LEGO Cities

So here I thought that LEGO was for kids! Apparently not the case, or at least it's for big kids. Like these:

Book Recommendation

Don't Shoot, One Man, a Street Fellowship, and The End of Violence inInner City America

By David Kennedy  

A recent book by David Kennedy titled Don't Shoot, One Man, a Street Fellowship, and The End of Violence in Inner City America puts a new face on the fight against urban drug and gun violence. In the book, Kennedy discusses his new approach for combating such violence, which he notes has been implemented in cities such as Boston, Cincinnati, Chicago, and Los Angeles. The approach to violent crime detailed in this book involves identifying a small group of worst offenders, arresting the worst of those, usually with Federal assistance, and then holding community dialogue with the rest and informing them that if they do not stop their acts of violence they will meet a similar fate.

Kennedy notes that when these methods, since given the name “Ceasefire”, were enacted, the type of crime targeted dropped noticeably and swiftly.

In addition, he notes that the presence of so much violent crime for so long has severely damaged urban neighbourhoods, both economically and socially. Kennedy points out that none of the economic, social, or racial problems affecting these communities can be addressed until the crime that permeates them is controlled in a lasting manner. However, he does not give any indication of when a community might be ready to move on to those tasks.

The book points out that the structure of violent activity is the same from city to city, regardless of the size, number, or ethnic makeup of gangs. Kennedy details how the majority of violent activity can be directly traced to a small group of core gang members, the most violent of these members can be targeted with policing in cooperation with federal authorities, and the rest can then be targeted with community outreach. Kennedy describes how round-table meetings were held with local, state, and federal police, prosecutors, community activists, and gang members. In these meetings, authorities explained to the gang members the gravity of the charges that could be brought against them if their actions continued, which, he noted, many offenders were unaware of. Community organisers explained the damage that years of criminal activity and accidental killings of children have wrought on communities, and the fear it brings to parents. These meetings also offer support services, such as housing and job opportunities, to replace income from selling drugs or other criminal activities.

Kennedy notes that this approach has been implemented to target various crimes, from shootings to drug markets to domestic violence, in a large number of cities and has been extremely successful. Kennedy's book presents an original perspective on the issue of urban crime, and one which has immediate and significant impact. His book should prove to be pivotal in the fight against crime, and a starting point in rebuilding communities and making urban areas more attractive places to live. 

Buy this book on Amazon

Book Recommendation

Made in Australia: The Future of Australian Cities

By Richard Weller and Julian Bolleter

How do you creatively plan for a population of 62 million by 2100? Australia’s current major city planning frameworks only account for an additional 5.5 million people. Whether we want a ‘Big Australia’ or not, Australia’s 21st century is likely to see rapid and continual growth — and if we want liveable, high functioning cities and regional centres we need to think outside the box. 

Of course, many things could change between now and then but for the purposes of planning we think it is prudent to take this figure seriously. So what does this big number mean? It means we would need to house an extra 40 million Australians over the course of the next 87 years. This means building the equivalent of an extra 10 Sydneys – one every 9 years!

Richard Weller and Julian Bolleter (from the Australian Urban Design Research Centre) offer optimistic and creative solutions for the future with one imperative: what we build this century will make or break our country. The authors explore where these people might live so that Australia remains ecologically resilient, socially amenable and economically productive.

• Part 1 – Big Cities, Big Ideas, Big Australia: Australia; Visionary Cities; and Visionary Infrastructure.
• Part 2 – Australian Cities 2012–56: Sydney; Brisbane and SEQ; Melbourne; Perth; Adelaide; Canberra; Hobart; Darwin; and Growing Pains.
• Part 3 – Australian Cities 2101?: Australian Megaregions and New Cities; The East Coast Megaregion (ECM); The West Coast Megaregion (WCM); and Darwin – The New North.
• Part 4 – Essays: Living with the Land; Back to the Future; Urban Resilience & Adaptation; Urban Metabolism: A way to make Australian cities more efficient?; Infrastructure: Now and then; New Settlements on the Fringe: Understanding contemporary peri-urbanisation; And now for the good news…; Cities as Water Catchments; Coding the City; and Follow the Money.
• Part 5 – Designs: Boyd’s Error: Planning’s curse; Infill Precincts; Mean Streets; A National Green Network for Australia.

 Buy it now from Amazon

Book Recommendation

The Endless City 

By The London School of Economics and Deutsche Bank's Alfred Herrhausen Society

At the turn of the twenty-first century, the world is faced with an unprecedented challenge. It must address a fundamental shift in the world’s population towards the cities, and away from mankind’s rural roots. The book’s foundation statistic is that in 1900, 10 percent of the population lived in cities. Today, that figure has edged over 50 percent and by 2050, within the career span of many of today’s urban design practitioners, 75 percent of the world’s population will be urbanites. This means serious change.

The book is the outcome of two years of investigation into six different cities: New York, Shanghai, London, Mexico City, Johannesburg and Berlin. The cities chosen give a broad description of the shades of global urban change, yet because the book is so good, even after five hundred-odd pages it still feels as though there could have been room for a few more cities to really complete the picture.

The book’s power is in making vast quantities of data accessible and interesting to the coffee table browser, while its essays have enough depth to appeal to the professional urbanist. Definitely a worthy browse, even for the pretty graphics.

Book Recommendation

Welcome to the greatest young planner book review page! Here we'll scourer the interweb in search of the best books out there and what better way to start off with one of the seminal books that changed the way people view cities, none other than Jane Jacobs' "Death and Life of Great American Cities".

"Death and Life of Great American Cities" 
By Jane Jacobs

Jacobs challenged conventional modern city planning and city architectural design. In the opening sentence, Jacobs declares war on the major schools of urban planning:

“This book is an attack on current city planning and rebuilding. It is also, and mostly, an attempt to introduce new principles of city planning and rebuilding, different and even opposite from those now taught in everything from schools of architecture and planning to the Sunday supplements and women’s magazines.”

Conventional planning, she noticed, did not seem to create vibrant, livable neighborhoods but rather killed whatever good had once been present. Looking into how cities actually work, rather than how they should work according to urban designers and planners, Jacobs effectively describes the real factors affecting cities, and recommends strategies to enhance actual city performance.

"Death and Life" made four recommendations for creating municipal diversity:

1. A street or district must serve several primary functions.

2. Blocks must be short.

3. Buildings must vary in age, condition, use and rentals.

4. Population must be dense.

These seemingly simple notions represented a major rethinking of modern planning. They were coupled with fierce condemnations of the writings of the planners Sir Patrick Geddes and Ebenezer Howard, as well as those of the architect Le Corbusier and Lewis Mumford, who championed their ideal of graceful towers rising over exquisite open spaces.

Some critics, a few of whom had an axe to grind, such as Mumford, the eminent critic and social historian, wrote the following reply in a New Yorker article: "Like a construction gang bulldozing a site clean of all habitations, good or bad, she bulldozes out of existence every desirable innovation in urban planning during the last century, and every competing idea, without even a pretense of critical evaluation."

The book achieved a remarkably wide readership, perhaps because it's such a rare joy to read a book about cities written by someone who actually seems to appreciate what makes them fun to live in. Planners began to think about networks rather than grids; to whisper about pedestrians rather than motorists; to talk openly about urban infill rather than suburban sprawl; to speak out boldly on behalf of mixed-use buildings and diverse, self-governing neighbourhoods.

Jacobs’ ideas have been the foundation for the New Urbanism movement in an effort to promote social interaction by incorporating such Jacobean features as ground-floor retail in suburban developments.

You can get the 50^th anniversary edition on amazon for a mere 17.60 clamshells!! LINK