There’s a great article up on Curbed about a plan from the mid-1960s to replace most of the buildings and streets in Harlem with a series of 100-story circular-plan tower linked by diagonal boulevards: A ‘futuristic vision for Harlem’.
This was a blue-sky plan that never got very far. It lacked backing from the government agencies that would have had to be involved* for any of the work; it was arguably infeasible in the form proposed**; and there’s not a great deal of evidence that residents of Harlem wanted to live on the set of a pre-Star-Wars sci-fi movie. Given all that, there’s still a lot to look at in the article.
The article gives a nice recap of the history of Harlem real estate, which is inevitably caught up with the effects of speculative development and racism. There’s no question that a lot of work was needed in the mid-60s to fix the physical environment there***, the question is about how to do so. I work in restoration, so my first instinct is always to say that the existing buildings could be fixed. This is actually more true in Harlem than in most neighborhoods, because the vast majority of older residential in the neighborhood were built well in the first place. That’s not the only possible solution, though.
This project was part of a line of such ideas, some from distinguished architects. Le Corbusier’s Plan Voisin for Paris was, if anything, more brutal in its efficiency to stamp out the existing built environment and replace it. There are many possible reasons for demolishing and starting from scratch, but one cannot be avoided: it gives visionaries a clean slate on which to demonstrate their ideas. Buckminster Fuller, one of the people behind the Skyrise plan, was famous for designing buildings (and cars, and pretty much anything he could) in non-rectangular forms; if there were no new buildings in the plan, how could he get his trademark shapes involved?
Numerous studies have shown that, in general, people prefer renovations in their existing neighborhoods to replacement.**** Even more important, people like to be involved with the decision-making process for projects that will significantly transform their environment. Fuller’s partner in the Skyrise plan, June Jordan, was a Harlem resident, but that doesn’t mean that her views necessarily reflected those of her neighbors. And there’s an unsolvable problem there: how many residents of the affected area would have to agree to a plan that had, as its end goal, to move everyone in the neighborhoods into one of the new towers so that everything else could be demolished? Everyone? Then the plan was doomed before it started. Fifty one percent? Then hundreds of thousands of people who did not like the idea would be forced to move and see their old homes demolished. This issue cannot be resolved through voluntary action and most resembles the forcible relocations that took place for the construction of the housing projects.
Historic preservation is often unfairly targeted as the government forcing people to use their buildings in a certain way. It’s interesting to note that the other end of the spectrum, full redevelopment, can only work with complete control over everyone who lives in the area.
* Condemnation, for example, requires government involvement.
** The towers would be flown in by helicopter and dropped into the landscape without traditional site preparation. Uh huh.
*** Or that work is still needed.
**** This is separate from the issue of gentrification. Obviously, it is no resident’s preference to have renovations performed specifically to evict existing tenants and bring in people who can and will pay more.
