Ecopolis

In urban engineering, there's the concept of a bioligical city. The Discovery Channel ran a show called Ecopolis that touched on many of the ideas.

Fundamentally, the concept of a biological city comes from the ideal of a "living" city. Where the infrastructure we build is self-sustaining, to at least a degree. So that means plant life integrated with the design of the buildings and the urban layout; renewable energy in multiple forms; and a person-centric perspective on the layout of the city itself.

Discovery Channel chose Ecopolis because of the current green movement. The biggest concepts of the biological city have environmental friendliness as a result, but the vision is much larger than merely being ecologically sound. In fact, the perfect biological city would be something akin to an Arcology, just like the ones you could build in SimCity. Unfortunately, there are few who think arcologies are feasible in even the distant future. As such, engineering better cities as they are, now, is an achievable goal. It as close to an ideal city as we can manage, at least for now.

Detroit is the opposite of that ideal city. In this article from the Chicago Tribune, they put Detroit's problems into terrible focus. In it, they discuss the potential for Detroit to become America's city of the future, because everything is so bloody cheap. But being cheap isn't necessarily all that's needed. Because frequently, all that cheap attracts is the human detritus of society. Crime rates are high. Economic progress is low. Detroit itself needs a massive bailout.

But as the article points out,

"On a positive note, Detroit's homicide rate dropped 14 percent last year. That prompted mayoral candidate Stanley Christmas to tell the Detroit News recently, "I don't mean to be sarcastic, but there just isn't anyone left to kill."

At least he's honest.

They Paved Paradise and Put up a Parking Lot.

I recently purchased a book. Actually, that's a rather rare event for me. What with the infinite resource of the internet and a total disinterest in fiction, I spend almost no time in book stores anymore. Barnes & Noble has cheesecake to die for, though.

I picked up a book that I can safely say is worth the $20 it cost me. It's called A Field Guide to Sprawl. It is not directly anti-development, but it places images in front of you that can only lead to one conclusion; we're screwing up our planet in spectacular fashion.

The general point of the book is to define urban and rural developmental phenomena. They define well-known terms, like "Big Box Retailer" and a few less-known words, like "Boomburg" and "Starter Castle." You can guess what they mean, for the definitions make little difference to my point.

What the photos drive home is how devastating the current, unchecked, low-density expansion is to the planet and to the overall "nice" factor of our home. We go into an area, overpopulate it, destroy it, then the rich people leave, the poor people are left behind, we have a ghetto, and then we get the eventual sprawl of rich people ever outward, looking to get away from the horrid mess they left behind.

None of this is new. Conservationists and their ilk have been talking about this for the past 50 years. Pretty much since the dawn of Levittown, this has been seen. What I think is changing is that now, as opposed to even as little as twenty years ago, the effects of this sprawl are now very visible. The damage is real, as opposed to way off in the future.

I ranted and raved about yuppies and an earlier post. I hate them. Their unchecked expansion and total stupidity is, as I see it, the most destructive force in America. Materialism, the American Dream, and a population that's becoming ever more deliniated economically all fuel the expansion of America outwardly.

We aren't there yet. The world is not coming to and end, but sometime this month, the 300 millionth American will be born, and yet household sizes are at record lows. The growth is logarithmic, the worse it gets, the worse the getting worse gets. Within just one lifetime, we'll more than double our population. The US can NOT survive with current demographic distribution and a population of 600 million, or perhaps 1 billion. Eventually, we'll have giant megalopoli covering the entire landmass of the US like some sickened pestilence. Then there will be nowhere left to which the yuppies can escape. No new, virgin land they can bulldoze. It will all be done, and then what?

As I said, the world is not ending. Things are, in reality, pretty good. But we must begin taking action now, or the damage in the future may be too great to repair. Especially now, taking action can be pretty cheap. The government can heavily restrict development on virgin land. In my opinion, there are many areas of the country where development on virgin land should be halted entirely. Then, give developers subsidies and tax breaks for building up instead of out.

Population growth is not bad. In fact, I think it's great. If we are to achieve the wondrous, interplanetary civilization that sci-fi has foretold we actually need more people. It's the unchecked outward, low-density growth that's bad. We spread like a bacteria when we should be building towards the heavens.