GEOG 340: DAY 5
END OF CHAPTER 3, START OF CHAPTER 4
HOUSEKEEPING ITEMS
• A reminder that the meeting to protect Linley
Valley West is on for tomorrow evening at 7:00
at the Kin Hut in Departure Bay. The bulldozers
have already started to roll….
HOUSEKEEPING ITEMS (CONT’D)
• Please join us to watch the award-winning documentary film
SHIFT CHANGE at Vancouver Island University’s Cowichan
Campus on Friday, September 20.
The film examines employee-owned businesses that compete
successfully in today's economy while providing secure,
dignified jobs in democratic workplaces and growing healthy
communities. Visiting the 50-year old network of co-operative
businesses in Mondragon, Spain---and many thriving examples
of such businesses in the USA—SHIFT CHANGE shares the on-theground experiences, lessons and observations from the workerowners on the front lines of the new economy.
Check out this short trailer to learn more about the film:
http://shiftchange.org/video-clips/
We will be screening SHIFT CHANGE at 7:00 pm in VIU’s main
lecture theatre on the Cowichan Campus. Admission is by
donation.
DRAFT SCHEDULE FOR 340 PRESENTATIONS
NOTE: WEEKS ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE
NAME
Ashley
Dominique
TOPIC
(Ch. 4)
political economy of development (Ch. 8)
WEEK
this Thursday
5 (covering material from 4)
Natasha
Doug #1
Diego
Tara
Sarah and Keltie
Melissa
Thanh
Doug #2
Maggie
housing market (Ch. 9)
n’hood change (Ch. 9)
(Ch. 10)
social distance (Ch. 12)
messages of the city (Ch. 13)
architecture (Ch. 13)
shaping space (Ch. 14)
urbanism as a way of life (Ch. 14)
role of cities in eco-crisis (Ch. 15)
5 (Oct. 1st)
5
6
8
?
9
10
10
11
Chelsea
Property, crime, and homelessness (Ch. 15)
11
Thomson
urban growth in developing countries (some
portion of Chs. 5-7)
urban growth in developing countries (some
portion of Chs. 5-7)
TBA
12
Taylor & Emily
Chris
12
TBA
FINISHING UP CHAPTER 3
• The only major point left out in the discussion of
the pre-Fordist era was the phenomenon of
filtering in the residential sector. Relatively well-off
people build houses that are thoroughly modern
for their time. When they become obsolescent –
functionally, appearance-wise, or locationally –
then people lower down the socio-economic
ladder take over and the affluent move on to
new houses and neighbourhoods. This is an
ongoing process even today.
• Can you think of any examples of that in your
experience?
FORDIST ERA
• “Fordist” era of 1920-1945 brought great changes to
changes to cities, especially to the U.S.
• Fordism refers a whole variant on traditional
capitalism originally associated with Henry Ford: -mass production of consumables, --economic
horizontal and vertical integration, and --higher
wages for workers (so they can become
consumers).
• This was linked to a gospel of efficiency known as
“Taylorism” after Frederick Taylor who figured out
how to optimize the division of labour in
manufacturing and tract the most productivity. This
filtered over into the notion of how cities should be
planned – i.e. to maximize their efficiency for the
economy.
FORDIST ERA
• As mass production industries exploded in the U.S.
and Canada, epic migrations occurred, especially
in the U.S. Huge numbers of Afro-Americans
migrated from the South, where conditions were
harsh, to work in the factories – beginning during
World War I when there was a shortage of
manpower.
• As they were not welcome in white neighbourhoods, they created their own ‘ghettos’ (does
anyone know where the term originally comes from
and was first applied?).
• In 1929, a variety of factors contributed to the
beginning of a worldwide Depression and a quarter
to a half of the population became unemployed.
FORDIST ERA
The “dirty Thirties” were a period of
poverty and strife
FORDIST ERA
The “dirty Thirties” were a
period of poverty and
strife
FORDIST ERA
• The eventual response of capitalist
governments was to apply Keynesian
measures – increased public works
expenditures to provide jobs, the
beginnings of a welfare state, controls
on capital, recognition for workers’
rights, encouraging collaboration
between labour and capital.
• Roosevelt’s “New Deal” was a much
more robust version of this, but
Canada did some of the same under
W.L.M. King
• Prior to the Depression, in the affluent
‘20s, car ownership exploded and
suburbanization proceeded apace.
date
No. of cars
in U.S.
