"Adopting land-use policies leading to more compact and resource-efficient urban growth through higher residential and job densities, mixed land use and transit-oriented development could reduce GHG emissions by 25 per cent by 2050."

Why we fight ✊

I mean, climate action isn't the *only* reason we fight for better urbanism. It's important for social equity, for local economies, physical & mental health...lots of reasons. But climate is a big one, and global cities are all responsible for making improvements.

The street-level experience

This is the Kiser Law Building, designed by architectural firm Bruce & Morgan.

It stood at the intersection of Pryor Street and Hunter Street (now Martin Luther King Jr. Drive) in Downtown Atlanta from 1890 until 1936 when it was demolished for the construction of a viaduct, largely to accommodate car traffic.

Built for law offices, this was an 8-story, red brick building with lovely details and some stores at the bottom. I'll bet it was a beauty to see at street level, and a joy to walk past.

These two photos of the street view, below, are from 1927; the photo above is from 1907 (all from the wonderful GSU Digital Collection).

Also designed by architecture firm Bruce & Morgan: the Tech Tower on the Georgia Tech campus & the M Rich Building on Peachtree Street, both of which are still standing today.

Today, a parking deck stands where the Kiser Law Building used to be. Not quite the same effect on the street level. No windows with offices behind them. No barber shop on the sidewalk. No red bricks. Just storage for cars.

Maybe we'll put something great in this spot in the future? I hope so. A historic downtown should be filled with engaging sights and destinations that appeal to pedestrians.

Agreed. There's nothing innately wrong with background buildings like this.

Anyone who spends a significant amount of time exploring city streets from the sidewalk level will know this to be true: The most important design feature of cities is the 'fabric' that's created by the combination of things, such as walkable streets (and other public spaces) + trees + the compact-footprint development of active-use buildings + a rich diversity of people, with a focus on equity.

I wonder if most of the people complaining about so-called "bland cookie-cutter buildings" are driving around in cars and expecting to be wowed by the city from their windshield perspective?

Maybe that's too cynical. But my point is that you can't appreciate the best details of urban design from a car seat. You have to get out and hit the sidewalk.

We need to look at the entirety of the built environment including street design, neighborhood design, local culture, small businesses, and diversity in order to identify the 'beauty' around us. I fear that people focus too specifically on the design of single buildings rather than the holistic urbanism of a place, which matters much more, IMO.

Link to tweet

MARTA should change course on costly Five Points Station redesign

According to Atlanta Business Chronicle, MARTA has announced that the redesign of the top of Five Points MARTA Station will not be completed in time for the 2026 World Cup crowds as previously planned.

I think this is a chance for MARTA to make a better decision.

I say scrap the whole idea for a redesign at street level until some day when MARTA is able to include vertical development on top. Otherwise this is arguably a waste of a precious $259 million worth of funds.

Aesthetically, the planned redesign may be an improvement. But we need more than an aesthetic improvement in an area that is besieged with dead spaces such as data centers and parking decks. Five Points desperately needs active uses for 24/7/365 vibrancy to turn the tide.

Check out the above image to see what I mean when I say "besieged with dead spaces." The land-use around Five Points MARTA is awful, and this doesn't even capture all the badness.

An aesthetic improvement to the top of the station is arguably a misuse of public money given the huge need for active uses here.

Bland buildings are less offensive when they're part of an overall great urbanism

Something occurred to me while walking around Paris last week during a vacation visit...

If you zoom in on average Paris buildings, many resemble the apartments that often get pegged as being "cookie cutter, soulless density" in Atlanta. They may not be exactly as bland as the worst offenders in Atlanta, but they can be pretty dull in themselves, relative to the grandest architecture in the city.

But when you zoom out to their full context, to see how they're grouped closely together against pedestrian-focused streets, with shops on bottom, they look glorious.

This is the physical aspect of good urbanism that matters so much.

It's about creating public streets scaled primarily toward the movement of humans, and less toward the movement and parking of cars.

It's about streets where many things are in walkable distance, and where the doors and windows of buildings are politely close to pedestrians instead of being set back behind unused landscaping or parking spaces (though if I was rebuilding Paris, I'd definitely leave some room for more street trees).

Of course, individual buildings that are set back from the street in less pedestrian-oriented formats can be beautiful and beloved in themselves.

But in terms of scaling large populations upward in a way that sustains walking (versus car dependency), prioritizing compact density is important. And in the process, bland architecture is more forgivable because the aesthetic of the larger place is what's most important.

It's a challenging argument to make because I realize that Atlanta's dullest architecture is much more offensive than the bottom rung of what you find in Paris.

But in a classic European city where there's a lot of really grand, elegant, detailed architecture (much more so than what we have in Atlanta), the ones I posted here count as what I'll call "bland background buildings" by comparison.

It's only when you crop it specifically into pieces that you can see "oh, this building doesn't particularly stand out in terms of architectural details, but the entirety of the street is gorgeous anyway," and that's because of the overall structural urbanism happening.

I think there's a lesson for Atlanta in that. Yes, there's value in improving some details of our dull architecture. But the most important improvement in our design needs to happen at the level of streets and neighborhoods.

Classism. Racism. Ageism. Ableism. Climate denial.

No matter how we rationalize the wasteful destruction of nature through car-scaled urban sprawl, or how we rationalize the act of robbing people of chances to live with dignity unless they can drive, those evils are at the core.