"My City" by mycityis

A Model to Emulate

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A Park System Linked by Scenic Highways “from the Mountains to the Sea” LA’s freeway system began as a 1912 plan for a system of parkways linking public parks. To create a contiguous greenbelt, tunnels were dug through Elysian Park. Seen here in 1938, this section of the Arroyo Seco Parkway is still in use today near Dodger Stadium. The “Progressive Republican City” section (p.31) and the “Hand-Made City” section (p.36) detail the Arroyo Seco vision.

The Colorado Street Bridge

Built in 1913, the landmark bridge helped initiate Pasadena’s City Beautiful Movement.

“Home Made City Planning”

Based on the Work of Dean George A. Damon And the Conversations of Generations of Pasadena Planners, Residents, and Visionaries who are Co-Authors of this Work, Past Present and Future.

David Robert Wolf Centennial Edition 050417

“Remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency.” Daniel Burnham Jeanne Carr

George A. Damon

Horticulturalist The Mother of Pasadena Beauty Carmelita Gardens, 1880 Mentor to John Muir Planner of Gardens Protector of Native Culture Her gardens led to the creation of the Norton Simon Museum.

Dean of Engineering The forgotten Father of Civic Pasadena Pasadena’s City Beautiful Movement The Four Corners Competition, 1914 The Pasadena Plan, 1915 The “My City” Exhibit, 1916 The Pasadena Museum of History, 1916-1924 The Norton Simon Museum, 1924 This document is based on his work.

Paul Revere Williams

The largely forgotten career of the first prominent AfricanAmerican architect was launched by his First Place entry in Pasadena’s 1914 “Four-Corners Competition,” sponsored by Throop College, now Caltech, for improving the area around its new campus.

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A print copy is available at the Pasadena Central Library, Vroman’s Bookstore, the Pasadena History Museum Bookstore and New Century Books. See mycity.is for details.

More information about “My City” can be found at mycity.is Your feedback is valued and welcome at info@mycity.is

THESE ARE LINKS that allow the document to be navigated like a webpage.

Words and page numbers that are underlined are also links.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

the City Beautiful Movement

Updated for the 21st Century

The Gazing Globe at the “My City” First Horticultural Court The back alley behind the Pasadena Board of Trade Offices.

OVERVIEW

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CONCLUSIONS

CONTENTS, PART II: REVIVING “MY CITY” FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

Hotel Green: the Missing Bridge

This is Pasadena’s bridge to nowhere (left), which originally connected to the other side of Raymond Avenue and where one block north, at 34 South Raymond Avenue, an exhibit called “My City” invited the people of Pasadena to envision their future in 1916.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

Contents Part I: the Birth of the Modern City Part I of this document is a study of the first century of modern city planning, using Pasadena, California as a case study. Among the first cities to come of age at the dawn of the 20th Century, Pasadena had more cars per capita by 1915 than anywhere in the world. This is the story of the modern city, its rise, fall and resurrection. PREFACE........................................................................................................................................................11 INTRODUCTION..........................................................................................................................................12 “MY CITY” 1916: THE HOME-MADE CITY-PLANNING EXHIBIT..................................................27 27

The Rise of the City Beautiful Movement.................................................................................28 City of Gardens..........................................................................................................................30 Progressive Republican City......................................................................................................31 The Four Corners Competition and Paul Williams First Place Entry........................................33 “What Happened in Pasadena: The Story of a Municipal Triumph”.........................................34 Hand-Made City: The Arts & Crafts Movement........................................................................36 Home-Made City Planning: The “My City” Exhibit of 1916....................................................38 “How to Get Started in City Planning: The Pasadena Way” by Dean Damon, 1916................44 “My City” is “the Very Heart of the City’s Design”..................................................................45 “The Jubilee Year Passes to Greater Opportunities” by Dean Damon, 1924.............................48 Pasadena’s Civic Center Masterplan..........................................................................................50

MAIN STREET: THE PASADENA CASE-STUDY....................................................................................53 53 Colorado St

The Last Main Street Before Los Angeles.................................................................................55 Main Street in Decline...............................................................................................................58 Experiment 1: Redevelopment and the Story of the Plaza Pasadena Mall................................60 Experiment 2: The Revitalization of Old Pasadena...................................................................64 The Results of the Two Experiments.........................................................................................70

TODAY: CITY PLANNING IN THE PRESENT........................................................................................77 77

A Hybrid Model: The Early Visioning and Later Logistical Stages of Planning.......................78 Important Topics of Planning: Parts and Pieces.........................................................................81 People in the Planning Process Today.......................................................................................82 The General Plan and 710 Freeway Environmental Impact Report..........................................83

THE PROFESSION OF PLANNING TURNS 100: LESSONS LEARNED............................................87 87

A Century of Modern Planning: The Centennial of the Profession of Planning.......................88 Turning Vision into Results: Lessons of Momentum.................................................................91 Lessons of Form and Process.....................................................................................................96 Creating a Stronger Link Between Vision and Outcome...........................................................99 Contents continue on the following page

The Arroyo Seco Parkway (the Pasadena Fwy & the 110) Planning began in 1912 as a vision for a greenbelt park system. By the time it was constructed in 1939, the plan had shifted to the West’s first freeway. In 2010, the original name of 1912 was reinstated.

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Contents Part II

“MY CITY” THE PROCESS The second half of this document explores how a revived and updated participatory planning process could work in your city today. Based on Pasadena’s City Beautiful initiatives of 1914-1916, this renewed “My City” process would “support, not supplant” the current process of planning, helping citizens to be more effective advocates of their common future while successfully engendering the enduring commitment required to meet the growing challenges of the 21st Century.

“The atmosphere here is that of planning a future home to which everyone who is to live in it has an opportunity for contributing something. This expression of public opinion is the crux of the whole exhibit.” Dean George A. Damon The American City, 1916

CONTENTS

PREFACE

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MY CITY 1916

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“MY CITY” FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: AN OVERVIEW................................ 100

Updating “My City” for Planning Today................................................................................. 101 Principle 1: Bottom-Up Planning in the Visioning Stages that Supports the Public Process... 104 100 Principle 2: Transparency, Ideas Presented in a Manner All Can Understand........................106 Project-Event-Survey-Proposal: Citizen Roles of Leadership, part 1 ....................................108 “MY CITY” PROJECTS . ...................................................................... 111

111

Principle 3: A “Clearing House Policy”..................................................................................112 The Structure of the Project Proposal and the Approach of Video Overviews.......................113 The Process of the “My City” Project.....................................................................................114 The “My City” Visioning Proposal is a Potential Specific Plan for the City..........................115 The Passages Project: An Example “My City” Visioning Proposal........................................116

“MY CITY” EVENTS............................................................................ 119

119

The Four Types of Public Participation at “My City” Events.................................................122 Competitions............................................................................................................................123 Surveys and Straw Poles: Building Momentum......................................................................124 Principle 4: The Revision Principle, “Not Approved But Improved”.....................................125

“MY CITY” PLANITORIUM................................................................... 127

127

Carnegie Library for the 21st Century.....................................................................................130 The Initiatives of the Planitorium............................................................................................132 What’s Happening at the Planitorium: An Example Activity Guide........................................136 Charlie Munger’s Lollapalooza Effect: Logistical and Top-Down Benefits...........................139

POTENTIAL NEXT STEPS...................................................................... 141

141

“My City” in Your City: Potential Stages and Steps...............................................................142 Local and Parent Organization, the “My City” Board, Support Teams...................................143 The Potential of Reviving “My City” in Pasadena..................................................................146

CONCLUSIONS: MAKERS OF THE GRAND MIX ....................................... 149

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The Future is Cities, Planning is the Key................................................................................150 “My City” is the Ship: The Proposal and Benefits..................................................................161 Makers of the Grand Mix: Be a Maker. Citizen Roles of Leadership, part II.........................163 Chapter 11: You Are Here........................................................................................................167 Appendices, “My City” in Your City, Author’s Note, Acknowledgements.............................185 Bibliography and Endnotes.....................................................................................................192

This is a visual study of what a revitalized Arroyo Seco would look like.

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“THE CITY PLANNING MOVEMENT IN PASADENA”

GEORGE A. DAMON DEAN OF ENGINEERING

This 1917 article outlines efforts to create the “My City” Planning Exhibit the previous year. For a copy, including local articles on the exhibit, download a pdf at: mycity.is/

Among the pioneering city planners at the dawn of the modern city, Dean George A. Damon authored an article about the exhibit he helped organize (left) and the Movement he helped lead.

planningmovement.pdf

“HOW TO GET STARTED IN CITY PLANNING: THE PASADENA WAY” Inscribed outside today’s Planning Bldg, Dean Damon describes “The Pasadena Way” in 1916. See page 44 or download the article with commentary on revitalizing “My City” at mycity.is/pasadenaway.pdf

The Property Value Map Grounded in the financial practicalities fitting of its Board of Trade sponsor, this display mapped land values.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

Preface This project explores the planning of the modern city, using Pasadena, California as a case study. Among the first cities to come of age at the dawn of the modern era, Pasadena tells the tale of both cautionary and exemplary results: a landmark civic center, the first freeway in the West, the decline of Main Street and the first city to build an urban mall to address that decline.

Part I of this document describes Pasadena’s City Beautiful efforts and the century that has followed. Presentations on the “My City” process in 2014 elicited strong feedback that this approach could be revived. To that end, Part II explores how an updated process could work in any city today.

As Pasadena’s new mayor, Terry Tornek seeks to “restore Pasadena to its rightful position as a model for other cities to emulate,” * this project explores how that reputation was created in the first place.

A revived “My City” process works to support, not supplant the efforts of any existing municipal planning department by enhancing planning literacy and enduring commitment in any city that seeks to create a stronger link between the early visioning and later logistical stages of planning.

Much of Pasadena’s model city reputation can be found in the City Beautiful Movement and the work of George A. Damon, Dean of Engineering. In creating a more participatory process during the early visioning stages of planning, community aspirations were shared, finances were measured, and an ambitious set of proposals were set in motion.

This exploration of how “My City” can be revitalized initiates the conversation, but does not lead the effort. Like the City Beautiful Movement, the potential of “My City” in your city is found in the leadership of those who champion the Dean Damon’s vision to more effectively and efficiently plan for the increasing velocity of change moving forward.

Endnotes and citations can be found on page 194. An underline is a hyperlink in electronic versions of this document.

Central Library Designed by Myron Hunt and H.C. Chambers in 1924, the vision and planning began in the decade before.

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Introduction This journey is an exploration of the rise of the modern city, and two themes that weave throughout: The first is Old World, top-down rule and ideas imposed from above.

The second is bottom-up vision and the

public search for a beautiful and useful solution. One city discovered the key to an optimal balance.

Their â&#x20AC;&#x153;My Cityâ&#x20AC;? approach and how it can be revitalized is explored in the pages that follow.

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MY CITY 1916

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LESSONS

This map from 1664 was created by Joan Blaeu was titled “Nova et Accuratissima Terrarum Orbis Tabula.” Some modifications have been made to highlight added text.

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Queen Calafia The name California comes from the myth of a warrior queen who ruled a land of black women in the Adventures of EsplandiĂĄn, circa 1500, by Spaniard Garci RodrĂguez de Montalvo. He drew inspiration from the frontier of the New World in the same way that science-fiction is inspired by the frontier of space.

Pt. Reyes

Monterey Pt. Conception Santa Barbara

San Diego

Johannes Vingboons Map of California. Circa 1650. When California was first encountered by Spanish explorers in the 1500s, the tip of what is now called Baja California appeared to be an island. Until the 1700s, maps of the world and North America continued to depict California as an island with some continuing to do so as late as 1865. Johannes Vingboons Map of California that is the background of this page draws from many source maps of this period. Some areas accurately portray coastal points of interest as reported by Spanish explorers, such as San Diego, Point Conception above Santa Barbara. As Vingboons drew from incomplete information, a great deal of inference and conjecture was also needed, which unwittingly perpetuated the myth of California as an island.

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AN ISLAND CALLED CALIFORNIA The name California is born of a mythic island paradise ruled by a queen named Calafia. Along with the tale of the Seven Golden Cities, these Old World fables sparked the imaginations of Spanish mariners in the 1500s, explorers who gambled fortunes and lives, searching in vain to find the cities of gold. As the puzzle of the world fell into place, the mistaken idea that California was an island was difficult to correct. Before there were public schools and libraries, knowledge was handed down and often out of date. Most people were illiterate and believed what they were told. As the truth emerged, fixing past errors took hundreds of years in some cases, with new maps showing California as an island still being produced as late as 1865. As a more complete picture of the world took shape, the rise of science and the printing of books brought a shift from the divine right of kings to the value of people making informed decisions and ruling their own lives. This Enlightenment in the 1700s marked the rise of reason, evidence, free choice and people following their own vision of life. The Enlightenment was crucial to all aspects of the American Revolution. Its bottom-up ideals went hand-in-hand with the creation of the public school and the public commons. Once it was deemed worthy of taxation, libraries proliferated in the decades surrounding 1900, fueling people’s desire to know their world better and participate more fully in creating their future. California’s sunshine and open space provided fertile ground for the fruits of increased public knowledge to blossom. Envisioning an “Athens of the West,” with free libraries and schools, its leading citizens sought to empower an informed populace to create strong and innovative government institutions which would pay great dividends in the century that followed.

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Abbot Kinney At 30 he

Carmelita Gardens, 1880-1968: (aka the Norton Simon Museum).

founded PLAVIS, worked to preserve the mountains, and later created Venice, CA.

PASADENA LIBRARY AND VILLAGE IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY (PLAVIS) In 1880, not far from the “colony” that would become Pasadena, 30 year old Abbot Kinney arrived to find no room at the Sierra Madre Inn. He slept instead on their billiard table and though he was an asthmatic, he woke breathing free and a convert to this new frontier town, population 391. A young man of ideas and enterprise, Kinney bought 500 acres and set about bringing a new culture of activism to this land of sunshine and possibility, promoting preservation of the mountains and native culture. Looking back fifteen years later, historian Hiram Reid writes that Kinney conceived what he called the Pasadena Library and Village Improvement Society (PLAVIS). Reservoir Park

Jeanne Carr Conservationist,

From John Muir to Helen Hunt Jackson, the long list of luminaries gathered to socialize, garden, write and do good work at this social and intellectual nexus continues to this day. See also pages 30, 45, 46, 50, 96.

horticultural expert, writer, and mentor to naturalist John Muir, planner and planter of Carmelita.

“Some thought the colony settlers too much scattered and too poor to make or use such a library;” wrote Reid “but the more cultivated and progressive people grew more in favor of the undertaking as they kept on talking about it.” Another new arrival, Jeanne Carr, also served on the board of PLAVIS. A “gregarious and gifted woman with a vast network of progressively minded and influential friends” her Carmelita Gardens served as a cultural nexus of the region. In turn, she helped PLAVIS to become a movement that mixed education, music, socializing, community and culture, helping turn this frontier village into a true society with an educated populace.

2nd Library

Colorado

Street

1st Library Carmelita

Ora

nge

Gro

ve A

ven

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

John Muir’s Carmelita

visits included gardening and socializing.“I owe to you all my best friends.”

The First Library

(1884-1890) was PLAVIS’ simple structure and included a social hall.

