January 5, 1969
LONDON, ENGLAND — Seven out of every ten United States citizens live in urban America.
Half the population of the United States lives on one percent of the nation’s land.
That is the crux of America’s urban problem, and behind the simplicity of those two facts lies what is certainly the nation’s most complex and demanding challenge. Another certainty is that the challenge will be greater tomorrow, and greater still the next day, for urban living — with so many economic, educational, cultural and social opportunities — has become the American way of life.
People enjoying people at a Dutch sidewalk cafe.
Urban living, at the same time, has given Americans ugliness, inconvenience, slums old and now, and a host of daily tribulations. The question is whether urban life demands the nation to accept such conditions, or whether urban America can order its life to avoid such a severe penalty.
Europe has been grappling with urban problems for more than 2000 years. Because of its differences in living style, culture, and tradition, the Old World cannot offer answers to the Now World’s urban dilemma. But she can teach by example.
There is the example of Sweden, Europe’s most motorized nation, giving preference to people over cars. Or that of Italy, a poor country by American standards, building decent housing for its poor. And the example of The Netherlands, so low that underground construction seems impossible, finding ways to build modern subways. And that of Poland, shaped as a now socialist state, still preserving its beauty of old.
Some of the methods urban Europe has found successful are incompatible with American ideals. Others might seem radical to Americans, though we acknowledge these are radical times. Many can be easily accepted. Curiously, nearly every major proposal made in the United States recently to deal with urban problems is a common practice in one or more European countries.
In the past year, I have had the opportunity to see much of urban Europe, to talk with many of the men who are shaping it, and to live in four of its cities: Rome, the Eternal City, struggling to be both modern and ancient; Warsaw, the capital of People’s Poland, terribly devastated by war and rebuilt under socialism; Stockholm, the “Beautiful Sinner” as a poet called it, nerve center of the democratic welfare state and Europe’s most modern nation; and Rotterdam, the muscle of Holland, raised from the ashes of war through aggressive Dutch capitalism to become the world’s greatest port.
America would have to be a very dull student not to learn something from their example, if only how to ask better questions about the future of 140,000,000 urban Americans.
Urban Europe: A Planned Approach
(First Of A Series)
If European cities don’t reach their goals, it won’t be for lack of direction. All over Europe, physical planners are mapping courses for future urban development.
Europe’s cities have been planned for centuries — by emperors, kings, popes, barons, merchants, and politicians. City planning in the United States has a relatively short history.
Today, there is a fundamental difference between planning in the progressive cities of Europe and planning in the U.S. metropolis. The American planner has the negative role of preventing bad development, while the European planner has the positive role of creating good development.
One might observe that America’s urban areas have been knit together with a patchwork of prohibitions, aimed at protecting individual property rights. Some of these were as blunt as the old deed restrictions, which said, in effect, “You can’t sell this house to a black man.” Others, still very much alive, are negative in a subtle ways “All houses in the Village of Green Hills must occupy lots of at least two acres.” The favorite prohibition is the rainbow-hued zoning maps “The yellow places designate multiple-family housing … No, not stores. A grocery store would go in one of the red places. That’s commercial, you see.”
The European version of planning differs in that it tries to make something happen, rather than stop it from happening. The architects, engineers, sociologists and others engaged in urban planning here decide — subject to political approval — such things as where housing is needed, where industry should be located, and what transportation links are required.
Europe’s planners are able to take the positive approach in urban planning because they know their plans can be implemented, either by requiring private developers to follow them or by the action of local government. The cities of Europe commonly act as developers of housing and commercial centers.
Mastering the Situation
The major planning tool in urban Europe is the master plan, which outlines how the city will be developed over the next 20 years or so. The key words are “will be” and the development power of the city backs them up. In the U.S., master plans are essentially forecasts or hopes, not plans.
The master plan for Stockholm may be the epitome of city planning. It outlines each land area to be developed, the best way to use the land, and the time when development will be most beneficial to the community. It coordinates all elements of community life to complement each other so the city knows, for a given area, how many houses, working places, classrooms, parks, streets, shops, social facilities, health centers, and public transit lines are needed, and when.
A key element of the Stockholm plan is its precisely calculated investment schedule, which provides the city with a realistic idea of the amount of money needed each year to implement the plan. While the plan remains flexible enough to permit changes, Stockholm knows what it has to do and what it will cost at least five years in advance, and has at least a general idea for the next 20 years.
Because both planners and politicians work together to create the master plan — and revise it continuously — the planners are forced to be more realistic and the politicians have a better understanding of planning objectives.
Theo Quene, director of the National Physical Planning Agency of The Netherlands, explains the Dutch approach, “The master plan is a living political document; discussions in town council on the shape of the city-at-large in the future are taking place rather frequently. So you can imagine how the absence of master plan debates in the United States struck me. In my opinion, the discussions on new neighborhood developments (in the U.S.) lacked many times a background in a concept for the whole city or metropolitan area.”
The absence of “master plan debates” in the American city is attributable to two things: First, the master plan carries so little weight. Since it does not really determine future development, no one gets very excited over it. Secondly, the process in the U.S. leaves the master-planning task to the professionals until it is wrapped into a neat package and presented for political approval. There is little political or public participation during the formative stages.
Many European cities have developed what they term “rolling plans.” This means that the plans are continuously revised to reflect changes in the community — population growth, more autos, new industry, etc. In some cases, changes are made every month. In others, revisions are required at least every five years. This is in sharp contrast to the common U.S. practice of putting the master plan away in a drawer.
Today, some U.S. cities still work with master plans up to 20 years old. A plan that old, assert European planners, cannot be used because the city it describes has disappeared, nor can it be merely updated. Only a new master plan can suit the purpose, they say. The rolling plan not only keeps the city’s plans current but keeps the City Fathers informed about changes in the community.
Alternatives?
Physical planning in socialist Poland is viewed as a means of implementing decisions of the Communist party, and Polish planners shape their plans around the government’s economic program. Because the government has a monopoly on development, the planners don’t worry about private developers upsetting their plans. Instead, their great problem is justifying their plans from the economic standpoint.
Working toward this end, the Polish planners have devised a variety of sophisticated methods — using mathematical formulas and computers — to analyze the cost of developing land for different purposes. The information is then presented to the political decision makers who must choose among the alternatives. Ideally, the politician will consider social or aesthetic factors as well as the price tag on each development scheme. In practice, however, economic factors eclipse the others.
The process does permit the decision makers to use both intuition and hard facts in determining the city’s investments, rather than intuition alone. Given a set of alternatives, the politician is forced to make the decisions and finds it hard to pass the buck. On the other hand, the politician has an abundance of facts to support his decision can feel more secure in his choice. Alternative planning is becoming common In Western Europe, with planners searching for more scientific ways of measuring non-economic costs.
The Who and How
Should cities be designed by city planners or by planners working for private investors? Both, say the experts, with the public also taking an active part.
