Urban Design Downtown
Author | : Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris |
Publisher | : Univ of California Press |
Total Pages | : 392 |
Release | : 1998-10-19 |
ISBN-10 | : 0520919327 |
ISBN-13 | : 9780520919327 |
Rating | : 4/5 (27 Downloads) |
Download or read book Urban Design Downtown written by Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1998-10-19 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The corporate downtown, with its multitude of social dilemmas and contradictions, is the focus of this well-illustrated volume. How are downtown projects conceived, scripted, produced, packaged, and used, and how has all this changed during the twentieth century? The authors of Urban Design Downtown offer a critical appraisal of the emerging appearance of downtown urban form. They explore both the poetics of design and the politics and economics of development decisions. Following a historical review of the various phases of downtown transformation, Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris and Tridib Banerjee turn to contemporary American downtowns. They examine the phenomenon of public-space privatization, arguing that corporate open spaces are the consumer-oriented result of policies that have promoted downtown renovation and restructuring but at the same time have neglected the cities' existing poverty-stricken cores. The book's case studies of individual West Coast downtown projects capture the essence of late twentieth-century urbanism. This analysis of downtown urban America, which offers extensive insight into the design and development process, will interest architects, city planners, developers, and urban designers everywhere.