What first got me interested in urbanism?
Four main experiences made me plunge into an amateur study of urban planning and urbanism advocacy in Atlanta:
- Growing up in a fairly undeveloped part of suburban Cobb County and watching the natural areas around us (former farms and patches of forest) get turned into sprawling, land-hogging subdivisions
- Being an independent kid who hated getting shuttled around in the back of a car, wishing I could walk to stores like the kids I saw in movies and TV shows that took place in classic city settings
- Visiting historic districts in Charleston & Savannah as a kid and thinking: “hey, you can walk from homes to stores and parks here instead of driving everywhere! we should build everything like this!”
- Moving to the city as an adult to escape suburban sprawl only to realize it wasn’t as easy for pedestrians as I’d hoped, largely due to hostile drivers, and also due to streets and shopping centers that catered mostly to cars
At first I mainly wanted to know what it was about our urban environment that turned otherwise normal people into homicidal demons behind the wheel of a vehicle, breaking down any sense of responsibility they should have to the safety of pedestrians and cyclists.
I feel that people are essentially good, and that environmental pressures (like car-centric design) will often be required to prompt them into morally corrupt behaviors. My research showed that, indeed, street design influences driver behavior.
But once I studied urbanism further, I realized there were also many other aspects to the way urban design affects our lives that I’d never known about, including issues involving economic equity that I’d been too privileged to experience personally.
It made me want to volunteer my time towards improving the way we all think about Atlanta’s built environment. I’m still learning exactly how to do that in a productive way, and I’m very thankful to the colleagues who’ve helped to shape my knowledge of urbanism, and my goals for action.