The common practice in the U.S. is for the investor to design plans for a development, then present them to the city for approval. Any changes suggested by the city planners come after the fact, and are normally of a superficial nature — move the setback a foot, plant shrubs along the parking lot. In Europe, the investor and city planner frequently collaborate, in one way or another, on the design. In this way, the public interest can be incorporated into the plans, rather than tacked on them. Plans for large developments are commonly exhibited to the public and public reaction solicited before they are finalized and submitted to vote.
For major projects, urban Europe frequently turns to the international design competition. Though this procedure is time consuming, many cities use it when planning multi-million dollar investments, which will stand for a hundred years or more. Soliciting ideas from architects all over Europe and rewarding the winner with cash and considerable prestige, the cities have been able to obtain designs far better than by merely relying on the local community or hiring an individual firm.
Finally, good planning is the product of good planners. Because European cities generally pay salaries and provide working conditions comparable with private business, they compete successfully for professional talent. Thus, the brains working in the public interest are on a level with those working for private interests. And generous public expenditures for personnel provide staffs large enough to pay attention to details. Stockholm, for example, has 400 people in its planning department, 100 of them architects, Cities of the same size in the U.S. have only a fraction of that number and background.
Regionalism
To speak of city problems is to speak of only part of the whole — that is, the whole of the urban area where many people live in close relation.
American and European planners agree that the problems created by large numbers of people living together cannot be treated within the political boundaries, which were established many years before the people came together. The nature of the game has changed, they say, and the rules must be changed too.
One of the rule changes is to begin planning for regions, rather than only cities. The Greater Stockholm regional plan, for example, was adopted in 1958 by a federation of 80 representatives from the 46 municipalities in the Stockholm area. The regional plan deals with those problems, which span political boundaries and require cooperation to solve.
Although the Stockholm regional plan is not mandatory on any of the municipalities, it enjoys strong support from them since they all helped to shape it. The plan deals with development over the next 30 years, outlining cooperative action needed in housing development, industrial locations, aviation requirements, highways, water and sewerage systems, and recreation areas.
As urban problems transverse state lines in the U.S., they cut across national borders in Europe. Efforts are well underway to increase cooperative physical planning between nations, with the European Council of Ministers devoting efforts to this end. Metropolitan, regional, and even national physical planning are being avidly pursued in most of Europe.
The idea of national physical planning in Europe — geographically like state physical planning in the United States — is being spurred by the migration of people, the swift pace of development, the problems of the labor market, and competition for land among industry, recreation and natural preservation. These factors are present in the United States too, perhaps to an even greater degree.
The Why of It
Why all this planning? Simply because the elements of urban life are too complex to fit together by accident. A German planner told me, “No major manufacturer today would attempt to produce or sell a product without first planning an efficient factory, setting up a plan for production, establishing a sales force, and planning marketing and advertising campaigns. If he is making a great investment, he will try to be fairly certain it will pay off. I see no reason why the public’s investments, which affect all of us, should be less rational.”
An investigation was launched recently in the U.S. to determine why some communities had established an excess of hospital beds while others were dangerously short of beds. Rational planning seeks to avoid this kind of waste.
Europe’s enthusiasm for planning may be due in part to its having less money than America and trying harder to maximize its investments.
Nowhere in Europe will you find a city where the schools, the houses, the streets, the stores and other main elements are planned each by distinct, unrelated public or private organizations. Yet the American city witnesses such fragmentation daily, as if some magical force was going to make the pieces mesh.
Urban Europe: On The Move
(Second Of A Series)
“The automobile has its place,” urbanist Lewis Mumford has written, “but it should not be all over the place. We need a complex network of many forms of transportation — rail, air, water, and roadway — each serving the other, each moving at its own pace.
“Unhappily, we have dedicated our civic efforts to serving the automobile traffic at the expense of nearly every other human need. We have come to look upon the automobile as a religion, and like every other religion, the cult of the motorcar -demands its sacrifices. The hearts of many of our great cities have been gouged out to make way for expressways, parking lots and garages.”
The cult of the motorcar is winning converts in Europe as fast as the automakers can pass the collection plate, and Europe’s cities are beginning to pay the same sacrifices, which Mumford deplores in the United States. However, some effort is being made to avoid repeating the American experience with the car.
Taking the Low Road
There is a growing tendency throughout Europe to put the automobile underground. Rome, for example, is planning to construct 26 underground parking garages. Sweden is encouraging underground parking facilities in all new developments. Holland, despite its soggy soil, has embarked on similar projects.
Many planners contend that underground parking, despite its high initial cost, is a wise investment. The major advantage, they say, is that surface space remains free to be used for either buildings or open space. Underground parking eliminates also the blight caused by a sea of autos on the surface.
“The automobile — though we tend to forget it — is a machine which can spend its time anywhere,” a Swedish planner asserts, “while humans have a need for trees and skies and sunshine.”
The enormous amounts of land devoted to surface parking escape the eye at ground level, but officials looking at aerial views of their city are usually amazed at the number of cars squatting on the valuable land.
Underground highways, though few in number are demonstrating both technical and social value. Stare Miasto, the charming medieval quarter of Warsaw, has been preserved by one ingenious act of engineering. Instead of widening the highway through the old section, Warsaw’s engineers cut a long tunnel beneath the area. As a result, traffic flows unimpeded and Varsovians enjoy the quarter without fear of traffic.
Stockholm’s plan to renew the Sodermalm area includes a tunnel highway to take through traffic off the surface streets. Not only does the underground roadway promise more rapid movement of traffic, but it also preserves the neighborhood, rather than cutting it in half with a surface highway. The tunnel frees nearby residents from the blight, noise and fumes produced by a surface highway.
The noted Greek planner Constantinos A. Doxiadis asserts, “We may have to place the whole system of mechanical transportation underground, perhaps in tubes, to leave the surface of the earth free for ourselves, for our children, for art to be developed. On the surface we will have the human values; below will be the inhuman systems.
To Each His Own
“One of the new laws of transportation,” explains Doxiadis, “is that the greater the distance, the shorter the time needed to cover it. We fly between our metropolitan areas at speeds of 600 miles per hour, and yet we travel within them at only nine miles per hour, which was the speed of the horse drawn carts at the beginning of the century.”
One of the factors, which complicates travel in the urban area, is the practice of mixing various modes of transport, the planners explain. While we provide separate courses for racing cars and mile runners, to make top performances possible, we force pedestrians and motor vehicles to compete with each other in our cities, to the detriment of each.
Led by the Scandinavians, city planners in Europe are currently laying heavy stress on the separation of people and oars in urban areas.
The broad sidewalks provided in some cities — Warsaw, Paris and Rotterdam are examples — give pedestrians greater freedom from passing vehicles. But the clash of people and autos still occurs at each intersection.
The solution, say traffic planners, is to provide bridges or under passes at all major intersections, with gradual inclines or escalators to ease the burden on pedestrians. Another approach is to provide different levels for each kind of traffic. In Stockholm’s now city center, this is accomplished with pedestrian ways above or below the street level,
In some now communities, like Farsta in Stockholm and Tapiola in Helsinki, streets and pedestrian ways have been designed for a minimum of conflict. They make it possible to reach schools, stores or parks with virtually no danger from cars.