Pasadena’s Second Library

At Walnut and Raymond, PLAVIS built Pasadena’s second library, finally realizing a free library system. Today, the arched corner still stands in Memorial Park

Many were swept up in the “public-spiritedness.” Reid continues, “Mr. Kinney had planned it to be a popular movement in which all could take part.” In addition to its goal of civic beautification, its primary goal was the creation of a free public library. With space provided on the Central School grounds, a simple two story wooden structure was built that also had a social hall. “A fee of twentyfive cents per month was charged for loan of books, although the reading room remained free to all.” Through the late 1880s PLAVIS sold shares and held social events to both promote civic improvement and to pay for a more substantial library on Raymond Avenue and Walnut Street, where Pasadena’s first public park would follow. Reid writes of the following events in the 1880s: Public Concerts, “to provide needful furnishings for the Library parlor and reading room.” Book Socials, with guests contributing a book. Art Exhibits, organized by Kinney, included a “rare collection of stone implements and Indian relics.” The Great Citrus Fair of 1885 “was ‘the most extensive of anything yet attempted.’ To advertise this Fair, and advertise Pasadena at the same time, Mr. Rust and others got out a pamphlet

Helen Hunt Jackson

worked on “Ramona” a book on Native culture at Carmelita.

of 96 pages (2,000 copies of it).” The Fair proved a great success, raising: $531 ($18,000 today). Finally, in 1889, with the new stone library half completed, a ten day event was held in the unfinished shell of the new building. A theme each day brought a blend of cultural offerings. The Ten Day Art Exhibition of 1889 “was the most ambitious and elaborate Art Loan show that had yet been attempted on the Pacific coast; and having been in some sort repeated yearly ever since, it became an historic event which has won fame to Pasadena in literary and art circles both East and West, through illustrated periodicals and descriptive pens,” writes Reid. The library exhibition of 1889 presented: “Senor Arturo Bandini will daily conduct a Spanish conversazione upon suggested subjects of interest to strangers.” Forestry Day: An address by Abbot Kinney, State Forestry Commissioner. Children’s Day: School children’s day. Russian Day: “Exhibits from Alaska. Russian tea.” On Mexican Day: Don Antonio Coronel exhibited rare Mexican relics. Spanish Day presented “Senator Del Valle and relics from his hacienda of Camulos, the reputed home of Ramona.” On California Day: The “widow of Hon. B. D. Wilson, former owner of the Rancho San Pasqual, will pour tea.” There was Oriental Day and Chinese Day. Three years prior to the Ten Day Exhibition, a mob had run the Chinese

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The Colorado Street Bridge, 1913 Initiated by Pasadena’s Board of Trade three years before it sponsored “My City,” this new automobile link to Los Angeles was an engineering marvel that helped usher in the modern age.

out of downtown PLANNING THE Pasadena. Jeanne Carr’s CITY BEAUTIFUL husband Ezra, a professor and state Superintendent of With theNeighborhood Village Improvement Pasadena’s Libraries served to be the ‘the heart of the Public Instruction, exposed the everySociety setting a higher standard Pasadena resident is within walking distance of a library. The b mob’s members in the LA Times. for Pasadena, the town attracted services into the neighborhood and each branch library,/ through its p Perhaps, then,“the Chinese candleincreasingly wealthy progressively the unique character andand needs of the neighborhood that surrounds it maker” may also have been a token minded citizens. By 1900, Pasadena’s 9000 measure of cultural equanimity. residents owned 4000 bicycles. The cutting edge technology of bicycle shops produced Reid recalls, “The ten days’ proceedings showed the Wright Brothers’ aeroplane in Ohio, and in a vast resource of ingenuity, enterprise, skill, Pasadena they sold early automobiles, which first working energy and steadfastness.” In the end, appeared about this time. By 1915, Pasadena had however, PLAVIS did not raise the money needed the highest rate of car ownership in the world. to complete the half-built library. Instead, the free library Kinney envisioned a decade before required At this dawn of the Modern Age, engineering and an 1890 Pasadena bond initiative and for the city architecture now took the lead. Helping lead civic to take over the effort of operating what would improvement, Pasadena’s Board of Trade initiated become a very successful system of 10 libraries. the city’s new bridge to Los Angeles in 1913. George A. Damon, an electrical engineer from Throughout the history of Pasadena that follows, Chicago’s 1893 Fair, arrived in Pasadena about this mix of an authentic bottom-up vision with this time, becoming Dean of Engineering at what the expertise and efficiency of top-down logistics is now Caltech. In 1910, they were building a new is a repeating pattern that would culminate with campus at the edge of Pasadena. Concerns about Pasadena’s City Beautiful Movement and the the development of nearby intersections at Lake subsequent Golden Age of Development. Street and California prompted the 1914 “Four

Pasadena’s branch Libraries are “the heart of the neighborhoods,” often located beside a park or school. Central Library was proposed in 1915 and built 1925

Hill Ave. Branch, 1925

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Corners Competition,” organized by Dean Damon to explore potential solutions. In a blind competition, first prize was awarded to a young man of 20 from South Central Los Angeles named Paul R. Williams, launching the career of one the first prominent African American architects, who would be among the most prolific in the decades that followed.

e neighborhoods, which is why branch libraries bring information programs and collections, reflects t.\

Like the Village Improvement Society, Dean Damon’s efforts repeated the bottom-up, participatory approach to creating a common vision. Sponsored by the Board of Trade, their efforts culminated with the “My City” Exhibit of 1916. It was “My City” that refined the vision of Pasadena’s future so that “its program for civic improvements includes nearly all of the elements which go to make up the very heart of the city’s design,” wrote Dean Damon. From the dawn of the Modern Age in 1900 and on through the mid-1920s, the efforts of this World War I generation stand tall among the very best of what the Golden State had to offer. Though remembered for building California’s greatest bridges and public landscapes after 1925, how they first created the bottom-up momentum for such audacious projects has faded from public memory amidst the cycle of change that has revised and sometimes reversed their efforts.

Dean George A. Damon

led the early visioning efforts in building momentum towards an ambitious Civic Center”

Paul R. Williams

He won first prize and got his start.

Everyone in Pasadena is within walking distance of a library. These are ten branch libraries, plus local college libraries. La Pintoresca Park Branch Library, 1930

Santa Catalina, 1930

Barack Obama at the Occidental College Library, also lived in Pasadena when he made his first speech (p.68).

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1. Originally parks and an open Civic Center axis faced the 1930 Civic Auditorium.

2001: The Paseo Colorado mall reopened the axis. By 2013 it sat half empty and waiting renewal.

Civic Auditorium.

1980: The Plaza Pasadena Mall blocked the axis and failed to thrive.

The Natural Cycle of Change Progress, Improvement and Unintended Consequences main artery. Over time, the creation of more expedient parallel streets and freeways made Colorado less attractive as a thoroughfare and more of a destination.

Reacting to urban flight after WWII, Redevelopment marked a shift in this Natural Cycle as the Plaza Pasadena mall inverted the original pattern of development by moving pedestrians to the interior of the block (where an alley would have been) and locating loading docks 3. Inversion adjacent to the sidewalk on Green Street.

4. Revitalization

For example, when wandering tribes first created settlements with an enclosed area for grazing animals, this enclosed area would often become the park or plaza open space for the city that grew around it.

2. Refinement

In the evolution of cities and human endeavor, there is a Natural Cycle that begins with invention followed by continual refining that transforms and can even invert the original vision. This often leads to a desire to revitalize and the cycle begins once again. Though this cycle can lead to unintended consequences, the pattern is also a natural part of growth, development, transformation and change.

When the Plaza Pasadena mall failed, the revitalized Paseo Colorado mall continued the cycle, reopening the Civic Center axis and transforming it into an open-air mall. Fifteen years later, the mall is set to enter its third cycle, as it now sits in a state of deep incubation, empty of anchor tenants and ready to begin the cycle once again.

Downtown Pasadena also demonstrates this repeating pattern. In 1900, the blocks 1. Invention surrounding the main intersection at Colorado Street The Natural Cycle of Change and Fair Oaks Avenue were the This pattern repeats throughout this study, most among valuable in the city. This pattern, common to the recurring on pages 88, 156, and 158. With the advent of the freeways, development of cities and downtown property values plummeted. Revitalization organizations, can be found throughout the history in the 1980s brought fresh energy and today these that follows. Understanding the Natural Cycle helps blocks are once again among the city’s most valued. substantiate why planning driven from the bottom up is the key to more effectively avoid unintended Pasadena’s main thoroughfare also repeats the cycle. consequences, and in so doing, the cycle serves to Originally known as Colorado Street, it was widened help people both recognize the pattern of inversion to boulevard status and for decades it was the city’s and the signal to revitalize and begin once again. While Modern domestic architecture is largely seen as a triumph of design, the Modernist urban landscape is generally disliked.

Testing the Oaklawn Bridge Pasadena’s most famous architects, brothers Henry and Charles Greene, are seen in 1906 testing their still standing bridge over the Santa Fe (Gold Line) tracks.

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THE “NATURAL” CYCLE OF INCREMENTAL CHANGE: HOW INVERSION WORKS Robert Crumb draws a familiar transformation. Pasadena of 1916 was focussed on row three as they sought to avoid row four.

The Greene South Pasadena and Greene Oaklawn Pedestrian Bridge in



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A Short History of America © Copyright. 1979, 1981 by Robert Crumb. Published by Kitchen Sink Press, No. 2 Swamp Road, Princeton, Wis. 54968

After making the top twelve panels, Robert Crumb later added the three potential futures shown above under the title “What’s Next?”

A revived “My City” process seeks to offer the public more input and involvement.

Your Vision...

The Planner’s Vision...

The Developer’s Vision...

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The Grand Mix The Blending of Bottom-Up Visioning and Top-Down Logistics As Pasadena Mayor Terry Tornek strives to “restore Pasadena to its rightful position as a model for other cities to emulate,” this document seeks to trace that reputation back to its source. In Terry Tornek’s mayoral election of 2015, Pasadena’s former Planning Director pointed out that planning g needs a more “bottom-up” approach. As that vision inspired this exploration, it has become a template to better understand the complicated relationships at play, encouraging the idea that “My City” can work today. The top-down and bottom-up metaphor is a useful way to understand the complexities of planning. The same idea could easily be insiders and outsiders or Pasadena’s organization chart which puts citizens on top, but is basically describing the same idea. While this exploration promotes a more bottom-up approach, there is also a need for a top-down approach in the later, logistical stages of planning. Abbot Kinney’s Library and Village Improvement Society (p.16) spent a decade building the essential bottom-up momentum needed by the top-down efforts that helped perpetuate that vision into ten libraries.

Dean Damon and the City Beautiful Movement’s “My City” process was also based on the marriage of bottom-up vision and top-down logistics, which they i called “beauty” and “order.” The exemplary results and cautionary tales of the history that follows are rooted in either the presence or the lack of this critical blending of bottom-up and top-down efforts. The term “Grand Mix,” in turn, is used to describe this blending of bottom-up vision with the top-down order needed to execute and sustain the effort. It is efficient and effective democracy at their best and the essential key to creating good government. Part II of this project is an exploration into how “My City” can be updated for any city today. Using a project-event-survey-plan approach, “My City” is designed to “support, not supplant” the existing process, presenting projects so they may be not approved, but improved,” as Dean Damon put it. This is the story of what made Pasadena a model for other cities to emulate, how the vision was lost, and how the public’s rightful place in the process can be restored using an exemplary approach to realizing an extraordinary vision that was called “My City.”

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THE GRAND MIX THE “GRAND MIX” OF THE PUBLIC REALM

This description of top-down and bottom-up planning continue from this introductory description as a thread of logic that weaves through pages 79, 91, 105, 115, 156, & 159.

TOP-DOWN LOGISTICS FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION POLICY-BASED AND SINGULAR

ORDER TOP-DOWN • GOVERNMENT • POLICY • BUDGET • ENFORCEMENT • INSPECTION

TOP-DOWN

• DEDUCTION

Top-down entities are key to maintaining a civil society and the repository of the collective expertise necessary to carry out logistical planning.

• GLOBAL

BOTTOM-UP

• DECREE

In planning, bottom-up approaches use greater participation by the public in the early visioning stages, focusing on measuring the ambitions of the people who will be living in the world being planned. Bottomup approaches have a greater tendency to focus on the process of creating beauty and making a civil society one worth living in.

• INDIVIDUALS • VISION • ECONOMY • INITIATIVE • GRASS ROOTS • EXPLORATION • LOCALIZED • CONVERSATION

BOTTOM-UP VISION

BEAUTY

FORM FOLLOWS PROCESS NON-LINEAR EXPLORATION BY THE MANY

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FROM THE MOUNTAINS TO THE SEA: THE MOUNT LOWE TRAIN TO THE CLOUDS Immigrants and visitors from around the world arrived in Pasadena bringing new ideas and technologies and a spirit of innovation. On July 4, 1893, the Echo Mountain incline railway opened, a funicular that rose halfway up the mountain and was then followed by an elaborate mountain trolley trip carved into the canyons, utilizing elaborate trestles as it journeyed to the Mount

Santa Fe & Hotel Green c.1900,beside the train depot.

A Tally-Ho at Hotel Green, 1890 Walking, horses, mules, bicycles, trains and trollies were the way from here to there.

A Trip to Mt. Lowe In 1893, a trolley was extended to the foot of the mountains.

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Part I: History

Memories of the Golden Age How Pasadena Embraced Democratized Planning

The Incline, 1893 A funicular up Echo Mountain.

Echo Mountain to Mount Lowe A trolley on trestles crossed the canyons.

The Mount Lowe Tavern Seen here in 1913, the restaurant and guest rooms operated until 1936.

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“MY CITY”

Future Rose Bowl

Pasadena Presbyterian Church

Christian Science Church

Hotel Maryland

B D

DOBBINS ELEVATED CYCLEWAY

of 1900 was planned from Hotel Green to LA via the Arroyo Seco.

THE 1890S BICYCLE CRAZE

Bicycles let women be independent. Bicycle parades were also popular.

DOBBINS ON HIS CYLEWAY, 1903. Cars were first sold in bicycle shops. This photo tells the change to come.

THE 1908 MODEL-T FORD Ford’s Model-T initiated the age of the automobile.

Greene & Greene’s Duncan Irwin House of 1908

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Colorado Street Bridge The image below comes from this area.

Holly St. Bridge

A History of Pasadena’s 1916

Caltech (Throop) moved here

Home-Made City Planning Exhibit Raymond and Colorado

Hotel Green Caltech began here

Clunes Theater (now Gap)

This is Pasadena as the young city was coming of age as a municipality in 1914. Under the leadership of its Board of Trade, the Colorado Street Bridge had just been completed (top photo, far right), but few other signature landscapes such as the Rose Bowl or Brookside Park in the Arroyo Seco had been completed.

This background photo, taken from the panorama at the top, shows many buildings still standing today. Throop College (now Caltech) had opened in a building annexed into Hotel Green in the 1890s. Moving to its current campus in 1910, they opened the West’s first wind tunnel in 1917 and the first aeronautical design curriculum a year later. Its new Dean of Engineering, George A. Damon, was also starting to teach courses in the emerging field of city planning. Together with the City Beautiful Association and Board of Trade, Dean Damon set about writing Pasadena’s next chapter, an impact that can still be felt a century later. This is a story of both forgotten origins and reawakened opportunities. “MY CITY” 1916 CONTENTS The Rise of the City Beautiful........................... 28 City of Gardens................................................. 30 Progressive Republican City............................ 31 The Four Corners Competition......................... 33 Pasadena: “Municipal Triumph”...................... 34 Hand-Made City................................................ 36

“Home-Made” City Planning............................ 38 “The Pasadena Way” by George Damon.......... 44 World War I and After....................................... 45 George Ellery Hale & the Shifting Vision.......... 46 “Jubilee”........................................................... 49 The Bennett Civic Center Plan ........................ 50

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Raymond Hotel

“MY CITY” Chicago’s Columbian Exposition, 1893 The largest gathering in human history, the fair introduced many to civic planning.

The Rise of the City Beautiful Movement Chicago’s Colombian Exposition of 1893 marks a key turning-point in American history. The fair was the largest gathering to date and a portal into the rapidly approaching future. Over 120,000 lights illuminated the defining inventions of modern life. It was as if Chicago had switched on the 20th Century and the world poured in, including many of Pasadena’s most influential citizens. Also among the visitors was a young electrical engineer named George Damon who would later apply the lessons of Chicago to Pasadena. Of all the exhibits, the city of Chicago itself was chief among the fair’s attractions. Its rebuilding after the Great Fire of 1871 produced the first steelframed skyscrapers, grand civic architecture, modern planning and a spirit of progressive thinking that would help usher in a new age. The Fair marked the dawn of the Modern Age and the final settling of the American frontier, as well as a pronounced change in the way people thought about what a city could be.

The Exposition’s Classical “Beaux Arts” buildings were aligned on the open space of a grand axis, helping establish the ideal America’s civic landscapes for the next 40 years. Daniel Burnham, chief architect of the Chicago fair, inspired a “City Beautiful Movement” that grew nationally, but in few places more fervently than Pasadena, California. Where Chicago had become a world-class city, Pasadena was still striving to exhibit that a city could be both a cultural destination and a beacon of the future. To that end, the fair’s great spotlight was moved to Echo Mountain above Pasadena. The completion of the Colorado Street Bridge in 1913 marked the end of one era and the crossing into the next. The new century saw both the revival of Classical architecture and boundless feats of engineering, two aspirations that defined Pasadena’s quest for world-class stature.

San Diego’s Panama-California Exposition

Celebrating the opening of the Panama Canal, the 1915-17 fair was held in San Diego’s Balboa Park.

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San Francisco’s “Panama-Pacific International Exposition” of 1915 and the Palace of Fine Arts

Celebrating the opening of the Panama Canal and San Francisco’s resurrection after the 1906 earthquake, the Pan-Pacific fair was built on the rubble of the destroyed city that filled the edge of the bay and is now called the Marina District. When the fair’s temporary plaster and burlap buildings were pulled down, the public wanted to save Bernard Maybeck’s magnificent Palace of Fine Arts. It was saved and then rebuilt in the 1930s and again in the 1960s.

Driven by his experience as an engineer at the Chicago fair, George A. Damon moved to Pasadena and became Dean of Engineering at Throop Polytechnic (renamed the California Institute of Technology in 1919). In 1914, Dean Damon helped form the Pasadena City Beautiful Association, which would build on the momentum of the new Colorado Street Bridge. “This organization is composed of delegates from fifty different local societies, and holds monthly meetings at which projects for making the city “more beautiful” are discussed,” he wrote. “Active work is done by committees reporting at these regular meetings, and considerable constructive work has been accomplished in the way of clean-up days, care of vacant lots, flower boxes on business blocks, rubbish collection, refuse receptacles, removal of real estate signs, billboard agitation, ornamental street lamps, etc.”

