Retail Entertainment Part 2

In February and March I wrote a bunch of entries on this, in part a response to the upcoming merger of Federated--Macy's & Bloomingdales--and the May Company--the national chain Lord & Taylor, and Hecht's, Marshall Fields, and a number of regional department stores around the country, and in recognition of the "competitive advantage" that great department stores provide to city center shopping districts (Hecht's in downtown Washington; Macy's, Bloomingdales, Barney's and others in Manhattan; Marshall Field's in Chicago, etc.)

The article below, "Get Ready for Retail Theater," is from the Marketing Profs e-newsletter. (Of course Pine and Gilmore's book The Experience Economy is still one of the best treatments of this general theme.)

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Solve this real-life riddle. A 37-year-old woman's car is packed with a tub of dirty dishes, a laundry basket of stained clothes and a package of cookie dough. Where is she heading?

To her local Maytag concept store, of course, where she will test-drive a state-of-the-art dishwasher, washing machine and stove using her own dirty lasagna pan, grass-stained soccer jersey, and grandma's famous chocolate chip cookie recipe.

In early 2003, Maytag created an innovative experiential marketing strategy, whereby prospective customers would take their new, top-of-the-line appliances for an interactive "test-drive." Maytag found that customers were more interested in understanding how a product would fit into their lives than listening to a pitch about the merchandise. With the high cost of upper-end appliances, it makes perfect sense to take a potential washer/dryer for a trial spin.

See this story from USA Today.

The company also realized that the social aspect of shopping was important, too. A new environment was designed that included wider aisles, brighter décor, and kids' play areas. In the new Maytag store the ready-to-use appliances are displayed in "vignettes" of home kitchens and laundry rooms. Since 1998, Maytag has opened close to 50 interactive stores and plans to continue expanding in 2005.

Successful retail spaces create a full sensory experience. Consumers want to see, feel, touch, taste and interact with your products before they buy. Here are some strategies that will help you stage a little retail theater of your own.

1. Present a lifestyle

Display and market your products in a way that helps customers visualize the full experience and realize their lifestyle aspirations.

According to USA Today, Whole Foods grocery stores enjoyed a 15% jump in total sales last year while the average supermarket grew just 1%. Why? Whole Foods has taken the mundane task of grocery shopping to an inspiring and interactive new level. Dip a fresh strawberry in a flowing, chocolate fountain. Watch while any one of 150 fresh seafood items are prepared before your eyes. Sip a glass of pinot in the produce section.

Affirming your customers' desire to feel exclusive, indulgent or even organic and chemical-free can have major bottom-line impact.

2. Construct vignettes and suites

Create vignettes that can be merchandized and accessorized, even if your inventory is not usually displayed that way.

Pottery Barn has this concept nailed. I may be dashing in to pick up party napkins, but the room vignettes always keep me browsing and lingering. Each "scene" is so perfectly set that I always think, "Forget the napkins. I'll take that full 15 square feet."

Displays are powerful because they show you how to use the products—how they would fit into your life and make it more efficient, more comfortable and even more fun. A leather armchair that I would otherwise have ignored suddenly beckons me with a cozy cashmere blanket and a steaming americano—in a sleek new mug, of course.

3. Satisfy the senses

Multi-sensory experience and inviting design can lend a powerful competitive advantage—even in unexpected industries.

My doctor is great, but the office definitely leaves some room for improvement. Imagine a cold, square, ill-painted waiting room with hard chairs lining the perimeter. The walls are decorated with cheesy and dated artwork, last year's magazines rest on the plastic tables, and a few worn-out toys linger in the corner for kids.

My friend, on the other hand, says she waits in a softly lit reception area with warm laminate floors and current issues of her favorite magazines. The examining rooms have the same friendly feel, with flat screen computers, electronic medical charts and supplies organized in stylish stainless-steel containers.

Doctors, dentists and many other medical practitioners have firmly entered the service industry. With the rise of elective procedures such as teeth whitening, non-essential dermatological services and cosmetic surgeries, many doctors and dentists are competing for patients—and market share.

Think about it. Who do you think would feel more relaxed about seeing her doctor for an elective procedure—me, or my waits-in-comfort friend?

4. Encourage customers to sample, touch and feel

Give your customers unrestricted freedom, access and creativity with your products and you'll stand out in a crowded marketplace.

Sephora, the cosmetics mega-store, is a sampler's paradise. Unlike department store-type cosmetics counters that force shoppers to interact with a salesperson to try a specific item, Sephora is organized around freestanding racks with unrestricted access to chic brands such as Bulgari, Christian Dior, Gucci, Lancome and Calvin Klein.

Customers can roam the store and try on lipsticks, eyeliners and blushes from many different manufacturers. Strategically placed mirrors, tissues, cotton swabs, astringent and makeup remover encourage sampling. Prices, which are usually hidden in department stores, are prominently marked at Sephora.

Freed from staff paid on commission or overly eager to close a sale, shoppers often spend an hour or more trying different colors and brands until they find exactly what they like.

Starbucks is a great proponent of sampling. See this article from Fast Company. (Photo by markane on Flickr.)

Watch the details

Whether you're dealing in appliances, medicine, home improvement, clothing or groceries, the right surroundings have an enormous impact on your customers, especially your female customers. A retail space that satisfies women's needs for engagement and plays to her heightened awareness of environment and aesthetics has a major advantage over the dingy, uninspired retail space, even if the products are fantastic. Put on a good show and watch your profits soar.

And, finally, don't forget that seemingly inconsequential details can actually make or break a sale:

-- Consider your lighting. Who wants to purchase a bathing suit after seeing your butt in a harsh, fluorescent glow?

-- Bathrooms and office spaces reflect your store's atmosphere. Make sure they're clean, well stocked, properly lit and ventilated.

-- Create amenities such as a family room or play place where dads, kids or grandparents can gather while other family members are shopping. One major interiors retailer projects a hopscotch pattern on the floor with laser lights. And voila—kids aren't tugging on your sleeve while you hunt for furniture.

-- According to America's Research Group, nearly half of a consumer's perception of a retail brand is formed in the parking lot*****. Like it or not, consumers judge your styles and your selection before they even walk through the front door, and they may just drive away if they don't like what they see.
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**** or in urban areas, by the streets and sidewalks in front of your store. If it's dirty, people will move on...

Suburban building forms in the center city--Does this contribute to crime?

Historic photo of shopping center parking lot demonstrates that there have been no significant steps forward in parking lot design over the past fifty years. (Photo from the Woodrow Wilson High School Alumni of Beckley, WV website. There are some great photos here...)

Right now, there is a thread on the Brookland email list about steps by the Police Department to address crime at the Brentwood Shopping Center, home to Giant and Home Depot, and a place where a couple people have been killed, and where many cars are stolen. As someone pointed out, crime happens where there are a lot of people, and I agree with this. (I also remember an interesting article a year or more ago about a community out west, in Utah maybe, that found its police department overburdened as a result of a Wal*Mart opening in its jurisdiction. See this story from the KUTV, Salt Lake City, website.)

Anyway, this is what I wrote:

In the right sidebar of my weblog, there are many website links, including four sites directly relevant to this thread: one is a website on CPTED--Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design, another is a legal review article on "Architecture as Crime Control," as well as the National Council on Crime Prevention (known for McGruff the crime dog), which publishes a number of excellent resources, and the Crime Reduction Website sponsored by the UK Home Office.

Clearly, from the perspective of safety in urban environments, traditional suburban forms do not make it. The suburban form is anti-thetical to eyes on the street, and this is perfectly exhibited in the Brentwood Center AND the Metro site. Plus those d*** parking lots are cesspools for windblown trash, dead plants, etc. It happens that I wrote a blog entry somewhat related to this wrt the Target development in Columbia Heights.

The blog entry isn't about crime, but it does discuss protecting and extending urban design in the city instead of acquiesing to suburban design. The crime at Brentwood Center (and the Metro site) are a result in part (imo) of the dominant suburban, car-centric nature of both.

The classic work in this field in the book Defensible Space by Oscar Newman, and his follow up book Creating Defensible Space. It's not a matter of creating gated communities, just putting the principles of urban design to work, rather than letting them slide.

Aerial view of the Autozone parking lot, 1200 block of H Street NE, from the DC Guide/DC Government website.

The 4 R's of Historic Preservation and Community Revitalization: Restoration; Rehabilitation; Redesign; Relocation

Because of family ties, local preservation activist Peter Sefton (Victorian Secrets) is also involved in preservation advocacy in upstate New York, including helping beleaguered activists in Troy, NY, a city that like most of the cities upstate, has been left behind by the increased globalization and de-industrialization of the U.S. economy.

From Peter:

Curved rear wall of the Freihofer Bakery in Troy, New York.