Pedestrian separation can be accomplished in old city areas, explain the traffic experts, by closing some streets to vehicles and making then pedestrian ways, and by rearranging traffic patterns. Carrying the idea still further, the pedestrian mall is growing in popularity. Rotterdam’s Lijnbaan had instant success and is now being expanded.
Several European cities have found it necessary to make some areas completely off limits to the car, and provide parking facilities on the peripheries of the areas.
From those cities, which have successfully established pedestrian malls, a few guidelines have emerged: It is not enough to close a street or area to traffic and tell people to walk there. There must be an incentive for pedestrians — interesting shops, cafes, sculpture, greenery, natural beauty (as along riverfronts), and other people. Some cover from the weather should be available. And a city should be prepared to continue the mall long enough to prove its value, at least three months.
European cities are using numerous schemes to keep commercial traffic apart from other traffic. The most impressive technique is Sweden’s use of underground service streets in now commercial centers and the rebuilt center of Stockholm. Trucks drive under the centers to load or unload without interfering with surface traffic. The service networks can include also underground parking facilities.
In the reconstruction of Warsaw and Rotterdam, short service courts were built inside each block of buildings. The courts are limited to commercial vehicles and those of storeowners.
The Public Way
Because Europe has far fewer cars than the United States, it has devoted much more money and energy to public transportation systems. However, increased motorization has not diminished the growth and improvement of public transit. Urban Europe is pursuing a policy expressed this way by the Dutch governments “The greater the number of cars, the more important public transportation becomes.”
Stockholm is generally considered to have one of the finest public transportation systems in the world. Though Sweden is second only to the U.S. in cars per capita, the Stockholm transit system is used by 75 per cent of the city’s commuters.
“Once you realize that you can’t ever build enough roads or parking lots for everyone to drive to work,” explains a Stockholm transit official, “you have two choices. One choice involves the use of negative measures to discourage the use of the automobile, such as raising parking fees. The other is to attempt to provide quality public transportation which offers a genuine alternative to driving.”
To do this, the experts assert, public transit must be as fast or faster than the auto, operate very frequently with only short waits, keep a regular schedule, be priced competitively, and deliver its riders as close to home or job as possible. Some contend further that it must offer the same degree of comfort as the auto — clean and attractive surroundings, and a seat for every rider on trips of 10 minutes or more. Needless to say, few transit systems meet these requirements.
“In our enchantment with the motorcar,” Lewis Mumford remarks, “we have forgotten that rail transportation can move as many as 50,000 people per hour along a two-track route. In the same time, the best expressways can move approximately one-tenth that number.”
Throughout Europe, the subway — or underground or metro or rapid transit-system is enjoying a boom of new lines and extensions of old ones.
Rotterdam’s Metro.
C. G. van Leeuwen, director of Rotterdam’s public transportation company, feels that any metropolitan area with 750,000 people or more is justified in making the investment in rapid transit. (Applying this to the U.S., more than 40 American cities qualify.)
He contends that any major city, which needs rapid transit, can obtain it with an effort. Rotterdam’s new Metro was built with no outside aid and in spite of tremendous technical problems. Van Leeuwen asserts that a small beginning such as his city’s four-mile system is better than none, and produces strong support for expansion.
Rapid transit, with its free track, moves more people faster than busses or trams. Efforts are underway to provide special bus tracks in several European cities, either by limiting some streets to public transit or building special roadways along with motorways. Modern, express tramways are being developed also — using bridges or underpasses at street Intersections — to fill the gap between the small capacity of busses and the large capacity of rapid transit. The great need, planners explain, is to keep public and private transit apart from each other, since public transportation cannot be effective if it must compete for space with the automobile.
Time — rather than distance — is the major factor in developing a transit system, say the planners. Some European cities are trying to provide public transportation which will carry a person from anywhere in the metropolitan area to the city center in just 45 minutes. Others say one hour of travel in the maximum acceptable. Using a figure, it is said, gives an objective to pursue and is favored over simply saying riders should reach their destinations in a reasonable time.
Transportation a Service
Public transportation in Europe is operated as a public service, rather than as a public utility. The difference is vital. A public utility is expected to break even on its operations. Operating as public utilities, American transit companies find themselves in a vicious circle-losing riders and income, raising fares and cutting services, losing more riders and income, etc.
A public service — something considered vital to public welfare — is not expected to balance its books. Police and schools are examples. In operating public transportation as a public service, it is financed from tax money to the extent necessary to provide adequate service.
Stockholm, for examples along with its neighboring communities, spent $18,000,000 last year to subsidize its transit system. At the same time, the Bi-State Transit System serving Greater St. Louis was refused a total of $500,000 from the States of Illinois and Missouri.
National governments in several European nations now contribute to the construction of rapid transit lines and the purchase of transit equipment, Sweden will contribute 95 per cent of now lines, for examples with Holland giving its cities 50 per cent of construction costs.
Decongestion
No matter how efficient its transportation network, there is a limit to the amount of traffic a city can absorb, urban planners agree. For this reason, many European cities are seeking to decentralize.
In Warsaw, the city core is set aside for government uses offices, and cultural facilities, with a limit on commercial facilities. The official policy is to place commercial facilities in outlying neighborhoods. Stockholm has decided that its city center should remain a commercial center, but that ordinary needs should be provided in neighborhood centers to reduce congestion in the center. Rome has selected three areas for the relocation of businesses and government offices, which do not require central locations.
The difficulty, planners explain, is to strike a balance between the very diverse but heavily congested city center and the center, which achieves efficiency but loses its vitality. In other words, the task is to make the city efficient and attractive.
Moving certain functions from the city center, it is explained, not only reduces congestion there but also gives peripheral areas a boost in life.
Transit officials say that good public transportation spurs decentralization by making it easier for people to reach the peripheral areas, and benefits from it by carrying traffic both toward the city center and away from it.
Decentralization by accident is becoming more and more common in the American metropolis as many companies move to suburban locations. Because local finances are tied to political boundaries, city officials have been dismayed by such moves and suburban officials have welcomed them. Urban planners contend that such reactions are not always justified. The vacation of city land, they say, often permits it to be used in a better way while many small communities find themselves with major problems when a large firm moves in. If decentralization is inevitable, they argue, it should be planned.
Urban Europe: Under Roof
(Third Of A Series)
The United States will have to provide homes for 1,300,000 now families a year by 1970, forecasts the Bureau of Census.
Added to this is the continual need to replace worn-out housing and the huge task of replacing six million housing units in American slums. The new Housing and Urban Development Act calls for the construction and rehabilitation of 26,000,000 houses in the next 10 years.
Though low and moderate-income families suffer most in the housing pinch, Congress has provided only enough funds for rent and interest subsidies to build 65,000 housing units this year. And the private housing market not only appears unwilling to build low-cost housing but also unable to meet general demands, in the eyes of many.
The European Way
Housing has been one of Europe’s most pressing problems since World War II. The loss of houses in the war, fast population growth, and rising demands for better housing have produced strong pressures, and an approach based on the belief that housing is too important to leave in the hands of private housing developers.
Housing construction is booming in Europe. In 1965, Sweden built 12.5 new dwellings per 1000 inhabitants. The Netherlands built 9.4 dwellings per 1000 people. That year, the United States built 7.8 dwellings per 1000 residents.
