Kunstler's Perspective on America

Got a ton of books from the library yesterday that are all loosely related to the themes of community planning and urbanization. Can't really explain the backstory on this pursuit because there is a lot that went into it, but with that said I would like to draw out some things from my book-gathering. Today, I will frame up what I hope will develop into a fuller discussion of several prominent authors in this realm.

James Howard Kunstler

While I don't agree with his approach, or his cynicism I think Kunstler raises some important points and his discussion is quite interesting given our present economic status. I have included two Kunstler videos below to give you a general sense of his ideas and philosophy/worldview. Additionally, here are a few quotes from one of his books, The City In Mind, which I find a little less raw/cynical than his approach as a presenter.

America at the turn of the millennium is suffering the woeful consequences, largely unanticipated, of trying to become a drive-in utopia. The attempt took roughly eighty years, from the end of the First World War to the brink of global warming, oil depletion, and other epochal disorders hard upon us. This nation's massive suburban build-out was an orgy of misspent energy and material resources that squandered our national wealth and left us with an infrastructure of daily life that, left as is, has poor prospects in the new century. It is also hard to overstate the cultural destruction that was one of it chief side effects, especially the loss of knowledge, tradition, skill, custom, and vernacular wisdom in the art of city-making that was thrown into the dumpster of history in our effort to fulfill General Motors' World of Tomorrow. (from the Preface to The City In Mind, page xi)

Kunstler is certainly controversial (and quite doomsday, I might add), and I am sure that this post alone will rouse some spoken (or unspoken) fervor amongst readers of this blog. There are some holes in his analysis, and many of his points are quite extreme. However, I find Kunstler's discussions useful for educating me-albeit incomprehensively-on a topic of significant concern: What has become of America's communities and what can we do about it? More to come...