Troy, New York’s 1913 Freihofer Bakery and 1895 Riverside Club have apparently won another week of life. The buildings could have been demolished today under the terms of a demolition permit applied for by the building’s owner. However Justice James Canfield has granted preservationists a one-week stay pending a court appearance next Thursday. The buildings, however, remain in grave danger of demolition.

Click here for pictures of the historic bakery and clubhouse; the text refers to a prior demolition effort to demolish the buildings for a drugstore, which the Historic Action Network successfully opposed.

For more, check out "Time is running out for two historic buildings near the Waterford Bridge in Lansingburgh" from the Troy Record.

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In the article, "Geneva History Center explores ways of historic preservation," from the Geneva Courier News in Illinois, Jan Ramming writes:

"Picture an old church converted to a resale shop, a bank turned into a fine restaurant, and an abandoned factory being used as an upscale hotel. It has happened in Geneva through the creative use and preservation of historic buildings. Finding new uses for old buildings is one way communities can save their historic landmarks, according to Michael Dixon, a local architect. He was the speaker at the Geneva History Center's Brown Bag Lunch meeting Tuesday.

"You have to find new use for the building to keep it in the mainstream of contemporary life," he said. "You may need to make some adjustments, and with sensitivity."

But the city has lost its share of history as well, and that's the focus of the Historic Center's new exhibit "To Be or Not To Be?" The exhibit opened this May in honor of National Historic Preservation Month.

The exhibit asks visitors whether it is ever acceptable to demolish historical buildings, and shows photos and models of the detailed old architecture of the Swedish Lutheran Church and the 1892 Train Depot, both demolished.

The exhibit shows that historic preservation may involve different processes. They are:

• Restoration — Accurately returning the building to its original state.
• Rehabilitation — Maintains the original state outside but updates the inside.
• Redesign — Done when not all of the old structure can be reused.
• Relocation — Saves and moves structures that sit on land desired for other uses.

Photos are shown of residential teardowns and infills — the practice of razing modest houses and replacing them with lot engulfing structures, called infill houses.
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An interesting way to think about what we do in thinking about historic preservation as the foundation for community revitalization and how we go about it.

One caveat, I will say that location matters. Geneva, west of Chicago, is in a strong and thriving metropolitan area. Troy, NY is not...

DC's Most Endangered Places

McMillan Reservoir photos by Christopher Leary.

From the online Washington Business Journal

Preservation group names endangered D.C. sites
Tim Mazzucca, Staff Reporter

Some of Washington's most desirable sites for redevelopment are also some of the most historic, according to the D.C. Preservation League. The group has released its ninth annual list of the city's most endangered places -- 13 sites where development may destroy historic landmarks of architecture and culture.

This year's list includes St. Elizabeths Hospital, Mount Vernon Triangle, Martin Luther King Jr. Public Library and the South Capitol Street corridor. Today, St. Elizabeths is being surveyed as the home for the U.S. Coast Guard; Mount Vernon Triangle has seven projects slated to break ground this year; and the Anacostia Waterfront Corp. held another public meeting May 25 to show residents what will be developing along the main street while a new baseball stadium is built.

The Preservation League says there's no immediate threat to the 33-year-old Martin Luther King Jr. Library at 901 F St. NW, but the league is afraid the D.C. government might sell the building before it could get a landmark designation.

Also making the list was the National Capital Revitalization Corp.'s McMillan Reservoir Sand Filtration site near North Capitol and M streets NW. It also made the list in 2000 when the D.C. Office of Planning last tried to sell the land.

Other endangered places included on the list this year are:

• Anacostia Historic District, near the Frederick Douglass Home in Southeast;
• Battleground National Cemetery, at 6625 Georgia Ave. NW;
• The interior of the Franklin School, at 13th and K streets NW;
• Holt House, near the National Zoo off Adams Mill Road;
• A causeway at 3100 Macomb St. NW [Tregaron];
• Open space within the National Mall [For more information, see the National Coalition to Save Our Mall website];
• Uline Arena, at 1140 Third St. NW; and
• Western Union Telegraph Co. Building, at 4623 41st St. NW.
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For the DCPL page, click here. Each of the places on the list has a full-page writeup.

Letting riders "tell the truth to" Metro...

Riding on the Metro...

Dennis Jaffe of the Transit task force of the Sierra Club, reminds me of something I meant to write about. On Monday, the Washington Examiner reported on the Sierra Club's efforts to get WMATA to create a Riders Advisory Council, a council of volunteers representing the transit users community, but a committee with a modicum of independence.

That seems to be a bone of contention with some WMATA board members, if Gladys Mack's quote in the article reprinted below is to be believed.

As much as I am a proponent of transit, I am an equally strong proponent of citizen engagement and involvement in land use, built environment, and transportation planning issues. Certainly WMATA can't think it's doing a sound enough job on their own, or they wouldn't come up with occasionally boneheaded policies like two car late night trains or ordering all drivers to stop trains if they think they see smoke. Clearly they need to hear more voices...

I really believe this after taking part in two different but equally enlightening public participation workshop trainings, the "How to Turn A Place Around" workshop from the Project for Public Spaces, as well as the Great Tours workshop for historic sites from the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Each demonstrates the power of a structured workshop process that teaches and engages, with the goal of making places better. Transit is not some unique process unable to benefit from a good dose of participation and visioning from engaged citizens.

Note: Duncan Spencer in his Hillscape column, see "Our Own Central Park," waxes about the skill of the landscape architecture firm Oehme van Sweden and their proposals for the Eastern Market Metro Plaza.

Yet, an abbreviated PPS workshop involving staffers from Scenic America came up with proposals ten times better in a 6 hour workshop, using the How to Turn A Place Around "Place Game" method.

After seeing how the PPS people-based [seeded with an overview of placemaking principles and examples from around the world] approach can often come up with better results than the experts, this made me an even stronger proponent of citizen engagement in the planning process.

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To get a better sense about what I am talking about, check out these placemaking tools on the PPS website. You will have to register for access. Look at the difference in process between "Project Driven vs. Place Driven Planning"
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I will say it helped that all the participants in this particular workshop had a great deal of experience with placemaking issues. This is why I am big on providing an introduction to the subject and a discussion of best practices as part of the process. This is pretty typical in charrettes done in the New Urbanism field (although not necessarily as part of the planning projects in DC).

The Sierra Club letters to WMATA on Public Involvement are a must read.

Examiner, Monday, May 23, 2005
Sierra Club, WMATA plan advisory council
By Christy Goodman Examiner Staff Writer

Continuing with their efforts to give Metro riders a voice, the Sierra Club and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority have been working to create a Riders Advisory Council.

The Sierra Club complimented Metro's effort to boost its public outreach in a letter last week, but said more can be done. The transit agency has added town hall meetings, an e-mail address, online chats and a public comment period to its monthly board meetings."Our concern has been that WMATA sets up a RAC that can truly be seen, in practice and perception, as the voice of riders," said Dennis Jaffe of the Sierra Club.

Concern over Metro bias

"The cornerstone of the proposal and the advisory council is that the [RAC] staff be allowed to carry out its duties in such a way that it is known that the staff is doing what is expected of it by the RAC and not by WMATA employees," said Jaffe, who worried about staffers who would be biased toward Metro.

Gladys Mack, Metro Board vice chair, credited Dana Kauffman, board chair for his support. "What we all need is transportation. We do what is best for our riders and the pocketbooks of the people who pay the bills," Mack said. "I just don't think it will come down to a situation where one has to be independent of WMATA."Mack added that Metro regulations may not allow the agency to fund such an entity, but that is being looked into as the RAC proposal is still in development.

Under current plans, the RAC will include volunteers from Metro's general ridership. These volunteers will voice their opinions to the Metro Board and its various committees.

June presentation planned

Leona Agouridis, Metro customer communications, marketing and sales manager, has been working with the Sierra Club to build a RAC presentation for the Metro Board to review. She said she hopes the presentation will come before the Operations and Customer Service Safety Committee in June.

The only other transit council within WMATA is the Elderly and Disabled Committee. The committee has a Metro staff liaison who records meeting minutes, posts information on the Metro Web site and supports the committee.

ANC6A recommends that DCRA set up Ward liaisons

(In DC, the Office of Planning and the DC Department of Transportation each have ward planners, one assigned to each ward, to track various efforts and to respond to citizen needs and inquiries. Here's the list of OP's "Ward Planners" while DDOT doesn't seem to list their ward transportation planners, at least after a couple minutes of looking I couldn't find them.)

ANC6A recently voted on such a recommendation to the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs (from the ANC-6A@yahoogroups.com and hstreetdc@yahoogroups.com email lists):

Dear Dr. Canavan,

On May 12, 2005, ANC 6A voted unanimously to send this letter recommending that DCRA establish Ward liaisons.

