himself as the ultimate arbiter of all things civilized, never shows the grace to express even the smallest appreciation for the way 2Blowhards occasionally stimulates a little conversation on architecture topics. No, he just seems to want to stamp it out. Tres civilized. …
You need a bit of heat in among the enlightenment of a good debate. Michael then goes on to offer an example of what he has in mind. In general, the needle between the Blowhards and ACD is something to savour. My opinion of ACD’s views on the Modern Movement in Architecture is that I agree with most of what he says about the operas of Wagner.
My take on all this is that Salingaros is onto quite a lot of good stuff, and stirs in quite a lot of opinion-wrapped-up-as-science sense and ditto nonsense. I don’t plan to read his magnum opus until it is (a) a huge best-seller and then (b) remaindered. I’m not holding my breath.
The way I prefer to write about modern architecture – well, maybe I mean the way I prefer to see it written about – is one bad idea at a time. And there are plenty of those, believe me. I’m strongly with “Tom” in wanting to see fact and opinion separated, as Salingaros and Douglas are both very bad at doing. In my opinion.
In my other postings on this subject I’ve been recommending in particular this article, entitled The New, Neighborly Architecture.
Meanwhile, my congratulations to the Blowhards on some fine blogging and some truly outstanding blog-debate hosting, terrific even by their standards.
Brian wrote: “In general, the needle between the Blowhards and ACD is something to savour. ”
The savoring is over, I’m afraid. Poor, wounded Michael has banned me from further posting in the 2Blowhards comments section. My response to that can be read here.
ACD
Brian wrote: “In general, the needle between the Blowhards and ACD is something to savour. ”
The savoring is over, I’m afraid. Poor, wounded Michael has banned me from further posting in the 2Blowhards comments section. My response to that can be read here.
ACD
Oops. Sorry for that double posting. Your comments thingie hung, and I hit REFRESH to try to get it going again.
ACD
I don’t know what has happened to this comment system, but I’m sure Perry is working on it.
Re the savouring, yes I got that very wrong, and you are entirely right to correct me. Any “needle” that leaves either party wanting nothing more to do with said needling is not something to savour at all. Sorry everybody.
Acd: you seem like someone who doesn’t understand the difference between winning an argument and arguing in a way that others don’t want to continue with. “Poor”? “Wounded”? How about plain fed up?
I hold monthly discussion meetings at my home, and about once a decade I remove somebody. I’m sure the last one who got removed regarded me as poor and wounded, and I was indeed rather wounded, but he still got removed. Like you, he didn’t understand the precise nature of his transgression. He probably thought he’d “won” the argument that we’d been having as well, or that he would have won it if he’d been allowed to continue, and that I just couldn’t bear it. That wasn’t quite it. It was more of a property rights thing. It was my flat.
And it’s his blog. As yours is yours.
As it happens I have strong disagreements with Michael about architectural modernism, etc., very much along the lines of the second paragraph of the “Tom” comment I quoted. But I don’t expect either Tom or me ever to to be banned from the Blowhards. That’s because neither of us have any plans to wound Michael, and if by mistake we did we would not regard this as any sort of victory.
My suspicion is that not much modern architecture would get built if the users of buildings had any say.
International-Style offices, houses and other structures have for almost a century been overwhelmingly commissioned by one group of people for another group of people to work or live in.
Brian wrote: Acd: you seem like someone who doesn’t understand the difference between winning an argument and arguing in a way that others don’t want to continue with. “Poor”? “Wounded”? How about plain fed up?
“Winning an argument”(!)? I sense (OK, I know), Brian, you’ve misunderstood what was involved there. This present business was merely the last episode in a long line stretching back over months. This was not about my “winning an argument.” It was about my exposing a hidden agenda; an agenda at bottom political and personal rather than aesthetic and architectural.
And notice, please, that I posted my definitive salvo NOT in the comments section of 2Blowhards, but on my own weblog, merely giving a URL reference to it in that comments thread, and that only because another commenter hit the same nail-on-the-head as I in my weblog post. I entered the 2Blowhards comments thread with direct comment only in response to someone who had addressed me personally with an insulting if comically idiot remark, and in response to Michael’s direct attack on me in that thread. Michael (and Friedrich as well) was very much aware I was on to his little game, and that really pissed him off, not only because I nailed him (again), but because he thought he was being so clever about disguising under cover of “stimulat[ing] a little conversation on architecture topics” his agenda of promoting the architecture movement to which he’s so deeply devoted that no-one would suss out the imposture.
And speaking of movements, your,
My opinion of ACD’s views on the Modern Movement in Architecture is that I agree with most of what he says about the operas of Wagner.
is misplaced. I’ve expressed NO views whatsoever on “the Modern Movement in Architecture” beyond my general statement that I hold in contempt all aesthetic movements, which would very much include the “Modern Movement in Architecture.”
ACD
Brian, re: the substance of the new urbanism…
My wife and I live in one of the first “planned communities” in the U.S., just outside the D.C. area. A ring road encompasses a nice mix of residential homes, circles a big golf course, and premium housing has been built on two edges of the development. There are a couple schools within the ring road, a small commercial / retail development, and a few churches. A couple plush strip malls with little oases of retail buildings in the parking lots, featuring ordinary and upscale shops, have sprung up along the boulevard which is the main route into the area. The essentially rural character of the other side of the development – trees, churches, gas stations, nurseries, a farm or two, and a couple honky tonks, remains. We moved into a townhouse cul de sac last year and love the place.
This is a fairly old new urban community – planned 40 years ago, and really developed 30 – 20 years ago, but we absolutely love living in it. It’s quiet, there are lots of little neighborhood cul de sacs, we’ve gotten to know our neighbors because the houses are fairly close together… in short, it’s an old neighborhood, like the kind I lived in when I was a kid in an old rust belt city; and like Birmingham, where my wife grew up.
We also took a good look at Southern Village, in Chapel Hill, NC. Had we stayed in that area, we definitely would have tried to buy there. While roomy suburbs are nice, there is something really special about having a lot of neighbors close by, and forming a nice little community where we can live and raise kids and grow little back yard gardens. Sure there are some tradeoffs with respect to absolute privacy and freedom of action — but I don’t mind the tradeoffs, at least after around 15 years of living in impersonal, isolating apartment blocks.
A sometimes missing half of libertarian philosophy can be found in local communities. We resent central government planning and intrusion into our lives. I would hate to have a cop in front of my door, watching over my house. But local communities can fill the role that government often subsumes, and the people in a small community answer to each other, unlike the government, which answers only to a simple majority of the local political subdivision, whatever that may be. In contrast to the cop, I don’t mind the old lady next door, and the nice young couple with kids from across the street, keeping an eye on the place when we are out. It doesn’t take a village to raise a child… But living in a good quality village makes raising a child an easier and more pleasant job.
Ok