With the opening of the Panama Canal and World War I breaking out in Europe, California became a popular alternative for vacationing Easterners. Celebrating the canal’s opening and the rebuilding of San Francisco after its 1906 earthquake, its Pan-Pacific Exposition of 1915 drew visitors from around the world. Apparently, its new City Hall left a great impression on visitors from Pasadena as its architects, Bakewell and Brown, would later go on to design Pasadena’s City Hall. At a second 1915 fair in San Diego, Bertram Goodhue’s Spanish Colonial Revival architecture defined a uniquely California approach that had an even greater influence on Pasadena. Goodhue then designed the Caltech campus in 1916 and this style of architecture came to define Pasadena. As World War I drew the US closer to entering the conflict, the two fairs and the thought of impending war would energize the City Beautiful Movement in Pasadena to “make big plans.”

Daniel Burnham

Dean George A. Damon

Burnham designed most of Chicago’s 1893 Columbian Exposition and inspired a national movement, including both the City Beautiful Association of Pasadena as well as the Exposition’s Electrical Engineer George Damon, who featured his famous quote (right) in the “Possibilities” section of their 1915 “Pasadena Plan.”

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THE ARROYO SECO

IDG

ELKS CLUB

COLO RADO BLVD.

ORANGE GROVE AVE

CARMELITA GARDENS

Carmelita: The Birth of the Norton Simon

Flowers Year Round

New Years 1930 (see pages 16, 45, 50 & 94).

The Birth of Bush Gardens

Busch gardens 1933

Busch gardens opened to the public in 1906.

City of Gardens questing for a better way brought the scientific study of botany and horticulture into the exotic gardens of this once barren land.

In stark contrast to Eastern cities settled by clearing trees, Southern California was relatively barren before being settled. With key exceptions, such as the seasonal Arroyo Seco or the occasional ancient oak or sycamore tree, there was little water, and consequently few trees or vegetation. In 1865, Benjamin Eaton designed a way of collecting water from the Arroyo Seco at a narrowing called Devil’s Gate after having created a water system for Los Angeles. With water now available in Pasadena as well, the land was sold to a group of Indiana settlers in 1874 who planted citrus orchards and elaborate gardens in the 1880s. The Enlightenment’s notion of “tending one’s own garden” and The “Horticultural Court” (below) at the

“My City” Exhibit of 1916 in support of a Horticultural Hall in the new Civic Center.

(Though Benjamin Eaton’s son Fred is long credited with masterminding the 1913 Owens Valley to LA Aqueduct, the idea may have been the work of his father.)

The Batchelder Fountain (above) at

In Pasadena’s temperate climate, the garden proved an idyllic outdoor living room for social gatherings. With 90 varieties of trees, Carmelita Gardens was both Pasadena’s first great garden and a famed cultural nexus (p. 16, 45, & 50). In 1924, the last 13 acres were acquired for a park, museum and school of art and design, now known as the Norton Simon Museum.

the Horticultural Court of the “My City” Exhibit was also featured in the brochure of its host, Pasadena’s Board of Trade. See also pages 36, 39, 46, 65, 67.

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Progressive Republicans When the party split in 1912 into two factions—one led by William Howard Taft and the other led by President Roosevelt—the reformers led by Roosevelt and Johnson were known as the Progressives.

Progressive Republican City Perhaps no single influence was as important to the development of Pasadena’s “My City” approach as California’s Progressive Republicans of 1909-1917. In the post Civil War Era, Republicans had been reformminded and often more liberal than the Democratic party’s Southern flank, which still had many former Confederates of the Civil War (aka the Dixiecrats). By the time of the Chicago Fair of 1893, municipal corruption and urban squalor brought scientific study of government, education, business, religion and medicine, which in turn resulted in new government reforms and more direct forms of democracy.

Though the Progressive era itself spanned the spectrum of political parties from Democrats to Socialists, the Progressive Party itself was an offshoot of the Republican Party of 1912. The Republicans took to reform with the “Bull-Moose” fervor of President Theodore Roosevelt. Progressive Governor of California, Hiram Johnson—later Republican Senator—was among the strongest Progressive reformers of this period. His achievements are described in the articles on the following page. As Progressives acted most effectively at the state and local levels, few cities took to this new reform spirit more fervently than Pasadena. In the 1912 presidential

election, Pasadena’s Republican majority gave 40-to-1 support for Theodore Roosevelt’s platform of conservation and prosperity for all. Though Roosevelt did not prevail, Governor Johnson introduced the referendum, recall, initiative, workers’ compensation, direct democracy and a Progressive reputation to California government that persists to this day. Due largely to this progressive spirit, Pasadena municipalized water and power (p.34), created a city owned farm that fed employees (p.35), a Council-Manager system, (p.77), and the rare municipal Health Department, all of which contributed to its lasting reputation as a model city. As this Progressive spirit faded, and with it, meaningful public participation, so did Pasadena’s reputation as a model city.

THE CALIFORNIA OUTLOOK was published between 1911 and 1920 by the former chairman of the California Republican Party,

a close ally of both Republican Governor Hiram Johnson and Republican President Theodore Roosevelt. The articles below and on the following page are from 1914 issues of the magazine.

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“MY CITY” The unabridged version of these articles can be found at: mycity.is/outlook.pdf

“THE CALIFORNIA OUTLOOK”

Continuing from the caption on previous page. Right: Child Labor and Southern Antipathy It is easy to forget that looking back to the Civil War from the 1910s occurred with the same space of time that people look back to the 1960s today. The GOP was still the party of Lincoln. African-Americans were almost universally Republicans and the South was a solidly Democratic. The Progressive Republicans continued the tradition of social and economic reform. They were trust busters who regulated big business. Their loss of the presidential election of 1912 led to more restrictive racial segregating of the US Army by Democratic President Woodrow Wilson and the Dixiecrats. Left: Before World War I had a Name This article explains the then recent unfolding of what is now referred to as World War I.

PRO-REGULATION Progressive

Republicans promoted the sensible regulation of business.

THE ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF CALIFORNIA’S PROGRESSIVE REPUBLICANS 1) “Kicking out the Southern Pacific Railroad” by reducing their political influence.

“GOOD GOVERNMENT: PROTECT IT”

2) Direct election of US Senators.

3) The Referendum: A citizen vote on an issue. 4) The Recall: A vote to remove from office.

5) The Initiative: A vote bypassing legislators.

6) Worker’s Compensation: State run insurance 7) Increased regulation of big business. 8) “Good Government” Initiatives

After Progressive Republicans failed to split from the GOP, they dropped the phrase Progressive and many of it’s reform-minded advocates formed the“Good Government League,” which entered a float in Pasadena’s Rose Parade of 1950 showing bipartisan cooperation between donkey and elephant.

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“MY CITY” Paul R. Williams

towards class, race, religion and wealth, a young man of 20 from South-Central Los Angeles named Paul Williams entered the blind competition, presenting his vision for how Pasadena should plan and develop, winning First Place over established firms. Williams designed a hierarchy of pedestrian spaces set concentrically around the intersection—from a curbside sidewalk to an offstreet arcade— and back passage market stalls providing refuge from the bustle of the street. Including a post office, firehouse, civic clubhouse, theater, park, and library; Williams’ design, the Star News wrote, would “increase the value of surrounding property to a much greater degree than if the community was left to establish its own individual form of development.”

The Four Corners Competition: First Prize

The above article is excerpted from “The California Outlook” magazine, November 14, 1914; page 15.

Pasadena Mansion

LA County Courthouse

The City Beautiful Association’s participatory approach of gathering as many ideas as possible was inaugurated by the 1914 “Four Corners Competition,” which sought solutions for intersections then at the edges of Pasadena. Despite the prevailing attitudes

Architect of the Rich and Famous (Sinatra)

The young Paul Williams was not only handsomely rewarded for his efforts, he went on to become among the most prolific and famed architects of the region and the first African-American member of the American Institute of Architects. Architect of both the rich and famous, housing and government, this largely forgotten beginning to architect Paul Williams’ career is also among the lost stories of the years that followed the Colorado Street Bridge.

Beverly Hills Hotel

LAX Theme Building

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“MY CITY” “What Happened in Pasadena: the Story of a Municipal Triumph” From an October 1909 article about Pasadena published in 20th Century Magazine by Francis Marshall Elliott, this abridged article chronicles how a strong municipal structure was critical to the development of the modern city. Through the words of Mayors Waterhouse and Earley, the article shows how the direct democracy approach of the Progressive Era changed the way people thought about what a city could accomplish (including the mixed blessing of eminent domain) and the City of Pasadena’s forgotten 500-acre farm that is seen in the photo at the bottom of the opposite page. The full article can be found at: mycity.is/pasadena1909.pdf “The stage-setting in this instance was Pasadena, California, one of the most beautiful residential cities of the New World. It has a population of about thirty thousand. It is known the land over as a city of millionaires and has more beautiful homes and more home-owners than any city of like population in America. A large percentage of its people are retired capitalists and have come hither from almost every section to spend their declining years in this wonderful garden spot where the sun is ever shining and flowers bloom perpetually. More than one hundred and fifty men in the city are reputed to be worth a million dollars or more; while a large proportion of the population are persons in more than comfortable circumstances. Less than one hundred families dwell in flats, and there are no slums, no manufacturing enterprises and no tenement sections. It is preeminently a city of wealth and culture, and by all preconceived notions of economists, Pasadena should be one of the most conservative and undemocratic communities in the land; yet as a matter of fact this city rejoices in, perhaps, the most fundamentally democratic municipal charter to be found in the world—a charter which provides that the city shall have the power:— “To purchase, receive, have, hold, lease, use, and enjoy, property of every kind and description, both within and without the limits of the city. and control and dispose of the same for the common benefit. It furthermore specifically provides that the city shall have the power:— “To construct and maintain water works, pipes, pipe lines, aqueducts and

hydrants for supplying the city and its inhabitants with water and the right to supply water to persons who live without the city. “To construct and maintain gas and electric works for supplying the city and its inhabitants with light, heat and power. “To construct and maintain works for supplying the city and its inhabitants with telephonic and telegraphic service. “To construct and maintain and operate street railways and other means of conveyance, together with all rolling stock, power houses, equipment, appliances, and apparatus necessary and proper in the operation, management and control of the same.”

Pasadena Electric Light & Power Co. 1900 Sixteen years later, the “My City” Exhibit was held here at 34 S. Raymond Avenue. Then, 63 years later, the Espresso Bar was found in the back alley. See also pages 39, 42 and 66.

“Having thus provided that the municipality might primarily establish itself in any line of business deemed by the citizens to be for the public weal. the framers of the charter, evidently fearing that they inadvertently overlooked some point of vantage where some individual or corporation was already established in some line which the community might consider to be to the collective advantage to own, rather than await the otherwise slow process of establishing and building up, in competition with said established enterprises, or else in a spirit of sheer democratic abandon, provided in Section 23 of Article 3, that the city should have the power:“To exercise the right of eminent domain for the purpose of acquiring real and personal property of every kind, necessary or convenient for the use of said city or its inhabitants.” Now these radical and progressive sections of the most radical and democratic city charter in America were not forced upon a reluctant and protesting community by a coterie of socialistic agitators, but were evolved by a charter commission composed of staid business men and retired capitalists, and they were submitted to and adopted by an overwhelming’ majority vote of the wealthy, staid and conservative home owners of Pasadena. In addition to the provisions above quoted, looking to the economic protection of the citizens of Pasadena, this remarkable document embodies the practical political safeguards of popular government—the Initiative, Referendum and Right of Recall, by which the citizens reserve to themselves

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“MY CITY” Mayor Thomas J. Earley 1907–1911

Mayor William Waterhouse 1905–1907

the power to initiate desired legislation, to veto undesired legislation, and to recall or discharge unfaithful or incompetent city officials or employees. Having thus established themselves in this model and modern citadel of municipal democracy, the citizens of Pasadena were in a position to enjoy the legitimate benefits to be derived from natural monopolies—benefits which in various cities throughout the United States have, during the last half century, made scores of multimillionaires at the expense of the health of the citizens and the purity of municipal government. “The question of municipal ownership of a lighting plant was not an issue in my first campaign,” said ‘William Waterhouse, known to all Southern California as the father of municipal ownership in Pasadena, and who was elected mayor of the city in the spring of 1905; “but the issue at stake was the municipal ownership of the city’s water supply, and the entire administration, including the city council, was elected on a platform embodying this proposition. “Soon after assuming office, I became satisfied that the water question was not the only one demanding consideration. The city was paying an exorbitant price for the lighting of her streets and public buildings, and the service rendered was about as bad as could be imagined. I started an investigation and in a very short time accumulated evidence to prove that the city was being defrauded. …We were utterly unable to bring the corporation to terms, and we finally held up the lighting bills. The corporation brought suit to collect, and though the suits are still pending, the city has won in every court to date. …The threat of the private company to leave the city in darkness brought matters to a crisis. “I called the council together and submitted my plans to them;— with, the result that a resolution was introduced and passed,

submitting to a vote of the electors a proposition to vote a bond issue of $125,000 for the purpose of establishing a municipal lighting plant for Pasadena. “This action of the council was like a thunderbolt from a clear sky. It electrified the people and it brought into action at once all the deterrent force of the powerful electric company and its allied corporate interests. The battle was bitterly fought. Every newspaper in the city opposed municipal ownership. Within twenty-four hours after the introduction of the resolution in the council I received a call from the president of the lighting corporation, who advanced every argument, from ‘patriotism’ to the ‘interests of the poor widows and orphans’ who owned stock in his company, in a vain effort to convince me of the error of my way as a public official; to all of which I turned a deaf ear. “Finally the day of election dawned and the battle raged until the last vote was polled. When the votes were counted the city had won by the necessary twothirds majority and had just seven votes to spare. This victory, however, was but the beginning of the struggle. Suits were instituted by the private corporation, which are still pending, attacking the city’s right to engage in municipal lighting. The bonds were refused by every local financial institution and were finally purchased by private parties. Every obstruction that could be devised by a great corporation in dire distress was thrown in the way of the municipal undertaking. Necessary supplies were delayed, construction work impeded, and in the midst of the building of the plant the municipal election came on. The struggle was even more bitter than that over the bond issue. My opponent, though the candidate of the opponents of municipal ownership, ran upon a platform as zealous in its advocacy of municipal ownership as the one upon which I

stood. My defeat was accomplished by means and methods upon which it is unnecessary at this time to comment, but the significant and satisfactory feature of the election to me was, that, no difference who gained the day, the municipal ownership education of the people was complete, and with the Initiative, Referendum and Right of Recall in their hands, no administration would dare defeat the work so well begun.” “I was not a convert to municipal ownership when elected, though making my race for the office upon a platform demanding it,” confessed Mayor Thomas J. Earley, banker and capitalist, who succeeded Mayor Waterhouse, and who is the present mayor of Pasadena; “but I put myself in the position of a juror, who, having an opinion in the case, was nevertheless open to conviction and my nearly two years in office has absolutely convinced me that municipal ownership is not only a success but from every standpoint desirable.” “During my two years’ administration, we have held two bond elections, voting money to improve and complete our plant. That the issue is popular with the public is best evidenced by their vote. “The first two bond issues, plus $53,332, used from the city’s General Fund, enabled us to complete our plant and light the city in every department. We also found that we had considerable energy to spare and in answer to a general demand we entered the commercial field, as an experiment. So great was our success in this venture and so satisfactory to the public, that the latest bond issue for increasing our plant to care for all commercial business offered, carried by the astonishing vote of 7 to I. Yes, municipal ownership in Pasadena is a pronounced and an unqualified success.” The City of Pasadena also owned a 500-acre farm that utilized sewage and table-scraps to make fertilizer and grow crops to feed municipal departments.

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“MY CITY”

Motto of Judson Studios, where USC’s College of Fine Arts began in 1911.

Charles Lummis built his home,“El Alisal,” 1897-1910. It is open today as an Arroyo Seco landmark.

Hand-Made City The Arroyo Seco is an 11-mile canyon that runs from the San Gabriel Mountains, north of Pasadena, down to the Los Angeles River. It was beside this boulder strewn canyon that Pasadena was founded in 1874. Among its bungalows of 1900 there grew an Arroyo Culture of artisans and architects who built their low-slung homes of brick, boulders and wood, drawing inspiration from the Craftsman style of architecture, with its Japanese and Swiss influences. By 1910, Pasadena artisans were producing some of the finest works of the Arts and Crafts Movement.

Ernest Batchelder

is among the most beloved craftsmen of the Arroyo Seco. His architectural tilework is a cherished feature in homes and buildings throughout the US, including the Horticultural Court of “My City” and the Pasadena Playhouse. He also helped establish the Pasadena Art Institute at Carmelita Gardens. See also pages 30, 39, 46, 65, and 67.