ANC 6A recommends that DCRA create Ward liaisons similar to those employed by the District Department of Transportation and the Office of Planning. These Ward liaisons would answer questions and respond to inquiries on building permits, certificates of occupancy, abatement of nuisance property, and other issues under the jurisdiction of DCRA.

While we appreciate the efforts of DCRA staff such as Mr. Joseph McCarley, we feel that the DCRA’s scope of responsibility and the number of issues that regularly emerge in our ANC and Ward would justify the creation of multiple staff positions with Ward-specific responsibilities and accountability.

If you have any questions or need further information about this recommendation, please contact Commissioner Cody Rice, Chair of ANC 6A’s Economic Development and Zoning Committee. (...)
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Yet another good idea from ANC6A.

Mike Lewyn on the Policy Link Conference in Philly & My response about DC

In the blog Lewyn Addresses America, Mike Lewyn reports on the Policy Link conference on Social Equity that was held last week in Philadelphia.

Mike says this about a presentation about DC, which I respond to below:

There was a session on housing affordability, and a couple of people agreed that developers in the District of Columbia should be weighed down by all sorts of inclusionary zoning and affordable housing requirements. I can understand the logic behind these programs in prosperous cities like San Francisco. But DC is a city that is still losing population and still has a 20% poverty rate- lower than some cities, but higher than the nation and region as a whole (See Census Quick Facts for more information. DC is not in as desperate shape as some cities- but I still think it has a lot more in common with Baltimore or Cleveland than with San Francisco.

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Thanks for posting this.

I wanted to go to the conference but have been traveling all over lately and I couldn't do it. My joke response to the Pres. of PolicyLink's presentation at last October's National Trust for Historic Preservation annual meeting is that PolicyLink's mission is for "equitable sprawl." (Policy Link does a lot of good work on affordable housing issues and it is an oversight that I don't have a link to them. I will add them to the list at the top of the right sidebar.)

In any case, I think you might be wrong about DC. The residential market is akin to SF, Manhattan and Brooklyn, and Boston. You can't buy houses for less than $200-250,000 now, in most any part of the city, and that price includes shells in Anacostia. Houses in most areas of the NW and NE that are in neighborhoods that can be even seriously problematic such as Trinidad still cost $300,000 or more.

That ain't the case in Cleveland, Baltimore, Detroit, Pittsburgh, or even in the non-Center City part of Philadelphia.

I don't think the Census is correct in claiming DC is continuing to lose population. I just don't see it as new condo buildings sell out before construction is finished and as houses vacant for decades come back online through rehabilitation and sale.

As far as the poverty rate goes, yep, it's there, but concentrated, and people are being pushed out or are doubling up, in order to remain in the city.

This is a huge issue, but it's not just about affordable housing, it's really more about making good jobs available to people with limited educational aspirations.

Edvin Osorio and other Latinos are part of a historic shift in the demographics of construction workers. (By Michael Robinson-chavez -- The Washington Post). Where are the African-Americans?

Today's Washington Post has a page one article, "Hispanics Build a Solid Base: Immigrants Change Makeup of Construction Crews" about how Hispanics have more and more of the construction jobs... In DC, which is one of the strongest real estate markets in the world, it makes no sense in a city with a population of 60% African-Americans to have almost no African-Americans on construction job sites.

(This relates to a project that I am working on that I will write about some time in the future.)

Don't forget WMATA really is best in class in North America

Of course, we're critical of WMATA because it's all we have and know. Last week, I was in NYC and Philadelphia, and the week before in Baltimore. Here's something to think about:

Fares in Washington on buses are $1.25. In NYC and Philadelphia, fares are $2. A bus transfer in Philly costs 60 cents. In DC, a bus transfer is free. Bus fares in Baltimore are $1.60.

Plus on Metrobus with a transfer, you can connect to other buses (even go back to where you started) for two hours!

The base subway fare in DC is $1.35. In NYC and Philly it is $2. Granted, DC's fares are set up by distance, so the farther you travel, the more it costs, but still, according to this article from City Journal, "How to Save the Subways—Before It’s Too Late", NYC collects less than 50% of the cost of providing subway rides through farebox revenues. It's my understanding that DC collects 80% of the cost of subway operations through farebox revenues, with a much lower base fare. By the way, this article says that the actual cost of a trip on the NYC subways is greater than $4/ride!

This is one indicator that WMATA is relatively efficient. (Granted the NYC system is much older and more expensive to maintain, as well as much much bigger in scope and scale, with much greater service levels.)

I'm not saying that we should be happy with where things stand. Service is deteriorating. One can no longer rely on the subway to get to someplace "on the button"--it now is safer to allocate extra time in advance, if you really need to be somewhere on time. Still, through APTA self-studies and other research, WMATA is well-respected. And we have pretty good bus frequency in the city.

Subway frequency is nothing like NYC, but we get around, without having to drive.

updated -- Suggestions for improving Metrobus (a submission to Dr. Transit)

(Photo by furcafe.)

"Rebuilding Places" correspondent Phill Wolf has been thinking about bus transit issues for quite some time, and he has summarized his thoughts in this entry (with some Dr. Transit comments in brackets):

• Improve the ventilation, so it wouldn't be so painful when a really stinky person sits down right next to or behind you. [Dr. Transit remembers one of his favorite commercials of all time, from Dial, about this issue, with a woman lamenting at the end of the commercial "I wish I had a car."]
• Improve the sound insulation, so people shouting won't bother you so much. [One advantage of the subway is being able to move to another car at the next stop, if people are particularly loud or loutish.]
• Don't clump up the buses. Institute a de-clumping policy so that when two buses of the same route in the same direction meet each other, they shuffle passengers and one of the buses expresses to some point far away. [Dr. Transit once heard Chris Zimmerman refer to bus clumping as "the buddy system." Dr. Transit has been pissed off plenty of times to see 7 or more buses pass by in the other direction, while patiently waiting for the bus.]
• Stop accepting cash and paper transfers. Smartrips should be harder to fake, and give policy-makers greater latitude to adjust policies to favor real travelers while discouraging the nut cases who just like to ride the bus and shout at the other passengers. Also, cease distributing "benefits" travel tokens in any form other than registered (non-anonymous) Smartrip cards. [Dr. Transit is torn here. I like the anonymity of cash. I also found in NYC at least that their machines for issuing Metrocards is very very very very very slow. Plus they only have a couple machines per entrance--in a system with 10 times the ridership of DC.]
• Accelerate the adoption of low-floor buses. The increased headroom seems to make people inclined to behave better. [Hmm? that's a question for the Transportation Research Board I guess.]
• Standardize (and generally increase) the leg room. The minimal leg room on most buses gives people an excuse to spread their knees and take both seats. Also, kids sitting behind me always kick the seat back for fun.
• Buy CVT (as in hybrid Hondas) instead of plain automatic transmission. Modern buses with automatic transmission shift gears so hard they threaten whiplash. I can't concentrate on my reading the way I could in the 1970s on those old GM buses with spacewalk transmissions. Switching to CVT would give more people a chance to concentrate on innocent pleasure and thereby reduce destructive and annoying behaviors.
• Demolish decorative planters and trash barrels that block the rear door of the bus, dissuading people from exiting through the rear door. [Dr. Transit notes that when he was riding a SEPTA bus last weekend in Philadelphia that they had signs stating that passengers should exit only from the rear of buses.]
• Let the announcement system, which currently tells people to report anything suspicious, also helpfully advise people to get off the bus through the rear door.
• Prohibit Metro board members from riding in the same private auto more than once a month. Do not give Metro board members free passes. It is important that they be frequent riders, on their own dime, like everyone else.

The Downtown Circulator might answer some of Phill Wolf's concerns as it will have low floors and should provide a means to get around downtown in a tourist-friendly but efficient manner. Photo by Steve Pinkus.

• Downtown, replace Metrobus with a smoother fixed-guideway system that eliminates delays from wheelchairs embarking or disembarking, or passengers getting confused over payment. [Maybe this will be one of the benefits of the Downtown Connector?]
• Publicize the routes to people who see a bus in a useful place and are curious where it has been or is going. A bus system I took in the early 1990s posted the route of each bus on a big sign visible to people on the sidewalk: not as a map, but as the names of the sequence of streets it plies. [This is connected to the roundup entry from last week. Great signage at bus stops and useful maps will help promote riding buses, along with great bus stops--I took some photos of some Philadelphia artistic bus shelters on Chesnut Street last weekend--we'll see if they come out...]

This Metro Rapid bus stop map sign from Los Angeles demonstrates that we can learn from other systems.