Though Europe’s housing policies have had their greatest impetus since 1945, they go back much further. As urbanist Hans Blumenfeld explains, “In European countries since World War I, governments have assumed responsibility for housing the urban population by a great variety of policies. The basic housing policy of the United States and of Canada has always been and still is to rely on the ‘filtering down’ of dwellings vacated by the more affluent to house those of lower income.”
Supplementing the efforts of the private housing market, government activity in housing ranges from actual construction of housing to subsidies to developers.
A Direct Approach
In Italy, a housing tax of 0.35% is levied on employee salaries and employers are taxed 0.76% on the wages they pay. The receipts from this tax, together with a contribution of $960 per room from the national budget, finance housing construction. In the next five years, the government hopes to build one-fourth of Italy’s now housing. The program has two aims — to meet the housing needs of the growing population and to provide additional employment through the construction industry.
Though financed nationally, built-built housing in Italy is generally planned and built and allocated by local agencies. Residence is now limited to families of lower-middle income or below. Formerly, government housing was open to anyone who paid the tax — much like Social Security in the U.S. — regardless of income. Some Italian housing experts argue that the old program was better because it provided a diverse social and economic mix in the housing estates.
The income limitations have given the Italians a now game to play — trying to finagle themselves apartments in attractive and inexpensive government housing. If nothing else, this is a compliment to the quality of the housing being built. It’s hard to imagine middle-class Americans trying to cheat their way into U.S. public housing.
In Italy, the tenants are given the right to purchase a dwelling after a certain period as residents. Once they own it, they may lease it to another or eventually sell it. As a result, older buildings often contain a remarkable mix of people. In a few cases, buildings once constructed by the government are today luxury apartments.
Subsidies and Loans
“The subsidizing of new construction is now viewed in The Netherlands as a structural housing measure in a rapidly developing society, by means of which the quality of the dwellings built is prevented from falling behind the general rise in prosperity,” says the government.
In Holland, 84% of the housing built since World War II has been government subsidized.
The Dutch government loans money for the acquisition of land and housing construction at below-market interest rates to municipalities and nonprofit housing corporations. In addition, it subsidizes dwellings for as long as the rents they produce are unprofitable. Rents are raised gradually and subsidies reduced so that tenants pay a larger share of their housing costs as time goes by.
This year, Holland, a nation of 12.5 million people, will spend about $675,000,000 of its national budget for housing.
In Sweden, housing is financed by private and public money together. The private market provides primary loans to 50% of the cost. A private secondary loan covers another 20%. Then Sweden’s National Board of Housing grants a low-interest loan for part or all of the remaining costs — 100% of the costs for municipal housing, 95% for cooperative housing and up to 90% for private housing.
One of every ten Swedish families receives also a family rent allowance, paid directly by the government to the landlord if the dwelling meets the government standards, which are high. Despite its high volume of construction, Sweden still faces a serious housing shortage because the government emphasis has been on quality rather than quantity. Municipal housing, financed with national government assistance, is open to all.
Social Housing
What is termed “public housing” in the United States grew out of the Depression as a way of providing jobs, one of a number of projects used to put idle men to work. Thus, the term “housing project” came into use. The legislation behind this kind of housing limited occupancy to poor families. Once a resident began earning a decent income, he had to leave and find other housing. Consequently, only people at the bottom of the economic and social ladder lived in government built housing, and this gave it the black eye it suffers today. Even though the social problems created by limiting such housing to the poor are known, the rules have not been changed.
The International Federation for Housing and Planning uses the term “social housing” to describe Europe’s approach. It says, “Social housing refers to the provision of dwellings to an approved minimum standard with regard to health, comfort, and equipment; and intended either to rent or for purchase by people and families whose income does not permit them to obtain accommodation for themselves on the private market without direct or indirect help of public authorities or social institutions.”
Under that definition, any American who has purchased his home through FHA or VA might be considered living in social housing.
The Federation, in its report on the financing of social housing, says that most nations have abandoned the idea of limiting social housing to the very poor. Now, the report says, social housing is being extended “to all the others, who, in spite of the fact that they present a great variation in salary range, do not however have the necessary financial means to obtain, without social support, satisfactory modern housing.”
Government-built social housing in Europe is much different than “public housing” in the United States, for several reasons:
- It is not always limited to the poor.
- It is generally built in suburban areas, rather than old city areas.
- It is of a quality at least comparable with minimum private standards.
- It includes supporting facilities within it — schools, shops, parks, social centers, and the like.
- It is frequently integrated into private housing complexes.
- It is provided, to some degree, by nearly every community.
Tapiloa, near Helsinki: Intelligent land use, a sense of community –
The Co-ops
Cooperative housing is another form of social housing, one that enjoys strong support in much of Europe. The cooperative movement grew out of the Industrial Revolution as a rebellion against living conditions. Houses were dark, damp, cramped, cold in winter, hot in summer and generally unfit for living. Angry people asked, “Why can’t we build housing ourselves, the kind we need?” No one could think of a good reason not to try, and the cooperative movement was born.
Although government intervention has forced the quality of private housing to much higher standards, Europe’s cooperatives continue to flourish, in both the East and the West.
In Poland, 80 per cent of the new housing is being built by cooperatives, which have demonstrated that they can build better housing than the state. Italy permits as few as six people to form a cooperative and the cooperatives play a major role in housing production there. Cooperatives in Sweden, Denmark and Finland build some of the finest housing in those countries.
Cooperatives are organized by people to build housing for themselves. They may number anywhere from a few dozen members to many thousands. HSB in Sweden has 300,000 members. Members vote to elect delegates to governing councils. The councils, in turn, hire staff to build and maintain the housing units. Proponents of cooperative housing assert that costs of cooperative housing are lower since profit is not a factor, and that cooperative members take pride in seeing the housing is well maintained.
Members of cooperatives do not purchase housing. They pay a fee to join the cooperative and then a monthly amount similar to rent, covering the principal, interest, and maintenance cost of the dwelling. In Sweden, a person who leaves the cooperative receives a refund of the amount he has paid toward amortization, though practices vary in other cases.
Legislation favoring the establishment of cooperatives and giving them substantial financial assistance for land acquisition and construction has made the cooperatives a major source of good housing in Europe.
Blumenfeld asserts, “The (private) market has not been effective in housing — as it has been in the field of most consumer goods — in calling forth the best product possible at the existing level of technology … worldwide experience over a hundred years has clearly shown that housing built for the purpose of use — whether by governments, cooperatives, trade unions, philanthropists, or even by employers — has been far superior to most housing built for the market.”
Looking at Europe’s success with cooperatives in light of U.S. housing needs, two intriguing questions arises Could housing cooperatives build single-family housing, as well as apartments and row houses? Could supporters of black enterprise use the cooperative method, with government support, to build new housing and black pride at the same time?
The Coming Thing
The search for low-cost, quickly assembled housing has taken Europe down the road to industrialization — prefabrication — in the construction process. This involves the use of fewer but larger elements than the traditional brick-and-mortar method.
