Archive for urban history

Finding the right labels

May 3, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 5 comments

  Cities and their hinterlands are changing, and have been for some time.  The black-white dichotomy of suburban-core is becoming ever more unhelpful in describing the different types of places in or related to cities where people can live and work. Some new definitions or labels may be in order.

Here are my thoughts on some definitions of metropolitan and related spaces.  I’d welcome your ideas, or links to existing work in this area by others.

Lets start with what we had maybe 20 years ago.

Twin Cities – Cities that were founded separately, for different reasons.  They have their own historic “downtown” centre of gravity.  During the 20th century, because of the automotive age, they became linked by a ribbon of freeways; they also likely came to share a major airport as well as some “suburbs” that grew to sprawl in between the historic poles.  Twin cities have distinct identities and even economies in the sense that not many people live in one twin and work in the other.  Dallas-Fort Worth, Minneapolis-St. Paul, and possibly Seattle-Tacoma  could be called Twin Cities.

Satellite Cities – Cities or smaller metro areas that are close enough to a major metropolitan area that citizens or business people might make easy day trips there and take advantage of specialized amenities, but are far enough to be distinct entities.  They don’t share suburbs or airports.  The Kitchener CMA (+ Guelph) would be a good example of a satellite (to Toronto). Tucson in some ways qualifies as a Satellite to Phoenix and San Diego and Los Angeles might also be considered a Satellite pair.

Bedroom Suburban District – Bedroom suburbs do not have the same economic centres of gravity as major metropolitan areas, satellites or twins.  Typically, many more people would leave them daily to go to work than there are jobs in that suburb. Plus many of the jobs there would be retail, restaurant or personal services, mostly serving the bedroom community population.

Industrial Suburban District – A suburb that contains a lot of low density industrial lands and business parks.  Manufacturing might have been there in the mid 20th century, while today it could be home to more warehouse-logistics space as well as suburban office parks and flex spaces.  Sometimes within the same municipality there might be an industrial suburban half and a bedroom suburban half, with little relation or interaction between the two other than they pay taxes to, and are served by, the same municipal government.

Urban Suburban Districts -  Places that are within a major metropolitan area, but seem more urban.  They have mid and even higher density, walkable residential areas often next to taller office towers and higher density employment lands.  They also have rapid transit links into the major metropolitan area’s downtown.  What they may lack is that “historic downtown” and they likely have regional branch offices of businesses rather than the metro area’s head office.

Today many suburban municipalities are shifting from all or mostly low density, separated bedroom and industrial districts into something more complex.  Mississauga (Toronto CMA) and Surrey (Vancouver CMA) are attempting to create new high density town centres from the shells of shopping centres. Office and residential spaces combined with new transit options are being created to reshape these places into urban suburban districts.  What shall we call these places — Urbanizing suburbs?

Category: residential development, satellite cities, sprawl, urban history /

What’s driving bike lanes and the anger?

March 25, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 5 comments

Over the past 12-24 months bike lanes have been popping up in cities across North America, in some cases displacing a lane for cars.  In other cases, it’s just lines on the road, but ones that suggest motor vehicle drivers now must share the space with the bikes.  And both before and after the added bike lanes, increasing numbers of people are taking to cycling on roads built for cars and buses.

Some prominent drivers have decided to push back, and the rhetoric has reached hyperbolic levels.   New Toronto Mayor Rob Ford ran in part on a platform to “end the war on the car.“   War?

A driving lover in New York even referred to bike lanes as causing more destruction than the terrorist attacks of 9-11. Facilitating cycling is the same as mass murder? Get a grip.

Here are some thoughts on what’s driving this conflict and extreme reaction from some drivers.

First, there has been an urban shift over the past few years.  (See my previous post on this topic.) Enough people have shifted their lifestyles and embraced living closer to work that it is increasing non-automotive commute methods, including cycling.

These newer urban dwelling cyclists, I suspect, are more often home owners than people who lived in these neighbourhoods in the past (at least in Toronto and Vancouver I’m fairly certain this is the case).  Paying that ever-increasing property tax bill, they expect the city to provide some infrastructure to suit them and their needs and not just those of auto-commuters, often from the suburbs who don’t pay taxes in their jurisdiction. There is also some evidence that bike-friendliness helps cities attract and retain talent (and therefore employers of that talent).