• Get rid of the upholstery. It harbors biologically evil things. The best seats are the not-very-padded fuzzy seats that help prevent you from sliding around as the bus rounds corners over the curb.
• Improve RideGuide so it understands that buses on a circular route (like some 87 and all(?) 89) continue past their arbitrary/imaginary suburban end point, so that travel past that point doesn't require a transfer to a (much) later bus.
• Improve RideGuide's representation of the location of a bus stop. For example, it tells you the stop is at "SANDY SPRING RD & VAN DUSEN RD". The intersection has at least 4 corners. Which corner is the one with the bus stop for this bus? You don't have time to cross the street in a really big hurry once the bus becomes visible. It so happens that at that point geographically, the 87 bus and the 89 bus travel on opposite sides of the street trying to reach the same marked destination, so RideGuide could be heaps more helpful.
• Improve RideGuide so it doesn't give indistinguishable choices. For example, try "4th street & main street" (specifying a city does not seem to help). Did you mean"4TH STREET & MAIN STREET (in PRINCE GEORGE'S COUNTY)", "4TH STREET & MAIN STREET (in PRINCE GEORGE'S COUNTY)", or "4TH STREET & MAIN STREET (in PRINCE GEORGE'S COUNTY)"? Warning: Those are 3 different places, in 2 different municipalities. I don't know how they expect me to make sense out of it.
• Improve RideGuide's walking directions. Here I reproduce verbatim what RideGuide says you should do to walk from 8101 Sandy Spring Rd [the Laurel city offices] to the bus stop RideGuide suggested, "SANDY SPRING RD & VAN DUSEN RD". Not even a falling-down drunk could have come up with this.
1. Walk 1 approx. block W on SANDY SPRING RD.
2. Walk straight on GORMAN AVE.
3. Walk 2 approx. blocks W on GORMAN AVE.
4. Turn right on VAN DUSEN RD.
5. Walk a short distance N on VAN DUSEN RD.
6. Turn left on GORMAN AVE.
7. Walk a short distance W on GORMAN AVE.
• RideGuide should tell you how many minutes late the bus usually is at your *destination*, so you can decide whether you've allowed enough time. [Hmm, I actually try to get to the stop a little early.]
• Enforce seat-belt rules. Rarely do I see my bus drivers wearing the seat belt. Do you remember the accident in which a Metrobus driver ran over a bump and was bounced right OFF her driver's chair and therefore lost control of the bus as it smashed through the front of a hairdressers' shop, pinning a customer under a barber chair, whose leg (or legs) had to be amputated?
• Educate bus drivers on what to do with railroad tracks! Trains stick out about 4 feet on either side of the track. My bus very nearly hit a train once. The bells rang but the driver tried to beat it. The gate came down on the bus's roof. The train was visible, coming at us. The bus came to an agonizingly full stop anyway! Meanwhile the train's headlight was bearing down on us and the train horn was blowing, blowing nonstop, closer and closer and closer, as our big old Metrobus slowly wheezed up from its full stop to safety in the nick of time, forty sweating passengers silently marveling at the doppler effect as the train blew past and the horn receded. Of course I wrote a letter to Metro about that! But it didn't make any difference. Perhaps bus drivers think they're supposed to stop where they have a good line of sight up and down the tracks. I will grant him this, my bus driver sure gave us a front-row seat with a darn fine view of that train.
• Shape buses' rear end like the rear end of a PCC car: slightly tapered. The collision I was in the other day (I was riding the D6 bus when it hit a parked SUV as the bus made its final hard turn to the left while pulling into the right-side curb spot ahead of the SUV) would have been avoided if the rear end didn't swing so far.

Manhole covers (from Japan)

Photo by Robby Findler. Manhole cover, from Sakata, Yamagata, Japan.

Many people know that I focus on street architecture, such as manhole covers, treebox grates, and other items, as ways to develop community markers of distinction. Debra Mayberry clued me into this gallery of manhole covers from Japan, which are really stunning. Check out the Manholes of Japan photo gallery for more.

Love 'em and leash 'em

Dog park in Washington Square Park, New York City. I was here last week and saw the two dog parks, one very large, this one, for big dogs, and a micro-dog park for tiny dogs. It got me to thinking about school playgrounds in the neighborhood. (Photo from www.purdy.info)

These are the only "large" potential parks around, but they don't have enough use, so therefore negative uses on and around these parks abounds--drug dealing, other disorder, rampant trash, dumping, litter, etc.

If there were small dog runs here, there would be a lot more activity in and around these parks, likely crowding out some of the negative behavior. After all, the best way to crowd out bad behavior is with a lot of good behavior...

However, I find that parents of children in the neighborhood schools don't like the ideas of dogs on the playgrounds as they seem to believe that dogs are major disease vectors. I think if they were, then we'd have millions of sick people around, and we don't seem to.
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From the Chicago Sun-Times, http://www.suntimes.com/output/commentary/cst-edt-edits25.html.

People, people who love their dogs, may be the luckiest people in the world. But presuming it's a smoochy-poochy world for everyone can get them in trouble. Witness the ugly scenes being played out in Washington Square Park on the Gold Coast. Last week, a police officer used pepper spray on an individual whose dog was unleashed and who refused to produce an ID, and later got into an angry confrontation with Ald. Burt Natarus (42nd), who reportedly was sticking up for his constituents.

Police may need to exercise more restraint, but dog owners need to obey the leash laws, no matter how sweet and well-trained they think their pet is. Aside from chronic waste management problems created by unleashed dogs, there is the issue of security -- for canines as well as humans. There's little you can do to prevent a loose dog from getting in your properly leashed dog's face. And what solitary walker has not felt his level of comfort reduced by the appearance of an unleashed dog? For every 99 that won't bite you, there is one that just might.

There are certain patches of America where everyone is happy to let dogs run free. The urban environment is not one of them. Dog owners should feel free to lobby for dog parks. But breaking the leash law is not the best way to garner public support for one.

Dealing with suburban-scale retail in urban Columbia Heights

(Slightly edited from a post to the Columbia Heights email list, where there is a thread going on about dealing with the amount of traffic likely to be generated by the DC-USA development which will include big box stores such as Target and Bed, Bath & Beyond.)

The challenge in attracting retail and residents to the city is to not do this in a manner that encourages wasteful suburban practices such as driving everywhere. Instead it is imperative that we stand up and defend (and extend) urbanism wherever appropriate and whenever we can.

The issue is to encourage the utilization of alternative modes of getting there, even delivery, to reduce the number of car trips. I am surprised that the number of car trips on 14th Street is actually pretty low, all things considered (H Street NE is close to 25,000 trips/day). Nonetheless, while Dennis is right that congestion in urban areas (unless due to design flaws) is in fact a sign of health and vitality, you don't want to encourage needless driving.

A 1,000 space car garage seems pretty big... if not overkill. The owners of the redeveloped Sears site in Tenleytown (Best Buy, Container Store) have discovered that even during the busiest times (i.e. Saturday afternoon) only 1/2 of the not very many spaces (I think 150) are in use--although that was before the Container Store opened. That site is similar to CH in that it is right on top of a subway entrance. The 50s buses also provide a lot of service as well, and this bus line connects to other heavily travelled lines such as the 90s buses.

Home Depot in SoHo in New York City. No parking lot, but delivery service is available (plus lots of taxis).

The Home Depot in Manhattan is offering delivery service. That should be part of the letter of agreement with Target--in fact, it could be extended to the major tenants in the development (Bed, Bath & Beyond, etc.). Another thing is to figure out how to leverage the customer stream to support other things desired in the neighborhood (such as an interesting and thriving 11th Street commercial district).

And I guess while I understand and respect David's fury, the thing's coming and you gotta deal with it now, to mitigate the potential negatives, and to encourage and strengthen and extend the positives, besides easier access to Michael Graves appliances...

This article by Roberta Gratz, author of Cities: Back from the Edge and The Living City, discusses how suburban retailers are recasting their methods and practices for urban settings: Suburban Retailers Say Hello to Downtown: Home Depot finds a welcoming market in Manhattan. In "Big-box stores squeeze into Big Apple," USA Today also reports on this phenomenon.

It is important to demand urbanism from the big box stores, otherwise we get the cookie cutter, car-centric, parking lot fronted developments like the Brentwood Shopping Center which is a few hundred yards from a subway station, but might as well be off some suburban arterial road miles away from public transit.

Business as usual from Home Depot.

The Customer-Centric Store: An IBM Report

Historic photo of People's Drug Store #5, located on the 800 block of H Street NE. Photo from the Library of Congress.

