Scott Larson’s chapter, “The ‘Patron Saint’ and the ‘Git’r Done Man,’”  from his 2013 book Building like Moses with Jacobs in Mind, contained a lively discussion of the merits and drawbacks of Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs’s urban planning philosophies. Larson made sure to give a fair overview of their legacies, and their impact upon the modern New York City was stressed, but he ultimately made no attempt to pick a side in the Moses-Jacobs argument. A person’s views on the matter would definitely depend on how they think of New York City and what the city ought to be like; should it be more like a shining, homogeneous, “modern” city, which would require the presence of a grand architect to oversee its development, or should it be more like a diverse mass of neighborhoods that determine their own identities, without outside interference?

However one may feel about the question, it is clear that the modern New York City features a synthesis of the best parts of Moses and Jacobs’s ideas. The diverse neighborhoods that Jacobs so favored are present throughout the city, while the strong infrastructure engineered by Moses connects them and unifies them into a cohesive patchwork quilt. It is important to remember that every city presents its own challenges when it comes to urban planning, and such a large city like New York has many unique challenges that make it especially hard to plan, such as how to coordinate with the numerous minority enclaves within the city’s boroughs and how to build infrastructure that can adequately service the largest city in the nation. As a result, some imagination is essential when it comes to urban planning, as what has worked in one city may not necessarily translate over successfully in New York.

Discussion Question: How would the urban planning of New York change if the city were half its current size? Would it look more like Jacobs’s ideal city or Moses’s ideal city?