Strong Towns
Page 23
Because of our efforts, more people are articulating not only their desire for change, but are dreaming bigger (or smaller?) than ever before as a result of learning the tools and the methods of cultivating a stronger town.
There comes a point where you understand policy and the role of the public in shaping policy so well that your friends see opportunities that you don’t immediately see for yourself. Multiple friends suggested that I run for office. I finally heeded the call when I realized that we have an opportunity to push for sound decision making about how we shape our city for future generations. Thousands of people in my city want to encourage growth in our core and choose leaders who aren’t afraid of making tough decisions to improve our infrastructure, encourage change, and show people what is possible if you just work to improve the next small thing within your purview. They elected me to city council at the end of 2018.
Shreveport is a work in progress, but we have good bones. City council members and members of our new mayor’s administration often quote pieces of the Strong Towns message in council meetings. We have a number of projects in progress with different neighborhood groups looking to calm traffic on their streets and encourage bicycle and pedestrian activity. Not every project is perfect, not every implementation is as we might initially envision, but the dialogue and intent with which our community acts is beginning to evolve thanks in large part to the perspective we have gained through the visionary call to action that Chuck is instilling in cities and towns like ours across the country.
This can be your future too. Not a utopian society, but a society of communication and shared vision that values the human scale, the connection with neighbors, and the understanding of what being a community really means.
LeVette Fuller
Shreveport, Louisiana, council member
Acknowledgments
I would like to acknowledge the guidance and insights of Steve Mouzon, Jeff Speck, Andres Duany, Mike Lydon, Jason Roberts, and Monte Anderson. They have all added disproportionately to the insights contained in this book. I would also like to individually acknowledge John Anderson, whose friendship and counsel has gone beyond what I ever deserved. I will strive to pay it forward.
I would like to thank Jon Commers and Ben Oleson for their efforts in founding Strong Towns, and Justin Burslie for his critical help in the early days. The Blandin Foundation took an early gamble on us, a model of philanthropic leadership I admire and appreciate.
I am also extremely grateful for the stewardship – and friendship – of Andrew Burleson, Ian Rasmussen, and John Reuter in running the organization. So many great ideas were hatched with them while standing in line at theme parks. Strong Towns would not have accomplished much without them.
I also want to acknowledge my co-conspirators at Urban3, Joe Minicozzi and Josh McCarty. The sleepless nights and long car rides geeking out together have become tales of legend. May there be many more.
I’m also grateful for the team at Strong Towns, especially Rachel Quednau, Kea Wilson, Michelle Erfurt, Daniel Herriges, Bo Wright, Jacob Moses, and Missy Trees. They always picked up the slack when my late nights writing wore me down. Churros for everyone!
Thank you to Quint Studer and Dottie DeHart for the support and for nudging me to write this book.
And I want to thank my mentors, George Orning and Stuart Lade, for everything they did to push me along this path in life. I’ll never repay the debt.
About Strong Towns
Strong Towns is an international movement that’s dedicated to making communities financially strong and resilient.
For generations, North American communities have been growing – or at least, they’ve been building. But as we’ve paved endless roads, raised countless buildings, and put more and more infrastructure in the ground, we’ve given almost no thought to whether future generations will be able to afford to maintain the world we’ll leave them with – or how many of the things we build are making our communities worse places to live today.
The Strong Towns approach is a radically new way of thinking about the way we build our world. We believe that in order to truly thrive, our cities and towns must:
Stop valuing efficiency and start valuing resilience.
Stop betting our futures on huge, irreversible projects, and start taking small, incremental steps and iterating based on what we learn.
Stop fearing change and start embracing a process of continuous adaptation.
Stop building our world based on abstract theories and start building it based on how our places actually work and what our neighbors actually need today.
Stop obsessing about future growth and start obsessing about our current finances.
But most importantly, we believe that Strong Citizens from all walks of life can and must participate in a Strong Towns approach – from citizens to leaders, professionals to neighbors, and everyone in between.
Strong Towns, the 501(c)(3) organization, is working to make the Strong Towns approach real in every city and town in North America. Through producing media, hosting events, and by networking people together, the messaging is spreading, and places are beginning to change.
To learn more about Strong Towns, or to support the movement, go to www.strongtowns.org.
Get Involved in the Strong Towns Movement
Here’s how:
EXPLORE the universe of content produced by Strong Towns media that keeps you asking hard questions about how we build today, and shines a spotlight on a better way that we must take up tomorrow, at strongtowns.org.
SUBSCRIBE to the Strong Towns email list for important updates, top stories from Strong Towns media, and notifications about when Charles L. Marohn, Jr. will be in your area. (strongtowns.org/email).