Holland is building about 15 per cent of its new housing this way, while Poland uses industrialized methods for most of its housing. About 90 per cent of the new housing in Warsaw is prefabricated. Housing experts across the continent are agreed that industrialization is just beginning to grow out of its infancy. They say it will certainly be the primary method of building in the years to come. Hundreds of experiments are underway in an attempt to refine the method. Most of the builders working with prefabricated housing admit that it has yet to produce substantial savings of money. They are eager to make the process cheaper. However, substantial savings of time in construction have already been demonstrated using industrialization.
Milan, currently erecting 26,000 prefabricated apartments, has been able to out construction time in half with the method, city housing officials say. The savings of time allows the city to shave one year off interest payments and begin collecting rents a year earlier.
Another advantage of industrialization, its proponents say, is that it permits housing construction on a large scale despite the growing shortage of tradesmen in traditional building. Workers without construction experience can be trained easily in the now method, including both those who build the elements in factories or on the site and those who assemble them.
Much of the public reaction to prefabricated housing has been hostile, or at least suspicious, though residents of industrialized buildings have endorsed them in surveys despite some complaints. “This new technology is with us, whether we like it or not,” a Finnish housing expert contends. “I don’t know why we are so alarmed at the thought of prefabrication. It has been with us for thousands of years. The brick was the first example of industrialized building. Now we are simply trying to improve things by using a building unit bigger than a brick.”
There are dozens of industrialized building systems currently in use. And all generally have the same thing in common — dull or even ugly results. None have achieved the flexibility of economy combined with attractiveness.
**The shape of things to come?
While finished interiors of prefabricated buildings are about on a par with those in traditional buildings, the technology today requires that the same building design be repeated several times to make possible economies in production. Thus, industrialized housing estates tend to resemble army camps.
Architects generally dislike industrialization, since it offers them only a few elements to work with and limits creativity in design. It cannot be shaped and molded, as can traditional building methods. Bat this is only a temporary problem, its supporters say. Improvements in the technology are bound to come, they assert, and will come even faster if more brainpower is concentrated on the problem. This means a combined effort by engineers, architects, sociologists, home economists and related professionals.
Some architects envision the day when a family will be able to enter a big housing showroom, study the models and the literature, and then order an apartment or house to their specifications, just as you do with an automobile today. Instead of white sidewalls, they could order a family room. If technology can make this possible for the automobile, they say, it can do the same for the house.
Taking Stock
Several European cities keep a running tally on the condition of existing houses and the need for now housing. Such inventories include not only information on the physical characteristics of housing but also a good deal of economic information.
With this in hand, planners can forecast where new housing is needed, what kind of housing it should be, and how much it should cost.
A knowledge of housing needs is obviously required before local authorities can take steps to meet the needs. A number of cities have set up five or ten year housing programs, supported by national governments, to see that their citizens have better places to live.
Urban Europe: Using Its Land
(Fourth Of A Series)
Europe has 3,750,000 square miles of land, less than half as much as North America, to serve a far greater population. Necessity forces the Europeans to take a more prudent approach than Americans to the way their land is used.
Prudence in urban Europe spells government intervention or control in land development. It can be as severe as the nationalization of land, like Poland pursued in Warsaw after World War II. It can take the form of municipal ownership of land acquired by democratic methods, as in Stockholm. Or it can involve the temporary ownership of land during redevelopment and subsequent resale to private owners, as practiced in Rotterdam.
To a limited degree, American cities already practice the latter two methods and there are many urban experts who urge a broader use of them.
“Good planning is only possible when the city owns the land,” bluntly asserts J.T. Smits, general secretary of the Rotterdam Town Planning Department.
The City as Landowner
Why is land ownership important to local government? Stockholm contends, “For the functional and systematical development of a big city, it is essential that the municipality can decide where, and in which turn, the different areas have to be built, and see to it that public transport, traffic routes, sewerage, etc. are planned at the same time.
“Municipal ownership also enables the city to control that both the bigger and smaller shopping centers cover a suitable number of customers and are equipped with all kinds of social and cultural institutions, as well as shops, and to prescribe how the land is to be divided between shopping centers, office blocks, flat blocks, one-family houses, parks and so on. The municipal ownership means that no private land owner can prevent fair apportionment of land for open spaces.”
Since Stockholm began purchasing land for future expansion in 1904, it has acquired more than 34,000 acres of property — a third of the land in the city core, about 85 per cent of the land in the rest of the city, and several large pieces of land outside its boundaries, some in other municipalities. The past year, Stockholm invested more than $25,000,000 in land.
Stockholm officials stress that they consider municipal land ownership to be a means to an end, not an end itself. In some cases, the city itself develops the land through Svenska Bostader AB, the municipal development company. Svenska Bostader recently built a $40,000,000 commercial center, which the city leases, to private firms.
In most cases, Stockholm leases its land to private developers or cooperatives prior to development. The land is then developed by the companies or organizations in accordance with plans drawn by the city. The city has had no difficulty attracting such developers.
To determine leasehold charges, Stockholm computes the costs of developing the land with streets, sewers and the like, and the amount of interest the city pays on money borrowed to acquire the land. The leasehold charge does not include the actual investment in the land, and thus can be lower than similar private arrangements. The leases are for “unlimited periods” but the city can give notice of termination after 60 years. If no notice is given, the lease is extended automatically for 40 more years.
If the land is ever needed for another purpose — a highway, for example-the city must prove in court that reclaiming the land is in the public interest. If successful in that, the city must pay the leaseholder the value of his buildings when the lease is terminated. To reflect rising land values, leasehold charges are opened for possible revision every 10 years.
The Public Profit
“There are those who suggest that the ground should be sold — as happens in many other municipalities and countries — when the city has determined how the land is to be used and a town plan has been established,” Stockholm acknowledges. But it retorts, “The leasehold system is, however, regarded in Stockholm as a better solution.
“First of all, the increase in land value goes to the municipality. This is the main reason, but there are also other arguments in favor of leaseholdships. It gives the city a continuous control of the built-up areas and the construction. It makes it easier to arrange common facilities as, for instance, heating plants, parking places, underground service roads and the like.
“Modern legislation can, of course, impose such arrangements also on privately-owned land, but it is easier to supervise the utilization of these establishments in the long run if the ground remains In the possession of the city … It has proved necessary on several occasions to repurchase sites originally owned by the city.
“Finally,” Stockholm argues, “it is also worthwhile mentioning that the city has influence on the ground value and can counteract unreasonable rises.” In other words, the leasehold system stops wild land speculation.
Stockholm’s land policy, which has won international praise, is being emulated by other Swedish cities. The Swedish government last year established a special fund to grant loans to cities for land acquisition. It advised them that they “should acquire land to such an extent that they would have a dominating influence on the supply of land likely to be used for community development within the foreseeable future… (And) should imply the guaranteed availability of land necessary for construction during at least 10 years.”
Sweden’s cities have a further planning tool in the Swedish Building Act of 1947. Part of this law prohibits private developers from building dense subdivisions unless such development is found to be in the public interest. The private landowner remains free to build scattered, low-density buildings.