Second, most metro areas are getting bigger, with more new housing in suburban locations than close-in communities.  This is resulting in more drivers and therefore more congestion.  To a long-time automotive commuter, this ever-slowing commute would get frustrating.

Third, to further grate at the long-time automotive commuter, gas prices are rising.  They feel like they’re paying more for the commute, and may be blaming taxes, but the reality is that tens of thousands of new drivers start up their cars around the world every day.  Supply of petroleum cannot keep up with demand.

Items two and three are not a conspiracy or “war on drivers” they are the reality of too many drivers and not enough supply of roads and fuel. If there hadn’t been the urban shift–allowing thousands to commute by pedal, foot and transit–the situation would be far worse.  And I suspect the new bike lanes will help it get better.

Four, there hasn’t been enough time for all urban dwellers to adjust to the bike lanes.   Some automotive commuters who live close in, will switch to cycling once they see dedicated bike lanes and they have a secure place to park their bike and then shower and change when they get to work.  The combination of more bike lanes and a push to facilitate lower-carbon living is pushing office building owners to add these facilities.

Others, facing congestion, will switch when the can to walking and/or transit or a combination.  All of these behavioral changes will get some drivers off the roads, making room for those who want or must drive.

In conclusion, bike lanes are part of a needed structural shift in how we live.  Everyone cannot live in low-density suburbs. If tens of thousands are choosing urban neighbourhoods, the infrastructure originally built for suburban commuters has to work for them too.  The good news for suburban commuter-drivers is that over time more urban dwellers will get out of the car lanes for their commute, leaving more room for them.

(full disclosure: I’m not a bike commuter, but might give it a try now there there is a dedicated lane and route connecting my house to the office building–and where new showers and change facilities are opening next month). 

Category: urban history /

The delicate art of parking provisioning

March 9, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 3 comments

(with apologies to Trent Carlson)

How people live in cities is changing, faster in some places than others.  In general, people are driving less.  But car ownership is still quite prevalent and it remains a key means for people to get themselves, their families, and their stuff from A to B and C and D around the city.  Even though urban travel by bike, transit and foot is on the rise, cars are not likely to disappear.  They are too handy in certain circumstances.

So what to do with cars when we’re not using them?  That is a key challenge for cities these days.  Here’s what I mean.

First, lets talk about surface parking lots and above-grade parking structures.  These are ugly and suck the life out of the streetscape.  Nothing interesting (or at least good and interesting) is ever going on there (drug deals and break ins are interesting, but not in a good way).  So, the answers are either street parking or underground parking, or typically both.  But….

Starting with underground parkades, these are expensive to build.  They therefore can make it uneconomical to build many apartment, office and retail structures unless the highest rents (or condo sale prices) can be achieved.  Some cities are experimenting with reducing parking requirements for apartments in core areas where most residents will walk or take transit, in part to keep the costs down so new rental can be built.  But this isn’t practical in most neighbourhoods, even walkable ones, as a typical couple or family will have a car.  This is an unresolved dilemma in cities–adding residents to average communities still requires room to park a car.

Next, street parking. This works well if there is enough room on the streets for residents and visitors to a neighbourhood.  In detached, single-family neighbourhoods this is the case.  But in slightly more dense areas, there isn’t always enough.  Especially if a prominent shopping street is nearby.

In a trendy walkable neighbourhood, many people will drive to the area, park, and shop. The retailers rely on these non-neighbour customers, so need there to be parking.  But if the number of people living in the area increases, without more parking places, suddenly none are available for retailers unless we either add underground parking (too expensive), surface parking (too ugly), go to parking meters to keep people moving.

Parking meters.  It seems that some city halls have figured out a science of parking meters.  Charge enough so that there is usually an empty spot every couple of blocks, and then people don’t circle around looking for parking.  I was shocked to read New York City still has lots of free parking.  We’re also starting to see variable rate meters that adjust the costs with the time of day and congestion.  I like this approach.  I’d rather pay more and have a spot available when I need one, than have to drive all over looking for free parking (I put a value on my time, and it’s more than $2 for 15 minutes!)

