Death of former Washington Post columnist Roger Lewis

Roger Lewis was an architect and consultant on community design matters, and professor at the University of Maryland.  

The way most anyone has heard of his is that he wrote a newspaper column running in the Washington Post Real Estate section for many years, starting in the mid-1980s, called "Shaping the City." and he wrote about "good urbanism."  

He often drew a cartoon to accompany the column.

-- Obituary

At the time, his column, along with a then similar column in the Washington City Paper, educated me a lot about good urbanism--I was always into cities but after 1972, except for a stint in Ann Arbor, I lived in the suburbs, until I moved to DC in 1987.

I only interacted with him once, on the Design Review Committee for the 11th Street Bridge Park Project, aimed at adding park space to the city, a premier project across the river, connecting Capitol Hill and Anacostia and East of the River and West of the River. He was a great resource.

-- "Revisiting the 11th Street Bridge Park project as an opportunity rather than a folly: a new revitalization agenda for East of the River, DC"

His column was dropped in 2022.  When I met him he said over the yeas, some Post editors were into the column, others indifferent.  

But because architecture and especially historic architecture is one of defining characteristics, it's a shame that the Post has very little writing on architecture and urban design these days--although it's typical of newspapers across the country as they've downsized as a result of circulation losses.

In the US, besides writers at the New York Times, Inga Saffron at the Philadelphia Inquirer and John King at the San Francisco Chronicle are the two consistent writers on urban design.  But King is retiring, so it will be interesting to see if he is replaced with another top notch writer.

Christopher Knight, the art critic at the Los Angeles Times, writes a lot about architecture too, especially since his counterpart as architecture critic, Christopher Hawthorne, left the paper a few yeas ago.

Change takes a long time: Parks edition

Today we had a ribbon cutting for the new Fabian Lakeside Pavilion at Sugar House Park in Salt Lake, where I am on the board.  One of seven pavilions, they are about 60 years old.  The Park is about 70 years old, a regional park, and unusually, owned by the City and County jointly but overseen by an independent board.

The pavilion project is interesting for a bunch of reasons:

• the original pavilion study dates to 2016.  So it took 8 years to construct the first new pavilion.
• the park, being jointly owned by the city and county, has interesting problems with capital funding, as the agreement calls for joint and equal funding, leading to lots of paper and accounting issues.
• But the two different governments work on different Capital Improvement Planning (CIP) schedules and only last year did I figure out how to make the two separate processes congruent--for our purposes, the equivalent of one process
• the city started putting money aside for this pavilion 4-5 years ago.  The county a bit more recently.  
• the original design for the pavilion was very modern and execrable (a lot of architecture firms aren't interesting in referencing architectural history).

The latter made me blow up the meeting and we had a special session later where we worked out a style that was a bit more balanced, with some cues to historic park architecture.

After the board meeting, I happened to go to a conference with a session on historic park architecture, featuring buildings and structures of the US Forest Service, and I ended up writing a long paper about park architectural history.

And I realized for the first time that most park system master plans fail to discuss park architecture generally, let alone park architectural history ("I discovered a massive omission in local parks master planning: it fails to discuss architecture and design in an overt way," 2023).  Which dates to the late 1800s with railroads creating lodges to serve the large western national parks.  This approach to design was continued by the National Park Service when it was created in 1916 ("parkitecture"), and was updated in the 1950s for modernism.

For various reasons, state and local park systems tended to adopt this approach, abetted by the New Deal, when many state and local parks were built by various federal government works programs, using design guidelines developed by the National Park Service as the lead, but also the US Forest Service.  (Other federal agencies like BLM use the same guidelines.)

This issue was one that inspired my series of articles on gaps in park master planning:

-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part One | Levels of Service"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Two | Utilizing Academic Research as Guidance"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Three | Planning for Climate Change/Environment"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Four | Planning for Seasonality and Activation"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Five | Planning for Public Art as an element of park facilities"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning, Part Six | Art(s) in the Park(s) as a comprehensive program "
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Seven | Park Architectural (and Landscape Design) History" 
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Eight | Civic Engagement"

-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Nine | Second stage planning for parks using the cultural landscape framework" 

and specifically with architecture and the cultural landscape (""Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Seven | Park Architectural (and Landscape Design) History").