Stockholm, unlike American cities, relies very little on property tax revenues to operate local government and so it does not deprive itself of income by purchasing land. But even in the U.S., taxes on land have come to play a less important role than in the past. American cities, too, continually purchase land for public purposes. Unlike Stockholm, they generally sell unneeded land — and often are forced to buy it back later for much higher prices.
Stockholm’s land policy, its admirers say, proves that municipal ownership of land permits the public interest to be served by better land development and individual interests — from home ownership to profitable commercial investment — to be served at the same time.
Buying, Building and Selling — Dutch Style
The constant threat from the sea faced by The Netherlands has led its people to accept vigorous government action in the area of land use. Although the government was given such p3wer to develop dikes and sea barriers, the authority is now used also to shape urban developments. Land expropriation is the most common method.
Holland’s original expropriation law, though often amended, is still in use after 118 years. It provides that a city seeking to acquire land to carry out an approved development plan is assumed to be acting in the public interest. Thus, it has the right to use expropriation if the landowner will not sell voluntarily. Rotterdam, for example, used its power of expropriation to acquire its entire bombed center in World War II. Today, it is using the power to build now satellite communities. Today, most now land development is done by the city. Private developers have become rare.
The process works this way: Based on population studies, city planners and officials determine that facilities for 20,000 more people, for example, are needed. Then an area best suited to such development is selected. Preliminary plans are drawn to include the number and kinds of houses needed, supporting facilities like schools, shops and parks, and the requirements for streets and public utilities.
Economists from Rotterdam’s Real Estate section study the plans to determine if the city can expropriate the needed land, make the public improvements required, and resell the land to private investors at a price which will cover the cost of the land and the improvements. The goal is to break even.
Working together, the planners and the economists juggle the number and kinds of items in the development until they reach agreement on a plan both consider physically and economically sound.
To obtain the land, the city attempts to reach a voluntary purchase agreement. Failing that, the matter goes to a special court of expropriation where three judges set the purchase price. Out-of-court settlements are the most common.
When the public improvements have been made to the land, the city totals the costs of land acquisition, those public works solely for the development, and a part of the costs of those public works, which benefit an area larger than that, being developed. This total is the basis for the resale price of the land.
Under this system, Rotterdam officials view the city as a producer. It starts with raw land, refines it by installing those improvements, which make it useable, and then sells it ready to be built upon.
In selling the land, the city can attach conditions requiring the purchaser to fulfill the conditions laid down by the planners, ranging from the type of housing to the number of trees needed. (As a rule, one per cent of construction costs must be devoted to art and beautification.) Officials say that such conditions give the city much greater control than it could normally exercise under existing planning laws.
Rotterdam sells both commercial and residential land but leases industrial land for 75-Year terms. Amsterdam, however, follows a policy much like Stockholm, leasing, rather than selling, land to developers. With 70 years of experience in leaseholds, Amsterdam contends, “An appreciable part, certainly, of the increases in the value of the building sites is created by the activities of the community, and it is still the principal argument in favor of the long-lease system that such increases in value should be for the benefit of the community.”
In both cases, new developments are assured of having not only streets and utilities but also parks, land for schools, commercial facilities and other community ingredients.
“Throughout the centuries,” says Rotterdam official J. Rutgers, “real estate has been the most contested ‘raw material’ at the disposal of humanity for their needs. Having the disposal of the required real estate has always been one of the most essential conditions for practically all material activities and for a great many in the spiritual field. This makes the allocation of real estate by the municipalities an absorbing and varied activity with far reaching social, economic and financial consequences…”
The President’s Task Force on Suburban Problems in the United States recently submitted a report to the White House, which warned that America’s suburbs are beginning to decay. The report asserted that industry, housing and other facilities have been built so quickly and without central planning that the suburbs have no sense of community.
The report explained, “The dullness of existence is acutely felt by many older suburbanites and is often tragically reflected in the behavior of their children.” The development policies of Stockholm and Rotterdam are intended to prevent similar occurrences in those cities.
A Hand for Old Land
Municipal policy in renewing older city sections also relies on expropriation. But Stockholm has added a few new twists in its renewal practices.
Tapiloa, near Helsinki: Intelligent land use, a sense of community –
To redevelop large areas of its inner city, Stockholm uses “zone expropriation.” This permits the city to expropriate the property in an area even before a renewal plan has been drawn for the area. And the law permits the city to occupy buildings in such an area at the initiation of expropriation proceedings, rather than waiting the months or even years until the cases clear the courts. When the case is finally decided, the city pays building owners interest from the time it took possession. (Often the city permits owners to stay on their property for some time under a lease arrangement.) Obviously, this procedure permits renewal to go much faster.
The expropriation law also permits the city to acquire property adjacent to a renewal area, though not in need of renewal itself. Officials assert that this stops the speculation in buildings, which increase in value due to rub off from the renewal. Unearned increases in the value of the property then fall to the community, rather than individuals.
Once a renewal area has been cleared of unwanted buildings, it is leased — rather than sold — to developers who construct now facilities.
Stockholm’s land holdings (in grey) enable it to implement its plans –
Urban Hopes At Home With Power
(Fifth Of A Series)
Europe had cities before it had nations, and the cities have witnessed the rise and fall of nations for centuries. The staying power of the European city has earned it both prestige and power uncommon to local government in America.
When Austria, Prussia, and Russia partitioned Poland among them in the late Eighteenth Century, Poland disappeared from the map. However, Warsaw remained to rally the Poles, proving itself as Poland’s heart.
In the same period, Thomas Jefferson reflected popular opinion in America when he wrote, “The mobs of great cities add just so much to the support of pure government as sores do to the strength of the human body.”
Today, Europeans rely heavily on local government, while Americans are looking more and more to state and especially federal government.
Despite the role of the national government in Sweden’s welfare state, Swedes boast of “the Holy Municipal Right of Self-Determination.” In Yugoslavia, local government retains so much power that an American municipal expert said of it, “Talk about home rule — Barry Goldwater conservatives would love this system.”
A Broader Scope
The Europeans’ attitude toward local government is reflected first of all in the home he gives it — the City Hall. In cities large and small, the City Hall is usually a showplace expressing a sense of local patriotism and often the focal point of the community.
Another reflection of the role of local government is the prestige enjoyed by municipal officials. Mayors are often accorded as much respect as elected officials in the national government.
More meaningful, of course, than these things is the task the city performs. Compared with American cities, local governments in Europe have, at least generally, broader functions, more freedom of action, less fragmentation of duties, and more duties delegated from higher levels of government. Here are some examples:
Broader Functions — Many European cities perform functions, which are handled by higher levels of government or private firms in the United States. Foremost among these is the provision of large amounts of housing for their citizens. The construction and operation of large health and hospital systems by local government is another example. Higher education is frequently a municipal function and public transportation is city-operated normally. Many European cities provide electricity and heat to residents, as well as water and sewerage. The construction and operation of theaters, museums, and other cultural and social facilities are commonly performed by city government, too.