But parking meters work at destinations, not at home.  So we’re back to the challenge of urban development right now: the delicate art of balancing enough room for cars while also improving the livability and walkability of communities, and keeping costs of new housing down so that homes can be built for the non-super-rich.

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How is the parking dilemma affecting your community?

What examples are you seeing of the delicate art of balancing parking needs with other urban requirements and challenges?

Category: transportation, urban history, urban technologies /

Cities, mobilized human energy, and housing

March 7, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 2 comments

 In thinking about the recent revolutions and unrest in North Africa, Richard Florida tweeted March 4 2011 that:

Great cities mobilize human energy. That energy = innovation & creativity in free & open city.

In the middle east right now, human energy is motivated toward bringing political change.  But what’s been happening back in North America?  How has this mobilized human energy been shaping metro area housing?

As others have previously observed, revolutions tend to emerge from cities. Following success in urban and higher-density Cuba, Che Guevara had no luck convincing Bolivian peasants to rise up. It’s easier to mobilize urban people.

This got me thinking about life, mobilization and protests in dense, transit-oriented and walkable city areas versus auto-centred suburbs.  More spaced out, and car-centred suburban living seems to prevent people from getting together to protest something.  I rarely hear of protest marches in the suburbs, for example.  Meanwhile downtown and in the denser urban neighbourhoods I can observe one almost every day (just go to the ritual protest spots).

I’ve also observed how much harder it is to build new housing, office space, or even community spaces in dense urban areas compared to the suburbs.  It’s hard to change people’s communities. People living there all see something happening, they walk and take transit so have time to chat about it with the neighbours and friends, and then they often fight the proposed change.  This is often good as it provides a democratic check on various initiatives that might not be a good idea in the long run (but might be politically expedient today). Vancouver’s oldest neighbourhoods would have been torn down to put in a freeway in the 1970s if people hadn’t fought it, for example.

But this tendency for people to fight change is also at least partially responsible for the rising costs of housing in urban cores.  Just try to double the density on one site in an established neighbourhood (as opposed to a new, greenfield one), it’s a tough battle. Adding a new subdivision in a suburb is often quite easy by comparison.

When I see protests about high housing costs in Vancouver, I sometimes wonder if these are the same people that protested against the building of new market rental housing in their neighbourhood (housing which the planning department recommended).

Ed Glaeser in his new book (which I have yet to secure a copy of) has apparently critiqued city planners for not allowing for more height in core areas, which has had the result of limiting housing supply and pushing prices up, thereby forcing millions across North America into the suburbs.  Maybe it’s not the planners’ fault? maybe the citizens and politicians have been the ones resisting the change.  And today Angie Schmidt of Streetsblog wondered if it is the boomers and war-time generations specifically (although I’m unsure about this).

Cities are full of contradictions and ironies.  Cities are also full of ideas, different tribes of people, and different ways of looking at problems.  People in cities talk, and seeing that they are not one lone person, they feel empowered, whether in Tunisia or Toronto or San Francisco or Vancouver.  This makes cities vibrant places.

But if we want to critique the reasons for sprawl and high cost urban housing, perhaps we need to look in the collective mirror and not blame only the planners.

Category: resident attitudes, sprawl, urban history, urban lifestyles /

What drove the shift toward urban living?

March 5, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 7 comments

In Canada’s cities, prices in the older urban areas as well as the suburbs generally stagnated for over a decade between the early 1990s and early 2000s.  Not coincidentally, during this time an abundance of new housing opened in suburbs like Milton and Markham (Toronto area) as well as Coquitlam and Surrey (Vancouver area).  Calgary annexed more land, and suburban style homes proliferated. Metro area residents did not seem to show much of a preference for urban vs suburban living.

Starting in around 2002 prices everywhere began to rise, but over time the urbanized areas experienced more rapid increases.  I know of homes in walkable East Vancouver communities that tripled in value over just 6-7 years.