I suppose there are a couple more I should write, on transportation access ("Revisiting: Access to Theodore Roosevelt Island, a national park in Washington, DC," 2022), on planning for multiple agencies owning parks in particular jurisdictions ("Federal shutdown as another example of why local jurisdictions should have more robust contingency and master planning processes," 2013), and including for profit actors in the sector as part of master planning ("Why community recreation plans should include for profit actors: What do you do when important assets face dissolution?," 2021) which I've written about for even longer.

Still, 8 years.  One of the other board members really helped push this along in the past 18 months, so it does show the value of having independent boards.  Again, it puts in perspective how long change takes.  That's the equivalent of two political terms.  I always laugh when after 6 months or so people are complaining about the failure of newly elected public officials to do anything.

.... But you've got to invest in those boards.  The city and county have failed to do that.  Luckily, we have a couple of more engaged board members, and the board is becoming more active and less passive.

====

I fought to keep grills as part of the program.  Our park manager (the County) has been removing grills.  But because we are independent, they had to do what we wanted. I argued grills are part of equity. Similarly, we've developed some nice signage for the pavilion, although it's not quite installed.

Newark and Mayor Ras Baraka

Is the subject of a good article in the New Yorker, Ras Baraka's Reasonable Radicalism.  Particularly interesting points are (1) dealing with activist roots and running a city, (2) dealing with police as a safety measure and more broadly in public safety, and (3) he's running for Governor of New Jersey.  Plus his activist pedigree as a son of Amiri Baraka.

WRT (1), this is always a challenge for activists, standing for something but also being able to work within government systems to get things done.  He seems to be particularly good at this.

I always forget that he had been a school principal, which probably helps a lot.

GGW suggestion on making 90 bus line primary on its streets: bus on top, tunnel below?

While I haven't written for awhile, I have been thinking about things at a bigger scale, which will come out in some of the next entries.

As I get older, I become a little less doctrinaire, and given that in the US 92% of all trips are by car, I've resigned myself to having to accommodate them.  This is less the case in DC than SLC--which is the epitome of sprawl--but it's still an issue in DC.

Even though in DC on the major routes, bus riders make up a significant amount of the total people "throughput" on the street--e.g. on H Street NE, at least pre-covid, 40% of people throughput was by bus, via 300 bus trips, it's tough to corral automobiles, especially because most of the city, except the core is shaped by the automobility paradigm ("DC as a suburban agenda dominated city," 2013).

BeyondDC suggests in a GGW post, "One change to transform DC travel: Make the 90 bus truly awesome," that because the 90 bus line is the only major crosstown route, its uniqueness means that it should get priority on its streets.  

This is a problem because at many points the street is super narrow for an arterial

While it's unique as a crosstown route for buses, the same goes for the route in terms of motor vehicle traffic. 

And while I think the proposal is meritable, it's probably too controversial to ever get approved.

Not that my counter proposal is any easier....

In "Tunnelized road projects for DC and the Carmel Tunnel, Haifa, Israel example--tolls" (2011) and "DC and "city repair" of the urban grid," (2020) I suggest that a series of DC streets be "tunnelized and tolled" to separate commuter traffic from local traffic.  

It would facilitate faster travel for commuters--helping to maintain the relevance of Downtown as a regionally significant commercial district--it would also reduce the negative effect of commuter traffic on residents and neighborhoods.

Flickr photo by Elyse Horvath.

The 90s busline roadway could be brought into that proposed underground road network.  

It could get great urban design treatment on the surface where the bus would still run, because of frequent stops, while the tunnel would focus on satisfying longer trips.

With the tunnel, the surface street could become a kind of transit/sustainable mobility mall, at least in certain sections, using my Signature Streets model, the My Figueroa project in LA, etc..  

And you could run articulated buses to increase capacity.

Spitalerstraßße transit mall, Hamburg, Germany.  