This Arroyo culture also worked to preserve the canyon as part of a larger park system that would create a contiguous green-belt from the San Gabriel mountains to Elysian and Griffith Park and on to the ocean, from “the mountains to the sea.” The Arroyo Culture’s reverence for the hand-made also reflected a larger impulse in Pasadena for self-reliance. To that end, local schools immersed students in a first class education in the manual arts. By providing facilities and instruction in woodworking, metalsmithing, drafting and printing, Pasadena educated children in how to not only make things on their own, but more importantly, gave them the confidence to initiate projects, solve problems and take matters in hand. The excerpt on the following page, from “Pasadena Kindergartens: 1901-1919,” and a chapter titled “Construction Works With Wood” tells of this effort:“This year we introduced construction work with wood. We secured a load of lumber, odd scraps, from the Pasadena Lumber Company. The boys in the grades were making’ toys at that

The Greene Brothers

were influenced by the Japanese pavilion of the 1893 Chicago fair. Among the most revered architects of the Arts & Crafts Movement, their 1909 Gamble House (bottom), is a masterpiece open for public tours.

William Lees Judson Judson Studios is where USC’s school of Fine Arts was started in 1911 and still produces leaded glass on the Arroyo Seco to this day.

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time, discarded scraps were added to our bin. The children revelled in this material and put it to many uses; hammers, saws, and nails were quickly made acquainted with this pile of wood scraps. The children had free scope to make anything they chose. Both groups of children spent two periods each week in the sloyd room. All the articles made which we considered really good were honored by being painted, or stained. One of the first things to be constructed was a horse and wagon. This suggestion came to the child because of a discarded horse’s head. The following day the horse and wagon were improved upon. The man on the horse was removed and placed in the wagon. The first table constructed was made of a flat board and four long nails for legs. ‘The next day the table received wooden pillars for supports. Following are some of the articles made: chairs, tables, carts, airships, guns, a church with cross. slides and ladders combined, window rod cross, T-square, tooth brush, bookrack, benches all sizes, and settees.”

adults they were more inclined to acquire “agency,” that term of the Enlightenment that described the capacity of people to act independently and make their own decisions. With the advent of the computer age, the manual arts facilities were phased out of Pasadena schools in the 1990s. Though there are slim exceptions—an elective weekly class or the laudable efforts of non-profits such as Side Street Projects, which attempts to fill that gap with a mobile workshop. These efforts, however, do not replace what was once accomplished by a full manual arts program.

Pasadena’s first-class education in the manual arts was not once or twice a week, but an everyday education in both junior high and high schools, producing generations of adults who were not only great at fixing things, but who also honed their problem solving skills in the process. As

Where young adults once helped shape the Pasadena landscape, the process of shaping the future is now dominated by an older generation that was educated in this more hands on approach. Rather than find a problem for every solution, this can-do spirit of finding a solution for every problem is just what is lacking and so greatly needed today.

The Rose Parade Inspired by Pasadena’s pioneering aeronautic

“Floral Peace Dove” Pasadena’s Rose Parade gave local groups the

community, this 1908 entry demonstrates the increasingly imaginative craft work put into its New Year’s Day “floats.”

chance to make their own hand-made float. The“Floral Peace Dove” built by the Pasadena Negro Taxpayers Association in 1916, also served as a visual reminder that all people in Pasadena paid taxes to support the new pool at Brookside Park that had opened in 1914 and all were entitled to equal access, which was finally granted in 1947.

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“MY CITY” The Civic Center Vision: This conceptual sketch for a Civic Center is from “Pasadena Plan” of 1915 and Dean Damon’s “Hammer and Roses”

talk given to the Pasadena Woman’s Civic League (which can be found at mycity.is/pasadenaplan.pdf). Before World War I, the extension of Library Park (now Memorial Park) was seen as the logical location for a new Civic Center. However, it required either moving or burying the Santa Fe tracks which would take another 80 years to accomplish.

“Home-Made” City Planning In an effort to connect the hands-on spirit of the Progressive Era with the emerging city planning movement, the City Beautiful Association created a process called “My City” which invited citizens to help craft their city with the same hands-on approach that they used to build their homes. Competitions were held to beautify empty lots. A “Four Corners Competition” (p.33) was held to generate new ideas for the design of major intersections. The City Beautiful Association invited citizens to give “city planning suggestions, and a result more than one hundred separate ideas were submitted, both by individuals and by the allied organizations.”

“In all the history of municipal endeavor along these lines, probably there never was an exhibit approximating the one at present here… to obtain the co-operation of citizens in choosing the best out of the good; in deciding what shall be done first, and of proving to them that it is within their power to do anything they please.” Henry James

Pasadena Star-News March 3, 1916

With the larger themes of Progressive politics, the Arts & Crafts Movement, and World War I in Europe, the City Beautiful Association adopted a uniquely democratic approach by polling visitors to the “My City” Exhibit, an approach that was explicitly designed to build support for a Civic Center bond measure that would eventually follow. The exhibit presented both an in-depth history and pointed critique of the city. A “We Object Corner” (also called the “slam corner”) invited critical debate. As outlined in the article abridged on the next five pages, Dean Damon’s approach of connecting past lessons learned with a frank assessment of the present was the key to building a common vision for Pasadena’s future.

“Pasadena Plan” The Planning Association’s “Pasadena Plan” of 1915 called for new streets, now Union Street and Green, parallel to Pasadena’s main thoroughfare of Colorado Street. Calling for the removal of the Santa Fe (Gold Line) tracks, the commuter rail line on what is now Arroyo Parkway ending at Colorado would be the site of new Civic Center (center).

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The following four pages are abridged excerpts reprinted from a 1916 article written by George Damon, Dean of Engineering at Caltech (when it was still known as Throop), on creating a “Pasadena Plan.” See pasadena passages.org/ homemade.pdf for an unabridged copy of Dean Damon’s original article along with other articles he wrote, and news articles from local papers about the exhibit.

Pasadena’s First Horticultural Hall

The “Horticultural Court” of 1916 included a Batchelder Fountain. From 1979 thru 1994, this alley was known as the Espresso Bar. See also pages 30, 36, 46, 65 and 67.

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“MY CITY” “The atmosphere here is that of planning a future home to which everyone who is to live in it has an opportunity for contributing something.… This expression of public opinion is the crux of the whole exhibit.” Dean George A. Damon 1916

Batchelder Fountain

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“LAND VALUE ‘TOPOGRAPHY’ ” Dean Damon writes: “A map showing land values throughout the city is, perhaps, the most unique feature of this part of the exhibit. Round pegs were made on a scale of an inch in height representing $40 and these upright sticks were placed in the middle of each block on the map and show graphically the value per front foot of lots at that point. The highest peg is in the center of the city, where values run $1,000 per front foot, and the pegs are in the outlying districts, where values are appraised as low as $10 per front foot. The results of this device for showing the relative values of real estate throughout the city are striking and satisfying, and no one single feature of the entire exhibit is attracting more favorable comment. The idea of the map is at once apparent and the reason for the difference in values of the various sections of the city is a subject constantly and intelligently discussed. As a means of arousing a genuine and widespread interest in real city planning, this map has been a great success.”

“PASADENA PLAN” Dean Damon’s City Planning talk at the Pasadena Woman’s Civic League (below, right) is excerpted on the next page and can also be found at mycity.is/pasadenaplan.pdf

“MY CITY” BALLOTS Two ballots invited attendees to order their priorities (below). Inspired by Daniel Burham’s famous quote (p.29), one ballot focused on “Beautiful” and the other “Orderly.” Tabulation over the months indicated that the sentiment of the first month remained consistent over time.

The “My City” Exhibit Grounded in the financial

practicalities fitting of its Board of Trade sponsor, this display mapped land values.

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The above list is from “Pasadena Plan” 1915, Dean Damon’s “Hammer and Roses” talk given to the Pasadena Woman’s Civic League, which can be found at mycity.is/pasadenaplan.pdf

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In 1916, the City Beautiful Association, Women’s Civic League, Caltech (Throop), and Board of Trade set up the “My City” public planning exhibit at 34 S. Raymond Ave, (later the site of the Espresso Bar). Much of the planning of Pasadena’s growth of the 1920s was inspired by the process surrounding the exhibit.

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“The Pasadena Way” A common expression in the local dialogue, used to describe a high degree of public involvement. This 1916 article may well be the first use of the phrase, which is inscribed unattributed outside the Pasadena’s Planning Department Building.

Dean George A. Damon The Birth of the Planning Profession Until the 1910s, the profession of City Planning was part of the general practice of architecture, engineering and building. In 1909, when the first US National Conference on City Planning was held, the idea that planning was a separate profession was not apparent. By 1916, a journal called “The City Plan” was created to publish its proceedings. Opening the conference that year was Dean Damon’s lecture, “How to Get Started in City Planning the Pasadena Way,” which set the tone, helping cities become acquainted with the idea of planning. Another article marked the first college courses in City Planning.

Article An unabridged

copy of Dean Damon’s article can be found at: mycity.is/ damon_how_to_get_started.pdf

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“My City” is “the Very Heart of the City’s Design” By June of 1916 it was clear that US entry into World War I was near. Dean Damon helped lead a group of engineers from Throop, which would soon change its name to Caltech, volunteering their skills to the US Army. The school’s famed astronomer George Ellery Hale also organized the National Research Council to support military research. Writing in 1917, Dean Damon reports how, through “My City” it was first determined that “Pasadena is particularly interested in the possibilities of a civic center.” It was “My City” that refined the vision so that “its program for civic improvements includes nearly all of the elements which go to make up the very heart of the city’s design. The exact location of this center, its size, its arrangement and its style of

The WWI Memorial Flagpole at Colorado Blvd and Orange Grove was once in the middle of the intersection and later moved to the corner. Designed by Bertram Goodhue “in memory of 1917-1918.”

architectural treatment are details to which the city will, very shortly, address itself.” A century after “My City,” and particularly in light of the controversy surrounding the planning of Pasadena’s Civic Center in 2016 (see p.95), the lessons of “My City” are clear: gathering solutions and building community vision early in the planning process is essential. Participatory planning is what made Pasadena a model for other cities to emulate. By measuring the public’s ambitions, financial resources and creating an enduring vision for civic improvement, Pasadena was able to build the momentum to successfully “make big plans.” With World War I serving as intermission, the planning efforts put on hold in 1917 began to bear fruit after the war, resulting in civic buildings constructed in the 1920s and ‘30s that remain the pride of Pasadena to this day. Carmelita Gardens: Exhibits and Lectures In the 1920s, George Damon continued his civic planning efforts at Carmelita Gardens (seen behind the flagpole to the left). The vision of Carmelita Gardens and the Art Museum that began with Jeanne and Ezra Carr in the 1880s (p.16) continued in 1924 as George Damon shifted his planning efforts toward

Carmelita Gardens, seen here in the background. Known today as the Norton Simon Museum, this park and gardens is also discussed on the following page and on pages 16, 30, 46, 50 and 96.

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Pasadena’s Planning Commission requested that architects Bakewell and Brown change the belfry to a dome. Otherwise the design is the same as it stands today.

In 1922, Caltech astronomer George Ellory Hale took the lead in getting the City Board to start hiring architects. “To make a city attractive,” he urged, “is to make it prosperous,” quoting architect Willis Polk.

With the aim of transforming Jeanne Carr’s original gardens into a civic space for concerts, symposiums, exhibits, and the Pasadena Art Institute, Carmelita hosted the city’s Jubilee of 1924 with George Damon leading the effort. Carmelita continued until the early 1970s when a new museum was finally built. With its patrons disagreeing about its focus on Modern Art and the lack of stronger top-down civic leadership, the Pasadena Art Museum was privatized in 1974 and is known around the world today as the Norton Simon Museum of Art.

building an art museum. As Dean Damon describes in the article to the left and on the following page, Camelita Gardens would serve as one anchor at the west end of the Civic Center’s Holly Street axis.

continued…

The famed Caltech astronomer led the effort to hire Bennett’s firm to plan a civic center.

George Ellery Hale

Edward H. Bennett

Bennett organized the layout of buildings for the architects that followed.

With a new municipal Planning Commission created in April 1922, the firm of Bennett, Parsons, and Frost was hired to create a plan for Pasadena. As a protege of Daniel Burnham, who had inspired Pasadena to “make big plans” a generation before, Edward Bennett’s Civic Center master plan included a city hall, library, auditorium, and museum at Carmelita Gardens, which was not funded by the bond initiative. Though there would be no Horticultural Hall, the Civic Center was designed with ample land set aside as public gardens and open space, a plan voters enthusiastically approved with a $3.5 million bond in 1923 and a supplemental bond initiative approved by voters the following year.

George Ellory Hale’s Campaign

“MY CITY” George and Harriet Damon’s Christmas Card “Waiting for you at the garden gate.”

Courtesy of Susan Phelan and the Damon’s grandchildren.

Pasadena’s Commencement of High Schools at the Rose Bowl 1928 Until 2012, Pasadena’s high schools graduated at the Rose Bowl. After desegregation and the defunding of schools after Proposition-13, many withdrew their children from Pasadena’s public schools.

The Rose Bowl Myron Hunt was the architect of Pasadena’s Central Library, Huntington’s home, hotel, and hospital, Occidental College, and the Rose Bowl, which was envisioned the decade before, but grew in support at “My City.” The original 1924 stadium was open to the landscape of the Arroyo Seco.

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Pasadena Playhouse Founded in 1916, the Community Playhouse’s new Spanish Colonial Revival theater by local artist and architect Elmer Grey includes work by artist Alson S. Clark.

Jubilee Pasadena Realizes its City Beautiful Dreams

Star News (JJ. Blick) The merging of two newspapers in 1916 led to the Star News building of 1925. Its radio towers were later used by underground station KPPC, which led to KROQ. Many local children got their first job delivering the Star News by bicycle.

The 1924 celebration of Pasadena’s 50th year was a cornerstone of the most admired decade in Pasadena history. The label “Golden Age” may obscure its larger origins, however. Just as the ribbon-cutting of one mayor is usually based on the planning of the previous, it is the actions of the preceding decade that defined the major landscapes and buildings in most modern cities. For Pasadena, the pent-up aspirations of the Progressive Era began to pay rich dividends in the decade, and ultimately in the century that followed.

The Pasadena Athletic Club opened at Green and Los Robles in 1925

Grace Nicholson Bldg Another singular vision that would be enjoyed by many, this gallery later became the Pasadena Museum and is now USC’s Pacific Asia Museum.

One example from this period is Gilmor Brown, an actor who envisioned a community theater in 1916. Operating out of a rented space, he shared his dream with locals who energized the vision. In 1924, as the new City Hall was being built, a new Pasadena Community Playhouse opened. Grace Nicholson repeats the pattern. Her shop featured Native American handiwork in the 1910s and she dreamed of an elaborate Chinese temple set around a courtyard with rooms for art galleries, classes, lectures and meetings. At the height of American fascination with exotic culture, her dream was finally realized in 1925 when her illustrations were translated by architect Sylvanus Marston. Her shops and artist studios became the Pasadena Art Museum in the 1960s and is now known as the Pacific Asia Museum. For whatever closed and segregated qualities Pasadena would have as a society in the 1920s, when Jackie Robinson’s family moved Pasadena, the architecture and planning of this period were characterized by a quality of openness. From the open courtyards and arcades of City Hall to the openended design of the original Rose Bowl, to this quality was best reflected in the City Beautiful Movement of 1913-1916, a momentum that would only be retained as long as the city stayed faithful to the vision.

Eclectic Architecture mixed Classical, Moorish, Mayan, Spanish Baroque and Rococo.

The Arcade Building Marston, Van Pelt & Maybury, 1927

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Pasadena’s Edward Herbert Bennett

Civic Center Masterplan CARMELITA GARDENS, THE PASADENA ART INSTITUTE & THE NORTON SIMON MUSEUM Once Pasadena’s most elaborate garden, Carmelita Gardens was a cultural nexus. Residing guests included John Muir, who worked the 42-acre garden, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Helen Hunt Jackson (who wrote part of Ramona there). There was also a horticulture school for women. Gifted to the city for the Pasadena Art Institute, nearly half was lost to the 134 freeway. The last 9.5 acres became the Norton Simon Museum.

Edward Herbert Bennett (1874–1954) might best be known for his coauthorship of the 1909 Plan of Chicago with Daniel Burnham, who planned the Columbian Exposition of 1893. Educated at the École des Beaux-Arts, Bennett’s plan for Pasadena’s Civic Center was funded with a $3.5 million bond in 1923. Aligning with the existing Post Office and YWCA, Bennett created two grand axes with City Hall in the middle. Nine architecture firms were invited to submit a design for a city hall, library and auditorium, and then the Planning Commission awarded a commission to the best of each. Pasadena’s City Hall was designed by Bakewell and Brown (San Francisco City Hall). Blending the Classical and Mediterranean Revival styles of 16th-century Italian architect Andrea Palladio, its open courtyards and arcades would serve as both the symbolic and physical embodiment of open government as well as a prime example of Beaux Arts architecture.

PASADENA YWCA: 1920-22

Designed by the first woman to attend the world’s preeminent school of architecture in Paris, the École des Beaux-Arts, Julia Morgan’s simple courtyard arrangement and Spanish tiled roofs preceded the Civic Center, helping site its two axes together with the also existent Post Office. CARMELITA GARDENS, (NORTON SIMON MUSEUM)

PASADENA POST OFFICE: 1914

/////

NOTE: The Green is added to the original plan to highlight open spaces. Central Park was not originally differentiated. All white labels have also been added.

