In celebration of The Municipal Arts Society’s exhibition, Jane Jacobs and the Future of New York, I’ve decided to reread Jane Jacobs’ seminal work The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Much of what will be showcased on smogr will be for my personal notes and to use this process to work through my thoughts on Jacobs, the greater question of urbanity and the effects of Mid Century Modernism on the city and Polis. I’m going to do something new, and turn on comments for each book club entry, and we can see what sorts of conversations we can have. Please tune your browsers to the main page, smogr book club – The Death and Life of Great American Cities to follow along, or just periodically return to the main page for updates. A housekeeping note: I am working off the 1993 Modern Library New York version, your versions may differ. Use the following link and you can kick back some money my way: The Death and Life of Great American Cities.
With that taken care of, I am sure you are asking why should we even review Great American Cities anyway? Why should we discuss a book that is over 46 years old, based on a reaction to an orthodoxy which has long been deemed invalid, and potentially harmful? Hasn’t Jane Jacobs won? Hasn’t monolithic, centrally planned construction been eradicated from today’s cities?
In the end, the forces which Jacobs spent her entire life fighting are still at work, and while urban cores are regenerating throughout the US, her thesis and notes on successful cities are still valid today. I am still initially doubtful that Jacobs is the touchstone which all good wisdom falls from, but I am a receptive mind on many matters.
What is extraordinary is that while the New York City Jane Jacobs lived in is so radically different from my New York City, her thoughts on urbanism and New York City were such a radical departure from the norm at the time, and frankly still is a departure from ideologies currently en vogue (New Urbanism – but more on that later). What is interesting about this book is that you can read it on two levels: a history of the fight of a neighborhood against colossal power or an antiquated tome regarding outdated ideas or a blueprint of how to approach and live in the polis.
OK, so you sold me; how is this going to work?
I don’t really know – time permitting, we should be able to get through a chapter every two weeks. I plan on posting my notes on the chapter and then a summary. As the inaugural book club progresses, I am sure that the format will morph into a form distinctly different from what I imagined. But thus is the power of the Internet – please comment on ways I can make this a better experience for my one reader.
Please begin reading the Introduction, which consists of two parts:

• Thesis statement, and
• History of orthodox planning circa 1960

I will post my notes near the end of the week and next week post my summary and questions. With that said, welcome to the Inaugural Smogr Book Club!