Bi-articulated buses (3 sections) are allowed on the street

Image by BeyondDC.  50 foot road right of way with bus service in the middle of the street

Florida Avenue NE Streetscape Improvement (2nd Street NE to H Street NE)

I finally figured out how to ride buses in my greater neighborhood in Salt Lake City

Salt Lake City and the core of the County have decent transit, although it's best in the light rail transit shed which I don't live in.

The problem for me is that my mobility mindset is really shaped by the bike and point-to-point movement, that is going directly from origin to destination.

While there are a bunch of bus lines serving my area, and I can get within 5 miles pretty easily riding buses--since my congestive heart failure I am not supposed to drive, and I don't have the stamina to bike--mostly I get driven places.

The problem with point to point thinking is when bus routes aren't point to point.  In the eastern side of the city, the University of Utah Union is a key bus transfer point.  (The campus is also served by 3 light rail stations, and students get free transit access as part of their ID cards.)

But I only know the routes as they are, where I go to and from.  But there are bus stops for two major routes within a few blocks of my house and one of those routes takes me to my hospital.

UTA transfer ticket.

But when the line "breaks" and deviates from the main road, I get hyper and off the bus, to walk to the place where I know I can transfer, back to a different main road.

But it's really hard because of CHF, so I have to stop a lot and rest.

Saturday, after doing this to come back from the 9th and 9th Festival, I realized that my point to point approach doesn't work up here, that it's significantly easier if I go with the flow and when the bus route deviates to go to the University of Utah, so should I, because I can still catch the transfer bus there, and I won't need to walk as much.  It will also shorten many trips for me in terms of time, even if the distance is longer.  From the University website:

A new transit hub, located in front of the Union, will accommodate more frequent UTA bus service coming to campus. The Transit Hub construction project includes: 

• Expanding the bus stop and staging area 

• Relocating the ADA stalls to the pay lot 

• Creating a new entrance to the Union pay lot, which will be located at the north end.  each week.

Being less focused on point to point makes it easier to go to my primary hospital if I have to and other places.  Many of my primary destinations are within a 5 mile distance, and if you use the online transit trackers, pretty easy to get to and from.

Boommates -- Seniors living together (from Bloomberg)

Call them “boommates.” 

Surging costs for housing and other expenses are prompting baby boomers to take on roommates. A Harvard study estimates that almost a million Americans over age 65 now live with unrelated housemates ("NYC's Rent Surge Drives 86-Year-Old to Move in With a 'Boommate'"). 

To make ends meet, an increasing number of those 65 and older are choosing shared housing arrangements, helping save money in an era when many have fallen behind on retirement savings and there’s increasing concern about a loneliness epidemic.

... Versions of these shared living setups have existed for years, but they’re increasing in popularity as a surge in prices for housing, and pretty much everything else, coincides with the baby boomer generation entering retirement. There were 58 million Americans ages 65 and older in 2022, up from 43 million in 2012, according to Harvard’s JCHS. And a record 4.1 million Americans will turn 65 this year and every year through 2027, data from the Alliance for Lifetime Income shows. 

Even though inflation has cooled, senior adults are struggling to afford costs that have skyrocketed the last few years. In 2021, more than 11 million were cost-burdened, meaning they spent more than 30% of their household income on housing. While many retirees own their homes outright, others are stuck with high mortgage or rent payments. 

... In New York, rent has shot up 33% from pre-pandemic levels, and nationwide that figure is about 30%. For homeowners, increased costs for taxes, insurance and utilities have surged 26% since 2020. 

“We've seen an increase in older adults who are carrying mortgages on their primary homes including among people who are 80 and over,” said Jennifer Molinsky, a project director at Harvard’s JCHS. “And for those folks and for renters the cost burden rate is much higher. There's a much greater struggle with affordability. As we have more and more people in their eighties and over, that's a time when incomes really can't necessarily keep up with housing costs.” 

Revitalization in a distressed residential-industrial neighborhood: Pullman, Chicago, Illinois

I came across an interesting case study by the Chicago Business School, The Pullman Historic District: A partnership in place-based community investment, about the revitalization of the distressed neighborhood of Pullman, in Chicago.  