From talking to friends and realtors, it seems that today, the housing market is hot in walkable urban areas, and a softer in the suburbs.  Evidence of continued strong demand for urban living.

As pointed out by the Economist this week in a cleaver parable about Gotham vs Pleasantville, rising house prices rising faster in in urban areas vs the suburbs are a clear indicator of accelerating demand for these urban homes.   Many urban areas have limited or no room to increase supply, so if demand rises so do prices as those with the most money are able to secure the most walkable, transit oriented homes.

So what changed in or around 2002?

What has led an increasing number of home buyers to have a preference for urban living?

Here’s my partial list.  Please add to it!

  • Maturation of the knowledge economy, reliant on the internet, that has benefited from a very urban workforce constantly looking for inspiration
  • De-industrialization in many metro areas as manufacturing declined either outright or as a percentage of employment (while service and knowledge jobs grew)
  • Generations X and Y started to make their ideas and culture felt in cities, as they embraced an experience economy over a consumer goods and large-home-and-car based one.
  • Women’s higher rate of degree attainment resulted in career women selecting short commutes and urban living (with the trade offs) over suburban homes
  • The fertility rate edged up slightly, likely as younger boomer and older gen x women who had postponed children had 1 or 2, but didn’t give up urban living or urban careers and wanted short commutes.
  • Millennials defining freedom as their “first iPhone” rather than first car, and driving less.
  • More recently in 2008 and now in 2011, high gas prices are encouraging more people rethink auto-motive lifestyles

Agree? Disagree? What else has changed?

Category: urban history /

America’s proud urban history

February 8, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 3 comments

Ed Glaeser’s right,  it’s time to re-conceptualize the American past to include its proud urban heritage.

Frequently, the American story is told as one of conquering frontiers or conquering nature (while somehow also embracing its wildness). People who lived in cities have often been characterized as not real Americans, not tough enough to be real Americans.

The much-spoken-about Chrysler Super-bowl commercial felt so radical to me because it placed a car in a rugged city–Detroit–with an edgy, tough driver (Eminem) at the wheel.  Car ads usually involve less urban spaces: trucks going off road, Mazdas zooming on closed wiggly highways. It also celebrates Detroit, and what it has given America–not just cars, but the mo-town sound too.

Arguably America’s cities have been as important to forging an American tradition as the countryside.  Places like New York, San Francisco and New Orleans and many more welcomed people from around the world at different important times in the country’s past.  They were places that mixed cultures, languages and ideas from around the world, with the result being great music, art or business ideas–in short, creativity.

These cities and others also exported what America had to offer (agriculture products initially, but later the fruits of that creativity) to the world. They helped make America the financial and cultural world power that it has been for nearly a century. America’s cities were the birthplace of: the automobile, the movie industry, the personal computer, the internet industry, and much more!

What other contributions and innovations have come from America’s cities?  What else makes them a part of a proud history?  For what other reasons have they been ignored?

Category: urban history /

Will downsizing boomers change urban housing for the better?

January 17, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 8 comments

As the baby boomers exit the single-family housing market in cities, what will happen to prices and neighbourhoods?

Journalist Gary Mason offers a few thoughts in today’s Globe and Mail:

In a 2008 paper co-written with Sung Ho Ryu, Prof. Dowell Myers said communities in the United States face a historic tipping point. The ratio of seniors to working-age residents is expected to grow by roughly 30 per cent in each of the next two decades, the pair calculated….

Those wanting to enter the market in the coming years may not have the money to buy single-family detached homes, either. Thus the dilemma: Who will boomers sell to when they’re ready to move into some swank condo downtown or on a golf course somewhere?

This could actually be good news for young people. An oversupply of homes generally means prices fall. But as home values decline, so will home equity, diminishing retirement savings in the process. Home equity is the single largest component of net wealth for most people.

Today, Prof. Myers [is] anticipating another recession in the latter half of this decade, and that’s when the crisis he’s predicting will reveal itself. “Recoveries are usually fuelled by people who postponed buying a home who are now surging into the market. I just don’t see there being enough buyers for all those selling. I think this is going to be bad for house prices, public finance and global treasuries.”

