The Inauspicious Prospect of Exclusionary Places

For the past few weeks the airwaves have been saturated by accounts of the senseless killing of 17 year old Trayvon Martin, a Florida teen allegedly gunned down by neighborhood watchman, George Zimmerman during the teen's walk home from a nearby convenient store.   Ample space has been given to editorial pages, and cable pundits have devoted hours attempting to examine the tragedy from a social/racial perspective.  - Could the hoodie Trayvon wore that faithful evening caused Mr. Zimmerman’s unreasonable anxiety? What factor did the teen’s race or the neighborhood watchman’s ethnic background play in the ill-fated encounter, - what bigoted feeling did he harbor? What about the competence and/or objectivity of the City of Sanford, Florida’s Police Department…

In an event such as this, reasonable, law abiding citizens should have a plethora questions. However, in the spirit of this blog the questions which interest me particularly come from a spatial/ land use policy tack. How did the very construct of gated community set the stage for this type of confrontation  -  This case has now garnered national attention, however, on a daily basis, in communities across the nation, how are these gated concept defining the idea of belonging, exclusion and citizens/pedestrian mobility.  With the passing of ‘Stand You-Ground’ law and the liberal interpretation by the Stanford Police Investigators, such lethal confrontation can’t be seen, truly, as an anomaly, but instead as a prescriptive method of dealing with a ‘foreign body’ in our midst.    

According to an article on gated communities in a blog called “Heavy Trash,” “The problem is, gated communities do not increase people’s trust in each other or the overall quality of life. They may in fact do harm to both.” Healthy neighborhoods depend on contact between people of all incomes and races. (USATODAY.com)

1995 -2012

Form and Function in the Age of Uncertainty

We live in an age of heightened security; at least it seems to occupy a much larger segment of our collective consciousness.  The unimaginable events of September11-2001 are the rational for this new paradigm, but even before that dreadful day, catastrophic acts of carnage here and abroad made it crystal clear we were entering an era of increased security. Consequently, urban centers today are impaired by haphazard mazes of bollards, safety barrier and jerseys walls. Initially it seemed tactically astute and necessary, but in time, is less convincing if the proliferation of barriers project a sense of assertiveness and preemption, or telegraphs a tacit vulnerability…

After all since time immemorial societies have been concerned with ‘barbarians at the gates’,- So, what makes our modern circumstances so unique…What elements situate our contemporary situation beyond the realm of adequate design and/or planning?  Going forth the built environment should remain attentive to requirements of safety, certainly, - but also the need for pedestrian access and aesthetically pleasing places.

                                                                              

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The Good

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The Bad

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And the Ugly!