How can you tell if your city is dying?
The question is how can one tell if one's city is dying, not what is causing it. I would have to say that one of the surest signs is a desire to commit municipal suicide demonstrated by the urban leadership's pride in how many buildings they can demolish. Such folly is routinely accompanied by a failure to appreciate the value of the traditional urban form with its pedestrian, human scale as opposed to the modern suburban model and its automotive scale. In an age where the need for sustainability is becoming increasingly critical, this lack of vision portends the eventual decline of even those cities which may seem vibrant at the moment.
A city which is experiencing population decline and economic distress can be revitalized if it respects, honors, and protects its urban character. Unfortunately, since WWII the official goal of American public policy has been to transform the nation's urban spaces to conform with the modern suburban model, reaching all the way to our city centers. The only deference to being within a formerly traditional urban space is frequently that the modern automotive scaled suburban form has been scrunched more tightly into the former urban grid, but often, as in Pittsburgh, even that is eliminated to substitute serpentine streets in its place along with blocks being combined into large lots where huge automotive scaled buildings overwhelm their location with a detail that can be fully observed at 65 MPH as they replace human scaled architecture whose details intrigued those walking past from varying angles of view.
Authentic, quality urban spaces have huge, distinct advantages over the modern suburban form. But, when diluted and increasingly suburbanized, the balance reverses. A city which tries to compete with its suburbs by imitating their form, either in part or in whole, merely succeeds at becoming a third rate suburb at best -- more people and investment will leave, choosing the real thing over the cheap imitation.
Real urban space, not the faux urbanism which seems to have become all the rage of architects in the past couple decades, offers both substance and emotional charm, is socially more engaging, and provides for more efficient energy and material usage. As the costs of carbon consumption come home to roost, the population will be clamouring for more opportunities to move into quality urban communities, especially those which have retained their real traditional form and character. Those urban communities which have championed and preserved their architectural heritage will beat the suburbs hands down. They'll also have much more to offer than new Disney-esque imitations which resort to loud speakers piping in the sounds of birds singing in their attempt to seem real.