CONNECT with The Strong Towns Network of readers, members and advocates around the world. Get the inspiration, resources, and relationships you need to make your community stronger. Visit strongtowns.org/connect for more information.
EXPERIENCE the Strong Towns message live in person. For a full schedule of in-person events presented by Charles L. Marohn, Jr. and other members of the Strong Towns team, visit strongtowns.org/events.
HOST a Strong Towns event in your place. Visit strongtowns .org/speaking for rates and details.
JOIN THE MOVEMENT. Become an official member of the Strong Towns movement at strongtowns.org/membership. Your contribution of any amount helps us produce the content, events, and platforms for connection that we need to change the way America is built—and that our communities need to make the Strong Towns approach the default.
About the Author
Charles L. Marohn, Jr. – known as “Chuck” to friends and colleagues – is the founder and president of Strong Towns. He is a professional engineer licensed in the State of Minnesota and a land use planner with two decades of experience. He holds a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering and a master of urban and regional planning, both from the University of Minnesota.
Marohn is also the lead author of Thoughts on Building Strong Towns – Volume 1, Volume 2, and Volume 3, as well as the author of A World Class Transportation System. He hosts the Strong Towns Podcast and is a primary writer for Strong Towns’ web content. He has presented Strong Towns concepts in hundreds of cities and towns across North America. He is featured in the documentary film Owned: A Tale of Two Americas, and was named one of the 10 Most Influential Urbanists of all time by Planetizen.
Marohn is a long-time commentator on KAXE Northern Community Radio. He currently co-hosts KAXE’s Dig Deep program, a monthly examination of public policy issues affecting Minnesotans.
Chuck grew up on a small farm in Central Minnesota. The oldest of three sons of two elementary school teachers, he joined the Minnesota National Guard on his seventeenth birthday during his junior year of high school and served for nine years. In addition to being passionate about building a stronger America, he loves playing music, is an obsessive reader, and religiously follows his favorite team, the Minnesota
Twins.
Chuck and his wife live with their two daughters in their hometown of Brainerd, Minnesota.
Index
A
Accounting, for infrastructure, 70–71
Acre, value per, 135, 138–142
Alexander, Christopher, 8
Altruism, in community living, 6–7, 26
American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), 65–67
Amish society, 217
Anderson, Monte, 160–161
Antifragile (Taleb), 193
Anti-fragile systems, 4, 6
Appreciation, for maintenance staff, 180–183
Arnade, Chris, 214–215
ASCE (American Society of Civil Engineers), 65–67
Assessment process, 77
Automobile reliance: development based on, 27–30
and modern city development, 111–112
productivity and, 140
B
Barbell investment approach, 148–150, 150f
Better Block Foundation, 159
Bezos, Jeff, 102
Bias, confirmation, 69, 74, 183–186
Bicycles, 112
Big box stores: alternative uses of sites of, 169
productivity for, 136–137
Big project mentality, 184–186
The Big Sort (Bishop), 207–208
“Bipartisan Placemaking: Reaching Conservatives” panel, 210
Bishop, Bill, 207–208
The Black Swan (Taleb), 59, 120
Blighted areas, productivity of, 131–134, 140
Boise State University, 126
Boys & Girls Club of Santa Ana, x
Brainerd, Minnesota, 16f, 18f development of infrastructure in, 30–31
experimental development pattern in, 125–126
founding and development of, 16–17
productivity at downtown vs. edge of town, 134–138
traditional vs. modern development in, 131–134
Bretton Woods agreement, 90
Brooklyn, New York, 213–214
Brown, Aaron, 211
Brown, Michael, 114
Budgeting, by cities, 50–57
Building code deficiencies, addressing, 194
Buildings, complex vs. complicated, 20–23
Bureaucracy, 172
Burnham, Daniel, 122
Bush, George W., 209
C
California, government decision making in, 197–198
Capital investments, return on, 171–172
Carbon-reduction benefits, 74
Carlson, Curtis, 121
“Carlson's Law,” 121
Cash flow: and debt, 98, 187–192, 188f–190f
over life cycle of development project, 52–57, 55f, 56f
CBO (Congressional Budget Office), 78–80
Centralization, 198
Chaos, order vs., 121–122
Chicken problem, 195