Good news and bad news for neighborhood commercial districts-independent stores. People want quality personalized experiences. Are we living up to those expectations?
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Retailers Offering a "One Size Fits All" Shopping Experience Will Lose Customer Loyalty

Shoppers Are Turned Off by Unhelpful Employees, a Disorganized Store and No Differentiation in Services, Products or Atmosphere, According to a New IBM Survey

Retailers will lose shopper loyalty unless they differentiate themselves in the eyes of consumers, according to a new IBM Survey of American shoppers. Those surveyed say lack of distinction in services, products and store atmosphere, as well as unhelpful employees, all top the reasons why they take their business elsewhere.

Retailers offering the same level of service and the same products as other retailers turn off more than half of all shoppers who have no customer loyalty to specific retailers, according to the IBM Survey. Forty-three percent of all respondents don't like retailers that have employees who are not helpful. Shoppers also tend to stay away from retailers that look and feel the same (46 percent) and have disorganized stores (31 percent).

As for the reasons that shoppers do chose specific retailers, store location and price aren't the only reasons they cited. According to the IBM Survey, consumers prefer retail stores where they are recognized as individuals, products are easy to find, and the employees are knowledgeable. Eight out of 10 shoppers (81 percent) are loyal to certain retailers rather than others, citing helpfulness of employees (34 percent) and a well-organized store (32 percent) as key reasons for going back.

Download The Customer-Centric Store: An IBM Report.
_________________
Also, I forgot about a report that came out last fall, "Challenges for the Future: The Rebirth of Small Independent Retail in America," is another study, with a lot of great case studies, and practical advice that is well worth reading. For a summary, check out "Summary of Nov. 11 Media Teleconference on Independent Retail Study." This project was sponsored by the Illinois Retail Merchants Association.

I have put links to both of these reports in the "Must Read Reports" section of links in the sidebar. I will say the IBM study, as you can imagine, focuses more on technology in building the customer experience.

It's not all technology--it's great products, great service, and tying them together in ways that are interesting and useful for the customer.

Transit needs high-profile, strong leader (Alabama)

(From the Birmingham News [Alabama], column by Eddie Lard)
Wednesday, May 18, 2005

Wanted: Leader. Energetic. Persuasive. Resourceful. Corporate background a plus. Civic-mindedness a must. Needed to lead campaign for better transit.

Last week, a transit advisory group met to discuss "what's next?" The "what's next" being what strategy transit supporters in Jefferson County should pursue in the wake of yet another defeat inthe Legislature of a transit funding bill. If there was any consensus gleaned from the gathering of about 30 citizens, government officials and civic group leaders, it's that the transit movement needs a strong voice to argue transit's case, especially with lawmakers.

State Rep. George Perdue, D-Birmingham, who sponsored the bill calling for a vote on a vehicle registration fee to pay for transit, praised the work of citizens groups and others at the grass roots who pushed lawmakers to get the bill out of local committee and onto the full House, where it died. But he said it's going to take more than grass-roots efforts to move transit to the next step.

"Bottom up got us here. Top down will get us there," said Perdue, who for several years has sponsored transit bills. He has a point. What was sadly missing from this year's effort were strong business leaders and influential elected officials. Even though leaders in the highest positions, both corporate and government, support the idea of better funding for transit, they didn't exactly beat a trail to Montgomery to tell lawmakers that.

Birmingham Mayor Bernard Kincaid, a compelling public speaker, especially on the topic of regional cooperation on such issues as transit, was missing in action. So was the City Council.
The County Commission also supported transit, but except for talking about their own idea of downtown streetcars, commissioners pretty much left the lobbying to others. Most transit funding partner cities such as Homewood, Hoover and Mountain Brook allowed their House representatives to vote against transit with impunity, even though the mayors and city councils of those cities claim to support transit.

The exception was Vestavia Hills, whose mayor, Scotty McCallum, made clear he expected that city's representative to vote for transit. His director of development, Al Folcher, headed the funding partners' effort to get the bill through the Legislature.

The business community, too, was mostly silent. That was a clear departure from several years ago when Alabama Power CEO Charles McCrary, as chairman of the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce, led a spirited campaign that brought transit legislation to the verge of passage. Where was that corporate help this year?

What was most disappointing about the failure of transit bills this year was that too few people in influential positions did anything meaningful to help the cause. What would have happened if McCrary, Kincaid, as well as the mayors of Hoover, Mountain Brook and Homewood, Jefferson County Commission President Larry Langford, Tom Hamby of BellSouth and Mike Warren of Energen had called House members and urged them to vote for the transit bill? What if they had told their lobbyists in Montgomery to put their muscle behind the bill? What if they had gone to Montgomery to show their support?

So, what will it take to get these leaders, all civic-minded individuals, off the sidelines and into the game, transit folks pondered.

The people at the grass roots - transit advisory groups, the League of Women Voters, the Greater Birmingham Ministries, etc. - have to go knocking on more doors and broaden their coalition. "We have to get off transit as a poor people issue," Folcher says. "People in Vestavia need transit. They don't know they need it. "We've got to go the local clubs, the garden clubs and others, and get them aboard. Then we go to the Tom Hambys of the world and say we need them to say transit is important."

Spreading the word:

Sounds like a plan to me.

I'll add one other thing. The media have done a poor job covering this issue. We haven't sufficiently explained why transit is desperately needed by thousands of people in this area, or why it is vital to the region's economy. We also haven't shined the light on transit movements in Mobile and Montgomery.

We must do better. If we can't tell transit's story, who can?

Eddie Lard is an editorial writer with The News. His e-mail address is elard@bhamnews.com.
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Whereas I don't think it's all top down, unlike Rep. George Perdue, there needs to be a greater commitment to the continued extension of transit, but not solely to support sprawl--which will happen from the extension of the subway to Fort Belvoir in Fairfax County ("Planners Pushing Rail to Fort Belvoir") which will allow for the movement of DoD facilities from Arlington and Alexandria, further deconcentrating the metro area.

Speaking of some top down types that don't care too much about the core of the region, check out this article about the Greater Washington Board of Trade and their take on the military base closings....

"In a statement, the Board of Trade says that while certain areas -- including Alexandria, Arlington and D.C. -- will lose jobs, the region as a whole will not. Roughly 20,000 employees may be relocated, primarily to facilities such as Fort Belvoir.

While the relocations, along with the loss of approximately 5,000 jobs in D.C., present challenges to the communities involved, the Board of Trade says that even if all of the recommendations are implemented, the area's economy will continue to be among the nation's strongest.

The down side: Concerns that jobs are moving away from mass transit continue. The Board of Trade says it is urging the federal government to allocate funding for a Metro extension to Fort Belvoir. "
_______
And yes, the media needs to step up. Compare the Boston Globe's commuter column "Starts and Stops" to Dr. Gridlock... Can you imagine a whole Dr. Gridlock column on biking?

Trolley Car Barn at 15th and H Streets NE

Photo from the Historic American Building Survey, National Park Service (available online at the Library of Congress, in the Prints and Photographs Collection). This building was demolished in 1971. It is across from Hechinger Mall, on the site presently is the Pentacle apartment complex.

A bit on "New Suburbanism" and "Manchurian" Main Streets

I consider myself a "new urbanist" although I am in the "old urbanist" division, and I focus on the revitalization and repopulation of the center cities. I was at a Project for Public Places workshop last week and Fred Kent, in his presentation, called "New Urbanism" "New Suburbanism" because as he said, it is really about making better suburbs. I know that this will attract some negative response, and new urbanists always point out infill projects, but the fact is, these massive developments in the suburbs (Kentlands in Gaithersburg, Norton Commons on the border of Jefferson and Earlham counties--Louisville--Kentucky, etc.) are but another salvo in decentralization and dispersal of development away from a region's core.

On the pro-urb email list over the last week there has been a spirited discussion in response to the article "Manchurian Main Street: Are shopping districts inspired by New Urbanism a form of cultural brainwashing?," in the June issue of Metropolis Magazine. The article criticized the construction of lifestyle centers as "faux" Main Streets, with manufactured ersatz old signs, etc., as inauthentic.

A bit of "Manchuria" at Bowie Town Center in Prince George's County, Maryland.

I agree and here's some stuff I've written about it. In response to a post that called the article "pseudo-intellectual" b.s.:

How do you address the issue of authenticity versus the exchange value of place, and the continued disinvestment and "de-accessioning" of traditional, extant commercial districts, and the lack of comfortability with diversity, which leads people uncomfortable with people different from themselves to seek similar experiences in more homogeneous (certainly by socioeconomic status, to some extent by race) settings that tend to be constructed experiences by one developer?

Maybe the article was crap, but the problems identified are not.

And then I wrote:

Although it might be obscure, I use the term "de-accessioning" which is a term used by libraries, to refer to events such as the closing of inner city schools while new schools are being built in the suburbs, etc. Parts of cities have always been successful (well maybe not so much in cities like Detroit) even though people have preferred the suburbs especially since the end of WWII.

