Four easy steps to better cities

Watching a recent BBC documentary, I was reminded once again of the impact that Jane Jacobs had on me as a young planner learning my trade back in the 1970's.

Without the academic fog that accompanies so much writing about cities, yet backed up with thorough and robust analysis, Jane managed to set out simple rules that work well.

In the documentary, I was particularly struck by the archive film of protestors from the early '60's. They waved placards demanding "better air quality - now". They could have been on our streets yesterday.

So, I would urge all planners and designers to adopt Jane's 4 simple rules, which are:

  1)          Districts, and as many of their internal parts as possible, must serve more than one primary function; preferably more than two. These must ensure people go outdoors on different schedules and are in the place for different purposes, but are able to use many functions in common.

2)           Blocks must be short; streets and opportunities to turn corners must be frequent.

3)          The district must mingle buildings that vary in age and condition, including a good proportion of old ones so that they vary in the economic yield they must produce. This mingling must be fairly closed-grained.

4)           There must be a sufficiently dense concentration of people, for whatever purposes they may be there. This includes dense concentration of people who live in the area.

Follow these rules, and all our cities will change for the better! 

And for more detail, check out:

Jacobs, J (1962) – The death and life of great American cities: The failure of town planning – Jonathan Cape, London.