Ignore Pruitt-Igoe, Experiment With Big Box Development
I had another “connecting the dots” moment the other night. After reading Austin Contrarian’s thoughts on big box development, I started thinking about the symbolic end to Modernism.
[Image: Cartoon courtesy of Empire Wire.]
How much has the failure of Modernism to address social housing affected experimentation in development?
First, let’s start with Chris Bradford’s speculation on the introduction of big box development into dense urban centers.
Costco and Wal-Mart and Home Depot don’t know how to build urban stores — yet. They need to experiment to get it right. They have to learn how to handle parking, how to build up rather than out, how to cater to the slightly different tastes of urban dwellers. They have to learn how to fit a big store in a dense city.
They are trying to experiment. But they need to experiment in the right places.
Despite my distaste for big box retail, this makes sense. Perhaps my inability to think outside the “box” on this particular issue has clouded my ability to reach this conclusion. I do not intend to be sarcastic about this either, I think it highlights a fundamental character of American culture. To this point, consider a line from Hilary Clinton’s speech at the Democratic National Convention Tuesday night.
“In America, you always keep going. We’re Americans. We’re not big on quitting.”
Perhaps better suited for a political pep-rally, but I think it illustrates one of our eternal ideals quite well. Given this prevalent attitude, then, I believe there has to be some other reason than NIMBYism – some X factor – holding us back.
Enter Pruitt-Igoe, an award winning building demolished in 1972 for its utter failure as livable social housing.
[Image: Pruitt-Igoe demolition in St. Louis, 1972. Courtesy of Alicia Patterson.]
I previously mentioned this project’s impact on urban development towards the end of this post, and I bring it up again because it is perhaps the most symbolic event signifying the end – or failure – of Modernsim. I don’t intend to suggest that Modernism was a complete and valueless failure, but the idealism towards the modern man and his dwelling lacked foresight on certain occasions. To this end, I will speculate that there is a residual impact, from Pruitt-Igoe, on the number of opportunities for big box retail to learn how to inject themselves into dense urban environments.
A few commenters on Chris Bradford’s post look to Target as having already achieved some success. They suggest it can serve as a model for the Home Depot’s and Walmart’s that usually only thrive in suburban America. I would agree, with one exception – parking. Perhaps it’s my limited exposure to urban Targets, but I have seen a few. They tend to be in a shopping hub, or block, which wraps around a large parking deck. I don’t find this particularly successful because all pedestrian activity happens completely interior to the structure. Parking is still the driver and does not promote street life.
Now, if you think about the shopping experience at one of these stores, an individual is usually buying in bulk or large items. Therefore, it’s only logical for the car, and thus parking, to be an important component. I believe, for this reason alone, I have put big box retail out of the realm of possibility for dense urban centers.
However, maybe we just have not experimented enough as Chris suggests. In the end, what it really comes down to, as Chris also points out, “The city needs to offer the conveniences of the suburbs.” Let’s face it, the suburban lifestyle, with the convenience of the urban lifestyle is what most people want.
What do you think? Would you be willing to let Walmart, Home Depot, and others experiment in your city in order to evolve big box retail?
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I wanted to say that despite it making little sense nowadays for smaller retail outlets to exist alongside bigger stores, that from a social perspective this would mean that these kinds of jobs and careers would be become obsolete to the average worker, leaving them with more of the things people gripe about in relation to Wal-Mart, car companies and other tight-fisted assholes. Life from an economic perspective is so inhumane, when it fails to talk of community-based principles for the masses (remember us?). I don’t like looking at life as though many are simply automatons, but I don’t have a family, or a job, and I don’t know where the drive comes from for all the rest anymore. Sure, necessity is the main concern, but also it appears that at large people are willing to go along with some pretty dumb directions, despite often having a real depth of character. I’m grateful the world is still functional, but rather than see the human race as plucky or resilient as our media’s spokespeople often illustrate, I too often feel shocked, that such a barbaric and greedy ruling class puts our species through so much, and all we can do is willingly forget and resume our meaningless existence as expendable workers in a pigpen. The rich and powerful are too stupid to understand how shallow and selfish the’ve become, but because they control the media, dissident voices from the cities, towns, farms and the suburbs are barely heard (we don’t even have real public programming). You got cities of hundreds of thousands all over the globe filled with people by and large who just believe what their priests and politicians are telling them, never giving a second thought to where their taxes are going, and the fact that they never really own much in their life, unless the bills are always taken care of. The majority exist to make life much simpler for the wealthy, and many of us will semingly defend that right to the death. You know, Lucas made Star Wars in response to Vietnam, on how the huge technologically-advanced superpower goes into a small country of soldiers who are only on foot, in the jungle. Oh, the scourge of Communism. Imagine! One day, we’ll all be dead, and the overclass will have some other clones to kick around, eh?
That guy who designed the Pruit-Igoe complexes was an ass. This guy was no Frank Lloyd Wright. He did the Twin Towers, easily the worst-looking skyscrapers (excluding postmodern). Much of his work is pretty unspectacular. The problem with many so-called modernists is that they were merely high society snobs, showing off to their friends. The could care less about the little man, and this shows with the subsequent embracing of the newer design language. It was all just following current trends to them. It’s even worse now in some sense, because now they are reapplying ornamentation that is as much or even more offensive to many because it is too subjective. Only a supreme twit would spend millions on a building to house fellow humans that was really so inadequate. Don’t tell me about the failure of modernism. I’ve read that many times in reference the demolishing of these buildings. Philip Johnson for example was never even a true modernist. More like a closet homosexual, ex-fascist, high society shill. All the clowns in American and International media who would trump his work over Le Corbusier, Wright, or anyone with half a heart for humanity just because he got more publicity, probably also have the souls of slave owners. No love for the common man.
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Today I made my seasonal trek out to Target and Ikea in South Philadelphia – which I had to pick up a car-share vehicle to get to. Both are located in an enormous area of Philly, developed for the sole purpose of becoming a strip shopping center/big box chain mecca accessible to both city dwellers (myself) and those a little farther off the city grid. Parking in this area is abundant, but the traffic (which granted, it’s a holiday weekend) was unbelievable. I’m beginning to believe that a decent parking solution has yet to be discovered, regardless of location.
As far as the migration of these stores from suburb to city goes, maybe there are other factors as well? I would assume that profit/economic issues would have as much to do with their locations as space/parking issues. To generalize – many urban residents live on tighter or riskier budgets than many suburban residents. In good economic settings, I think these stores would have no issue thriving nestled into the urban fabric. But in times of economic hardship they may feel the hit a little harder in an urban setting as opposed to areas with a little more economic padding. Space comes at a premium, and while I think Wal-Mart would be able to afford putting a store by independence mall, it might not be the most profitable location.
To a degree I think there has been some success with extra large retail chains in urban areas, mostly in clothing & department store goods (ie: Macy’s, Boyd’s, Lord & Taylor.) In Philadelphia at least, the small boutique shopping isn’t an option to a large portion of the public, although it hasn’t died out. It’s simply too expensive compared to the H&Ms and Kmarts. Perhaps the combination of prices, locations, and diverse goods – with little local competition – has allowed them to dominate that particular market. It may be useful to begin with these types of store as models if Wal-Mart and the like are even interested in breaking into the Urban market.