The marginal increase in demand for urban living in recent years has been driven by a number of factors, and maybe the rise of new urbanism is one of them, although I don't think so. In DC, it comes from the strong employment engine of the federal government, a good public transportation system, historic residential building stock, and a classic urban design.

Jim Meyers of the Responsible Hospitality Institute makes a good presentation that in part it this demand for urban living has been driven by the rise of pro-city tv programs like Seinfeld and Friends as opposed to 50s, 60s, and 70s tv shows like The Nelsons, Father Knows Best, Ozzie and Harriet, and the Brady Bunch. Seinfeld and Friends are very urban shows without the "new". It doesn't hurt that an increasing number of people don't like commuting.

The point about the exchange value of place is that most developers could care less about urbanism, new or old, they just want to make money from it. "Lifestyle" centers are the flavor of the moment, so that's what's being built.

The point about continuing to build new, rather than re-invest in the old when it is a realistic option, is a perennial problem in the U.S. It continues to enable sprawl.

So in Prince Georges County you have disinvested strip retail along Rt. 1, or disinvested inner-suburbs, and you build Bowie Town Center, the Boulevard at Capital Centre where the old basketball arena was, etc. (see http://www.johnsondevelopmentcorp.com/newmall.html). It is new urbanism at the expense of old urbanism.

Or in DC, if we don't make good planning decisions then we get our clocks cleaned by Montgomery or Arlington Counties (i.e., Bethesda Row, Silver Theatre in Monto, and Pentagon Row, Clarendon etc. in Arlington).

I do see living in the suburbs in part a fleeing of having to deal with persistent urban problems (clean, safe, poverty), and the farther away from the center city one lives, such feelings tend to be more pronounced and expressed (i.e., the husband of my boss telling me at a work holiday party that he didn't understand how a thinking person--it was the Barry years--could live in DC [they live in Gaithersburg] and I merely replied, "It takes me 15 minutes to get to work [deliberate pause] by bike).

Cleveland is a good example. I don't know what a build-out analysis of the city would say, but I can see it accomodating a few hundred thousand "new" residents, merely replacing those that left. So every Crocker Center makes that much harder. It goes back to the idea of compact development and infill as a sustainable land use and resource planning practice. Same thing with Detroit. For every lifestyle center 25 miles away from Detroit, well, you what about the 55 square miles of empty land in the City of Detroit, etc.

Again, without urban growth boundaries recentering and to some extent intensifying land use, I can't see this happening. This is where I bring up the phrase "smarter spawl" and exit left.I agree with Seth that it's important to build great "urbanism" into new developments, but it doesn't come without costs to other parts of the region in which it is built. Maybe that's my role as an advocate for the center cities.

And finally:

"Main Streets" "Shopping Streets" "High Streets" that are "authentic" are (1) a part of the everyday physical building fabric of communities, (2) often not requiring special shopping trips to get to from some great distance from home, and (3) have more than just retail businesses-- including service businesses, offices (medical, dental, etc.), government services (libraries, post offices, etc.), and nonprofit organization representation, including, at times, churches, even light industrial and housing.

Old postcard showing the town square in Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania.

Examples are places like the stores at the corner of 4th or 5th and East Capitol, which are across the street (or next to) a used bookstore, a dry cleaner, etc. Others are streets like Pennsylvania Avenue SE where there are a bunch of restaurants, coffee shops, banks, a post office, other stores and offices, etc.

An example of a place created pretty much to make $ would be something like Pentagon Row in Arlington. Granted that there is housing there and the retail serves the residents, I imagine that most patrons make subway or car trips to get there, and I would be interested to see what the distance is for the trips to get there.

I really embrace the distinction that Logan and Molotch make over "the use value of place versus the exchange value of place."

True Main Streets mingle the use value and the exchange value of place in substantive ways. The point you make about a "public place" is important, but that's not merely a function of being old or not, it's a function of the "functions," business _and_ other that are present there.

We still have a bit to learn from Europe. Photo of Cologne, Germany, by BERNARD E. DROEGE.

Movie tomorrow!

This is a great book about community organizing and urban revitalization. Some of the stuff inside will blow your mind (arson as a "redevelopment strategy" or discussion of the brutal redlining of neighborhoods to foster segregation and profit).

Holding Ground is a movie about the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative in Boston, a ground-up revitalization and redevelopment effort that is democratically run. It is well known for having "eminent domain" powers, which is why I am always hesitant to mention this example in DC, because here community development corporations are more well known for not being democratically run, for holding properties for years (called "mothballing"), for the demolition of historic properties, and for building horrendously ugly new buildings. Since eminent domain is a special power to be used carefully and lightly, I don't think DC's cdcs, have by and large, "earned the right" to execute such powers.

Since people in DC aren't too good about drawing the right lessons from revitalization (see Jane Jacobs' letter in the previous entry, making the distinction between ground-up revitalization vs. big projects and economic development "extravaganzas"), I hesitate to trumpet this example.

Nonetheless, the great grassroots community organization "EmpowerDC" is showing the movie "Holding Ground" tomorrow nite. This movie is about the organizing of the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative (as is the book) and it is an inspiring story.

_______________From the flyer:

Gentrification out of Control!

Residents Can Fight Back and Win!

Holding Ground

Tuesday, May 24th
6:30 – 8:30 PM
1419 V St, NW
Basement Conference Room
RSVP Empower DC (202) 234-9119

Holding Ground: The Rebirth of Dudley Street
A story of Hope about Residents who Came Together to form the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative and Rebuild their Community through grassroots Organizing and planning.


Parisa B. Norouzi
Co-Director/Organizer
District of Columbia Grassroots Empowerment Project
(Empower DC)
1419 V St, NW
Washington, DC 20009
(202) 234-9119

Jane Jacobs writes to Mayor Bloomberg

Redevelopment of the Brooklyn Waterfront is a big issue right now, particularly with plans recommending a move away from light industrial and all the good blue collar jobs it supports, in favor of upscale housing and big box retail. Just about anything Jane Jacobs writes is worth reading for its directness and insight. This letter is no exception. (See also: www.brooklynrail.org/local/april05/save.html)
__________________
Letter to Mayor Bloomberg and the City Council, From Brooklyn Rail
May 2005

Ed.’s note: The following is a letter written by Jane Jacobs to Mayor Bloomberg and the City Council about the rezoning of the Williamsburg-Greenpoint waterfront. As modified during the May 2nd negotiations between the Bloomberg administration and the council’s Land Use Committee, the plan now calls for some industrial retention and makes nonbinding, incentive-based provisions for affordable housing. Jacobs’s key point about the contradiction between the rezoning and the goals of each community’s 197-A plan remains valid, however. Here is the entire letter.

April 15, 2005
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and all members of the City Council, c/o City Council President Gifford Miller

Dear Mayor Bloomberg,

My name is Jane Jacobs. I am a student of cities, interested in learning why some cities persist in prospering while others persistently decline; why some provide social environments that fulfill the dreams and hopes of ambitious and hardworking immigrants, but others cruelly disappoint the hopes of immigrant parents that they have found an improved life for their children. I am not a resident of New York although most of what I know about cities I learned in New York during the almost half-century of my life here after I arrived as an immigrant from an impoverished Pennsylvania coal mining town in 1934.

I am pleased and proud to say that dozens of cities, ranging in size from London to Riga in Latvia, have found the vibrant success and vitality of New York to demonstrate useful and helpful lessons for their cities—and have realized that failures in New York are worth study as needed cautions.

Let’s think first about revitalization successes; they are great and good teachers. They don’t result from gigantic plans and show-off projects, in New York or in other cities either. They build up gradually and authentically from diverse human communities; successful city revitalization builds itself on these community foundations, as the community-devised plan 197a does.

What the intelligently worked out plan devised by the community itself does not do is worth noticing. It does not destroy hundreds of manufacturing jobs, desperately needed by New York citizens and by the city’s stagnating and stunted manufacturing economy.

The community’s plan does not cheat the future by neglecting to provide provisions for schools, daycare, recreational outdoor sports, and pleasant facilities for those things. The community’s plan does not promote new housing at the expense of both existing housing and imaginative and economical new shelter that residents can afford. The community’s plan does not violate the existing scale of the community, nor does it insult the visual and economic advantages of neighborhoods that are precisely of the kind that demonstrably attract artists and other live-work craftsmen, initiating spontaneous and self-organizing renewal. Indeed so much renewal so rapidly that the problem converts to how to make an undesirable neighborhood to an attractive one less rapidly.

Of course the community’s plan does not promote any of the vicious and destructive results mentioned. Why would it? Are the citizens of Greenpoint and Williamsburg vandals? Are they so inhumane they want to contrive the possibility of jobs for their neighbors and for the greater community?

