“The room for great differences among neighbors- differences that often go far deeper than differences in color- are possible and normal only when streets of great cities have built in equipment allowing strangers to dwell in peace together.” -Jane Jacobs, The Death and Life of Great American Cities.
A woman- a regular at the store- drops a full cup of seemingly good coffee into the trash, orders another, and explains that, out of curiosity, she had tried the new place across the street for a change. And although I can’t say I remember the exact dialogue that went on that morning, I do recall one thing she said after being handed a new cup, free of charge, that has stuck with me to this day: “it doesn’t get better than this.”
In the 1950s, a man moved to the United States after being displaced from his home in Palestine. Although he planned to continue his studies in chemistry here, it turned out that, twenty years later, he opened a grocery store instead, being that he had the opportunity to buy the space and that he was told it would be difficult to land a job with education from overseas. While it may not have been according to plan, my grandfather’s store became part of what Jane Jacobs believed to be essential to sidewalk life.
In Chapter 3 of The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jacobs describes sidewalk life as the result of many casual public interactions at a local level. What comes out of these seemingly insignificant interactions is a “feeling for the public identity of people, a web of public respect and trust, and a resource in time of personal or neighborhood need” (Jacobs, 56). She goes on to explain the importance of public characters, people who are frequently in contact with a number of people, people who are in a position to speak and spread news to multiple people easily- people like storekeepers, for instance. My grandfather was someone who was willing to provide an environment where public characters were behind the counter daily. Haifa Market was more than a conveniently placed grocery store- it was the kind of place that provided family for neighbors whose children had moved to different states, the kind of place that would let customers pay things back another day, the kind of place where the store’s cat didn’t need a collar, because everyone simply knew it belonged to Haifa. People came to the store for company just as much as they did for groceries or a bite to eat. It was this small store that came to mind when Jacobs was describing not only places that helped establish trust in a neighborhood, but people who were the foundation for this trust as well. As important to sidewalk life as it was, however, I didn’t realize just how much my grandfather managed to bring people together with the store, until it was gone.
While the article I chose may not be recent, the very fact that it was posted in the event of Haifa closing reflects just how important these hubs of public characters are to the communities they bring together. The day the gates of the store closed for the last time, people from all over the neighborhood, some more familiar than others, came to say goodbye. What Jacobs wrote regarding the importance of sidewalk life and public characters in the creation of public identity amongst people is constantly reflected through places like my grandfather’s, making them all the more valuable to city life. With that, I propose the following three questions:
- Jacobs is frequently seen as the enemy of city planner Robert Moses in that she fought against Moses’s image of the ideal city, in which the city is characterized by highways and monotonous buildings. Although Moses isn’t necessarily around anymore to impose this ideal, does gentrification as it appears today pose a similar threat to communities? As an added thought, in what ways could communities combat this?
- Over time, Downtown Brooklyn has become increasingly dotted with Manhattan-like buildings in the place of local stores and older buildings, which Jacobs also discusses in regards to what is essential to “a successful city.” Although the new buildings aren’t exactly monotonous in design, do you think we are losing what makes New York so unique? Or is New York simply being redefined?
- Jacobs dedicates an entire chapter of her book to the importance of sidewalk life along with its components to creating “a successful city.” Do you agree with Jacobs’s view? Are there any aspects of her beliefs in regards to sidewalk life that you believe aren’t as integral as she makes them seem?