The effort was sparked by Park Bank, a locally focused community bank ("It shouldn't be a surprise that big banks are more comfortable dealing with large businesses | Community banking"), and its community development corporation which was doing a lot of housing rehabilitation.  It was also very much committed to community organization and involvement.

In planning, most cities use a 4 to 7 step ladder to summarize the economic health of a neighborhood: distressed, emerging, transitioning, and healthy.  Pullman is distressed.  The closure of various industrial businesses over the past decades decimated its economy.

With the Great Financial Crisis in 2008, the community bank was acquired by US Bank, which decided to continue to commit financial and technical assistance resources to the revitalization program in Pullman.

Main Administration Building of the Pullmans Palace Car Company, 1893. From a publicity brochure published by the Pullman Company. Pullman Company Archives of the Newberry Library, Chicago, Illinois.

Pullman was an industrial community, known for being the home of the Pullman railcar operation, which finally went kaput in 1955, although it manufactured cars elsewhere into the 1980s, and was later absorbed by Bombardier.

The community bank developed a plan to redevelop an old industrial site, which was complicated because of its size, community needs, and contamination.  

Historic Pullman homes come in a variety of different styles and sizes throughout the neighborhood. NPS Photo/Stephanie Schneider.

The original intent was to build retail and housing on the brownfield site, but wrt housing they realized they didn't need to build more, but instead should be focused on rehabilitation and re-occupancy of existing housing.

Just before the acquisition, the community bank received $50 million in New Markets Tax Credits, which passed to USB.  To meet self-dealing strictures, they spun off the CDC and gave the NMTC to it, which provided vitally needed capital.

At the time, Walmart was the only retailer interested. which was controversial, but people got a store and entry level jobs.  A community benefits agreement provided other inducements, as did the creation of a community center (eventually taken over by the parks department), and two light industrial facilities, for a total of about 1,200 jobs.

Like in DC at the time, when Walmart was expanding to cities. I ended up writing many entries on the issue:

-- "Walmart: in the city, vs. of the city," 2011
-- "Lessons from Walmart's foray into DC," 2011
-- "Wal-mart plays hardball with DC," 2013
-- "What community benefits are supposed to be versus what people think they are about," 2013
-- "More Walmart in DC," 2013
-- "6Ps, Walmart in DC and "I hate to say I told you so"," 2014
-- "Lessons from Walmart's foray into Washington, DC," 2011
-- "Piling on City Council for Walmart," 2013
-- "I hope for Aspen Hills' sake that Montgomery County is smart enough to learn from DC's planning errors with regard to Walmart's entry," 2012

-- op-ed piece, Washington Business Journal, "Temper Walmart glee with planning") 

While the case study lauds the Walmart as using an architectural style sympathetic to the local historic architecture, it looks a lot like the one on Georgia Avenue in DC.  At least the DC one has underground parking exclusively, rather than a big parking lot in front.  Vague historic aesthetic, nothing particularly specific.

To put into scale the jobs issue, the peak employment of the Pullman manufacturing plant was 10,000.  And there were many other businesses in the area, like International Harvester. So today, they have recaptured fewer than 20% of the jobs when the community was successful.  This is the reality of urban deindustrialization, either:

• closure of businesses
• consolidation of businesses with employment reduction
• replacement of workers with capital
• businesses moving out of cities 
• layoffs and tiered wages ("How the American South Drives the Low-Wage Economy," American Prospect)
• businesses moving overseas.

This is why I get angry when Republicans say "Democrats destroyed cities."  Elected officials didn't make those decisions.  And why spending upwards of $200 million on community improvement doesn't seem to have immediate effect.  From the study:

Place-based investing seeks to create positive economic and social returns in a given geography—say, a neighborhood: Pullman—through a coordinated influx of capital and development. The idea is layered: financial investors will see financial returns; “social” investors will see financial returns and community impact; and the community will benefit from economic development in the form of jobs, access to goods, services, housing, and quality of life. 

