Chris Costello
Donna Laquidara
ENG 4102—Critical Writing Workshop
12/5/00

The Impact of Poor Environmental Design
on the Human Psyche (page 2)

What is the Problem?
Over the past fifty years, America’s man-made landscape has been transformed into a haphazard array of repulsive and alarming geometric forms and color combinations that shock the senses. The gargantuan office structures, super highway interchanges, and piles of box like buildings strewn across the nation make every town seem like the one next to it. Connected by asphalt and telephone wires, they are boring, repetitive, sometimes horrifying, but never forgettable because they are permanent scars on the landscape and in our minds. These bland structures and spaces that we are forced to look at and interact with on a daily basis are having a profound negative impact on our minds. Yet, it is the public’s current acceptance of irresponsible development and economic practices that is part of the problem. Since the proliferation of the mid-twentieth century ideas of “progress” and the manifestation of the “American Dream”, many have turned a blind eye to poor urban design and its repercussions as they pursued the promises of technology and convenience that the new and modern society will provide. The concepts of “suburbia” and “expressways” , for example, were essentially untried experiments operated at a very large scale that promised quick personal transportation and easy living. Years later, we now live with the results—abandoned city centers, shifting demographics, and overloaded highways, along with a few unforeseen social side affects such as murder and suicides among suburban teens along with a new a phenomenon known as “road rage”.

The proponents of post-World War II urban development trends have recommended the sweeping away of old architecture in favor of more “modern” and functional structures. For example, during the urban “renewal” projects of the 1960’s, entire city neighborhoods throughout America were completely demolished and replaced with high rise housing projects. Designed in an architectural style sometimes referred to as Modernism, they amounted to nothing more than towering cement boxes devoid of color and human character. These structures were capable of housing hundreds of tenants per square block, but in the inner city “neighborhoods”, they become breeding grounds for the despair and discontent that lead many of its occupants to turn to gang activity and crime. These developments, however provided sizable profits for commercial developers, politicians and retailers, so the practice continued. Today, even the residential real estate industry benefits from this practice as new constructions become commodities rather than homes. However, we all pay the price in an overall dearth of lovable places and community peace of mind.

It is unfortunate that we have lost concern for beauty and community purpose in our environment today. It seems that statements of glory, achievement and civic pride are characteristics of societies long forgotten by most. The European Renaissance, for example, was a time of creative rebirth and a renewal of passion as artists, architects, scientists and writers reflected this newly discovered spirit in their cities. The Italian city of Florence, home to Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, was such a society. In the late 1400’s, the builders of this magnificent place thoughtfully planned its growth from a commune to a national center of commerce and culture. As Renaissance thinkers, civic beauty was foremost in their minds. Note how the writer Henri Marie Beyel describes his first visit there:

“the tide of emotion was as intense as a religious feeling. My soul…was in a state of trance. Absorbed in the contemplation of sublime beauty, I could perceive its very essence close at hand.…I had reached that most high degree of sensitivity in which the divine intimations of art merge with the sensuality of emotion.…I was seized by a fierce palpitation of the heart. I walked on fearing that I might fall to the ground” (qtd. in Labella 23).

The esthetic nature of the city had a very positive impact on his psyche. It is interesting to wonder how he might have described his first visit to Los Angeles, California. Sadly, in America today, architectural beauty is overshadowed by greed as developers stress functionality and economy. The main purpose for housing developments and high rise office buildings is to occupy them with as many tenants as possible at the least possible expense. Shopping malls, convenience stores, and retail centers serve only to attract customers, sell products and make money. To facilitate such development, architects use the simplest, most cost effective geometric form to construct with—the square. Thus, we have an environment cluttered with stark cubic structures that inspire neither praise nor admiration.

I argue that the overuse of such design motifs have a subtle negative affect on the human spirit. Consider the Swastika. The notorious symbol of Nazi Germany; this jarring, angular geometric form conjures up disturbing memories and emotions that people living in the later part of the 20th century cannot ignore. Adolf Hitler borrowed the symbol from Native American culture and transformed it into the hallmark of such Nazi ideals as Aryan superiority, military conquest and genocide. More recently, it has been used by extremists to symbolize racism and hatred. Because of these associations, the symbol has been forever maligned to represent the purest form of evil and moral depravity. The bold, dark strokes and sharp angles themselves are very alarming and, combined with the meaning of the symbol, are very disturbing to behold. It undeniably wells up feelings of embarrassment, shame, and disgust. Yet many of the buildings we see every day use these same design motifs—harsh, rigid angles that are even further enhanced by dark shadows that are cast by the sun. These forms, when repeated and amplified, can create the same sense of alarm and despair. We can feel hopelessly oppressed by these ugly and overwhelming structures in our cities and it is no wonder that many of us wish to “escape” to a more beautiful and enriching space.