Tsur Somerville, [of UBC Sauder School of Business], isn’t as pessimistic as Prof. Myers.

“I know it’s one of those theories where the numbers add up and the underlying fundamentals are correct, but I think in Canada, at least, it’s too early to say how it’s going to play out. I think immigration is the key. … The places that need to worry are those cities with an aging profile that don’t have big net immigration numbers and are seeing their young move to other places,” said Prof. Somerville. “I think there are some centres that fit that description that maybe should be worried. But there’s lots of ways this could play out yet.”

I agree that some suburbs may see values fall as younger generations are less interested in–or able to afford–living in more isolated areas that require a long automotive commute to major employment centers.  This could really hit some US metro areas.

But in cities where boomers own much of the older single-family housing closer to employment centers, or along transit lines, a wave of selling combined with rezoning to higher density use might actually accelerate a shift toward more sustainable urban living.  For example, an older rancher could become two or more homes as it is replaced by a duplex or by two detached homes–or two duplexes–on a subdivided lot.

Such a shift would potentially keep housing prices in check for younger generations–four homes in the same space as one.  It would also increase density, which allows for more retail, service and even transit amenities.  And finally, such a shift might actually help maintain property values for the aging boomer since the land value would reflect a “higher and better use” on the site.

Your thoughts?

Category: planning policy, real estate, residential development, urban history /

What changed our view of cities in 2010

January 10, 2011 / Wendy Waters / 2 comments

Thinking back on 2010, there were at least three noteworthy phenomenon that have helped change the discussion about cities and how we live in them.  Here are my three.  Feel free to debate, or add your own in the comments section.

1. The discussion and debate surrounding Richard Florida’s publishing of The Great Reset.  In Canada, bloggers and the media focused more on his argument about urbanization supporting the knowledge economy and broader creativity–the new economic reality for the 21st century.   In the US the discussion was more about the role of home ownership in slowing the needed economic restructuring, tying people to places with dying economies.  But everywhere, it got many thinking about the relationship between how we live, where we live, and the economy.

2. Walkscore.com saw it’s popularity and use expand, and received the funds to expand its offerings, adding more heatmaps, a transit score, commute report and a commercial property score.  Taken in conjunction with discussion coming from The Great Reset, walkscore provides some quantiative data on amenity density and walkability that can be correlated to economic or job growth.  By mapping features and amenities of a city, it’s allowing for discussion of what makes an ideal home location.

3. Social media is playing a growing role in city politics and city life.   Key city policies are now arguably discussed and debated on blogs and websites more than in town-hall or council meetings.  Naheed Nenshi harnessed social media to offer a more walkable and urban vision for the city and seize the mayor’s chair in Calgary.  And twitter has more people sharing urban events with each other and the world.

Category: city hall, communities, economic development, planning policy, resident attitudes, urban history, urban lifestyles /

Women’s decisions shape cities

November 9, 2010 / Wendy Waters / 7 comments

The choices and experiences of women are shaping 21st century cities–in fact, they also did so in the past, an often-overlooked phenomenon.

First, consider the choice to have fewer children.  In 1959 women in the US and Canada had on average 3.7 to 3.9 children in their lifetimes.  To look after this larger household, one person needed to make this their full-time job and the family needed the space offered in the suburbs.  The division of labour in the household and separation of residential from industrial and commercial spaces fit society.

Today, women in Canada have 1.6 children in their lifetime, on average.  In the US, although the national average fertility rate is 2.1, among college-educated women the number is closer to that of Canada.

This allows for a different urban development pattern, motivated in part by the choices of working women.  You can raise one or two kids in an apartment, condo, or urban townhouse much easier than four of them. Moreover, fewer children allows for the potential for more women to maintain careers while also being dedicated mothers.

Second, the expanding knowledge economy requires clusters of educated, innovative people.  Women earn 55% of bachelor’s and master’s degrees in the US and Canada. Knowledge-based companies (which could be anything from engineering firms to accounting, computer programing, or advertising) need to attract and retain talent.  They need women, as well as men, in order to keep their positions filled.

These big, structural changes in society and the economy require changes in the urban environment to accommodate them.