1894
4
1896
16
1900
8000
1910
470,000
1920
9 million
1930
27 million
FORDIST ERA
• By the end of World War 2 and, especially afterwards,
the car was to completely transform North American
cities and, indeed, cities all over the world.
• Governments began to
subsidize the car industry
by building roads and freeways (controlled access
parkways and expressways)
• Mass transit after the war
was systematically run into
the ground through a conspiracy entered into by GM,
Firestone, and Standard Oil.
FORDIST ERA
• By the end of World War 2 and, especially afterwards, the car
was to completely transform North American cities and,
indeed, cities all over the world, and with it there was a huge
rise in housing starts (see chart on p. 82).
• As noted before, the sprawl of cities matched the
predominant mode of transportation (see diagram on p. 79).
Slowly, lot size grew (initially suburban lots were small), and
densities fell.
• After the war, the Fordist (mass production) approach was
applied to building suburbs – Levittown on Long Island (12,000
homes and 80,000 people) and Don Mills in Toronto (its 2006
population was 25,435).
• Housing starts in the U.S. went from 90,00 in 1933 to 350,000 prewar to between 1.5 and two million until the recent meltdown.
• In both countries, mass ownership was facilitated by
government-backed mortgages and the GI Bill in the U.S.
FORDIST ERA
SUNNYSIDE GARDENS AND RADBURN
• Before the Levittown model took hold, Lewis Mumford,
Benton MacKaye and a number of progressive
architects formed a group in 1923 called the Regional
Planning Association of America (RPAA). They tried to
the buck the trend towards the “efficient city” by putting
more of the emphasis on humanist values.
• They developed Sunnyside Gardens in Queens, using the
“superblock” concept (large interior spaces for lawns
and gardens without roads) and Radburn in New Jersey,
with its street hierarchy and neighbourhood concept.
• Clarence Stein, one of their members later designed
Kitimat, B.C.
• Unfortunately, some of these ideas were distorted in
future subdivision planning, and as suburbs expanded so
did destination malls with an often disastrous effect on
CBDs.
REGIONAL DECENTRALIZATION AND SPRAWL
• In the first period (1945-1973), we have a number
phenomena:
unprecedented growth in the economy
close to full employment
the “baby boom” with the ‘classic’ nuclear family
urban sprawl and massive expansion of the freeway
system (a little less so in Canada)
explosion in the consumer culture
automobile-oriented culture – car representing
unlimited mobility, freedom for teenagers, services
catering to cars (drive-through restaurants, banks,
drive-in movies –and even churches!), destination
malls and strip malls.
huge expansion in air travel.
“Anywhere, North America”: the multiplication of ‘blandscapes’
REGIONAL DECENTRALIZATION AND SPRAWL
• All these affect cities. Can you think of how?
Because of the haste with
which I write these
lectures, I don’t credit my
picture sources usually.
Please do in your
assignments.
• The interstate freeway
system in the U.S. was the
most massive public works
project ever undertaken in
history. It was initiated in
part for national defense
purposes.
• The same period saw the
massive expansion of air
traffic with key nodes
emerging.
REGIONAL DECENTRALIZATION AND SPRAWL
• While the manufacturing belt in the
U.S. remained relatively stable until
1970, there was a gradual drift
towards to the south and west, with
New York, LA, Chicago, and Atlanta
becoming increasingly the focus for
‘higher order’ functions.
• Even manufacturing began to
move to the lower-wage regions of
the South – somewhat ironic of the
fact from the ‘teens to the late ‘40s
and beyond, Southerners (especially
Blacks were moving north) to get
the relatively good-paying jobs, and
were bringing their culture
(including their music with them).
REGIONAL DECENTRALIZATION AND SPRAWL
• While the manufacturing belt in the
U.S. remained relatively stable until
1970, there was a gradual drift
towards to the south and west, with
New York, LA, Chicago, and Atlanta
becoming increasingly the focus for
‘higher order’ functions.
• Even manufacturing began to
move to the lower-wage regions of
the South – somewhat ironic of the
fact from the ‘teens to the late ‘40s
and beyond, Southerners (especially
Blacks were moving north) to get
the relatively good-paying jobs, and
were bringing their culture
(including their music with them).
REGIONAL DECENTRALIZATION AND SPRAWL
• Another phenomenon are the
industrial parks, typically onestorey, often located by
freeways on the urban periphery on cheap land.
• In general, industry has been
decanting from the centres of
cities to “edge city” locations.
• Cities, which have relied on the
jobs associated with them have
had to fight to hang on to
industrial land, that is if they
make it a priority, because
condos pay better.