It's a Celebration

Slate recently had a very interesting piece on the planned town of Seaside, Florida. If you saw The Truman Show, you've seen Seaside - most of the movie was filmed there. I've never been to the town, so I my opinions are only based on photos and the descriptions of others. But I have a somewhat mixed reaction. I like how it looks, I like the plan to make a walkable town, the attempt to roll back the trend of building around automobiles. On the other hand, it's only made possible by very strong regulation, controlling what owners can and can't do with their property. The libertarian in me intensely dislikes that aspect.

Seaside, and other planned towns like it, such as Celebration, help frame larger questions. What kind of towns do we want to live in? Is New Urbanism really nostalgia dressed up as a movement? Free market thinking would indicate that the kind of towns people really want are suburbs designed around automobiles. Or is that putting the cart before the horse - is that what everyone is buying because that is the only thing available?

But more interesting to me is the more central question of design. How do we decide what is best in design? In my work, in engineering, this is often a very straightforward question: the ship must meet certain specifications for speed, strength, mission capability, etc. But once those criteria are met, the process becomes much more gray. Is it better if the messroom is forward off the galley, or starboard of it? Questions of arrangements, especially, fall into this category. The challenge is more akin to architecture, and city design. And very few engineers are equal to the task. I know I'm not. Luckily, not my job right now.

The challenges of design impact my city, my neighborhood, quite directly. Many in DC are now questioning the height limit. Unique among modern American cityscapes, Washington hugs the ground, and the skyline is punctuated by a handful of significant buildings - the Capitol, the Washington Monument, the Cathedral. I am a big fan of the height limit - it makes DC unique and special. Seeing the Cathedral in the distance from the Metro bridge still amazes me. Others argue that the height limit stunts the growth of the city, and encourages sprawl. But I've also heard about low tenancy rates at many office buildings, and a quick look at sites like Near Southeast show more space is coming. I say keep infilling around existing Metro stations, right up to the height limit, then worry about sprawl.

Closer to home, the Potomac Yard development is going up just a few blocks from my house. The renewal of the the largest undeveloped urban tract on the east coast is at least attempting progressive design. It's not a pocket suburb of cul-de-sacs and curving lanes - it is set up as almost a city-in-miniature, with a downtown commercial area surrounded by a grid of residential streets. As I said above, I'm not sure if I'm necessarily a fan of new urbanism style designs like this, but it is definitely better than another strip mall fronted by massive parking lots. And there is a chance it could lead to an infill Metro station closer to my place. In about 10 years...

So, what kind of place do we want to live? Distant suburbs and exurbs, with plenty of space for yards and garages and playgrounds? Dense urban centers, served by mass transit and only footsteps away from the full range of services and cultural activities? Do you want to own property in the boonies where you can do whatever you want with your land, or live in a condo with a million rules but right next to the Kennedy Center? I say give Burlington, Vermont some thought. Recently cited as the "Best Green Place" in the country, among it's other accolades, it's a fine town. Big enough, but not so big it suffers for it. But don't move there - too many people would ruin it. Go find someplace else like it, though.

Beyond cities and homes, what makes for good design? Is pragmatism the only yardstick, or should we give weight to aesthetics? But if "form follows function," isn't extra credit for aesthetics immaterial, since if it works well, good form will naturally follow? Then we just need to define function. It's easy to decide if a stapler works: it staples or it doesn't. How do you measure measure the functionality of a house? A city? Is a pleasing aesthetic part of the core function of a city? I think so, but taste varies so much, the city might "function" for some and not for others. I think you are starting to see why I'm an engineer, with more straightforward design questions, rather than an architect like Chris.