America seems to be conflicted in its relationships with its cities. The story of twentieth century American society is really two contradictory stories; the first a rapid urbanization as agriculture became mechanized and the economy diversified, and the second a rebellion against that very urbanity in favor of sub-urban lifestyles. While Americans want high-paying office jobs, we tend to have somewhat parochial dreams. Cities, we hear, are polluted and littered havens of sin, corruption, and vice. The real America, we hear, is found in single family homes built around culs-de-sac with basketball hoops and Fords in the driveway.
Triumph of the City, by the Harvard economist Edward Glaeser, empirically turns much of what we hear about cities on its head. The subtitle of the book, “How our greatest invention makes us richer, smarter, greener, healthier, and happier,” flies in the face of the common reasoning on America’s cities. And really, the subtitle provides an incredible synopsis of the book. He visits the history of the city, from Rome and Baghdad to New York and Hong Kong, and develops the thesis that cities thrive because they provide people with connections. Smart people who live in cities meet other smart people who are working on similar problems, and the intellectual whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. New York, Silicon Valley, and early twentieth-century Detroit all serve as compelling examples of this proximity effect.
Glaeser uses research of his own and others to provide an empirical matrix backing up his central thesis. City dwellers have longer life expectancy, higher wages, higher reported levels of happiness, lower suicide rates, lower risk of accident, more romantic opportunities, and generally higher quality of life compared to their suburban and rural countrymen. Glaeser is not pollyannish about the challenges of cities, particularly in education, traffic congestion, and crime, but he believes we will (and already are) finding many solutions.
Speaking of traffic, we need to bring this around to transportation (it being the ITE blog after all). I met Dr. Glaeser when he came to Decatur to promote the book in February, and had a brief conversation with him about the role of public transit investment. We both understand that transportation and economic growth or land development quickly becomes a chicken-and-egg situation. He insisted that rail transit ought to only be installed when there was clear demand for it, and I tend to believe in the ability of infrastructure to shape the growth that eventually happens. Economists tend to side with him, and engineers tend to follow closer to my theory. I am in favor of smart projects, but I have more belief that properly induced demand can make a decent project a smart one.
Toward the end of the book, he outlines things that cities are doing to become successful, and he scores Atlanta favorably. Glaeser points to three circumstances helping Atlanta succeed: warm climate, bigness, and good higher education. He mentioned (in his personal appearance, but unfortunately not in the book) that Atlanta is like a smart Dallas or Phoenix. In the published record, he says,
As Atlanta has grown, it has also become remarkably well educated. The central city has about the same share of adults with college degrees as Minneapolis, and more than Boston, the self-proclaimed Athens of America. More than 47% of Fulton County’s adults have a bachelor’s degree, making them better educated than those in Westchester County (NY), or Fairfield County (CT), or Santa Clara County (CA), and almost as well educated as Middlesex County (MA).
Atlanta has a wealth of older colleges and universities. It was a center for the Union Army after the Civil War, and its remarkable roster of historically black colleges generally formed during that era. Emory and Georgia Tech, the latter explicitly modeled on Massachusetts schools, also opened their doors in the decades [surrounding] the Civil War.
… Between 2000 and 2008, Fulton County’s share of college graduates has grown two thirds faster than that of the country at large.
Just read this book in April/May…was a great book. Hopefully more people in the program and in general will read this.
Phil, I think we need to give you a prize for being the first comment on our website other than me and Donny.
I am an economist by training, but I agree with your point that urban form largely follows transport infrastructure. The question remains open whether this infra should be rail infrastructure rather than busses (except that rail has the obvious political advantage that it is much more difficult to dismantle once it is in place). I agree though with Glaeser’s point that building expensive public transit systems in empty cities is unlikely to revive them… See also my discussion of Glaeser’s book on http://dismalscientistsbookreviews.blogspot.com/2011/08/edward-glaesers-triumph-of-city.html
I think in small to medium sized suburban-styled cities (<1 million), buses are certainly the answer. But any time you have a significant downtown core with existing traffic congestion issues, the buses are not going to work. Even though they may attract some riders, the travel times on the buses are directly correlated with the travel times on vehicles, and thus there is no travel time advantage.
You can do fancy things with buses like giving them dedicated guideways and elaborate stations. But by the time you've done all of these things, you might as well have just built a train, which will save you millions on operating costs.