Surely not. But the proposal put before you by city staff is an ambush containing all those destructive consequences, packaged very sneakily with visually tiresome, unimaginative and imitative luxury project towers. How weird, and how sad, that New York, which has demonstrated successes enlightening to so much of the world, seems unable to learn lessons it needs for itself.

I will make two predictions with utter confidence:

1. If you follow the community’s plan you will harvest a success.
2. If you follow the proposal before you today, you will maybe enrich a few heedless and ignorant developers, but at the cost of an ugly and intractable mistake.

Even the presumed beneficiaries of this misuse of governmental powers, the developers and financiers of luxury towers, may not benefit; misused environments are not good long-term economic bets.

Come on, do the right thing. The community really does know best.

Sincerely, Jane Jacobs

More on stadia: juicy info from Indianapolis

Indianapolis Colts stadium. Rendering from the City of Indianapolis.

Apparently, a new football stadium is a big issue in Indiana and Indianapolis specifically. In the article "Smaller NFL markets pay more for new stadiums" Matthew Tully of the Indianapolis Star reports that in larger markets, cities paid about 45% of the cost of a new stadium, but in smaller markets such as Cincinnati, Pittsburgh and Denver, these cities paid more than 80% of the cost of new stadiums.

So, DC is one of the largest markets and one of the larger television markets. Granted this story looked at football, not baseball, but why 100% of the cost in DC?

Note that the article mentions that "smaller markets offer less of the revenue, from local TV and radio deals, suite sales and sponsorship agreements." That wouldn't have been the case with the Washington Nationals, if their rights to ownership of television broadcast rights hadn't been given on a silver platter to the Baltimore Orioles.

For more interesting stuff, check out the Field of Schemes website. In this item, "Boon to Bust in Indy," on the stadium in Indianapolis, more detailed analysis yields an increase in annual tax revenues of $1.2 million for the new stadium. Is that a decent return on a $687 million "investment?" Uhh, no.

For more information, check out the Indianapolis Star Citizen's Guide feature on the Colts Stadium, as well as this special report.

Crude Awakening: Globe and Mail special report on peak oil

American values. Arnold and the Hummer and the American Flag. (Photo from www.treehugger.com)

"Wanton" use of energy enables sprawl. Cities are relatively efficient energy users, although food comes in from all over. With constant increases in the price of oil, will people continue to be able to live farther and farther out?

The Toronto Globe and Mail is running a special series on peak oil "... the economy has witnessed a tectonic shift, the kind not seen in a generation. Oil - $50 (U.S.) a barrel oil - is again transforming our world. To see how, the ROB today begins our most comprehensive look yet at the new energy shock. We don't know if oil prices will hit $100 a barrel or stay below $50 for the summer. No one does....

Two key changes have conspired to make world oil markets much more volatile. There is surging new demand for oil in fast-growing China and India, where the middle class is taking to the road in a big way. And in the Middle East, mega-producer Saudi Arabia appears to have run out of spare production to turn on and off the tap at will. There will be losers -- countries, industries and even workers. Just as powerful locomotives made obsolete almost overnight the vast network of canals built with the blood and sweat of immigrants in the early 1800s, so too will the gas-guzzlers of this century vanish."

You can keep up with this series over the course of the week:

SERIES SCHEDULE

THE GLOBAL CHALLENGE
Oil at the peak, the Canadian landscape, and Saudi Arabia's supply v. China's voracious demand
MONDAY: THE DRILLER'S FRONTIER
New technologies are helping engineers search underground so they can extract the last drops of oil
TUESDAY: THE EXPLORER'S FRONTIER
Is Azerbaijan the next Middle East? After 10 years of fanfare, the Caspian Sea oil balloon has burst
WEDNESDAY: THE TRANSPORTATION FRONTIER
The world is awash with pipeline proposals and money to fund them, but refinery projects are rare
THURSDAY: THE CONSUMER'S FRONTIER
Green cars, clean coal, fuel cells and wind power are all expected to help reduce the world's oil consumption
FRIDAY: THE DREAMER'S FRONTIER
Exploring the world for new fuels, scientists leave few geographic locales - and no locales - untested
SATURDAY: YOUR THOUGHTS, YOUR IDEAS, YOUR MONEY
We present readers' letters on the series - and report how smart money managers are playing their energy hand
FEEDBACK
We welcome your views on the issues raised in the series. Please send your comments to oil@globeandmail.ca
ON THE WEB
You'll be able to follow the series from beginning to end on our website at http://www.theglobeandmail.com/business

For a dystopic view of a future with limited energy, check out these movies.

Likely offline for the next few days

Am at this Project for Public Spaces workshop in New York.

University of Pennsylvania and West Philadelphia

I've written before about the University City District, an assessment-funded Business Improvement District in the area around the University. (Although I did have a conversation with a Philadelphian last week about the UCD and he surmises that part of the reason it is assessment-funded is that nonprofits like the University of Pennsylvania don't want to set the precedent of paying a tax of any sort, figuring it would give the state or local legislature too many ideas. He also told me that in the 1970s the University considered decamping, and leaving the city for the suburbs.)

Penn Bookstore. 3601 Walnut Street.

Opened in the Summer of 1998, the Penn Bookstore combines the elements of a full-service academic bookstore with the amenities of a Barnes and Noble superstore. The Computer Connection is housed within the bookstore and carries hardware as well as a wide selection of peripherals, accessories and software. Among the store's 130,000 titles are approximately 90,000 academic books, making it one of the most comprehensive academic bookstores in the country. It also features a large Faculty Authors section and extensive World News section. Throughout the store are murals and kiosks depicting the rich history and favorite images of Penn.

The development of which the bookstore is a part, University SquarePenn, was built through a $90 million commitment by the University, and is a 300,000-square-foot retail and hotel development on the site of former parking lot at 36th and Walnut Streets, creating a new social and commercial magnet for students, faculty and staff, as well as local residents and outside visitors. University Square tenants include:
- A new and vastly expanded University Bookstore which is now the largest campus Barnes & Noble in the nation;
- The 228-room Hilton Inn at Penn, a first-class hotel that includes18,000 square feet of meeting space; a new faculty club.
- POD a cutting-edge restaurant developed by one of Philadelphia’s most successful restaurateurs.
-Several high-volume retailers such as Urban Outfitters, Eastern Mountain Sports and Smith Bros. , as well as a Cosi sandwich and coffee bar.

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Anyway, the University of Pennsylvania came to understand that its health and success is in part dependent on the safety and success of the adjacent (very large) neighborhood, and that its enrollment yield is dependent in part on the vibrance and safety of the neighobrhood. The University responded to this fact with the West Philadelphia Initiative, a comprehensive and pathbreaking five point initiative to impact and revitalize the neighborhoods around the campus:

1. Clean and Safe Streets
2. Housing and Home Ownership
3. Improving Public Education
4. Economic Development
5. Commercial Development

Here's the section on Clean and Safe Streets:

A New Civic Partnership…the University City District

A key vehicle for neighborhood improvement has been the University City District, or UCD – a public-private partnership that Penn helped found in 1997 together with community groups, local businesses, government and other partner institutions such as Drexel University.

The UCD’s operating budget comes from voluntary five-year contributions from its member institutions, including Penn, Amtrak, Children's Seashore House, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Drexel University, U.S. Postal Service, University City Community Council, University City Science Center, University of the Sciences, Veteran's Affairs Medical Center and West Philadelphia Partnership as well as from businesses, residential and commercial property owners and community organizations.

In the past four years, the University City District’s logo has become a familiar symbol of a range of efforts to improve the neighborhood’s quality of life. Its core services include:

Safety Ambassadors: The UCD’s 40 Safety Ambassadors are distinctively uniformed, unarmed officers who patrol University City streets to help local residents and visitors, while serving as a highly visible deterrent to crime. The UCD headquarters also houses a Philadelphia Police Department Substation, staffed by 25 city police officers. Safety Ambassadors work cooperatively with Penn and Philadelphia police to share information on crime patterns, and develop joint deployment plans.

Public Space Maintenance: The UCD provides a team of uniformed cleaning personnel who regularly clean sidewalks and work to eliminate graffiti in University City. All 25 employees of the UCD’s Public Space Maintenance program are former unemployed recipients of public assistance. Most are themselves West Philadelphians who received job training through the UCD program and are now working fulltime with benefits, to improve the community’s quality of life.

LUCY -- Loop Through University City -- Bus: In partnership with the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA), the UCD has established a new minibus service that connects major institutions in West Philadelphia, including Amtrak 30th Street Station, Penn, Drexel, and other major locations. As an adjunct to the extensive network of SEPTA buses, trolleys and subways that serve West Philadelphia, the LUCY bus has made local travel even more convenient for those who are living, working or simply visiting University City.

