Last week, Boston Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham Renee Loth asked, “What’s Vancouver got that we don’t“, ‘we’ being the city of Boston.
Her argument:
Vancouver’s population grew by 6 percent over the past five years; even the number of families with children living in the downtown area increased. The Olympic Village, built on the city’s largest remaining tract of undeveloped land, will become a new neighborhood for 16,000 – including housing, parks, and a public elementary school – when the athletes depart.
Meanwhile, Boston – with roughly the same population, a larger area, and, arguably, better weather – seems stuck in neutral, with much development stalled along the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway, the Fan Pier, and the South Boston waterfront.
A cynic, sarcastic person would respond, what does Vancouver have that Boston doesn’t?
The worst slum in North America, for one thing:
Ms Loth poses the questions to a couple of experts.
So what has Vancouver got that Boston has not?
“Political will,’’ said Tom Piper, research scientist at MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning, “and a set of procedures and practices that balance the public interest with the creativity of the development community.’’
“They support the enterprise of development in recognition of the added value that wealth creation can bring to the community,’’ agreed Richard Dimino, president of the downtown business group A Better City.
“They understand the economic and place-making value of density,’’ added Fred Kramer, president of the architectural firm ADD Inc. and chairman of the Urban Land Institute of Boston. Vancouver, he said, is a showcase for well-planned, thoughtful density that is “incentivized rather than feared.’’
Hmmm. All three answers seem to be “pro-development” and, therefore, suspect. Is the answer simply, “let developers build whatever they want?”, thereby destroying all that is good in the city?
No. If you look more closely into what they are saying, it seems to me there is a suggestion that the city needs balance. Where can we build new housing that will leave current, thriving neighborhoods as they are, today? How do we expand the city so that new construction doesn’t strangle us? It’s more than housing, it’s transportation, taxation policies, technology, health, business, and micro- and macro-economics.
It’s depressing, sometimes, to see what our city could become and then look at the reality. It’s a city in stasis, which is a shame.
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