Achieving an Impressive Landscape

Boston's streetscape: Impressive? The street fascinates Jackson. Throughout the book, he mentions the significance of street networks, street life, and streetscapes as a fundamental part of modern American places. In "The Vernacular City," his explanation of the "commercial vernacular" suggests that streets are of equal importance as buildings to the American landscape (246). The role of streets in the landscape has only increased with the advent of the automobile. The modern "thoroughfare," for Jackson, is "an extremely efficient instrument for continual change and development" (245). His assertion that certain American cities appear "impressive" from the perspective of riding in a car reminded me of my own childhood experiences of driving through or to cities.

To visit relatives or family friends, interstate highways often took our car through Hartford, New York, and other northeastern metropoli, but the only destination city my family ever ventured to was Boston. Driving into Boston from the North on I-95 is an impressive vista, to be sure, but its quality is not of the same magnitude of, say, the Grand Canyon. My childhood trips to museums in the city with my family were before the completion of the Big Dig, an effort to alleviate traffic problems by constructing an underground network of highways. The route would bring us into what the city refers to as The Central Artery, via a giant stack of highways that violently penetrates the inner city.

As a child, the scale of this infrastructure stunned me. As much as I was in awe of the city's towers, I was amazed that so many cars were zipping in so many different directions in such a meticulously designed set of roadways. The aesthetics of the trip, however, offered little interest. The highway's placement, as most urban American highways are, was in the most unsightly neighborhoods of the city, occupied mostly by industrial manufacturing uses. Jackson refers to the "visual competition" between buildings and streets in cities (246). In the case of Boston pre-Big Dig completion, the streets definitely won out over the city's unremarkable architecture. Now completed, countless millions over budget and failing on a number of counts, including its main objective to decrease congestion, the underground highways completely eliminate the competition between these two contrasting landscapes.

My experience of entering the city of Boston is no longer the same, now devoid of any visual stimuli to "impress" me. A more "impressive" landscape, in my eyes, would be a more balanced network of streets to invite and accommodate various modes of transportation. The streets of the streets of the 19th century and early 20th century hosted a multitude of functions that made for a vibrant, energetic, and stimulating experience for urban dwellers. The gradual conversion to automobile usage eliminated the competition for space and the need for cooperating to navigate the city.

The American consciousness is only just now remembering that streets used to be more democratic spaces. The city Department of Transportation has gradually introduced bicycle lanes into a variety of streets in the boroughs to help accommodate the multitude of bicycle commuters, messengers, and deliveries - usually with a great deal of controversy. An organization called the National Complete Streets Coalition advocates for streets "designed and operated to enable safe access for all users. Pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists and bus riders of all ages and abilities are able to safely move along and across a complete street."

The effort to reclaim the American landscape presents a new set of questions about Jackson's "vernacular city." Are we entering a new era of "vernacular planning," where citizens actively become part of the urban planning process? Creating a Complete Street: NCSC's vision of restoring a balance of street uses.

Bonus: NCSC is HIRING! If you're into progressive transportation planning, public policy, or a fan of advocating for equal access to our streets and don't mind relocating to D.C., click here.

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