The tragic impact of the modern city on the human being has killed his sense of aesthetics, the material benefits of an affluent society have diverted his attention from his city and its cultural potentials to the products of science and technology, washing machines, central heating, automatic cookers, television sets, computers and fitted carpets. He is, at the moment, drunk with democracy, well-to-do, a car driver, and has never had it so good.
He is reluctant to walk. Statistics reveal that the distance he is prepared to walk from his parking place to his shopping center is very short. (41) __________. Congestion has become the predominant factor in his environment, and statistics suggest that two cars per household system may soon make matters worse.
(42) __________. "Putting land to its highest and best use" becomes the principal economic standard in urban growth. This speculative approach and the pressure of increasing population leads to the "vertical" growth of cities with the result that people are forced to adjust themselves to congestion in order to maintain these relatively artificial land values. Paradoxically the remedy for removing congestion is to create more of it.
Partial decentralization, or rather, pseudo-decentralization, in the form of large development units away from the traditional town centers, only' shifts the disease round the anatomy of the town; if it is not combined with the remodeling of the town's transportation system, it does not cure it. (43) __________.
It is within our power to build better cities and revive the civic pride of their citizens, but we shall have to stop operating on the fringe of the problem. We shall have radically to replan them to achieve a rational density of population. We shall have to provide in them what can be called minimum "psychological elbow room." (44) __________. We must collect, in an organized manner, all and complete information about the city or the town, if we want to plan effectively.
The principal unit in this process is "IM' (one man). We must not forget that cities are built by people, and that their form and shape should be subject to the will of the people. (45) __________.The "man-educate' man, the human, will have to set the target, and using the results obtained by science and his own engineering skill, take upon himself the final shaping of his environment. He will have to use his high moral sense of responsibility to the community and to future generations.
[A] New systems of city management may be necessary to cope with the needs of today's urban populations. Some planners insist that a decentralised decision-making process is fundamental to ensuring that cities work for and not against people.
[B] As there are no adequate off-street parking facilities, the cities are littered with kerb parked cars and parking meters rear themselves everywhere.
[C] Here the engineering solutions are strongly affected by the necessity for complicated intersections, which in turn, are frustrated by the extravagant cost of land.
[D] Scientific methods of data collection and analysis will indicate trends, but they will not direct action. Scientific methods are only an instrument.
[E] The convergence of economic growth, population growth and urban expansion offers both great challenges and great potentials for realizing metropolitan sustainability.
[F] In the meantime, insult is added to injury by "land value." The value of land results from its use; its income is derived from the service it provides. When its use is intensified, its income and its value increase.
[G] One of the ingredients of this will be proper transportation plans. These will have to be an integral part of the overall planning process which in itself is a scientific process where facts are essential.