There are three places that have had the greatest influenced on my life, and have made me quite aware of how we can be so affected by our surroundings. I grew up in Kingston, New York, a very historic town on the Hudson River at the foot of the Catskill Mountains. With the exception of the stereotypical malls and suburbs common to most American towns, it is a beautiful place, with Gothic church buildings, Victorian mansions, an authentic turn of the century main street and charming stone buildings dating back to the 1600’s. Being a small city, one does not have to travel far to find sprawling farms, meadows, lakes and forests. The surrounding Hudson Valley was home to the Vanderbilts, the Roosevelts and others of the American elite who built their mansions and summer retreats on the banks of the magnificent Hudson River. Today, it is home to many New York City commuters who find the two-hour commute a small price to pay for living in such wonderful surroundings. It is a beautiful place and I did not realize how much it affected me until I moved to attend art school in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

In contrast, with the exception of its beautiful beaches and isolated parks, Fort Lauderdale is a very ugly place. Incorporated in 1911, it is a relatively new city that saw much of its growth start after the First World War. Its population swelled in the 1950’s as a popular resort area and much of the city’s architectural makeup is of the drab Modernist style. With cheap and abundant land available, the city’s grid, even to this day, is expanding ever west with construction of thousands of hastily built suburban housing complexes and endless miles of anonymous boulevards. I seemed to be lost in a constant state of shock as I found myself continually looking for someplace that did not seem alien…a place were I could rest my mind. As an artist, I deeply desired to connect with something wonderful and sensual, but these surroundings denied me. I was often depressed and longed to be return to the tranquility of the Hudson Valley. I could not imagine settling in a faceless South Florida suburb for any period of time and constantly felt a need to “vacate” or leave my present surroundings. I then discovered other places in the area, like Key Biscayne, Key West, and Coconut Grove which were oasises of culture and emotional renewal that made my time in South Florida bearable.

I am not alone with these feelings. James Howard Kunstler, in his book The Geography of Nowhere asks: “Why did America build a reality of terrible places from which people longed to escape?” (106). Why do we need vacations, anyway? Part of the reason is that we desire to leave behind our mundane and depressing surroundings in search for some place better; a beautiful place to relax and recreate. If you could afford to stay and live somewhere like Martha’s Vineyard, Key West, or Aspen, would you really want to leave as often? With a continual sense of dissatisfaction, I found the need to leave Fort Lauderdale all too often and finally did so for good.

After making my home in Boston, Massachusetts, my work as a musician gave me several opportunities to stay in Paris, France. My first experience with this city was profound and lasting. I was in awestruck by the beauty of its buildings and public squares. This ancient man-made environment was stunning; full of vitality and people that were interacting and enjoying the fact that they were there. I had never seen or felt anything like this in all my life. It was a place where I wanted to be because everything about it was so inspiring. Dr. Salingaros described his first visit there as “not only visual and psychological—it was physical, and a shock to my body…it is one emotional experience that I can recall very vividly. I had no idea that materials and space could have such a positive affect on a person” (“Ecology”). Shouldn’t all cities move people in this same way? Boston, at the turn of the century, looked a lot like Paris, in all of its romantic splendor, but much of it was laid waste under the urban renewal projects of the 1950’s and 1960’s (Kay, 298). While the French chose to preserve the character of central Paris and developed a modern urban center outside of the old city, La Defénse, for example, Americans demolished their old cities and built new ones on top of the ruins. This is evidence of two cultures that honor opposing value systems. While the Parisians enjoy a sip of wine at a romantic café overlooking the picturesque Ile de la Cite Conciergerie during a two hour lunch break, Bostonians skip lunch to work extra hours inside their brand new office cube so they can make more money to afford payments for the car that rushes them out of the city every night to their private little space in the “burbs”, always tired and never satisfied. This is not a life, it is simply an existence. I believe we must stop and think about what our artificial surroundings are doing to us.

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©2007 Chris Costello. All rights reserved.