In chapter nine of his book, Building Like Moses with Jacobs in Mind, Professor Scott Larson makes it clear that the goal of New York City’s Mayor Bloomberg was to build on a large scale in such a way as to make the city more marketable, and more competitive with other super-cities; attractive to businesses and the wealthy. One way this would be achieved was through design, and the recruitment of elite level architects, appropriately dubbed “starchitects”, to design these plans for the city. What is clear in Larson’s depiction of the Bloomberg plans is that his municipality was most concerned with overall economic growth  than anything else. Moreover, from the discussions in class over the semester it is clear that there is a big debate over what the priorities of urban planners should be: economy versus other considerations that are more vague and complicated. Furthermore, it seems that economy has been the victor more often than not and that if it continues this way, the city will become completely gentrified, which is arguably what Bloomberg wants.

Why is this problematic?

Some students in class may be taking the utilitarian economic approach, wherein the belief is that more money is better for everyone. That is hard to argue with, because money is power and makes life easier, not just more comfortable. Thus the more money for everyone, the happier we all are because we all enjoy easier lives in one regard. However, this is not what happens in America. The wealth is not redistributed to make people’s lives sufficiently and markedly easier. Granted, the wealth does provide americans with many of the luxuries they enjoy at least in metropolises like New York City, but who is benefiting from these luxuries? Only those people who can afford to live in Manhattan, and eventually in the burroughs, and then the suburbs, and then where do the lower class live? This is something that could happen.

What we are being told is that economy should not reign supreme, and that marketability should not be the primary and sole concern. Oddly enough, the utilitarian economist is arguably not even following his own principles of bringing the most pleasure to the most people and minimizing pain as much as possible. People in this country are discontent with the income and power inequality that exists between the upper five percent and the lower 95%. Such beliefs are enforced when the lower classes are evicted in favor of new development, or not considered in design consequences like who will patronize the high-line (these people but not those people because they are not into that kind of stuff). It is a problem when the majority is not the main concern.

if a not as developed economy means more people are satisfied, then what is wrong with that? You cannot argue that weakening the economy now will cause terrible economic issues for decades to come, even if that is true and correct, because the 95% does not care right now. The problem with my argument is that there are logical flaws in it, and the most apparent one is that I approach the problem presupposing that economy is not chief whereas the people I am addressing do consider it chief. Effectively, my argument is trash to anyone who believes economy is all that matters. However, even to my argument, is not considering economics as chief and supreme going to be these option for the city?

The point is that other considerations for urban planning always lose when it comes to money. Alongside this is that a prominent website for urban planning and development called planetizen does not even label gentrification as one of the top planning issues of the year or of years past. Either people do not care or do not know. Or perhaps they know about the inequity that exists in our country but do not think it is a big deal. One of the points of our seminar is exactly contrary to that conception. The equity or lack thereof is directly responsible to where you live and consequently how you have grown up. The only virtue in New York City’s plan currently is the virtue of making money; their chief civic responsibility. It remains to be determined if this is ideal or not.

http://www.planetizen.com/node/47535/top-planning-issues-2010