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Central Library was designed by the local firm of Hunt and Chambers, its stately facade leading to an intimate forecourt entry and then a grand hall. Construction began in 1925, which is carved in Roman numerals over its entrance, and dedicated in 1927. In 1984 and 1990 renovations aided by the Pasadena Public Library Foundation improved the old metal stacks and added a rear entrance. Pasadena’s Civic Auditorium was designed by George Edwin Bergstrom (who had been John Parkinson’s partner), Cyril Bennett (who designed the Pasadena Playhouse with Elmer Gray) and Fitch Haskell (Glen Arm Power Plant with Bennett). The stately Italian Renaissance-style auditorium anchors the now reopened civic center axis that had been blocked by the Plaza Pasadena mall.

CENTRAL LIBRARY, 1925-1927

By Myron Hunt (Rose Bowl, Occidental College, Huntington Hotel, Library) & H.C. Chambers.

As Pasadena’s City Beautiful Association ceased to exist after World War I, its Civic Center legacy became increasingly vulnerable to the continual refinements of the next generation of city planning. The story of Pasadena’s Civic Center story continues on page 94.

PASADENA CITY HALL: 1925-27

Designed by Bakewell and Brown, architects of San Francisco’s Beaux Arts City Hall, its open courtyards are symbolic of open government and among the finest civic spaces anywhere.

MEMORIAL PARK

PASADENA CIVIC AUDITORUM: 1931 Bergstrom, Bennett, and Haskell’s auditorium included a 3,029 seat main theater, a ballroom and exhibit hall. From the Pasadena Symphony to the Emmys it is among the leading landmark venues in the state.

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Main Street The Pasadena Case Study Pasadena’s main thoroughfare, then known as Colorado Street, is seen here in 1929 on the eve of the city’s first major redevelopment project. Designed to better accommodate the increased flow of Route 66 that ran through the center of downtown, the project cut back buildings by 14 feet on each side of the street, widening Colorado to four lanes and elevating it to boulevard status. Despite this effort Route 66 continued through the middle of downtown for less than ten years. The 1939 Arroyo Seco Parkway, the first freeway in the West, made the street widening superfluous, contributing to the decline of downtown through the next 50 years. In parallel with this decline was an increasing centralization of city planning that resulted in an imposition of top-down solutions and abandonment of the participatory “My City” process that had produced Pasadena’s Golden Age. The street widening was the first example of a massive top-down effort imposed on taxpayers that drove away business during reconstruction and resulted in precedent-setting litigation. This pattern would then repeat four decades later with the Plaza Pasadena mall.

C O N T E N T S Last Main Street Before L.A............................ 55 Main Street in Decline................................................ 58 Experiment 1: Redevelopment and the Mall......................... 60 Experiment 2: Revitalization and Old Pasadena.............................. 64 The Results of the Two Experiments........................................................ 70 The Mall: Version II: 2000.................................................................................. 72 The Mall: Version III, 2016............................................................................................ 74

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1924 CIVIC CTR Colorado Street

THE MALL

Thurstons 1916 Map of Pasadena

From the 1890s to the 1950s, maps showed circles radiating from Fair Oaks and Colorado Blvd. Map has been colorized to highlight: the Civic Center (1920s), Route 66 (late 1920s), the Old Pasadena and the Mall (1979).

This is the tunnel to Pasadena, still in use today, Figueroa Tunnel #1: The Arroyo Seco Parkway at the LA River. The digging of the first of the Figueroa Street tunnels that will become Route 66 and the Arroyo Seco Parkway. Construction began in 1925 but the planning that created these park-saving tunnels dates back to the decade before.

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Last Main Street Before L.A. In the mythology of the family of nations, America is portrayed as the prodigal child, where the restless and yearning would pick up and move, advancing the frontier of democracy and pointing the way to the future for the rest of the world. Viewed through this lens, California can be seen as America’s America, where relentless reinvention defines the rhythm of change; that California and the West would point the way for the rest.

The Civic Center Envisioned in the 1910s, Pasadena’s Civic Center was built in the 1920s.

Route 66, in turn, stands in as the nation’s Main Street and the driving rhythm of a better life west. As cities whizz by to the beat

Route 66 Signage for US 66 in Pasadena was put up by the Southern California Automobile Association in 1928 using Colorado Boulevard (and Foothill Boulevard as late as 1974 when the Foothill Freeway (210) was completed).

Colorado Street of the tune, the road is a link between rural America and emerging cities, between the private realm and the public sphere, between roadside enterprise and the village green. Through the lens of film and myth, literature and song, Los Angeles stands in as the final cliche in this ongoing fable, a caricature of a “nineteen suburbs in search of a metropolis,” of “boosters and b debunkers, of sunshine and noir.”

Tale of Two Malls Plaza Pasadena (1980) and Paseo Colorado (2001).

Colo r

ado

However, if you flip a U-turn at Los Angeles and instead drive east, Pasadena comes up first on Route 66, the trip up the parkway adding just enough distance for a sharper reflection to come into view. It is Pasadena’s Colorado Boulevard, the final Main Street before the terminus of this westward migration, that tells the true tale of old 66 and the rise the modern city, of the shifting of main street and the highway that passed it by.

Colorado Street, 1923 The view below shows the north side of Colorado Street between Marengo and what is now Garfield Avenue, appearing here much as it does today. The widening of Colorado to boulevard status in 1930 occurred off to the left in the oldest parts of the downtown. By 1923, the 1913 Post Office below was used to align the new Civic Center along its side street of Garfield Avenue.

ffice

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 NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

is managed by Caltech atop the Arroyo Seco.

 VOYAGER was



directed by Ed Stone.



FIRST HUMAN POWERED FLIGHT

Paul MacCready’s first human powered aircraft, called the “Pasadena,” took flight at the Rose Bowl.



 AIRSHIP PASADENA

was the first regularly scheduled air passenger service travelling to Los Angeles.

1924 CIVIC CTR

Norton Simon once known as Carmelita.



Colorado Street Bridge



 THE MALL

Arroyo Parkway

crossing the Arroyo Seco.

Julia Morgan designed Pasadena’s



Young Women’s Christian Association building, helping anchor the new Civic Center.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PASADENA

Friendship Baptist Church was the first African American church and the last vestige of black Pasadena between the tracks.







Julia Childs‘ first home and first meals were here.

 Barack Obama’s

JAPANTOWN

Apartment The

future president lived at 253 E. Glen Arm in 1980-81.

Google Pasadena Japantown for a detailed list of the cultural and business nexus of Japanese Americans between the tracks.

Arroyo Seco Parkway–110

Robinson Family Takayama Family

Its 1912-1939 planning tells the tale of how the vision for parkways became a system of freeways.

In the 1930s, Mack and Jackie Robinson became friends with Shig Takayama, who’s family owned Meiji Laundry. When the Takayama’s were interred during WWII, it was the Robinsons and another African-American family that took care of the Takayama’s possessions.

These 1925 Figueroa Street tunnels through Elysian Park were built as part of a system of parkways. By 1939 it became Route 66 and the West’s first freeway. Today, all four lanes flow north to the Arroyo Seco Parkway (110) and Pasadena.

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

Jackie Robinson grew up on Pepper Street and attended John Muir High School. In 1947 he broke the color barrier in baseball. On the opposite



page, at the bottom, is a largely unknown story about his family.

Dean George A. Damon



led the early visioning efforts in building momentum towards an ambitious Civic Center.

George Ellery Hale

Caltech’s Hale led efforts in hiring architects for Pasadena’s Civic Center.

PASADENA: A PARADE OF FIRSTS From Pasadena’s front row perch of January 1st, a parade of firsts pass by as the 20th Century unfolds. First in per capita car ownership in 1915, the first freeway in 1939 and then among the first cities to experience both the rise of the freeway and the decline of Main Street. Colorado Boulevard Albert Einstein

polished his Theory of Relativity and went for a bike ride during his years at Caltech (1931-33).

Next the parade of firsts takes to the air; the first scheduled air passenger service in 1912 and then the first human powered flight at the Rose Bowl in the 1970s.

Caltech

plays a key role in the early planning and development of Pasadena. It has recently been ranked as the top university in the world by a London-based organization.

President Barack Obama





The real unknown chapter in the life of Barack Obama is when he lived in Pasadena in 1981 and participated in “street theater” at Occidental College, making his first speech and first political act. He is seen here at its library. See also page 68.

A little further up the Arroyo Seco, at Devil’s Gate Dam, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory comes into view. If space is the final frontier, the heir of this manifest destiny west is here at JPL, where NASA’s missions to Mars and Voyager’s trip out of our solar system shift one fork of the journey ever higher and into the heavens.

With the perspective of space and time, the continual cycle of change found back on Pasadena’s main street provides both exemplary results and cautionary tales city planning throughout the 20th Century. This is the story of the last Main Street before Los Angeles, its rise, fall, and resurrection.



Clara Burdette

As founder of the Pasadena Woman’s Civic League, Burdette was a suffragist and planning advocate, helping also sponsor the “Pasadena Plan” of 1915.

Martin Luther King was invited to Pasadena to speak at Caltech in 1958. Here he gives a sermon at Friendship

Baptist Church. In 1960, African-Americans demonstrated against the segregated lunch counter at Kress Pasadena. 

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MAIN ST Colorado Boulevard

In 1916, the Pasadena Playhouse began here.

Bars, antiques, bookstores, thrift stores and pawn shops lined Colorado Blvd.

Main Street in Decline THE TWO EXPERIMENTS: REDEVELOPMENT VS REVITALIZATION

Before the arrival of the automobile in the first decade of the 20th Century, walkability determined the design of cities. Promenades, arcades and two sidewalks for every street connected people with the world of downtown Pasadena. From downtown, 1100 miles of track linked the mountains to the sea with what was the world’s most extensive transportation system before World War II. Pasadena’s ever-expanding Hotel Green of the 1890s, located beside the Santa Fe train station (p.24), witnessed both a new elevated bicycle “cycleway” and arrival of the automobile in 1900. By 1910, new hotels, located away from the noise and soot of the train were easily accessible by car, providing a desirable alternative. Accommodating the car became a necessity and an alternative to the corporate control by Huntington’s Pacific Electric trains.

Stanton Building When Colorado Street was widened it was reduced to the smaller building still at the SE corner at Raymond Ave. today.

Pasadena’s street widening, the Arroyo Seco Parkway and construction of three new freeways, accelerated suburban flight in the 1970s. New suburban shopping malls built in Eagle Rock, Glendale and Arcadia furthered the decay of Pasadena’s urban core.

In response to the decline of the downtown and the resulting loss of tax revenue, Pasadena initiated two responses, each an untested experiment. First, under the leadership of the semi-autonomous Pasadena Redevelopment Agency, over 35 blocks of downtown were torn down in the 1960s and 70s in the name of top-down redevelopment. MIT Dean Bernard J. Frieden describes this first “experiment” of building the first suburban mall in an urban setting.“Retail conditions in the center of Pasadena resembled those of big city downtowns in the late 1960s. Block after block of Colorado Boulevard, once a flourishing commercial thoroughfare, had become a source of wounded pride and sagging revenue.… As retailers shut their doors, dead stretches of street frontage made shopping even less appealing. And as downtown retail sales declined in real dollars— more than 10 percent alone between 1966 and 1969— property and sales tax collections sank, eroding the city’s revenue base. If city government did not take some initiative, further decline seemed inevitable.” The second response to the decline of the downtown was Revitalization, a bottom-up effort to restore the historic core that remained. Colorado Blvd on the Eve of Widening Looking down Raymond Ave, just before the buildings on the left and right were cut back by 14 feet on each side. The Vandevort Building This is where the Board of Trade sponsored the “My City Exhibit” in 1916. Hotel Green

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EXPERIMENT #1

1970s

REDEVELOPMENT

MALL & MODERN DEVELOPMENT CIVIC AUDITORIUM WA L N U T S T.

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PARSONS ENGINE

The publicly financed Civic Center axis here was privatized.

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PACIFIC TELEPHONE

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R O B L E S

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US PO

C O L O R A D O B LV D .

G R E E N S T. B OF A

EXPERIMENT #2

REVITALIZATION

RESTORING OLD PASADENA Pasadenaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s downtown was full of empty and boarded up buildings in the 1970s. Some said the downtown was beyond repair and that no one would go there, while others envisioned its restoration.

THE MALL HOTEL GREEN

Between 1969 and 1979, over 35 blocks of Pasadena were torn down in the name of progress and redevelopment. The Pasadena Redevelopment Agency acted as a semiautonomous government entity with little oversight.

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MAIN ST The Pasadena Athletic Club Among the great tragedies in Pasadena history, it stood at Los Robles and Green Streets and was torn down for the “$50 Million Retail Center” described below. Then the price tag to taxpayers began to rise, and then rise again, and then it was torn down.

EXPERIMENT #1

Redevelopment & the Plaza Pasadena Mall In, Downtown, Inc., How America Rebuilds Cities, MIT Dean Bernard J. Frieden and Lynne B. Sagalyn, pioneering observers of the urban landscape, tell the story of redevelopment in cities throughout the US. “No Bed of Roses” is a chapter about how Pasadena developed the first suburban mall to be built in an urban setting. “City officials wanted a shopping center to reverse the loss of business and tax dollars, but they also wanted it as a symbol to show that Pasadena was making a comeback.” This chapter draws from their superb study. “With population on the decrease and court-ordered school busing stirring racial fears, civic and business leaders wanted to prevent white flight. A more attractive downtown, they reasoned, would help to keep the middle class happy with Pasadena, and a shopping center would be an important catalyst to revive downtown. It promised to bring people back to Colorado Boulevard, where fancy shops and handsome civic buildings used to set a tone of distinction for the entire community.” “When the redevelopment agency began negotiating with Ernest Hahn in 1971, retail developers across the country followed events in Pasadena with great interest. As far as they were concerned, the downtown experiments in the 1960s were little more than curiosities far from the mainstream of mall development. To bring downtown into the mainstream, a nationally known developer would have to score a clear success. Within a few years Faneuil Hall Marketplace would provide that success, but in 1971 it was still bogged down for lack of a capable developer.”

“Hahn’s interest in Pasadena seemed to be the rust test of whether an accomplished mall builder could adapt standard shopping center principles to an in·town situation. …the question was whether a seasoned suburban developer could run his usual race in the heart of downtown or would have to run it wearing leg irons. Whether, in addition, a downtown mall could flourish in spite of crime, fear, racial tension, and fiscal strain was a different issue to be tested in another time and place.” “When Hahn overlaid his plans on the three-block site city officials had chosen, the prototype layout split the heart of downtown and walled off a main axis on Garfield Avenue linking public buildings on either side of Colorado Boulevard. That was unacceptable to the Pasadena Redevelopment Agency (PRA). The issue was the ability of the public to see and get to the Pasadena Civic Auditorium from the steps of the library, or vice versa. Hahn had to find a way to adjust the prototype because

Shops facing Colorado Boulevard Squeezing in separate shops facing Colorado failed to integrate the cut-off mall into the fabric of the city.

Photo by Walt Mancini. Courtesy Star News

CIVIC AUDITORIUM

Civic Center Axis Closed

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

MAIN ST

Colorado Boulevard

A Suburban Mall on Main Street killed off the rich life of the street.

a three-block mall would have killed the deal. “Over the Garfield axis, we would have walked away,” recalled former redevelopment chairman Cornelius Pings. “We had to have the view, or no project.” “City officials also were concerned about dead space where the mall structure faced Colorado Boulevard, the route of the Tournament of Roses Parade; they insisted that Hahn line this side of the boulevard with small stores. Streetfacing stores also fit with city officials’ desire for a symbol of civic progress. They wanted “something different from the great bland fortress,” said architect Paul Curran, project director for Charles Kober Associates.” “The high cost of downtown land hit the Plaza Pasadena harder than the office projects. As a shopping center, Plaza Pasadena had a horizontal, two-story suburban layout with much less-income producing space than office towers on equivalent sites. This low-density use of the land made it less valuable for development, requiring the PRA to write off $16.6 million, or 40 percent of what it spent to buy and clear the site. By far the biggest item was $21.8 million for parking, the result of trying to match suburban standards in a crowded downtown.” “To get department stores for their suburban centers, developers had to subsidize them; when development shifted to downtown, the ante went up, and city government helped pay the bill.…The economics of building a mall downtown meant that the public subsidy had to be big. Meeting the The Plaza Pasadena

The Plaza Pasadena Fountain lacked Batchelder’s touch..

demands of the anchors was one reason. Providing free parking in expensive underground and multilevel parking structures was another. Working within smaller sites, building to higher fire code standards, and financing a longer construction period also added extra costs. Operating expenses, maintenance, and security were higher too, and they put pressure on Hahn to ask high rents of potential tenants.” “The leader of the referendum campaign was Christopher Sutton, a twenty-two-year-old who worked on a small Pasadena newspaper while attending UCLA. Spurred on by an accumulation of grievances, Sutton organized Pasadenans for Responsible Planning, a group consisting mainly of well-educated people with political affiliations that cut across party lines. Minority groups were conspicuously missing from the opposition, perhaps because the PRA had made a special effort to persuade the black community of the benefits of redevelopment. To get minority support, the PRA had made commitments on job training. minority contracting, and access to construction jobs.” “Picking up on discontent with the city’s annual operating loss on its recently completed convention center, plus opposition to public subsidy for private business, Pasadenans for Responsible Planning emphasized four reasons for blocking the mall project. First, property taxes were at stake and would increase as a result of the project. Second, the retail center was a major risk for the city treasury. Third, its design was unimaginative and left no

The glass in the arches was to be transparent, but instead reflected and blocked the view of the Civic Auditorium. The Civic Auditorium is behind this “clear” arch. It lasted 20 years and was torn down.

