It’s honestly baffling how incorrectly the U.S is built.
It’s easy to understand once you realize that the secret ingredient was racism.
Basically, it’s because of a combination of mid-century modernist utopian urbanism (a big influence was Frank Lloyd Wright’s “Broadacre City,” which was really closer to the opposite of a city) and the effort to find new ways to perpetuate racism despite SCOTUS outlawing de-jure segregation.
More specifically, the newly-created FHA came up with preferred development patterns that were low-density and car-centric in part because it was expensive and therefore helped exclude black people, then redlined everything that didn’t conform to that preference in order to deny black people financing for their homes and businesses.
(This reply lacks a lot of detail and nuance, mainly because I’m writing it on my phone and lack access to references to cite.)
It’s not rare in North America. If this article is to be believed, it happens on the order of about 100 times per day in the U.S.
It’s honestly baffling how incorrectly the U.S is built.
I’ve lived my entire life here, and I have never in my life seen a car crash into a building, or the aftermath of a car crashing into a building.
For over 30 of those years, I’ve lived in two of the 10 largest cities.
It’s easy to understand once you realize that the secret ingredient was racism.
Basically, it’s because of a combination of mid-century modernist utopian urbanism (a big influence was Frank Lloyd Wright’s “Broadacre City,” which was really closer to the opposite of a city) and the effort to find new ways to perpetuate racism despite SCOTUS outlawing de-jure segregation.
More specifically, the newly-created FHA came up with preferred development patterns that were low-density and car-centric in part because it was expensive and therefore helped exclude black people, then redlined everything that didn’t conform to that preference in order to deny black people financing for their homes and businesses.
(This reply lacks a lot of detail and nuance, mainly because I’m writing it on my phone and lack access to references to cite.)