Freedom of Action — Though European cities frequently are required to meet minimum standards in the quality of services they provide, they seem to enjoy less statutory regulation than do American cities. This is especially true in the vital area of finances. For example, cities are permitted generally to levy taxes to whatever degree their needs require. And most may borrow funds without restriction as to the amount of debt they may have (and often without a popular vote.)
Less Fragmentation of Duties — Local government in Europe usually is a single organ, providing all the services required. Rather than having a Board of Education operating the schools on its own (and competing with the rest of local government), the school system is one department of the city government, which works along with the other departments. The city government includes also renewal authorities, public transit authorities, cultural organizations, and the like, rather than operating them independently.
Delegated Duties — Enhancing the role of local government in much of Europe is the practice of the national government delegating duties to municipal authorities. Instead of establishing welfare offices in each community, for example, the state may give the task to local governments, along with money to finance it. Highways and housing in cities may be built by the cities with state approval and finances.
Closer to Home
The power of local government, in some cases, has led to excesses. There are numerous examples of cities, which have ignored the wishes of their national governments, sometimes to the detriment of the entire country. In a few cases, cities have shown themselves so powerful that national officials hesitate to argue with local desires. But, for the most part, city officials argue, they are able to meet local needs only because they have power to take the steps required.
The essence of the role given local government in Europe: Big local government can do more about big local problems than big national government.
Urban Europe: The Money Game
(Sixth Of A Series)
The crisis in urban America is best written in red ink. From the suburban village, which can’t afford full-time policemen to the central city with its dilapidated schools, lack of money is the root of most urban ills.
City Fathers in Europe don’t worry about dollars. Instead, they fret about francs or guilders or marks or crowns. However, local government in Europe gets a bigger cut of tax revenues generally than its U.S. counterpart. The reasons for this are complex.
Urban Europe, for one thing, is not split into prosperous suburbs and impoverished inner cities. Some cities, like Rome, include virtually the entire urban area within the municipal boundaries. Other cities have been permitted to annex the small villages around them as they have grown. In a few cases, Stockholm for example, metropolitan government has been created and given a broad tax base to finance metropolitan services. And the Europeans have not yet rushed to the suburbs.
Aside from this, the cities have been given a financial lift by national governments.
Sharing the Pie
The National Commission on Urban Problems in the United States recently recommended that federal revenues be shared with local governments. It proposed earmarking two per cent of federal income tax revenues — or $6 billion at the current rate — for state and local governments to use as they wish.
The Netherlands has pursued such a policy for many years, with one difference — about 13 per cent of its national budget is devoted to local government sharing. (This would produce $24 billion if applied in the U.S.)
Under the Dutch system, the money goes into a Municipalities Fund. From there it is distributed to the cities based on their surface area, their population, and special conditions — for example, very poor cities, historic cities with high costs, cities serving as regional centers, etc.
In addition to the money they receive from the Municipalities Fund Dutch cities get a number of direct grants from the national government. Schools have been subsidized since 1920 and today the government in The Hague Pays 90 to 95 per cent of all teachers salaries. In the case of Rotterdam, this means that about 80 per cent of local school costs are met by the national government.
Rotterdam receives also 80 per cent of its social welfare expenses from the national budget and about 95 per cent of its police expenses.
Subsidies for housing and public transportation are given the city also. The city levies no real property or income taxes, but does collect local taxes on streets, services, markets and entertainments. All told, 85 per cent of Rotterdam’s $250,000,000 operating budget comes from the national budget.
Taking the Municipalities Fund and other contributions to local government together. The Netherlands devotes nearly 35 per cent of its tax collections to its cities. If the United States pursued the same course, it would provide local governments with $60 billion annually. Such federal contributions now are about $10 billion annually.
To help Dutch cities finance capital improvements, the government has established a special national bank to make loans to local governments. The bank borrows its money on the private market at rates of interest lower than an individual city could obtain. Each city is permitted to borrow from the bank up to a set limit. Rotterdam last year borrowed $140,000,000 for its capital investments.
Paying for Police
In both Sweden and Holland, law enforcement is financed totally or in part by the national government.
In The Netherlands, cities with less than 20,000 population are provided with police protection by regional branches of the national police. Cities with greater size may have their own police forces. If they do, the national government finances up to 95 per cent of the cost, depending on the size and special circumstances of the city.
In Sweden, the cities have voluntarily given up the police function to the state. Sweden’s national police force, operating in regional districts, provides law enforcement throughout the nation
The advantage, officials say, is that both systems provide uniform qualifications, the same pay, and a uniform degree of training and equipment. Because of the size of the two countries, the national police are comparable to an expanded version of the state highway patrol known in most states of the U.S.
Homemade Money
Swedish cities raise most of their money at home, thanks to the willingness of their citizens to tax themselves large amounts to provide services in quantity and quality.
There is no limit on the amount of taxes, which a city may levy on itself in Sweden. Stockholm taxpayers today contribute to their city government an income tax of 17 per cent! But they pay little in the way of other taxes. And the complaints about local taxes are amazingly few.
Stockholm’s 1968 operating budget was $735,000,000 — an amount not even approached by an American city with 800,000 people. The city’s budget permits it to carry on an enormous capital investment program with little borrowing.
With so much money to spend, the city can afford not only to offer more services but place strong emphasis on increased quality, ranging from better parks to cleaner streets.
With money in its pocket, Stockholm can also compete as an equal with business and industry for talented people. With 37,000 employees, local government can devote large amounts of energy to research and planning, in addition to the routine chores.
Aiding the Cause
Stockholm’s willingness to tax itself doesn’t preclude aid from the national government. About one-fourth of the money spent by local governments in Sweden comes from the national budget. Stockholm, like other Swedish cities, receives national grants for purposes as diverse as street cleaning, fire protection, school construction and hospitals. Stockholm’s teacher salaries are paid almost entirely by the national government — a $40,000,000 subsidy last year.
Sweden began giving tax equalization grants to its cities three years ago. The Ministry of Finance explains, “The aim of the new rules is to provide adequate community services everywhere and to distribute the costs as evenly as possible. To date, local tax rates have varied considerably — roughly from 10 up to more than 20 per cent of taxable income — as have the services provided by different municipalities.”
The equalization grants are distributed according to a formii1a tied to the local tax rate. This prevents a community from imposing low taxes on itself and expecting the national government to help it meet its needs. Cities, which are found to tax themselves adequately but are still unable to make ends meet receive the grants.
In both Sweden and Holland, government grants to the cities require the municipalities to provide a minimum standard of service. Education grants, for example, require that teachers be of a certain quality and prescribe minimum criteria for curriculum and facilities, much like the process of accreditation for schools in the U.S. Grants for housing require that rooms be a minimum size and have basic equipment, much like the FHA standards in the U.S. Officials say the challenge is determining the right minimum standards and changing them as need be.
Equalizing the financial condition of the cities is intended primarily to give all city dwellers the right to a certain degree of accepted service. It has also eliminated the often-wasteful competition between cities for business and industry to broaden the municipal tax bass. And it has permitted standard wages for municipal employees — especially teachers and policemen — to be set.
In the City’s Employ
One of the sharpest contrasts between local government in Europe and that in the United States is the difference in the caliber of city employees and the wages and working conditions provided for them. The willingness of European cities to pay good wages gives them the opportunity to employ people — and keep them — who could easily find jobs in the private sector.