OVERVIEW

PROJECTS

EVENTS

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NEXT STEPS

CONCLUSIONS

MAIN ST Reflecting the Outside World Early renderings of the proposed Plaza Pasadena maintained an open-view Civic Center axis. Glass walls prevented that, however, and as a fix to the enclosed feeling of the mall, views of the sky and City Hall were painted inside the arch.

room for alternatives. And fourth, the public had not been given a chance to discuss the issues because the PRA had been secretive. Moreover, opponents argued that with lease revenue bonds, the city had sidestepped a vote on a long-term public commitment and had ignored creative proposals and constructive criticisms.” “Critics were bothered by the fact that while the review procedures for Plaza Pasadena were technically correct, Trimble’s swiftness had undercut the process. In a staff report to the planning commission that never saw the light of day, one city planner complained that twenty-

affairs, told the board of directors, ‘Four years ago, as a member of the Planning Commission, I asked repeatedly for meetings dedicated to a discussion of the Livingston Blayney report [which recommended the retail center] and long range plans for Pasadena. But I was told to wait until the Redevelopment Agency had a specific proposal. It was too early. Then, when a tentative proposal was presented we were told that agreements with the developer had already been signed. There was no turning back. Suddenly it was too late.’ ”

‘CRITICS WOULD CALL IT CRASS POLITICAL EXPEDIENCY; AND IT WAS. BUT IT WAS LEGITIMATE, VIABLE, AND WE WERE OPEN ABOUT IT. WE HAD POLITICAL SUPPORT IN THE COUNCIL. WE WERE INSUFFERABLE, BUT WE WERE RIGHT.’ ” CORNELIUS PINGS CHAIRMAN OF THE PASADENA REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY

two public hearings required by law had sidestepped the important issues by restricting discussion to the most limited questions. The significant hearings, he claimed, “took place behind closed doors in the offices of the Star News, the Chamber of Commerce and the Redevelopment Agency.” “Some public officials also felt shut out of the conversation. Robert Oliver, an economics professor at the California Institute of Technology, long active in public

“Confronted with a legal threat to the retail center; the PRA made quick work of the referendum drive. Although Pings and Trimble doubted whether their opponents had the votes to win, they were not taking any chances. Working around the clock, Trimble and the PRA’s bond consultants converted the financing to tax allocation bonds that were not subject to a referendum, and the PRA won quick approval from the city board of directors for their new plan.” “Opponents circulated more petitions and filed another

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

MAIN ST

Freeway #1 (110): The Arroyo Seco Parkway The vision of a greenbelt park system in 1912 became a freeway system in 1939.

Freeway #2 (134): The Colorado Fwy, 1954 and Ventura, 1971

lawsuit, but Trimble outmaneuvered them once more by bringing the first bond issue to market before they could get to court. PRA members worried enough about political fallout to hire a public relations firm for a few months to repair the damage, while Trimble did his best to rebut the charge that the mall would raise property taxes.

Freeway #4: The 710 Long Beach Freeway

“Pings and Trimble believed they had a mandate to get the mall built, and for that purpose they were prepared to cut some corners. ‘Critics would call it crass political expediency; and it was,’ said Pings. ‘But it was legitimate, viable, and we were open about it. We had political support in the council. We were insufferable, but we were right.’ ” Amidst the outrage surrounding the Plaza Pasadena mall, splitting the Civic Center axis stood as the greatest objection. The grand arch across the axis promised to be transparent, but instead offered a glass reflection, a fitting metaphor of this unfortunate chapter. Within a decade, the $110 million mall was struggling and within two, its was almost entirely torn down. In late 2015, its last vacant building, where the Athletic Club once stood, was finally demolished. As the public subsidy for the Plaza Pasadena mall grew from $14 to $41 million, it “set a record as the largest issue of tax allocation bonds in California.” Once the mall failed, the subsidy for the mall doubled again attempting to fix the fix. #3 (210): 1971 Planning for the Foothill Fwy began in the Freeway 1950s, bulldozing many Black and Japanese homes and churches.

Ending at the Eagle Rock exit, the Ventura Fwy doubled its width.

In the late 1960s, yet another freeway was proposed that would have further torn apart the fabric of the neighborhoods surrounding the downtown. But instead of the poor being impacted, this time the proposed freeway threatened wealthier and more well connected citizens. As the long term effects of freeways on downtown became clear, locals moved to block the 710 Freeway in the courts. Pasadena’s Old Neighborhood Church which stood in its path. The campaign to save it, and later salvage the church was lost one weekend as bulldozers arrived unannounced, even as Caltrans issued a stay. “Sad but inevitable” wrote one local on a clipped article. Fifty years later, there is still an empty lot where the church once stood. The “freeway revolt” that saved South Pasadena’s downtown inspired other cities as well. Today the stub of the halted freeway and the playground where the church once stood makes it clear there is no such thing as inevitability. It is possible to reverse course, change direction and take the situation in hand, from the bottom up, which is exactly what Pasadena did next. The Freeway Revolt and campaign to stop the Mall served as a catalyst for Revitalization, which sought to preserve what remained. Freeway #4: The 710 Freeway Stub and the Freeway Revolt

This is where the 710 was stopped at more affluent parts of Pasadena.

OVERVIEW

PROJECTS

EVENTS

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CONCLUSIONS

MAIN ST Hotel Green’s bridge added to the air of mystery.

The Ritz Hotel Pasadena is where WWI pensioners lived in the ‘70s.

EXPERIMENT #2

Revitalizing Old Pasadena By the time Pasadena’s fourth freeway was finally stopped, the flight of the middle-class to the suburbs had left an increasingly vacant downtown. While some stopped going to Old Pasadena altogether, the younger generations saw something different. Of the two experiments addressing the decline of downtown, the bottom-up approach of revitalizing Old Pasadena became the beacon of success. Compared to the promising start of Redevelopment, which quickly failed, Revitalization had a discouraging start, but achieved a more steady and enduring success. The Mystery of Fallen Empire Into this vacuum of urban blight and smog choked air, cheap rents attracted pensioners, prostitutes, veterans, the destitute, and a flood of artists. By the early 1980s, Old Pasadena had the highest concentration of artists’ studios on the west coast, arriving just in time to save Old Pasadena from further decline.

Antique and Thrift Stores The cast off relics of Pasadena

families filled the dilapidated buildings of Colorado Boulevard.

Tearing down the rest of the old buildings, including what remained of Hotel Green remained a threat until the Old Pasadena Plan of 1983. Even the iconic Colorado “Suicide” Bridge was not immune as the threat of demolition persisted into the 1980s, symbolic of a city seemingly bent on its own destruction. The urban frontier of the derelict downtown, with its decaying Old World architecture, crumbling terra-cotta detailing, and mysterious Hotel Green bridge that now led nowhere added to the air of mystery that lured a new generation of hip urban pioneers. In the late 1970s, near the old Santa Fe train tracks (what is now the Gold Line right-of-way), where the diesel Super-Chief train to Chicago still rumbled through Old Pasadena, an old Batchelder fountain stood in anonymous ruin. Once featured in the now forgotten “My City” Exhibit, the broken Batchelder fountain remained a silent relic of another generation’s great ambition and a forgotten remainder of better times. Back when Old Pasadena was Old Town Poobah Record

Store is here. The Oaks Theater is where the Playhouse began.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

MAIN ST

Batchelder Fountain at Vandevort Alley’s Horticultural Hall

Ernest Batchelder crafted tile of extraordinary elegance, helping transform an ordinary alley into a much beloved space. In 1916 (below left), the Horticultural Court at the “My City” Exhibit featured his fountain. By the 1970s, the fountain lay in anonymous ruin (below right).

The Broken Batchelder Fountain

1916: The Vandevort Batchelder

The Board of Trade’s brochure of 1916 proudly displays the “Batchelder Fountain, Horticultural Court.”

Here the fountain is seen in its original state, the base and bowl still intact, surrounded by a bounty of greenery.

“The Batchelder fountain in the alley was emblematic of Old Pasadena at the time,” writes Bruce Litz, a local artist who had a studio nearby. “Elegant, graceful, intricately detailed, beautifully proportioned, well placed, inoperative and brutalized. We used to live with it. It had a presence and it seemed to be glad to have company, welcoming the activity around it, playing its part in the continuing narrative. Its scars couldn’t hide its charm and grace. I used to sit on the stool behind the espresso machine with the door open on a warm summer afternoon and watch the light move over it, wondering how it was plumbed, where the water came from, how to turn it on, what would it take to repair it? But, then again, maybe it’s just fine as it is. It tells its story if you can hear it. Look. Listen.” Here in this back alley, past the old fountain and behind a red door, (bottom, left), a new generation began to gather, wondering, but not knowing what had come before.

1970s: The Vandevort Batchelder Long after the Horticultural Court and the “My City” Exhibit were forgotten, the old Batchelder Fountain lay in anonymous ruin, base and bowl broken, the silent reminder of a better time.

Vandevort Alley, the location of the Horticultural Court of 1916, become the back-alley location of the famed Espresso Bar in 1979.

OVERVIEW

PROJECTS

EVENTS

PLANITORIUM

NEXT STEPS

CONCLUSIONS

Photo by Maury Cohen

MAIN ST

Photo by Ted Soqui.

The Espresso Bar Where“My City” the“Home-Made City Planning Exhibit” had been, a new generation of do-it-yourselfers gathered.

The Espresso Bar Through a back alley door, where the “My City” Horticultural Court and Exhibit had been in 1916, a different generation gathered at the very same place in a very different time. With a name that was as exotic in 1979 as it is generic today, The Espresso Bar “My City” 1916 “Know Your City Better” read the sign on the wall of was a secret place you had to be taken “home-made city planning exhibit.” to, or at least told about. Part speakeasy, Located in the Vandevort Building at 34 South Raymond, the space and alley was part open-mic coffee house, part art also the Board of Trade. gallery, part cabaret, The Espresso Bar was a business that was never really a business, where the only rite of entry was a vague toleration of the offbeat and avant garde.

The Espresso Bar Sixty years later,

the same space where “My City” had been located, like-minded Pasadenans congregated once again in a similar spirit of home-made and do-it-yourself.

“It was our home away from home and another dimension in time. Most of those who spent afternoons or evenings at the E-Bar were forever altered by the experience.” he recalls. “Great schemes were hatched, lovers met, deals closed, philosophies wrestled with, friendships tested, decisions reached, contacts made, plays, stories and poems written, mathematics and physics argued, espresso tasted, culture felt and absorbed. There are other places, of course, but none are the Espresso Bar.”

Photo by Maury Cohen

In retrospect, there was something old fashioned and conservationminded about this new wave of do-ityourselfers who gathered there, people who wanted to preserve old buildings, old art forms, old ways of dress and who opposed the new old guard destroying the little that remained.

From the late 1970s through the mid-1990s The Espresso Bar served as a cultural and creative nexus of the DIY (do-it-yourself) ethos of the time, “a place to connect with current and future friends; a place to learn, study and create; a place that we have never forgotten,” remembers writer, regular and E-Bar employee Lars Peterson.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

MAIN ST

Espresso Yourself

a weekly talent show with host Maurice Illinois (Don Kirby).

Espresso Yourself Night Photo by Ted Soqui September 24, 1980

Vandevort Alley

Photo above, by Ted Soqui.

Photo by Ted Soqui

Photo by Ted Soqui.

Photo by Maury Cohen

Artist Jack Mcintosh was an investor who wanted to sponsor an alternative to local bars.

Doo Dah Queen Riquelle Small.

Snotty Scotty & the Hankies

“ART-I-CULTURE is what developed here, a convergence of soul traffic in a roiling harbor” recalls Margaret Shermerhorn, who founded the Espresso Bar with Michael Thornberry.

OVERVIEW

PROJECTS

EVENTS

PLANITORIUM

Ain Cocke

Photo, by Ted Soqui.

NEXT STEPS

CONCLUSIONS

“MY CITY” The Brayley was among the first buildings restored, it is now used for Scientology.

The Old Town Pub, located in a back alley, is the last of the bars from the 1970s.

DIY: Do-It-Yourself The phrase “do-it-yourself” dates back to the home improvement efforts of the Arts & Crafts movement, which reached its peak in Pasadena of the early 1900s. A reaction to the industrial revolution’s sleek and massproduced vision of the future, it sought to reconnect people with hands-on activities and a homemade aesthetic. Under its broad umbrella of selfdetermination and self-reliance, DIY in the 1980s had many flavors and took many forms. At one end of the spectrum, members of the newly forming Pasadena Heritage would meet at the Espresso Bar to strategize preservation efforts.

Mercantile Place Now a pedestrian

transition that also connects to parking.

“slam corner” invited public debate in 1916, a new generation of poets, writers and social critics arrived along with punk rock musicians who believed anyone could start a band. The stage was open to do your own thing.

Film Director Tim Burton

In the mid-1980s, Tim Burton lived in the old Hotel Green and was a regular at The Espresso Bar. Then, as now, his work reflected the DIY aesthetic of the time, his movies having a hand-stitched, patchwork pastiche aesthetic that mirrored the ethos.

By the late 1970s, the Baby Boomers were renovating cheap, old rundown homes and buildings. Their appreciation of the Arts and Crafts Movement fueled the renaissance of this DIY ethos, which often coalesced with their fascination and lament of all that had been lost in the progress of the modern world. Though the DIY movement of the 1980s included a broad range of ages, it was also a movement of youthful thinking. Many were students at Caltech, Occidental College and PCC, bent on taking hold of their own destiny, writing their own story and directing the theater of their own life.

College students, AA meetings and Zine collectives met there as well. And in this same space where a Barack Obama at Occidental’s Library

February 18, 1981: Barack Obama, Resident of Pasadena, Gives His First Speech in a Performance he calls “Street Theater” President Obama was living in Pasadena while attending Occidental College. As part of a campaign to divest from the South African apartheid regime, he participated in a work of “street theater” in which “they started yanking me off the stage, and I was supposed to act like I was trying to break free, except a part of me wasn’t acting, I really wanted to stay up there … I had so much left to say.”

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

“MY CITY”

Colorado Boulevard In the 1980s most of the oldest buildings were rehabilitated.

Filmforum

Showcased unique DIY films.

One Colorado at Fair Oaks Avenue. The facades were saved, new structures were built behind.

Barack Obama Gets His Start

A Grand Mix of Cultures

As with the homemade spirit of “My City,” the self-reinforcing nature of DIY gave invitation by example and provided an open forum to first-timers and the uninitiated.

In contrast with top down efforts of the tightly controlled Redevelopment Agency, the revitalization of Old Pasadena was a bottom-up blend of many people’s efforts.

A vibrant and political street theater scene arose out of this renewed interest in doing it yourself. Among the college students living in Pasadena who took to this participatory form of social critique was a young Barack Obama. February 18, 1981, he gave his first “street theater” speech at an Occidental College rally on divestment from South Africa and the cry to “Free Nelson Mandela.”

Pooling Parking Revenue

The advent of parking meters brought revenue used to improve Pasadena sidewalks.

As the renewed spirit of DIY brought new entertainment venues and crowds back to Old Pasadena, it gave new generations their first big chance, nurturing the potential of both unusual people and unlikely places, a bottomup approach that paid rich dividends moving forward and into the future.

First, a wave of creative people arrived, providing the fuel for a more dynamic culture. Then, by the mid-1980s, the desegregation of Pasadena schools brought a new multicultural generation that had grown up together and had largely integrated into a patchwork “Gen-X.” Perhaps at no other time in the city’s rich history had such a true blending of people come together, as the descendents of Pasadena’s wealthiest and poorest families sat sipping espresso beside the old fountain. Within this mix, Pasadena Heritage served as the key catalyst, helping to link the bottom-up efforts of the creative people in Old Pasadena with the top-down approach of municipal government in revitalizing the city.

Pasadena’s DIY Doo Dah Parade, 1986

Both the early Rose Parade and the Doo Dah Parade have their roots in a hometown do-it-yourself spirit as both included a broad invitation to participate. Here the Peace banner of 1986 is a reminder of the Rose Parade’s “Floral Peace Dove” of 1916 (p.37). Though the parade continues today, it has moved to East Pasadena. Photo by Doo Dah Queen Riquelle Small.

