People Must Take A Modicum Of Public

...frequent Streets And Short Blocks Are Valuable Because Of The Fabric Of Intricate Cross-use That They Permit Among The Users Of A City Neighbouhood.

This Is Something Everyone Knows: A Well-used City Street Is Apt To Be A Safe Street. A Deserted City Street Is Apt To Be Unsafe.

But Look What We Have Built Low-income Projects That Become Worse Centers Of Delinquency, Vandalism And General Social Hopelessness Than The Slums They Were Supposed To Replace. Cultural Centers That Are Unable To Support A Good Bookstore. Civic Centers That Are Avoided By Everyone But Bums. Promenades That Go From No Place To Nowhere And Have No Promenaders. Expressways That Eviscerate Great Cities. This Is Not The Rebuilding Of Cities. This Is The Sacking Of Cities.

Writing, Printing, And The Internet Give A False Sense Of Security About The Permanence Of Culture.

In Trading With Each Other Cities Can't Be In Too Different Stages Of Development, And They Can't Copy One Another. Backward Cities, Or Younger Cities, Or Newly Forming Cities In Supply Regions, Have To Develop To A Great Extent On One Another's Shoulders. This Is One Of The Terrible Things About Empires. Empires Want Them Only To Trade With The Empire, Which Doesn't Help Them At All. It's Just A Way Of Exploiting Them.