Jane Jacobs critique of 20th-century urban planning

Jane Jacobs

By DOUGLAS MARTIN

Jane Jacobs,...came up with a book that challenged and changed the way people view cities, died ...in Toronto


SNIP


In her book "Death and Life of Great American Cities," written in 1961, Ms. Jacobs's enormous achievement was to transcend her own withering critique of 20th-century urban planning and propose radically new principles for rebuilding cities. At a time when both common and inspired wisdom called for bulldozing slums and opening up city space, Ms. Jacobs's prescription was ever more diversity, density and dynamism — in effect, to crowd people and activities together in a jumping, joyous urban jumble.