I'm stealing this from Gabe's blog, TransitMiami.  It's too good.  Maybe you've seen it before, but I hadn't.

Reminds me of Sheller & Urry's "The City and the Car"¹:

Automobility is a complex amalgam of interlocking machines, social practices and ways of dwelling, not in a stationary home, but in a mobile, semi-privatized and hugely dangerous capsule. [...] As people dwell in and socially interact through their cars, they become hyphenated car-drivers: at home in movement, transcending distance to complete series of activities within fragmented moments of time. The car is thus not simply an extension of each individual; automobility is not simply an act of consumption since it reconfigures the modes of especially urban sociality. [...] Most importantly, there is an implicit underlying threat that is barely addressed by theorists of civil society: that the very freedom of mobility necessary to publicity somehow also holds the potential to disrupt public space, to interfere with the more stable associational life and to undermine proper politics. Mobility is the enemy of civility.

_{1. Sheller & Urry, 2000.  International Journal of Urban and Regional Research Vol. 24.4: 737-757.}

Today Universalhub.com alerts us that the Boston Public Library has put a bunch of photos from its collection on Flickr.  Check them out.  Very cool stuff.

I find it especially interesting to consider which landmarks the city has been proud of enough to put on postcards.  For instance, they seemed to like having roadways along the Charles.  Do they still make postcards of North Station?  The Mystic River Bridge (right)?

...Van Jones is GREENING the world near you...

The January 12, 2009 edition of The New Yorker featured an interesting article on Van Jones, founder and president of Green For All. He recently gave a lecture in New Bedford. Jones, a supporter of Barack Obama, is an even greater supporter of collective efforts to affect significant change from the ground up. Of Obama he asserts, "One man is not going to save us...And, in fact, if you want to be real about this...Not only is Barack Obama not going to be able to save you - you are going to have to save Barack Obama." Regardless of whether or not you agree with such a bold statement, the fact is that even Obama has been very clear from the get go, a successful future is contingent upon everyone doing even a small part to usher in change. Jones is as charismatic on paper as he is in person. The New Yorker article is definitely worth perusing.

Enjoy!

As an aside, Van Jones will be among the featured speakers at next week's National Green Jobs Conference in DC.

I'm sure at some point during our UEP tenure we've all read at least an excerpt from Herbert Gans' Urban Villagers, so we share some understanding of the history of the West End.

A quick overview would read a little something like this...

• Thriving, ethnic community, occupying prime downtown real estate.
• Deemed blighted, skid row and targeted for 1960s-style urban renewal program.
• Redeveloped to house a hospital and high rise apartment complexes.

The project displaced thousands and quickly came to represent the ill-conceived vision of the city's (nascent) planning authority.

50 years later, most don't even know where the "West End" is or what it once was. Its history has been left to the review of policy and planning students.

Yet, as one article mentions, there are those who, in recent decades, have been fighting against further development in an effort to preserve the sense of community that persists. 

And so it is through this lens that many view the recent renaming of a Green Line T stop as a small victory. The Museum of Science stop has been renamed Science Park/West End in homage to the historic area.

Certainly it is a nice gesture, albeit belated, but one wonders what such a nominal honor means to most of the people who will ride the train to and from the stop. The generations brought up since its demolition most likely have no memory of the West End as it once existed. And, given the construction that has taken place since, many passers-by would be hard pressed to visualize what the area looked like in the middle of the last century. Even redevelopment of the North End has reduced what used to be the most accurate point of reference to a generic yuppie playground.

Standing on the Blue Line platform at Government Center, one can see a faded remnant of the Scollay Square marker on the wall, but even I have a hard time conceiving where a train to Scollay Square might have taken me. While grabbing a morning coffee at the local Dunkin Donuts, or a post-work beer at the Red Hat, is one really able to picture the variety clubs and taverns that once dotted Bowdoin Street, home to barroom brawls and burlesque shows, staples of a once-notorious nightlife. It was Times Square before Times Square (and pre-Guiliani). 