Capital Programs and Planning: The UCD manages a variety of projects to improve the physical environment of University City. These capital investments include a variety of visible improvements in lighting, landscaping, directional signs, building murals and banners. For example, the UCD has created a new, user-friendly system of pedestrian signs strategically placed throughout the area marking the routes to major institutions and buildings. The UCD has also recently created a partnership with the Philadelphia Recreation Department to improve the management of Clark Park, the central park space for the University City community.

Marketing and Public Information: The University City District provides marketing and promotional initiatives designed to enhance the image of University City as a clean, safe and attractive environment in which to live, work and visit. UCD co-sponsors a weekly farmers’ market, and sponsors monthly events designed to highlight the arts, unique restaurants and international culture in University City.

New Street Lighting…UCBrite

In 1996 Penn and the West Philadelphia Partnership started a community lighting program called UC Brite. Under UCBrite, the University worked together with community members to light the neighborhood house by house, block by block. Specifically, Penn reimbursed homeowners and landlords in University City for 50 percent of the cost of both lighting fixtures and installation charges. Using local electricians, UC Brite helped homeowners install more than 2,500 sidewalk and house lights at 1,200 properties. As a result, 123 square blocks in University City are safer and more welcoming at night. The program is now managed by the University City District.

Planting Improved Streetscapes…UCGreen

This community-based project has brought Penn students, faculty and staff together with public schools and neighborhoods to enhance the physical environment in University City through planting new trees and greenery. So far, UCGreen has:

- helped renew 25 neighborhood blocks;
- planted more than 400 trees and more than 10,000 flower bulbs;
- created three children’s gardens and four public gardens.

UCGreen has focused on vacant lots, distressed parks and residential blocks. One example is the Lea School Garden. Through UC Green, what was once a 1,600 square foot concrete courtyard at a local public elementary school has become a thriving outdoor learning environment of plants, bushes, trees and flowers, a shallow pond and seeding area, a trellis and murals depicting the four seasons.. The children helped design the garden together with a professional architect while engaging in hands-on science activities with the support of Penn faculty and students. More recently, in November 2001, UC Green organized Penn and local volunteers to plant 150 trees in memory of the victims of the September 11 attacks along the main thoroughfare Chestnut Street, from 31st to 40th streets.For more information, call Esaul Sanchez, UCGreen director, at 215-573-4684.

Penn and Public Safety

Since 1996, Penn has taken broad steps to combat crime not only on campus, but also in adjacent areas of University City. The Penn Police Department:

- Hired 19 new officers
- Revamped its detective unit, bringing in four seasoned veterans from the Philadelphia Police Department.

The University of Pennsylvania and its partners in West Philadelphia have worked successfully to increase public safety in the area. In 1999 the University of Pennsylvania Department of Public Safety opened a new headquarters building on 40th and Chestnut Streets in West Philadelphia. The Philadelphia Police Department opened a new substation in West Philadelphia at the UCD headquarters.

Penn’s investment in West Philadelphia improvement reaches across hundreds of square blocks. It begins along the 40th Street commercial corridor that links the western edge of campus with the rest of University City. Over the past five years, Penn invested $12.7 million in new sidewalks, trees, lighting, bike racks and trash receptacles on 40th Street, along with developing major new retail tenants such as a premium freshgrocer and multiplex movie theater. The success of widespread streetscape and safety enhancements has been built on active partnerships between the university and local residents.

For more information on the sharp decline in crime in West Philadelphia, go to http://www.upenn.edu/police/dps.htm

University + Community = Bookstore?

I think that colleges and universities can be important linchpins to the revitalization of traditional commercial districts because the "captive" audience of the student population can be leveraged to support the development of businesses that the community wants, but lacks the kind of purchasing volume necessary to support such stores successfully.

One example is a bookstore. Communities want them. Bookstores are great additions to quality of life, especially if they do community events like author readings and signings, support the development of book clubs, etc. But remember that a $20 book only nets $8 to the store owner, out of which staff, utilities, and rent must be paid. You must sell a lot of books to make those costs. So a student bookstore located in the community commercial district, but adjacent to the college, can be a win-win. It provides a way to bring desired services to the community, and it also continually introduces students to the commercial district, and brings their buying power with them.

After the Main Street conference, I went up to Charles Village, which is adjacent to the Johns Hopkins University Homewood campus. The campus is a cloister, but even so the University is "leaking out" of its boundaries. I discovered a mixed-use project going on being done with Streuver Bros. and the Capstone Companies to build an office, dormitory, classroom complex, with some ground floor retail that will include the Barnes and Noble College Division bookstore that will relocate from the campus, bringing a combination student bookstore, regular bookstore to the neighborhood. (I wrote that Pratt has done this recently as well.) Howard University did this many years ago, although the store is on Georgia Avenue, it isn't by much residential. It would have been more effective as a community development tool had it been located further up Georgia Avenue in the traditional commercial district adjacent to the campus.

An e-conversation with Barnes and Noble alerted me to the fact that they have done this at the University of Pennsylvania and the College of William and Mary (Williamsburg) as well.

From the Capstone website.

"The architecture is traditional Georgian to reflect the Hopkins vernacular, with high-quality brick and pre-cast exterior skin, and a poured in place masonry structure.

Capstone was selected in January 2003 as co-developer of the Charles Village mixed-use facility at Johns Hopkins, adjacent to its main undergraduate campus in Baltimore, MD. This vertically integrated facility is being developed in joint venture comprised of Capstone Development Corp. and Streuver Bros. Eccles & Rouse, in close association with JHU. The program is comprised of 618 beds of undergraduate student housing, over 25,000 SF of living-learning and academic support spaces, a 24,000 SF state-of-the-art dining and conference commons, a 25,000 SF Barnes & Noble bookstore, and an additional 4,000 SF of retail space for a Hopkins related credit union. The site is roughly 1 acre and is located in a commercial/ residential district adjacent to the Homewood campus of JHU, which is being re-vitalized with this Charles Commons Development as the catalyst. This mixed-use facility is comprised of two mid-rise elements spanning an alley with a sky bridge connector. The architecture is traditional Georgian to reflect the Hopkins vernacular, with high-quality brick and pre-cast exterior skin, and a poured-in-place masonry structure. Included on our team for this JHU project are Ayers Saint Gross, campus /urban planners, Design Collective Architects, and William Jackson Ewing, retail merchandising and leasing.

Completion Date: September 2006
Development Cost: $74,000,000
Total Beds: 618
Total Units: 216"

City transit systems struggle to stay on track

CHUG CHUG: Left, rush-hour commuters rumble over the Chicago River on one of the city's elevated trains; at right, riders crowd a subway platform in Boston. Across the country, transit systems are in financial trouble - and commuters are feeling the pinch, with reduced service and higher fares. M. SPENCER GREEN/AP, JOHN NORDELL - STAFF/FILE. From the Christian Science Monitor.

Today's Christian Science Monitor reports in "City transit systems struggle to stay on track" that

"Flat or declining revenue, combined with big increases for fuel and labor costs and, in some places, declining ridership, has created cash-strapped agencies and a rash of fare hikes and service cuts. It's a situation that has public-transit advocates crying for more funding even as critics insist the agencies need to do a better job of paying for themselves, without increases in government subsidies. And some say that while multiple bailout options may help avert immediate disasters in places like Chicago, long-term solutions require a serious commitment to the idea of public transit."

"Transit systems have had a hard time over many, many years, and they've become very efficient," says Alan Horowitz, a civil-engineering professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. "We're providing an essential public service with transportation, and there still is a fairly large segment of the population that's dependent on transit. We have to decide as a society if this is something we want to support."

Transit agencies around the country have been feeling a pinch for some time, and customers are beginning to feel the cost. New York, Boston, and Washington, D.C., have all raised fares in the past couple of years, while Philadelphia has been threatened with fare hikes for months. Pittsburgh cut service along with raising fares, and San Francisco is holding hearings this month to consider both.

"It's a trend happening around the country," says William Millar, president of the American Public Transportation Association. "You have relatively flat income streams, skyrocketing major expenses" - including fuel, liability insurance, healthcare, and pensions - "and it isn't very long before that puts you on a collision course that requires drastic actions."

Mr. Millar and other experts note that transportation benefits people beyond direct customers by reducing congestion. The 2005 Urban Mobility Report, released last week by the Texas Transportation Institute, indicated that traffic delays would be nearly 30 percent worse - or cost an additional 1.1 billion hours - without public transit.

Both fare hikes and service cuts tend to make riders leave, Millar says. Both combined - the current plan in Chicago - can be disastrous."

Television advertising on buses in Atlanta.