According to CNI10, the investments it spearheaded in Pullman between 2010 and 2019 brought $350 million dollars into the community, leading to the development of more than a million feet of commercial, industrial, and recreational space; creating 1,500 permanent jobs, a 43 percent increase for the area; and leading to a 136% percent rise in residential property values. Jennifer Bransfield—now the organization’s chief operations officer and general counsel— indicates that a majority of this investment occurred within a single census tract.

National Monument.  In 2015, the Pullman manufacturing site was designated as a national monument, the Pullman National Historic Park.  Planning document.

Evaluation.  The case study discusses the difficulty of evaluating the success of the funding.  Time, causality, and replicability are issues.

My point would be that as a distressed community, revitalization will take decades, especially given the nature of the types of vacant land, which cost extranormal amounts to come back online.

It presented Census data, which finds the area is still losing population and wage growth is stagnant.

Lessons.  "Don't drip money." Invest large amounts.  New Markets tax credits can be a good capital source.  The area has a logistics hub opportunity, brownfield site attracted other funding sources.

Future.  Chicago Neighborhood Initiatives, the re-branded CDC, is now working beyond the Pullman neighborhood, is developing a microenterprise funding initiative, and developing its capacity to invest and help other areas grow.

Planning relevance.  I think this project is a good example of my "best practice revitalization planning" approach, including the elements:

• a robust plan
• an implementation organization
• funding
• serendipity -- jumping on opportunities, like the National Monument
• recognition of the length of time required to execute the program

Revisiting: Need for social marketing initiatives around installation of neighborhood traffic calming initiatives: Salt Lake City

In June I wrote "Need for social marketing initiatives around installation of neighborhood traffic calming initiatives: Salt Lake City," about animus about a traffic safety initiative in my neighborhood.  I made the point that car-centric people don't understand how imprinted they are with automobile dependence, and their unwillingness to consider other modes (walking, biking, transit) and users, in this case all the kids who live in the vicinity of this oversized intersection.

But I also made the point that the City Transportation Department could have handled outreach a lot better--basically they didn't do any.  I sent a pdf of the blog entry to the Department Director, and they responded.

These are photos of a couple of outreach devices they deployed, including a signboard in the roundabout and a flyer dropped off at area houses.

And just this week, the City Transportation Department continued to refine the street markings, in keeping with the idea that the roundabout is a prototype, a test.

Quote of the day: cars and pedestrians

There's an article, "Push. Pray. Walk: After yet another death, should Toronto replace these dangerous pedestrian crossovers?," in the Toronto Star about pedestrian crossings--not full traffic signals--and how there are plenty of close calls, and deaths from time to time. I like this particular paragraph.

Much of Toronto’s pedestrian infrastructure — and this goes for bike infrastructure too — was seemingly designed with the idea that the city’s drivers would have some baseline level of aptitude and care. Maybe that was always naïve. Maybe driver behaviour has just gotten worse in recent years.

Either way, the aptitude and care aren’t there.

The first paragraph called out to me, but these are good too.

We can debate the nature of the problem — I tend to think one root cause is a driver education system that licenses too many people without adequate training — but regardless, the response from city hall needs to be about emphasizing infrastructure that protects and separates pedestrians and cyclists from cars. That means red lights that enforce a stop instead of crossovers that are treated as optional, and concrete barriers instead of paint.

A lot of drivers aren’t going to like that — they already complain that there are too many traffic lights and lane restrictions as it is — but the reality, I fear, is that road safety measures that rely on driver responsibility are banking on an unrealistic expectation. Toronto’s bad drivers have shattered that basic trust too many times.

Chicago sports stadium funding request, therefore Crain's Chicago Business runs special section

See "Framework of characteristics that support successful community development in association with the development of professional sports facilities" and "Good quote on arenas and stadiums as "performing arts centers" attractions for cities" and "Follow up: arenas and stadiums as "performing arts centers" attractions for cities: experience versus retail." 

I've been meaning to write about this in terms of Salt Lake.  The State Legislature forced the City to acquiesce to a team and related entertainment district for the basketball and new hockey teams.  Many residents are up in arms, blaming City Council and the Mayor, when they were faced with fait accompli.

