Urban Prospect

In the last four years there has been a great deal of talk about urban redevelopment. All too often it has been useless or even pernicious because it has confined itself to asking narrow questions. 11 If, for example, a street plan is under discussion, 7! it is necessary to ask not only how many cars per hour will be able to pass through but also how the plan will influence the ordinary daily contacts of the people who live on those streets. If one is to do good rather than harm one must consider nothing less than the whole of the human life that the city exists to serve.
In these essays Lewis Mumford pursues this theme through a number of different contexts- the new towns and garden cities of Britain, the race riots and decaying town centres of America, motorways, regional planning, the idea of groups of cities, orbusier's new outdated conception of a high-rising "city in a park", and many others. Everywhere he brings to bear a largeness of vision, an overriding belief that the city exists to enrich the lives of those who live in it, and a conviction that it is within our power to make that happen.