[The Editors' Verdict] The Death and Life of Great American Cities

[Asia Economy] In 1961, a thick book was published in the United States titled The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Since then, it has changed the course of urban planning not only in the U.S. but around the world. The author was an ordinary housewife named Jane Jacobs. She was an amateur journalist with no formal training in architecture or urban studies. The simple question posed by this book, "Who is the city for? People or cars?" threw everyone into confusion. It was a question that shattered the conventional way of thinking.

At that time, the U.S. and Europe were rebuilding cities after World War II, adopting the so-called "Radiant City" urban theory as the ultimate guideline. This was a utopian urban theory advocated by the French architect Le Corbusier.

The "Radiant City" concept focused on demolishing old, dirty, and congested downtown areas to create parks rich in greenery, upon which high-rise apartments would be built. Highways and interchanges were constructed, and people were made to walk only on elevated walkways to facilitate automobile traffic. The result was a disaster. Downtown areas became slums again, and crime rates soared. White middle-class families moved en masse to newly built single-family housing complexes in the suburbs. The spread of automobiles and the construction of suburban railroads fueled this trend. The downtown areas continued to deteriorate rapidly in a vicious cycle. Jacobs witnessed how, contrary to the pure ideals and neat bird’s-eye views of the "Radiant City," urban public spaces were becoming empty.

The first part of the book deals with a positive evaluation of cities. The author argues that the complex functional order of cities should be understood not as chaos but as an organic order. She cites sidewalks as an example, defining them as the most important public space in a city. Streets lined with attractions become the backdrop for walking, protect citizens from crime, and serve as safe playgrounds for children.

Secondly, she claims that urban diversity is the source of a city's strength. The tightly interwoven diversity continuously supports each other economically and socially. Thirdly, she discusses in detail the harms of automobiles in cities. The automobile-centered "Radiant City" eliminates pedestrians and causes the collapse of communities. From an American pragmatic perspective, she also points out that the more space allocated to cars such as roads, the fewer commercial facilities remain to be taxed.

Additionally, she conceptualizes phenomena such as "natural surveillance," where the eyes of many passersby prevent crime, and the "curse of the border void," where the surroundings of large-scale single facilities like apartment complexes become desolate. This was a revolutionary shift in thinking at the time.

The positive urban characteristics proposed by Jacobs?complexity, diversity, and organic order?led to the emergence of a new movement called "New Urbanism" through subsequent research. In particular, the eco-friendly compact city theories adopted by many Western countries today regard this book as a textbook. The book begins with the statement: "This book is a critique of current urban planning and reconstruction."

It is bleak that Jane Jacobs’ critique still holds power in 21st-century Korea, more than 60 years later. Moreover, as the presidential election approaches, promises to supply millions of housing units of the "Radiant City" type are being made chaotically. I recommend this book to those who wish to prepare for the future.

Lee Kyung-hoon, Professor of Architecture, Kookmin University