My biggest problem with it is the failure to get a transportation demand management program focused on getting people to the games by transit.  Plus the teams are winter-based.  Will there be a good program to activate the space in the summer and fall?

Main article

About 80% of projects get public money.

-- "Are stadiums a smart use of taxpayer money?"

1.  The argument that there aren't many net financial benefits.

2.  Velocity of requests leaves little time for thoughtful consideration

For many in Chicago, the pace of discussion around the Bears' latest lakefront proposal, in particular, is moving too fast for the plan to be thoroughly evaluated. 

“When we think about how long a neighborhood park can take, the years grocery stores take, the thought that a project of this scale could just pop up when all these other projects have to go through rigorous analyses, just feels like jumping to the front of the line,” says Gin Kilgore, interim executive director of the nonprofit Friends of the Parks, which has concerns about building on the lakefront, wanting to keep the area “open, clear and free.” These same concerns led to the filing of a lawsuit against filmmaker George Lucas that prompted him to move the development of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art from Chicago to Los Angeles, as well as an ongoing debate on the construction of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park. 

“Everything’s been roughshod," says Chicago Ald. Scott Waguespack, 32nd, who was surprised when Mayor Brandon Johnson voiced his support of the Bears' proposal in April, and that the conversation has not yet been brought to the City Council.

3.  Threat of relocation to get funding.

4.  Stadiums increase team valuation.  But localities rarely get any benefit from their "investment."

“As a public policy position, we’ve taken the position that we will invest and give public taxpayer dollars to men’s teams, but we’ve never done the same for women’s teams,” Leetzow says. “Men’s teams have gotten a head start by about 50 years. The question for us as a culture is, are we going to do the same for women’s teams?” Leetzow believes that women’s teams can see the same valuation growth with the same “seed money" that men's teams receive.

5.  Soccer teams don't have the same access to public funding.

6.  Especially women's teams. 

-- "Soccer teams in a league of their own when it comes to stadiums"

“If we're going to build a stadium, we will privately finance. I’m not comfortable taking public money. Stadiums, in general, are not great investments,” he says. “They are big, expensive, costly to maintain and sit empty most of the time.” Given that Illinois already has high taxes and strained budgets, he says he wouldn’t consider adding to that public burden. Other MLS teams have successfully privately financed new stadiums, including the Nashville SC. Its Geodis Park is the largest soccer-specific stadium in North America.

-- "Consider stadium financing models that also benefit distressed communities"

This article is making an equity argument that the teams should be paying a set portion of revenue back to the city, also for achieving projects around the city.  And that there should be no pass on paying out.

-- "Harris Poll: Bears having a hard time moving the ball on public support for a new stadium"

-- "Never put a cemetery or stadium on valuable real estate" by economist Allen Sanderson

Years of research and a plethora of data, some of which I have conducted and submitted myself for professional publication, all point in one direction and to one conclusion: Sports facilities, regardless of activity or league, whether publicly funded or paid for privately, do not constitute a good investment for the sponsor. 

The closest one could come to an economic “wash” would be an arena that is home to an NBA and NHL franchise, plus the periodic concert, convention or other activity. By far faring the worst is a standalone NFL stadium that is used 10 days a year. As I testified a few years ago in New York, when then-Jets owner Woody Johnson wanted to move his team to the Hudson Yards area on Manhattan: “Hudson Yards is a valuable piece of real estate. There are only two things you never want to put on valuable property: a cemetery or a football field. Everything else is negotiable.” 

Another rule of thumb: Take any dollar figure a sponsor — of the Chicago Marathon, NASCAR, a Bears game, Democratic National Convention — gives you for the economic impact of that activity on the Chicago economy. Move the decimal point one place to the left and you’re pretty close.

... Most fans at NFL games are local in nature. They spend their $200 and three hours inside, say, Soldier Field, instead of at a Loop retail establishment or a suburban mall; they don’t stay in hotels. Net benefit to the Chicago economy? Approximately $0.