America's Utopian City

To whom it may concern,

With each epoch comes a different vision of the city. Since the beginning of modern city planning in the United States, these concepts have all been imported from abroad. From early English settlements to the influences of England’s Garden City and Switzerland’s Radiant City. Even Frank Lloyd Wright’s Broad Acre City remained little more than an idea as the separation of land uses and transportation modes emerged as the Urban Renewal and Interstate Highway programs of the 1950s and 60s. While we begin to shape sustainable city practices, the origins of sustainability can be traced back to growth management in Scandinavia. America is unique enough to have formulated its own ideal city, and in many ways it has evolved as a vernacular hybrid of many different and often conflicting concepts. France’s President Sarkosy recently issued a call for ideas for city planning in Paris. While this signals a return to grandiose city planning, it once again comes from abroad. All the issues surrounding housing, environmental justice, sustainability, climate change, water quality and conservation, the loss of our manufacturing base, green color jobs, and even the overall economy occur locally in cities. Why has this nexus between the health of our cities and the nation been consistently neglected at the federal level? What is desperately needed in this country is an American borne utopian vision of the city. Will this administration put out a call for projects to discover and support new city planning models and practices for the ideal American metropolis?

GUNNAR HAND, AICP