Rebecca Solnit on San Francisco

[Ian Livingston]

San Francisco is small, it doesn't take much to screw it up. We pretty well
knew it was done a living city when the TransAmerica pyramid went up,
followed by big, black glass Bank of America monolith. Ugliness has had
it's foothold, and the developers are drooling all over the possibilities
for more gruesome erections. The neighborhoods are all that's left of San
Francisco. It will be too awfully sad to see them go. Apartment complexes
suck the life out of cities, turn them gray, dull, beige.


On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 6:10 PM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:

> But I would be pleased beyond ever to be allowed to design and build the
> first glass 2 story in the French Quarter.  It'll never happen, but I'd do
> it right if it did.
>
>
> On Sunday, March 3, 2013, David Morris wrote:
>
>> You are being extreme.  I said districts, quarters, might rightfully
>> preserved ad infinitum.  Just not whole Cities.
>>
>> On Sunday, March 3, 2013, Ian Livingston wrote:
>>
>>> Well, I suppose the French Quarter is on the chopping block, too, then,
>>> right? Put in a nice glass tower and a super-size parking lot, some nice
>>> new row of offices and apartments along Champs-Elysees?
>>>
>>> On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 4:30 PM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Glass boxes versus brick boxes?  Stucco malls are suburban, and thus are
>>> moot in this discussion.  I'm talking about Cities.
>>>
>>> If your ideal is less procreation, fine.  But that has no vital link to
>>> architectural preservation.  Your chicken coop will be too crowded
>>> until you kill some chickens. Biology is.  Urbanism should follow biology,
>>> not wealth.
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sunday, March 3, 2013, Ian Livingston wrote:
>>>
>>> Oh, I'm sure those of you favoring new square glass boxes and stucco
>>> malls will have your world. I just hope I don't have to live to see SF go
>>> irrevocably all-out that way. Someday, maybe, people will slow down
>>> sufficiently on the procreating thing that character and individual
>>> aesthetics may show a resurgence. If it happens, that will be the boon of
>>> another generation, long after we are all gone and those who would box the
>>> world are all boxed.
>>>
>>> On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 3:25 PM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Everyone likes things as they were then, these days.
>>>
>>> Boston in the late 1800's was much more beautiful and comfortable than
>>> it is today, for a few, not counting modern medicine.
>>> I'm talking about now and the future.
>>> Should entire Cities be put under a bell jar?
>>>
>>> Preservation is best accomplished by those who cannot afford to tear
>>> down and start anew.  It's a good place to be poor and still have decent
>>> rent.
>>>
>>> But thriving Cities are not so blessed.  Preservation is the pastime of
>>> those preserved, already saved.  They should be given quarter, but not rule.
>>>
>>> Growth will happen, especially in thriving places.  It shouldn't be
>>> thwarted, especially not in favor of the rich squatters, wanting their
>>> urban manors.
>>>
>>> David Morris
>>> Architect
>>>
>>> On Sunday, March 3, 2013, Ian Livingston wrote:
>>>
>>> Well, you guys certainly represent the thinking that has made San
>>> Francisco what it is today. But I liked it before. Then again, I can say
>>> with James McMurtry, "I'm not from here, [either]."
>>>
>>> On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 11:46 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com>wrote:
>>>
>>> And NIMBY's should be exposed as anti-green.  Contrary to common
>>> mythology, dense Cities are inherently Green.  No cars. Everything walkable
>>> or by easy public transit. And dense architecture is inherently
>>> self-thermo-insulating by function of shared interior walls.  Cities should
>>> be as dense as demand allows, with reasonable regulation in the form of
>>> zoning focused on goals, not fears.
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sunday, March 3, 2013, David Morris wrote:
>>>
>>> I agree with Robert.  SF needs more density, but the squatters want to
>>> keep their legislated Disney Land North quaint.  I can understand historic
>>> districts being preserved, but NIMBY should not be the general rule.
>>>
>>> True Cities need density to expand housing, with a goal of keeping
>>> affordability and diversity.  In hand with density is the need for expanded
>>> public transit for those still unable to afford the City.
>>>
>>> DC is another City in need of density, for all the same reasons.
>>>
>>> On Sunday, March 3, 2013, Robert Mahnke wrote:
>>>
>>> I want San Francisco like it is, with more housing.  I certainly don't
>>> want San Francisco to be like San Jose, where I live only because I
>>> can have a five-minute commute.  I want people to be able to afford to
>>> live in San Francisco, and since the demand for housing there is so
>>> high, the way to do that is to make more housing.  Which means
>>> building up.  If you want to have a city that's friendly for artists,
>>> that means having cheap housing.  See, e.g., Berlin.
>>>
>>> I'm sure the people who zoned San Jose and the Valley thought they
>>> were doing a good thing, but there are no truly urban spaces, and
>>> housing is freakishly expensive here, too.
>>>
>>> On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 10:51 AM, Ian Livingston <
>>>
>>>
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