One change that is happening is a shift toward higher-density living closer to employment nodes such as downtowns and town centers.  Living in condominiums or (luxury) apartment rentals, are two more visible housing choices that many individuals and families are making in order to balance career and family or in the absence of children other lifestyle choices. There is also stealth density happening in the formerly-single-family neighbourhoods whereby duplexes, triplexes, and extra suites in houses are adding homes closer to employment nodes.

In larger metros (think Toronto, Chicago, etc.), where much of the housing is in the suburbs, and a long commute to downtown, we may see companies specifically locating satellite offices in the suburbs in order to hire the hidden talent pool of educated women who are available while their kids are in school.  Rather than being motivated by less expensive real estate prices in certain suburban business parks (as they were in the past), one Toronto-based commercial real estate broker told me that attracting the “9 to 3 labour pool” is motivating some of his clients’ decisions.

If women won’t or can’t come to them downtown, they’ll go to where the women are.  Not all women like (or will be able to afford) high-density urban living, but they’re still educated and talented.

What I expect to change in the suburbs, in response, is the type of office space in demand.  Isolated business parks may not be as attractive as office space in closer proximity to residential areas, perhaps attached to the community shopping centre or in a suburban “town center.”

Certainly, the types of jobs and careers available to the woman who chooses close-to-downtown, or downtown living for her family may be different than those in the suburbs.  The suburbs have traditionally offered more service-oriented “back office” type positions that are frequently lower paying.  However, this could change.

To some extent these isolated examples (so far) of moves to where the women are go against other urban workplace trends I’m seeing.  In particular, some major Canadian corporations have been or are in the process of consolidating their operations into a single downtown location (rather than have offices scattered throughout the metro areas).  Or maybe the motivator is the same: going where the people you want to hire live.

The location of job space is perhaps at a cross roads.  But it will be women’s choices that shape where new office space will be, as it always has been.

What do you see happening?

Category: attracting talent, economic development, urban families, urban history, urban lifestyles /

Why Revolutions Are Being Tweeted

October 25, 2010 / Wendy Waters / 4 comments

A few weeks back respected trend spotter Malcolm Gladwell commented that The Revolution Will Not be Tweeted. His argument is that twitter and social media does not generate the personal connections or convictions needed to create the revolutions of the past, such as the courage four young black men had to sit down in a “whites only” restaurant and request service. At the time, his arguments and sources sort-of-convinced me.

But, hearing and seeing first hand how the ground shifted in Calgary last week, it’s clear that Twitter and social media were crucial.  I have some theories as to why revolutions can happen via twitter.

First, twitter with its 140 character limit is a “cool” medium, to use the language of Marshall McLuhan.  This means that you have to interpret it.  And people interpret short, often ambiguous information and messages according to their own context.  The act of interpreting–or interacting–with this medium and message draws you in.

Second, social media can create an “imagined community” of people who feel a part of the same group. (This time I’m borrowing the thesis of Benedict Anderson who argues that nations are imagined in the sense that people belong to them in their own way, in their own mind–being “Canadian” or “American” means different things to each person).  In the case of our “revolutions, because they are all following a candidate, many participants may feel they have more in common with each other and the candidate than is really the case.  And imagined communities can be powerful.

Third, maybe the structure of political revolutions has changed with the times.  Gladwell suggests that twitter works best for getting things done when you’re not asking too much of people.  He suggests that Revolutions in history have typically happened because people were willing to sacrifice everything including their lives to achieve a goal.

Perhaps 21st century “Revolutions” will happen because millions of people did a few little things (instead of fewer people sacrificing their lives).   On Twitter, blogs, facebook, etc. it’s easy to ask people to chose one small thing as Obama’s team did with fundraising–anyone can donate $5 and then feel a part of the campaign (and become part of it’s imagined community).

In Calgary, followers were tweeted tips for getting out the vote, and apparently they did. The voter turn out for Calgary’s municipal election rose from 18% in a previous election to 53% this time.

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BTW – you can also follow me on Twitter (@Wendy_Waters)

Category: city hall, urban history, urban technologies /
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