OVERVIEW

PROJECTS

EVENTS

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NEXT STEPS

CONCLUSIONS

MAIN ST

Old Pasadena’s All-Stop, All-Walk Crosswalk at Colorado Boulevard and Raymond Avenue

The Results of the Two Experiments REDEVELOPMENT AND DRIVABILITY VS REVITALIZATION AND WALKABILITY The two experiments pitted the few who advocated for top-down Redevelopment and drivability against the many who advocated for the bottom-up vision of Revitalization and walkability. Pasadena Heritage was key to the Revitalization of Old Pasadena and saving much of what Redevelopment did not destroy. Energized by the halting of the fourth freeway and a citizens’ campaign to stop the mall, the new group included Sue Mossman, Executive Director and Claire Bogaard, whose husband would serve 16 years as Pasadena’s mayor.

reports and spearheading landmark district ordinances they sounded the alarm that what Redevelopment did not destroy should be preserved and revitalized instead. They helped secure the Civic Center, the Colorado Street Bridge and the reopening of the Civic Center axis. For anyone who loves Pasadena’s old buildings, an enormous debt of gratitude is owed to Pasadena Heritage.

Artists Today

Parking Free parking and a good pedestrian transition to the street was key to Old Pasadena’s revitalization. Three publiclyowned parking structures were developed with businesses on the ground floor.

Pasadena Heritage became a fierce and effective advocate for preservation by helping broaden public discussion about planning and what to save. By writing grants, giving tours, generating

With the artists studios now gone, the only artists left in Old Pasadena are in a gallery or on the street, which is what the artists predicted.

Facade Easements in Old Pasadena secured the front face of many of the old downtown buildings as these facades were “eased” to Pasadena Heritage (who control them) in exchange for a 25% investment tax credit.

THEN: The buildings and sidewalks at Delacy and

DIY Now The urban

NOW: Among the successful experiments in walk-

Colorado were empty for many years. In the background, Parsons Engineering can be seen.

frontier is now the fake graffiti of fashion stores.

ability in Old Pasadena has been the two “all-stop, all-walk” crosswalks.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

MAIN ST

Modernist Streetscapes Many Pasadenans refer to this 1980 Black Building (left) as “Darth Vader” as it kills street-life on the sidewalk. Parsons Engineering (center) and Edward Durell Stone’s Bank Americard Building also present blank walls to pedestrians.

“NEIGHBORHOODS BUILT UP ALL AT ONCE CHANGE LITTLE PHYSICALLY OVER THE YEARS AS A RULE...THE NEIGHBORHOOD SHOWS A STRANGE INABILITY TO UPDATE ITSELF, ENLIVEN ITSELF, REPAIR ITSELF, OR TO BE SOUGHT AFTER, OUT OF CHOICE, BY A NEW GENERATION. IT IS DEAD. ACTUALLY IT WAS DEAD FROM BIRTH, BUT NOBODY NOTICED THIS MUCH UNTIL THE CORPSE BEGAN TO SMELL.” JANE JACOBS

“THE DEATH AND LIFE OF GREAT AMERICAN CITIES”

The Results The “form follows function” approach of Redevelopment and Modernism was based on a notion called “machine in the garden,” which worked well for domestic architecture and poorly in urban settings. Because it put drivability first and generally pulled buildings away from the sidewalk, the top-down Modernist approach killed street life and introduced a monolithic aesthetic. Inside the mall, the “up-one-sideand-down-the-other” walking experience quickly grew dull and boring compared to the excitement and variety of Old Pasadena. The lack of a more bottom-up approach to creating authentic culture is what doomed Redevelopment and the Plaza Pasadena. Their one-dimensional solutions resulting from their top-down approach invariably fail to achieve enduring success.

Abandoned Sidewalks As city planning became more top-down after WWII, sidewalks were cut-off from new buildings as seen in the blank Bank-Americard building of 1971 (top). The 1980 Black Building on Pasadena’s main thoroughfare between the mall and Old Pasadena is referred to by locals as the “Darth Vader Building.”

Revitalization in Old Pasadena, on the other hand, involved many people, approaches and the architecture of many decades. Blending art, culture, walkability and a more meandering stroll offered variety and a richness of authentic culture. New council members, Bill Bogaard (later mayor for 16 years), Rick Cole and others also shifted the city’s planning process to a more bottom-up approach. However, as the two experiments became more like one another in the late 1990s and 2000s, the sense of DIY and urban frontier of Old Pasadena was lost to rising rents and gentrification. Affordable housing never materialized and the artists and The Espresso Bar were driven out. The attempt to revitalize the failed mall in 2001 tried to mimic the forms of Old Pasadena but failed once again, helping to underscore the lesson that only a genuine bottom-up process can create an authentic downtown.

Pasadena’s Dead Zone Between Old Pasadena, the Civic Center axis and the Plaza Pasadena/Paseo shopping mall, a one block

stretch of the downtown was torn down in the 1970s for Modernist redevelopment that killed street life and created a “Dead Zone.”

Marengo Avenue.

EVENTS

PROJECTS

Mall Parking

Green Stre

Colorado Boulevard

Union Street

OVERVIEW

The Black Bldg

Telephone Bldg

Mall

PLANITORIUM

NEXT STEPS

CONCLUSIONS

Bank Americard

71 Arroyo Parkway

MAIN ST The Paseo Colorado This is the reopened Civic Center axis where it meets the Civic Auditorium. The new mall struggled from the start.

EXPERIMENT 1B: THE PASEO COLORADO, MALL II

After the Plaza Pasadena was torn down in 2000, the Paseo Colorado “Urban Village” was built on top its subterranean parking. In November 2001, Nicolai Ouroussoff, the architecture critic of the LA Times, described the new mall. “Paseo Colorado, the $130-million TrizecHahn retail development in downtown Pasadena, is yet another example of the now familiar formula: mixed-use urban malls that seek to replicate the experience of a real city.”

shops and restaurants have nothing in common with the kind of incremental growth that takes place in real cities over decades, and sometimes centuries. “Covering three full city blocks along Colorado Boulevard, the development is conceived as an extension of Pasadena’s historic civic core. Its main pedestrian corridor, Garfield Promenade, runs along the axis that connects Myron Hunt’s 1927 Spanish revival public library building to the civic auditorium, an elegant Renaissance-inspired structure designed in

“AN HISTORIC EFFORT TO ‘DE-MALL’ THE CITY OF PASADENA, THE NEW DEVELOPMENT WILL BE REMINISCENT OF URBAN VILLAGES IN EUROPE AND OLDER AMERICAN CITIES,” The developer’s press-release announcing the Paseo Colorado

“Designed--again--by Ehrenkrantz Eckstut & Kuhn Architects, this one is cloaked in a veneer of Spanish colonial imagery. But its essential features are indistinguishable from Hollywood & Highland: a multiplex theater, chain restaurants and rows and rows of shops. The one major difference is the addition of 387 units of housing. “The result is still a soulless space, a prefabricated complex whose generic forms and predictable lineup of

1932 by Bergstrom, Bennett & Haskell. And the main entry to the cinemas opens directly onto the ornate domed facade of the old post office building. “These gestures give the project a strong visual connection to the city’s historical fabric. What is more, the ratio of public space to shops is unusually generous. Lined with tables, benches and pushcarts selling tourist trinkets, Garfield Promenade is designed at the scale of a real, traditional plaza. And the entry court that leads to the cinemas, framed by two grand staircases,

The Civic Center Axis Gelson’s market anchored this west end but for some reason, no pedestrian connection was made to the main axis.

Gelsons Market now Vacant Civic Center Axis Reopened

VACANT MACY’S DEPT STORE AS BUILT FOR THE 1980 MALL IS BEING REPLACED BY 72 A NEW HOTEL

CONTENTS COLORADO BLVD.

THE FOUNTAIN

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

MAIN ST

The Paseo Colorado’s “Urban Village” This is the reopened Civic Center axis where the Plaza Pasadena’s arch once stood.

is clearly modeled on the forecourts of the old Hollywood theaters--cozy public rooms that buzzed with social activity. Smaller, pedestrian walkways-some partially covered--crisscross the complex, linking it to the surrounding street grid.” “But this clearly is not St. Mark’s Square. The project’s gargantuan form is anchored by a department store at one end--in this case, Macy’s-and a parking structure at the other. The restaurants

“The project’s greatest value, in fact, may be that it’s only a 10-minute walk from Old Town Pasadena. As such, it offers a contrast between two very different development formulas. Beginning in the late 1980s, Old Town underwent a transformation from skid row to vibrant commercial strip. The formula was simple: Invest in the existing historic fabric, make room for both large-and small-scale businesses, and build lots of parking. The result is a genuine and varied urban mix.

“THE RESULT IS STILL A SOULLESS SPACE. A PREFABRICATED COMPLEX, THE FAUX MISSION STYLE IS AS BLAND AS THE PIPED-IN MUSIC THAT IS VIRTUALLY IMPOSSIBLE TO ESCAPE. IN THE END, DESPITE THE POTTED PLANTS AND HANGING LANTERNS, YOU COULD BE STANDING IN VIRTUALLY ANY AIRPORT TERMINAL IN AMERICA. PURGED OF ANY SIGNS OF DECAY AND POVERTY, LACKING IN COMPLEXITY, ITS AIM IS TO KEEP US INTENTLY FOCUSED ON THE TASK AT HAND: SHOPPING. AS SUCH, IT IS A TESTAMENT TO THE DEATH OF THE HISTORIC CITY, NOT ITS SALVATION.” Nicolai Ouroussoff, Architecture Critic of the LA Times, November 2001

and shops are the typical national chains. And the architecture’s faux mission style is as bland as the piped-in music that is virtually impossible to escape. In the end, despite the potted plants and hanging lanterns, you could be standing in virtually any airport terminal in America.

“Paseo Colorado, by comparison, is a picture of sterility. Safe, sanitized and ultimately manipulative, the development is a product of our new global culture. Its design has less to do with community than with consumption. Purged of any signs of decay and poverty, lacking in complexity, its aim is to keep

A Lack of Care Though the Paseo Colorado is bland and lacking warmth, a few details hint at an unrealized vision for something more.

OVERVIEW

PROJECTS

EVENTS

PLANITORIUM

NEXT STEPS

CONCLUSIONS

MAIN ST The Collapse of Tenants By 2013, the anchor tenants had vacated the Paseo Colorado and along with them second-tier tenants left as well. Many of the stores that remained open were clearly pop-up businesses that occupy vacant stores until the mall can be resurrected again.

us intently focused on the task at hand: shopping. As such, it is a testament to the death of the historic city, not its salvation.” Gelson’s Supermarket anchored the west end of the Paseo, but was tucked away at the corner instead of the end of the mall’s main axis. So problematic was the solution that, Gelson’s reportedly required a subsidy to remain, which was ultimately insufficient in the end. Finally, in 2013, Gelson’s and Macys vacated the mall. Soon, second-tier tenants followed. The Arclight Theater remained open, along with subsidized and popup businesses that occupied vacant storefronts. In the end, the final price to the developer of the Paseo Colorado rose to $220 million, including $26 million in taxpayer subsidies. In December of 2015, the east end of the mall was torn down and before new construction could replace this original wing of the Plaza Pasadena, the Paseo was sold.

THE MALL PART III: EDGING THE PUBLIC OUT Communities suffer when the continuity of local businesses, buildings, and landscapes are lost, places where people connect with neighbors and friends. As the trip down Main Street has shifted to big-box stores at the edge of town, artificial reproductions of downtown “urban villages”—such as Pasadena’s Paseo Colorado and Glendale’s Americana—have attempted to satisfy a yearning for the authenticity of “the downtown we once knew.” The development of a third version of the Mall and a proposed Hyatt Place Hotel presented yet another opportunity to correct the mistakes of the original mall and for the people of Pasadena to finally have a say in what they wanted at this key downtown crossroads. However, in order for citizens to know there was an opportunity to comment on the Paseo’s redesign, they would have had to notice a “280 E. Colorado Boulevard” notification on the Planning Department’s

Design Commission Space at the Hale Building while having the intimacy of scale the Planning Commission lacks, it is so small, there is no space between rows and people have to stand in the hall. After meetings, people converse outside on the sidewalk to talk as there is nowhere to confer, discuss and connect before or after a meeting.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

MAIN ST The Legacy of the Pasadena Athletic Club The original Athletic Club was built in 1926 during an era of constructing great civic buildings. In 1979, the Athletic Club was demolished and replaced with the blank walls of the Plaza Pasadena mall. In 2015 this last corner of the mall was torn down for a new hotel that will have a plaque commemorating the Athletic Club.

complicated web site. And to see the proposal, which was not posted on the web site, it was necessary to request to view the drawings in person at the Planning Department. To comment on the new hotel at the Design Commission in March of 2015, the public would have likely been forced to stand in the hall (photo, lower left), as the meeting space did not have the room to accommodate the developer’s team, the architect’s team, as well as the public. With such impediments to public participation, few people were aware they had an opportunity to be involved in the planning of their city. A survey of parking receipts in Old Pasadena indicates that 70% of parking revenue comes from outside the city. As more projects are built for visitors and without authentic local input, citizens find it increasingly difficult to feel at home in their own community. Without the gravitational pull of a bottom-up planning process that reflects public needs and values, the

privatization of the public sphere and planning process translates into fewer involved citizens. With the mall failing again, it is clear the problems of the original Plaza Pasadena mall were not fixed by the redesign of 2000. Although the Paseo reopened the Civic Center axis, the mall’s longer axis parallel to Colorado Boulevard remains closed, leaving a gap with Old Pasadena. The Passages Project (p.116) explores solutions and serves as case study of how a “My City” process can more efficiently explore solutions. Whether “My City” is revitalized or not, the question of greater public participation will determine the fate of the third incarnation of the mall by people either returning or continuing to stay away. The “My City” process can help the mall’s new owners to find out what citizens want and how to attract them to their important investment. By gathering ideas from more people, “My City” is a proven and advantageous approach for both citizens and developers of Pasadena today.

Tearing it Down In 1979, the Athletic Club was knocked down for the Plaza Pasadena mall, which was torn down in 2000 for the Paseo mall that is failing as well. In 2016, the east end was demolished and the mall was sold before new construction began.

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CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

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TODAY

Memorial Park Lake

Allen

Del Mar

Sierra Madre Villa

Arcadia

Monrovia

Irwindale

Filmore

Planning Today A city has many facets, but chief among its defining characteristics are the planning decisions made about the architecture, streets, and open spaces that define both the private realm and public commons. Today, long-range planning often takes a decade or more, shaping the landscape of cities in ways not well understood by the public. Too often, planning is a source of confusion, frustration, and fear, rather than civic pride, inspiration, and excitement about the future. CONTENTS

Results

Current Process..... 77

Mayor & Council

The Public

Important Topics.... 81

City Manager & Staff Commissions

People in the Planning Process... 82 The General Plan.... 83

The Public

The Environmental Impact Report........ 85

Vision This diagram of planning begins with a vision at the bottom and moves up to results.

Many of these challenges are the result of the growing complexity and ever-increasing demands of the modern city. This chapter explores the shifting focus that is needed in city planning from the early visioning stages to a more top-down approach with a greater emphasis on logistics at the end of the planning process. Though Pasadena utilizes a â&#x20AC;&#x153;council-managerâ&#x20AC;? form of government, with a City Manager serving as the Chief of Staff (p.84), its planning process shares the same challenges faced by cities everywhere.

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TODAY

The Later Logistical Stages of Planning

Planning begins with a vision and ends with the creation of blueprints and construction of a project. As such, planning has a distinct beginning and end. However, what is not well understood is how the original vision translates into results and why the process often takes longer than anticipated. Pasadena’s Civic Center was first envisioned in 1915 and not built until a decade later. The Arroyo Seco Parkway was proposed in 1912, but not built until 1939. This long, drawn-out process occurs in two distinct stages. The Early Visioning Stages of Planning In the early stages of city planning, the overall vision is first explored. This early stage considers a full range of potential options. In city planning, this is theoretically a bottom-up process with citizen participation but often takes place out of public view. Examples of the early visioning stages include:

• Abbott Kinney’s Pasadena Library and Village Improvement Society, which held social events to raise funds for the creation of a free library system (p.16) and drove planning from the bottom-up.

• Pasadena’s “My City” process of 1916, which built the momentum for Pasadena citizens to “make big plans” and ultimately approve its Civic Center.

• The planning of the Arroyo Seco Parkway (1912-39), which was so prolonged that the vision of a park system, linked by parkways, turned into a freeway system. • Redevelopment and Pasadena’s experimental urban mall, when public involvement was skipped in the visioning stages and the mall failed (p.60). • Pasadena’s 2015 General Plan Update, which is discussed later in this chapter (p.83).

