Books like Unsettling cities by John Allen

Jane Jacobs’ seminal work argues that diverse, vibrant street life sustains cities, challenging conventional plans that favor large developments and uniformity.

In the aftermath of the automobile, with struggling downtowns, spreading suburbs, and blooming private gated communities, are traditional cities becoming obsolete? In The City After the Automobile, internationally acclaimed architect Moshe Safdie passionately comes to the city's defense. Arguing that vital cities are fundamental to civilized society and culture, Safdie and his colleague Wendy Kohn describe how we can rescue cities from their current threat of demise. Today we face a choice: suburban lives of total dependence on our cars or increasingly unworkable urban lifestyles of endless traffic jams, eroding pedestrian street life, and mounting parking problems. Unlike those who want to turn back the clock to pre-industrial enclaves or those who propose science-fiction-like "cyber cities," Safdie believes we can solve our present dilemmas, preserve the best of our urban history, and create future cities of strong public life, cultural richness, and physical beauty. In vivid prose, The City After the Automobile paints a revolutionary vision of the future, one that integrates innovative architecture, technology, and policy to lead us toward richer and more humanistic places to work and live.