In the end, I appreciate the signage for the gesture that it is, but wonder what it is gesturing towards. A nameplate marking a lost past hardly does justice to the cost incurred by those who renewal displaced. For the rest of us, I wonder…is the sign indicative of where we are, or where we’re going?

Brown Bag Lunch presentation

by

Monday, Feb. 2nd at Noon

97 Talbot Ave (UEP’s Brown House)

It’s easy to despair about the foreclosure crisis currently sweeping the country; but fortunately, in Boston at least, people are getting together to do something about it. City Life / Vida Urbana is a tenant organizing group that’s been helping people in Boston fight for affordable housing for the last 35 years, and now has its sights on foreclosed buildings. With the help of hundreds of volunteer student canvassers, they’ve organized a “bank tenants’ union” to help folks in foreclosed properties fight for their rights. Come and hear what one group is doing, and how YOU can get invovled. For more information, contact Abi Vladeck at abigail.vladeck@gmail.com.

Presented by Tuft’s Student Policy & Planning Association

The following is courtesy of Abi Vladeck:

We see a lot of news stories about homeowners in foreclosure – people who were sucked into a predatory loan, were victims of a sudden chill in the housing market, or turn out to have been just one pink slip away from default. 

It’s easy to forget that renters are affected by this crisis, too.  In fact, in cities like Boston, more renters than homeowners are living in foreclosed properties.  

Luckily, they’re getting some help.

City Life / Vida Urbana is a tenant organizing group that’s been helping people in Boston fight for affordable housing for the last 35 years, and now has its sights on foreclosed buildings.  With the help of hundreds of volunteer student canvassers, they’ve organized a “bank tenants’ union” to help folks in foreclosed properties fight for their rights.  

Banks aren’t set up to be landlords; when they take over a building, they try to get the tenants out in order to sell it.  In Massachusetts, they can’t legally evict people in these “no fault” foreclosures, so instead they offer “cash for keys” – a token sum of money – if the tenant will leave the apartment ASAP.  But most people don’t realize that this is a negotiable offer, and assume they’re being kicked out.

City Life helps people understand their options.  Some people want to stay in their homes, and continue paying rent (to the bank – hence “bank tenants’ union”); others want to leave, but with adequate compensation for their lost security deposit, and for the expense and hassle of finding a new place.

 So far, CL / VU has helped people in dozens of properties stay in their homes; has helped others double, triple, or quadruple their initial cash-for-keys offer; and connected hundreds of people with free legal services and housing counselors. 

I think it’s fair to say that your average working class American feels pretty powerless right now.  People are working harder for less.  Healthcare (when you can get it) is getting more expensive.  We were sold dream of homeownership, and now it’s turning into a nightmare.

But organizations like City Life give people the resources to fight back.  It’s not just about telling people what their rights are, or helping them minimize their losses.  It’s about orchestrating a re-alignment in political power. 

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If you're interested in learning more about what you can do to help the fight against foreclosures, please join us for a Brown Bag Lunch with Nick Hardigan on Monday, February 2, 2009, 12-1:15, Brown House Classroom.

Welcome back!  We hope your break was full of friends, family, relaxation, and as many instances of excessive eating as you could have possibly hoped for.  Mine certainly was.  

But now it's back to the grind.  To start this semester off, I'll briefly mention some recent stories in the Globe that you may have missed.  The first centers around a report by the Harvard Institute of Economic Research suggesting that attempts at stimulating local economies won't get very far without making the place a desirable place to live in (and in fact, livability often leads to economic stimulus).  The report actually dates back to 2000 (it's here, if you feel like reading through it), but I'm sure most of us will find that its findings are no less relevant now than they were nine years ago.

The second article presents an interesting perspective on how cities might affect us psychologically.  The gist is that cities slowly drive us nuts, and we have to mitigate their harmful effects on our psyches by regularly exposing ourselves to"nature" (loosely defined).  Not terribly groundbreaking on its face, but there is some interesting discussion regarding how we respond differently to different natural features.

The third piece notes that Gov. Patrick signed into law a Bicyclists' Bill of Rights, which the state's bicycle lobby has pushed for years.  Kudos to all involved.