urban blight- why dont city planners focus on visually pleasing commercial developments. THE USA is ugly due?

Question

to all the strip malls and signs. What are we doing to address this.Am I the only one who dissaproves of the trashy appearance of our streets.

Answer 1

When urban sprawl first developed in the US, little concern was given to efficient and aesthetic design. The first concern was economics: if you built a building cheaply, you could always more or tear it down later and build something newer. We see this with a lot of major fast-food restaurants, who build a cheap building to push their image, only to build a newer building a few blocks down when their image changes a few years later. What a waste.

The second concern was convenience. In an age when everybody could own a car, they could drive anywhere and get what they wanted. So why invest in a nice-looking gas station or strip mall, when all you really need is a shed to house your wares? Besides, in our instant-gratification world, who has the time to appreciate a good structure when microwave burritos lay within?

In the suburbs, we are still building strip malls faster than we can fill them with tenants, and thus clear-cutting trees and paving land. Only a few suburban areas are re-assessing their development, and making more informed decisions on how land should be developed for commercial use, or better yet, if something that currently exists can meet a new commercial need. Sadly, as our population grows, people will continue to pour into the suburbs, which will only lead to further strip mall and commercial development as companies wrangle for profits.

Most major inner cities have undergone a new age of downtown revitalization. Older commercial or industrial buildings are being converted into new, trendy lofts to encourage downtown residential occupancy. More efforts to develop public transport are seen downtown, as well as the return of fine dining and fine arts. Despite these efforts, these downtown areas remain sparsely populated, as they are not seen as family-friendly when compared to the suburbs.

Answer 2

I completely agree with you. With all of the technology and everything available to us, we still can't manage a decent looking mall. Why? Because it would cost more to build. Then why are they putting in those God Awful Ugly glass pyramid structures that must cost a fortune?

Aesthetics are dead.

It's sad when I go to Detroit to enjoy the architecture. Seriously. Beautifully done buildings. And what do they do with these marvels of past architecture? Tear them down or let them rot. And build MORE glass and steel boxes.

My son want's to be an architect. He's only thirteen, but he's wanted to be an architect since he could talk. I take him to Detroit, and to other places with beautiful buildings and I tell him "When you create a building, make it beautiful. That's important." His role model right now is Frank Lloyd Wright.

Hopefully, he grows up and makes a difference to what we must look at. Till then, it's horrible.