Reviews » Archives » March 2009

“The twentieth century, both in Europe and North America, has a poor record of successful new public spaces. Most seem to have been intended to dramatize surrounding buildings rather than support social life on the square. They are often geometric works of art best appreciated in their original form, as drawings.” {211}

“As urban designers we must work as surgeons or auto mechanics and repair the diverse broken parts of the city rather than trying to manufacture a completely new, self-sufficient, conflict-free urban machine. We must reorient our thinking toward centralization rather than dispersion, integration rather than segregation, and urban space that expresses its setting rather than superimposing order from outside.” {230}