Cities, 37–62 abandonment of, 109–110
accounting for infrastructure by, 70–71
budgeting and growth in, 50–57
contracting of, 154
Detroit, Michigan, 60–62
development of Pompeii, Italy, 5–10
economic stability of modern, 104–106
engineer's view of, 11
experimental development pattern in, 126–127
filling gaps in, 160–163
and illusion of wealth, 57–60
incremental growth in founding of, 15–20
as infinite game, 38–41
and infrastructure, 44–50
maintenance required for infrastructure in, 115
modern development of, 12
revenues and expenses, 41–44
traditional vs. modern development of, 1–3
Cities and the Wealth of a Nation (Jacobs), 101–102
City Council of Santa Ana, ix, x
City engineer, 177t
City halls, 43–44
City planner, 177t
Class: and neighborhoods, 21–22
and re-urbanization, 116
Clinton, Bill, 209
Clinton, Hillary, 63
Cognitive Architecture (Sussman and Hollander), 8
Cognitive discounting, 65
Collaboration, between government officials and citizens, 195–197
Commers, Jon, 45
Common infrastructure, 130
Community living, 199–218 differing opinions in, 206–212
and extended family, 200–201
as infinite game, 39–40
meaning in, 212–218
in neighborhoods, 202–203
in Pompeii, Italy, 6–7
walking in, 203–206
Complex, adaptive systems: human habitats as, 3–4
and incremental growth, 168
incremental growth of, 15–16, 18–19
rational decision making with, 120–123
Complex buildings, 20–23
Complicated buildings, 20–23
Complicated systems, 11–14
Confirmation bias, 69, 74, 183–186
Conflicts, dealing with, 206–212
Congress for the New Urbanism, 210
Congressional Budget Office (CBO), 78–80
Constraints: and economic stability, 93–96
and gold standard, 90
growth as, 100
prudent, for investments, 164–168
removal of, in modern world, 59–60, 96
Construction costs, 136–137
Consumption, 215–216
Costa Rica, 126–127
The Crash Course (Martenson), 108
Critical systems, 182–183
Cross-generational civic collaboration, 187
D
Dallas, Texas, 159
Darwin, Charles, 8
The Death and Life of Great American Cities (Jacobs), 8
Debt: and cash flow, 98
for federal government, 186
for government, 96–100
for local government, 113–114
for place-oriented government, 186–192
for projects with quality-of-life benefits, 187
for state government, 113–114
Debt to income ratio, 97
Decision making: rational, see Rational decision making
subsidiarity in, 195–198
Default, on municipal debt, 191
Deneen, Patrick, 211
Density, as urban planning metric, 128–129
Depression economics, 86–89
Detroit, Michigan, 60–62 land values in, 24
renewal of urban, 117–119
Development projects: cash flow over life cycle of, 52–57, 53f, 55f, 56f
decisions about failing, 115–120
Diamond, Jared, 58, 59, 84
Dig Deep, 211
Donjek, 45
Downtown, productivity of, 134–140, 139t, 143–144
Duany, Andres, 195
Duggan, Mike, 119
Duncanville, Texas, 160
E
Economic development department, 178t
Economics: and benefits of infrastructure spending, 72–73
in depressions, 86–89
Economic stability, 83–106 and auto-oriented development, 29–30
and constraints, 93–96
creating, 85–86
and depression economics, 86–89
and focus on growth, 100–102
following World War II, 89–91
and government debt, 96–100
growth vs. wealth, 102–104
of modern cities, 104–106
and post-war boom, 91–93
risk management strategies for, 83–85
Edges, 7–8
Edges of city: center vs., 28
city infrastructure necessary for, 115
productivity of, 134–138, 143–144
Efficiency, designing for, 174–176
Ehrenhalt, Alan, 116
Empire State Buil
ding (New York, New York), 129
Employment, in productive places, 133
England, 83
Expenses, and revenues, 41–44
Extended family, 200–201
F
Failure, slow, 110–115
Failure to Act (ASCE report), 65–67
Family, extended, 200–201
Fannie Mae, 92
Farmers, risk management strategies of, 83–84
Federal Funds Rate, 97
Federal government: debt for, 186
impact of infrastructure on, 79
Federal Housing Administration (FHA), 89, 92
Federal Reserve, 99
Feedback, in local governments, 173–174
Ferguson, Missouri, 93, 114
FHA (Federal Housing Administration), 89
Financial status, local government's understanding of, 190–191
Finished states, neighborhoods built to, 21–23
“First ring” suburbs, 94
Form-based codes, 193–194
Fragile systems, 4
Franchises, productivity of, 133–134
Freddie Mac, 92
Future, predicting needs for, 19–20, 120–121
G
Gaps, in cities, 160–163
Garcia, Anthony, 158
Gas tax, 75
Gawron, Stephen, 161
Gehl, Jan, 8
“General Theory of Walkability,” 206