Planning for People or Cameras?

Now we have another sad example of a city planning goal being misused for political gain, this time in Florida. There, in the city of Riviera Beach, as reported by the New York Times , officials are seeking to ban its citizens from wearing drooping trousers! They do so because, in the words of one of the city officials, “We’re working very hard to improve the image of our city”, and, “just as we can dictate the height to which certain trees can grow”, so we have the right to maintain dress standards!

Is this just a bit too much? Surprising as it might sound, this kind of thinking abounds among city fathers everywhere. Urban politicians are very fond of grandiose sounding goals-Planning Goals. Just thumb through any General Plan and you will find goals like- “promote a high quality of life”,”strengthen the community’s creative and cultural identity” or “provide enriching growth opportunities for the entire community”, liberally sprinkled throughout the document. “Improving”, the “image” of the city falls into this category too. The dirty little secret is that city planning lacks any means by which cities can reliably reach such Planning Goals. The only means they have are “Standards” for “Guiding” “Land Use” in order to “Manage” “Development Activity”, so called Development Control Standards.

In the past decade, city planners across the planet have seen Development Control Standards fail miserably as the means to reach Planning Goals. Yet their silence on this failure is deafening, and has led to Development Control Standards being used for political purposes, especially in rapidly growing cities. The standards become tougher under the false flag of “needing” to be “more effective” to “change” whatever behavior it is fashionable to oppose at the time while pretending to have a planning goal at heart. “Toughening” them often means intruding on individual rights.

For example, in the United States weed free ordinances were enforced to reach the common planning goal of “Making Great Places by Insisting on the Highest Standards of Quality in Architecture, Landscaping and Urban Design”. Weed free ordinances were based on the concept that “a smooth closely shaven surface of grass is by far the most essential element of beauty on the grounds of a suburban house” and that “a premium needs to be placed on neatness and conformity”, because neatness and conformity are accepted symbols of a thriving city! Such ordinances are still, used to stifle individual rights of self expression in landscaping.

Imposing weed free ordinances, or any kind of ordinance, to promote a “good community spirit” is, at best, counterproductive, and at worst, blatant discrimination against behavior on an ethnic or class basis. Professor Kevin Lynch, in his masterpiece work,The Image of the City, stated that city dwellers create the image of the city in their own minds, each individual being entitled to their own image. I hazard a guess that he would turn in his grave to know that 21 st century urban government officials, using dress codes as their tool, are now regulating people, of a specific socio-economic status and/or ethnic background in the name of the “image of the city” with a goal of imposing one image on all, without even saying what that image is or who it is being aimed at!

Perhaps at a giant roving camera in the heavens seeking out the perfect city image!

Peter Naughton, Manager, Home-Grown Food Network