The American city, while it still attracts qualified people, has a difficult time trying to keep them on the payroll. In many cases, it has become a training ground for young professionals — especially lawyers and engineers — who see it as an ideal way to get good experience. Low wages paid by local government, along with security provided by civil service, have made city service increasingly a dumping ground for people who want early retirement. The majority of city employees who work long hours for low pay, do so in conditions, which are not comparable to conditions in Europe’s progressive cities. Municipal offices and salaries in most European cities are more attractive than in the American cities this reporter has seen.
The American attitude toward city employees was expressed recently by a New York architect visiting a major European city on behalf of his respected firm. Asked his opinion of the city’s architect, he smirked. Then he explained, “Well, you know…he can’t be very good if he has to work for the city.” The European architect in question is widely considered one of the finest in his field — and he earns a salary respectable even in Now York City.
Urban Europe: Living Hem and There
(Last Of A Series)
Is urban Europe more livable than urban America? Or has prosperity given the American metropolis the fuller life?
Many of the differences are simply a matter of money. Because they can afford automobiles, Americans enjoy greater mobility than Europeans and can live several miles from their working places. The European, even if he has a car, tends to live closer to the job.
With both money and land at his disposal, the American favors life in the single-family home. With less money and land, the European commonly lives in an apartment or row house.
The urban American’s bigger income and greater amount of leisure time leads him to buy his entertainment and recreation. The European still relies on his surroundings to entertain him. He lolls in the marketplace, walks in the park, or sits in his pub or cafe.
Shopping and Sociability
Material goods can change not only the shape of city living but also its style. The refrigerator is a case in point. With a large refrigerator (and freezer) at her disposal, the housewife in urban America need only shop once a week. Using the family car, she can drive to a store far from her home. Shopping for a large quantity of food requires a planned operation and her attention is devoted to the task.
In contrast, the housewife in urban Europe has a small refrigerator. So she must shop almost daily. She buys a small quantity of food and carries it with her on foot.
In each case, the housewife helps to produce a different urban environment. The American housewife wants a large store — the supermarket — with parking provided. Since she may shop far from home, she seldom meets friends or becomes acquainted with the large and busy staff. The European housewife needs a small store just a few blocks from home. Her daily ritual creates close acquaintances with the shopkeeper. And she normally meets friends and neighbors in the store and trades conversation with them. Thus, the American housewife gets efficiency while the European housewife receives social experience.
A similar contrast exists between Europe and the U.S. for a man going to work. The American worker leaves his house, gets in his car, drives to-the job, and begins work without talking to more than a few persons, if anyone. The European who uses public transportation generally sees many people along the way, while walking to his transit stop and during his journey, and usually gets to know at least some of them. Each practice produces a different social and physical environment.
The differences in urban living in Europe and the United States are not only due to differences in wealth. Critics of the American style of urban life contend that the U.S. approach, which segregates functions, should be changed.
Architect Astra Zarina-Haner, who has worked and studied on both continents, asserts, “Most Americans residing in typical contemporary communities lack the incidental pleasures and inspiration they should find in going about their daily activities. Their lives consist of racing from one isolated point of destination to another.”
. “Neighborhoods are made up of people of similar age and income groups, and the acceptable type of contact is made in one’s living room, and by invitation. Friends do not drop in by chance … Shopping has become a pre-planned operation. And entertainment has lost its spontaneity. Dark and lonely residential streets at night and deserted commercial and cultural centers after hours have made walking for pleasure a forgotten activity, regarded by suspicion by patrolling police and motorized passersby.”
She contends, “Architecturally, one witnesses it in sprawling, dull suburbs, devitalized city cores, and failing civic and cultural centers, which, although well-planned and pleasant within themselves, are isolated by stretches of wasteland, networks of frightening speedways, and surrounded by endless parking lots.
“All of it,” she says, “contributes to the split personality of the daily living mode for a vast majority of Americans today.”
Living Zoning
The segregation of functions, which she deplores, is the product of zoning regulations enforced in the urban U.S. Land is commonly set aside for single-family, multiple-family, commercial and industrial use. In Europe, neighborhoods are generally more balanced, blending those functions, which work together.
Professor Gabriele Scimemi of the University of Rome argues that strict zoning common to America “makes no more sense than putting all the people listed in the telephone book under ‘St in the same location.” He says, “I really question whether any zoning is good but I suppose that some is needed. But it should be aimed more at functions than at categories. A neighborhood should include all the things that function well together.”
As practiced in Europe, this means that a neighborhood might include single-family housing, low-rise multiple-family housing, shops for everyday needs, and even clean and inoffensive light industry. Some areas, the planners contend, should be set aside commercial or industrial centers. And others should be primarily residential. But care should be taken to avoid creating sterile living conditions. The mix, they say, should include both new and old buildings, if possible.
*We have to remember,” a Dutch architect said, “that the kind of neighborhoods we cres4te determine patterns of life for people.”
International Effort
Despite the differences in urban living in the United States and Europe, the two share numerous problems, which neither has solved. Many city officials, planners and urban experts in Europe have expressed a growing desire for greater international cooperation toward solutions in housing, traffic control, transportation and other fields. Sweden recently proposed that the United Nations take the lead in dealing with the growing peril of pollution of air and water. The proposal won unanimous support, since pollution is a subject without political overtones.
Urban problems of other kinds might merit similar action in the world body. One idea is for the creation of an urban task force under the UN, drawing together some of the world’s top urban experts to seek solutions to common problems. It might include, for example, traffic engineers from the U.S., housing experts from the Soviet Union, architects from Finland, water engineers from Holland, and planners from Sweden, to name a few.
Making the Choice
The “crisis of the cities” in the United States is a social illness with physical symptoms. The physical environment in urban America, the experts say, cannot be improved without fundamental changes in the social order it reflects. But neither can social improvements come without physical changes.
The problem of urban America is not only a racial problem. “You must remember,” Swedish social economist Gunnar Myrdal told me, “that the poor Negro is only a third or a quarter of the poor in your country. It’s ridiculous to talk of improving housing for Negroes, or education for Negroes. You must improve these things for all your people.”
Concluding its report to the President, the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders warned, “We cannot escape responsibility for choosing the future of our metropolitan areas and the human relations that develop within them. It is a responsibility so critical that even an unconscious choice to continue present policies has the gravest implications.
“That we have delayed in choosing, or, by delaying, may be making the wrong choice, does not sentence us to separatism or despair. But we must choose. We will choose. Indeed, we are now choosing.”
Postscript
My thanks go to the Alicia Patterson Fund, its directors, and its staff, for making possible the past year of study in the cities of Europe; to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch for granting me leave of absence to pursue the fellowship; and to my wife for her great help throughout the year. My thanks go also to the hundreds of Europeans who gave their time and energy to tell me about their cities.
David A. Meeker
Received in New York January 13, 1969.
Mr. Meeker is an Alicia Patterson Fund award winner, on leave from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. These articles may be published with credit to David A. Meeker, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and the Alicia Patterson Fund.
