What Is a City For? - THE URBANOPHILE

Un artículo muy interesante de la página web THE URBANOPHILE, leelo hasta el final.

 

Joel Kotkin recently produced a brief report for a Singapore agency called “What Is a City For?” that asks some important questions that are too often not considered when thinking about our cities. Whether or not you agree with Kotkin’s answer, the questions are worth pondering and being able to answer. The lead paragraphs set the stage:

 

What is a city for? In this urban age, it’s a question of crucial importance but one not often asked. Long ago, Aristotle reminded us that the city was a place where people came to live, and they remained there in order to live better, “a city comes into being for the sake of life, but exists for the sake of living well”  

However, what does “living well” mean? Is it about working 24/7? Is it about consuming amenities and collecting the most unique experiences? Is the city a way to reduce the impact of human beings on the environment? Is it to position the polis — the city — as an engine in the world economy, even if at the expense of the quality of life, most particularly for families?

The last question gets to Kotkin’s answer. He clearly sees the city as a locale that should be, above all, a place to produce and nurture future generations. As he puts it later in the report, “My answer is a city exists for its people, and to nurture families that grow, identify and share a common space. The issue, then, is how to do this while staying competitive in the global economy.”

 

 

One does not have to be pining away for the 1950s to recognize that, despite the decline in traditional nuclear and extended family household structures generally, urban cores – and the urbanism agenda – have become unbalanced in favor of singles. There has probably been more urbanist ink spilled over so-called “micro-apartments” than about playgrounds for children, for example.

 

 

Sigue la lectura AQUÍ