Clean Slate

For the past week or so I’ve been contending with one of those things that makes you feel, or tells you that you are, old. My back has turned on me, forcing me to inch around my apartment, walking like Frankenstein’s monster -- when I can actually stand. If anything, it has allowed me the chance to watch a lot of Hawaii Five-O, and in between, do a bit of reading. One of my choices was the Historical Atlas of the United States, by Derek Hayes. Studying the evolution of the North American continent from sparsely-inhabited to open space-challenged in a period of five hundred years, the maps and Hayes’ narration got me to thinking about what it would have been like to be around to see the fledgling New Amsterdam settlement, huddled against the southern tip of Manhattan Island, with pastures to the north and oyster shells piled on the shores. What would mission-era Los Angeles have been like, with the expansive basin undeveloped between the small settlement and the shores of the Pacific miles away, with no Wilshire Boulevard or Interstate 10 to connect the two? How about walking the Great Plains, unable to see above the native prairie grasses? Or the Chicago River before it was turned green each year for St. Patrick’s Day? These thoughts have always fascinated me, and the whole idea of starting a city from scratch has intrigued me, if not called me to buy a copy of SimCity.

City building is a continual human endeavor, even today. There will always be the polishing and tinkering performed on all modern cities. Metaphorically, the striving for the “new” will never end. Look at the west side of Chicago, which when I was in college there in the mid-nineties, it was a place to avoid. Now, with the influx of gentrifying forces, it is the place to be, particularly with the razing of Cabrini-Green, one of the most infamous public housing communities in the country. Of course, not everyone has benefited. Nonetheless, the march continues on. Likewise, in the thicket of Long Island, Charles Wang, owner of the New York Islanders and founder of Computer Associates, along with his real estate partner Scott Rechler, are looking to transform the hamlets of Old Bethpage and Plainview with a 166-acre parcel they seek to develop with a number of uses.

But what about entirely new cities rising from the ground in a world where it seems that potential sites have pretty much been exhausted? For instance, about sixty miles north of Los Angeles, along Interstate 5, three massive projects on the existing 270,000 acre Tejon Ranch are making their way through the land use and environmental approval processes. The three developments together would comprise about 50,000 acres, leaving the majority of the ranch intact. However, the magnitude of such a project has raised eyebrows in a region well acquainted with swallowing huge swaths of land for new development. The cornerstone project, Centennial, would include 23,000 homes and all of the amenities required to support a community of approximately 70,000 people. The second project, deemed Tejon Mountain Village, would include 3,500 homes catering towards the second home set. Finally, the third parcel would involve the construction of industrial park facilities. Literally from the ground up, a new city would be born. The approach is well in keeping with Alan Berger’s Drosscape view of urban expansion, where he charts the growing prevalence of communities about 50 miles beyond existing metropolises to serve the distribution needs of our national and international transportation network. (See prior post dated December 5, 2006). The Tejon Ranch plan is also in line with another familiar trend.

This next stage in city building is in some ways an attempt to provide what suburbs did in the last century -– provide that enclave separate and apart from the central city. With Americans increasingly accepting difficult commutes, living 60 miles from the office does not seem out of the question for many. If cheaper housing and quality amenities are present, the dream of “escape” has been granted again. When new settlers first planted themselves on Manhattan, and on the banks of the Chicago River and in the Los Angeles Basin, in some ways they also sought such an “escape,” to forge their own paths, and create something new. For me, I’m perfectly happy accepting my fate of being "old," at least when it comes to my choice of address. Following the trail of millions of others over the last five hundred years, I'm content to remain planted in Brooklyn. Not to mention, my back shouts to me to preserve it a bit longer, and avoid the sixty-mile commute each way.