When an actual project has funding and a proposal that aligns with the General Plan, Specific Plans, and zoning codes, planning shifts its focus from questions of vision towards a growing emphasis on logistics in the later stages of the public process. The diagram on the next page characterizes this narrowing of options and public involvement, which starts in the bottom-up, visioning stages and evolves into the top-down, logistical stages of planning. A cautious approach is required in the later, logistical stages of planning to identify any remaining areas for non-compliance of municipal policy. The need for caution is readily apparent at the end of the process, when the exacting details necessary for construction require great care in drafting final blueprints. A lack of caution can cause a negligent error or omission during this step, potentially leading to structural collapse or even the loss of human life. A top-down, logistical approach is also needed in other municipal departments, such as police, fire, and building inspection. Enforcement of policies, rules, and regulations is essential in handling emergencies and maintaining public safety. Any doubt or deviation at a critical time could be dangerous. Unlike these other top-down municipal efforts, the lack of a strong bottom-up planning component can undermine public buy-in and delay approval of projects that were years in the making. With a strong bottom-up process, however, an enduring public commitment can connect both stages together with enough momentum for the original vision to both inspire and thrive.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

TODAY

The Hybrid Model Construction CONSTRUCTION

DOCUMENTS CITY COUNCIL

THE TOP-DOWN

Design Commission

The second half of the process is focused on government review and its efforts to shape a project to fit established procedures and regulations.

Let’s Do This Funding Secured

DECISIONS INCREASINGLY BASED ON FINANCE, INFLUENCE, EXPERTISE, AND PROBLEM-FINDING.

Environmental Impact Report

LATER, LOGISTICAL STAGES OF PLANNING

Requires a Narrowing of Public Involvement

Planning Commission

Scoping Document

An Actual Project

Greater Focus on Policy

The Planning Department

THE BOTTOM-UP

EARLY, VISIONING STAGES OF PLANNING

Historic Preservation Commission

The first part of the planning process is dominated by input from stake-holders. Public commentary is invited and alternatives explored. Today, this part of the planning process is often handled through the outreach efforts conducted by city-hired consultants.

Arts and Culture Commission

DECISIONS BASED MORE ON MERIT, COMMONSENSE, AND ADDRESSING PROBLEMATIC ISSUES. Specific Plan General Plan Broad Invitation for Public Involvement

A revitalized “My City” would focus in this realm.

A Potential Project This diagram provides a useful tool for understanding any city planning effort. Although not an official City of Pasadena diagram, it generally describes the City’s approach. (The official organizational chart of Pasadena actually shows an inverted pyramid diagram with citizens

Greater Focus on Exploring Ideas

at the top driving the process, which is another way to portray municipal democracy.) A revitalized “My City” process would work in tandem with the city’s outreach efforts in the bottom-up section of this chart. This diagram recurs on pages 23, 79, 91, 105, 115, 156, & 159.

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TODAY When Daniel Burnham intoned “make big plans,” he probably did not mean plans that were 20,000 pages long that no one could read. These are public copies of local, regional and state planning documents at Pasadena’s Central Library. Required by state mandate, they are too complex to “present make ideas in a manner all can understand” and too often planning is the source of overwhelm instead of the“magic” to inspire.

A Problematic Emphasis on Later Logistical Stages Over the course of the last century, the growing complexity of building within the modern city has prompted planning departments to increasingly shift their attention from gathering and implementing the public vision to addressing a rising tide of logistical details that call for a cautious and top-down approach. Engage in conversation with any of the dedicated and hard working planners who work for the City of Pasadena, and that sense of caution pervades. It is an appropriate mind-set, as the Planning Department sets its focus on the demands of the later stages of planning. In its role of narrowing options as necessary in the later stages, the Planning Department collects the public’s vision and tends to filter out ideas early in the process. Current Mayor and former Planning Director Terry Tornek complains “City Hall staff often ‘pre-digests’ information about city projects and programs, giving elected officials and the public only the conclusions reached by the staff. I would rather let people know what the alternatives are and then make a decision.” Recognizing that it is difficult for municipal government to extend an invitation to citizens to “tell us your hopes and dreams for your city,” public outreach is increasingly handled by hired consultants. Citizens, for their part, may come to planning meetings with the unrealistic

expectation that in the few minutes they are allotted to speak, their ideas can gain sufficient momentum. However, because municipal planning departments need a largely top-down structure, city planners and hired consultants do not have the latitude to lead new efforts that represent proposals by the public. Public appeals to a planning commission that is focused primarily on policy and logistics can also be a source of frustration if they too lack the power to create actual momentum. Lacking what Pasadena’s pioneering city planner George Damon called a “Clearinghouse Policy” of recording all ideas and previous plans, citizen proposals have no place in the flow of information and are not tracked in a way that can lead to the benefit of ongoing public dialogue. As a result, the public often feels that the invitation to participate in the planning process is perfunctory and that their ideas and opinions are not needed and unwelcome. In turn, the public has become better versed in what they oppose rather than what they support. In the end, the dominance of the later logistical stages of planning has created a strong tone of caution that often leaks into the visioning stages as well. Because of this, city planning has taken to prematurely narrowing options, too often failing to create momentum or inspire the magic to stir people’s blood. However, as Pasadena’s commitment to public involvement is strong, it seems ready to reclaim a sense of what Dean Damon called “possibilities.”

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

TODAY

IMPORTANT AREAS OF PLANNING POLICY The following describes California cities and general planning in cities around the world. See also EIR, and General Plan, page 83.

ZONING CODE (USE-BASED) Conventional zoning protects a city from the most negative impacts of unregulated development to ensure health, safety and welfare. For example, zoning separates industrial and residential areas. After WWII, zoning increasingly segregated uses. Today, this once prudent approach is showing its limitations as separate residential and commercial districts give way to mixed-use zoning. FLOOR AREA RATIOS (FAR) This is the ratio of a building to its lot. An FAR of 2.0 means that the total floor area is two times the size of the lot, translating into a multi-story building. An FAR of .10 means a very low density. ENTITLEMENTS An entitlement gives a property owner permission to tear down, modify or build new construction on their property. (If the project is under a certain size and allowed under the current code, the applicant can build on their property “by right.”) Even if entitlements are required, in many cases, they can be granted over the counter by City staff. For larger or more complex projects, or projects that require variances, the applicant needs to present their proposal at one or more public hearings such as a Design Commission, a Planning Commission, or even City Council. The rules governing entitlements are spelled out in the Municipal Code. Planning staff is trained to review proposed projects and guide applicants on the entitlement process, so that they will have an idea of the time and money the process will cost before they begin.

FORM BASED ZONING CODE Where use-based zoning code uses labels such as “R-1” for a single home residential zone, form-based zoning code shows a generalized 3-D form on a map to show the general form for that parcel. Form Based code makes it very easy for non-professionals to visualize the massing of what is allowed on a parcel. It also may allow for more integrated uses and more interesting development patterns. While remaining flexible, form-based code removes a great deal of uncertainty, allowing citizens and developers to better understand the vision of the current General Plan. DENSITY Density defines how much can be built on a parcel. This is different from the use, or what you can do on the parcel. If a parcel has a higher density, that means that more building can be built on it. For example, the density of a parcel might allow one single-family home to be built on it. Other parcels might allow a duplex or a fourplex, while still other parcels would allow a 12 story apartment building. Rules that are usually related to density are rules that govern the placement of the building on the site (setbacks) and the height of the building (usually expressed in feet, sometimes expressed in floors). SPECIFIC PLAN Some cities have Specific Plans that govern specific areas within the city that have common characteristics, such as a commercial or residential neighborhood. The Specific Plan will have additional information about that area and additional rules that govern development in that area. These Specific Plans are considered additions to the General Plan, and they should not be in conflict with the General Plan.

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PEOPLE IN THE PLANNING PROCESS This page loosely characterizing the experiences of those involved, not just in the case-study of Pasadena, but in cities and towns everywhere, continuing on page 84.

CITIZENS Though a small core group of dedicated citizens is often involved, most people find planning to be mysterious and boring. Sometimes an issue affects them directly, so they attend a meeting or two, but it’s challenging to follow the dialogue and there are few resources to bring people up to speed. Too often citizens feel their opinion does not matter, involvement is a waste of their time and the results do not connect to their vision. CITY COUNCIL In most cities, Council is the gateway to final approval of large projects. The process to that point has been lengthy and complicated. With little variation, planning staff is recommending approval. The Commissions might not be. Some citizens are just learning of the project (even with outreach). There is great pressure to approve and little time left for input. Council often feels staff is filtering out information they might need. Correcting the Myth: Council does not control the details of the planning process. COMMUNITY ACTIVISTS These are citizens who often have a sophisticated understanding of the planning process and sometimes posses professional knowledge. Community activists are generally well informed, even to the point of independent research regarding proposals. One challenge for community activists is getting full access to the information in a timely manner (in Pasadena, for example, full packages are not available online). Another issue is that they are often tuned out because they comment on so many proposals. Correcting the Myth: Most community activists are not anti-growth, but instead want smart and reasonable development. DESIGN PROFESSIONALS Many architects are strong designers and thoughtful planners, but their design sensibilities need to be in service of an economic solution that can actually

get built. It takes many iterations to find the design that satisfies the owner, the city, and is sufficiently marketable to justify the cost of the project. Correcting the Myth: Architects are often accused of not designing what is best for the urban fabric, but have come to realize their work should enhance the urban context. DEVELOPERS Developers are the engine of growth, accounting for nearly all major projects. Their investments are responsible for the most visible landmarks in the city. The key for developers is finding a balance between risk and reward. The greater the risk, the greater the reward needs to be. A simple suburban project has the lowest risk, and therefore requires the lowest profit margin. A unique urban development, especially one that does not follow a proven formula, or makes an aesthetic advancement, is particularly difficult and needs to be priced accordingly. If the municipal process helps to determine potential costs, developers can better determine whether the project is worth the risk. Arbitrary changes in regulation during the entitlements process have a significant impact on the developer’s ability to plan, which can discourage development, add risk, and increase expense which is passed on to the end user. Correcting the Myth: Some think developers don’t care about good design. In truth most prefer to have a beautiful property. The process of developing requires a balance between risk and return on investment. PLANNING STAFF City planning draws dedicated and hard-working planners who are devoted to the profession. Their challenge comes in serving many masters: Council, the City Manager, the Planning Director, Citizens and a long list of state statutes. With so many conflicting interests and a heavy work load, it is impossible to please everyone. Correcting the Myth: Planners are not free to champion causes or campaigns.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

TODAY

IMPORTANT AREAS OF PLANNING POLICY

THE COMPREHENSIVE GENERAL PLAN A Comprehensive General Plan defines acceptable land use in California cities, providing a framework to guide development through upcoming decades. It is the point of exchange between community vision and the actual policies that city staff will be implementing when processing applications for construction and development. Zoning and land use maps detail these policies of municipal code, showing allowable uses for any given parcel, and also describe the limitations on the size and shape of the structures that can be used on those parcels. A General Plan is defined by “Elements” in areas such as Land Use, Mobility, Parks, and Housing. Periodic updates respond to growth and changes in the economic, environmental, social conditions and values of the city. Two updates created in Pasadena in 2015 illustrate the process. The Land Use Element is the most complicated and political of the two as it defines the amount and scale of development. Before being approved by Council, an Environmental Impact Report was required to evaluate the potential effects of the scenarios to be adopted. According to Vicrim Chima, a planner with the City of Pasadena,“the 2015 General Plan Update represents one of the most advanced documents of its kind. It includes a sophisticated policy framework to reflect the most

progressive thinking in land use management. Its policies were crafted to address several pieces of state legislation designed to support sustainable development, multi-modal transportation analysis, and affordable housing. While reducing overall development capacity and focusing new development around transit, the plan also concentrates development on South Fair Oaks Avenue. “The Mobility Element Update” Planner Chima continues, “is one of the first to be based on new standards that consider all types of transportation, from the pedestrian, to the cyclist, to the transit user, moving the focus away from just the automobile. These standards work together with the idea that a mix of uses and development near transportation infrastructure, coupled with policies designed to incentivize transit and ride share options, can lower the amount of traffic and pollutants generated from vehicle travel. This could improve overall air quality, noise, and quality of life while still providing the housing and services required by a growing population.” While the plan creates a separated “bicycle track” along under utilized Union Street, the plan has yet to connect to the larger regional network. Pasadena uses a system of planning that includes Specific Plans for various smaller areas of the City. In 2016-17, updates Specific Plans updates based on the adopted Land Use Element will include public input, environmental review, and eventual adoption by the City Council.

PASADENA’S COMPREHENSIVE GENERAL PLAN: BY THE NUMBERS Element Date Updated Cost Pages Pages in EIR

The Land Use Element Update August 2015 $x x x The Mobility Element August 2015 $x x x The Housing Element Date $x x NOTE: The 2015 General Plan xUpdate for the Green Space, Recreation & Parks Date $x x x with $380,000 Land Use Element cost $1.3 million being spent on $x x outreach that also Open Space and Conservation Date x included the Mobility Element. The information Noise Element Date $x x x for this chart is not readily available cost for the Safety Element Date $x x and the total x Comprehensive General Plan remains unknown.

A COMPREHENSIVE CHALLENGE As planning has become more sophisticated, it has also become more complicated. For the public it seeks to serve, the land use diagram is too difficult to interpret and for many people, incomprehensible. Taken together, all elements of Pasadena’s Comprehensive General Plan add up to an unknown number of pages. There is no single location where all elements are present, making it nearly impossible to take in the entirety of the Comprehensive General Plan.

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[ t i

TODAY The Design Commission Space at the Hale Building, while having the intimacy of scale the Planning Commission lacks, it is so small, there is

no space between rows and people have to stand in the hall. After their meetings, which offer insightful and intelligent discourse about proposed projects, people converse in the hallway or outside on the sidewalk as there is nowhere for participants to confer, discuss and connect before or after a meeting. A basement space has been found as a temporary solution but lacks a connection with the street and so the search continues.

PLANNING AND DESIGN COMMISSIONS The Planning and Design Commissions may have statutory legal authority over projects, but the City Council can overturn their decisions. Commissioners are appointed by Council and include very intelligent and committed citizens who are passionate advocates in the process of planning. They review recommendations made by staff, hear public testimony, and make decisions, which are binding except with appeal to the City Council. The Design Commission reviews major projects, focusing on design, context, massing, proportion, siting, construction details, finishes, materials, landscaping, and compliance with applicable design guidelines. It is also responsible for making sure that new construction and renovation meet the high standards of design for the city and are compatible with surrounding uses. The Planning Commission advises Council on the preparation of the General Plan, the creation of districts, zoning, capital improvements, and other topics that affect development. It also adopts and implements the General Plan, specific plans, the zoning map, regulations and review of capital zoning improvements. They also make recommendations regarding public right of way or open space, locations of roads and bridges, and the creation of parking districts. Correcting the Myth: It is not true that these advisory commissions can permanently kill projects.

THE CITY MANAGER Pasadena has a Council-Manager form of government. The City Council hires the City Manager, who acts as the CEO and supervisor of city government. Compared to other forms and ways of organizing local government, a city manager has more discretion when it comes to decisions. To keep undue political influence away from staff, the City Council is not supposed to give staff any direction except through the City Manager. As planning can have impacts into many millions of dollars, this separation is especially important. The City Manager hires department heads to oversee specific areas, such as Finance, Public Works, and Planning. Every city is organized differently, so Planning can stand alone or combine with functions such as Economic Development. In general, the City Manager usually leaves dayto-day running of departments and the details of their decisions to the department heads, but may get involved with special projects. If Council, staff, and citizens have conflicting visions, it is often the City Manager that best understands all the moving parts and pieces in the increasingly complex modern city. It is an exciting role, but it is often frustrating to be secondguessed in the many misunderstood factors at play. Correcting the Myth: The City Manager is not involved in the details of all real estate transactions, nor do they control all actions made by the city.

The Planning Commission Meeting in Council Chambers When Pasadenaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s City Hall was built in the 1930s, Council Chambers were designed to impart the regal grandeur befitting an imperial building. When it comes to City Council meetings, the restored space serves its proceedings. For the Planning Commission, however, the space presents four large and twelve small screens mirroring presentations creating a lack of a singular focus. Conversations afterward occur in an outdoor hallway, making the room is far from ideal for planning.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

TODAY

The Ventura 1959/1974

The Foothill Fwy

The Arroyo Seco Pkwy

The Long Beach Fwy

THE

710 ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT REPORT A $40 MILLION REPORT

WHAT IS AN EIR? The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) of 1970 requires state and local agencies to analyze the impacts of proposed projects and mitigate negative impacts. Projects subject to CEQA cause lead agencies to commission an initial study. This results in either a mitigated negative declaration or the finding that an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) is required. An EIR analyzes and evaluates alternative scenarios. This in-depth study and outreach is expensive. A typical EIR might cost a few hundred thousand dollars and rise with complexity. THE 710 TUNNEL PROPOSAL AND EIR calls for a 4.9 mile freeway tunnel. The EIR illustrates the implementation and limitations of CEQA. Costing $40 million thus far, it includes only studies of options, not the final design. ARGUMENTS IN FAVOR OF THE 710 FREEWAY • Closing a gap in the freeway system as envisioned 50 years ago. • An extremely congested freeway system. • Alleviating congestion on adjacent streets in nearby cities. • Trucking: Linking the Port of Long Beach to distribution centers on less expensive land north of the metropolitan area. ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE 710 FREEWAY • Limited Congestion Relief: Less than a decade of traffic relief. • Induced Demand: Studies show new freeways create demand. • Privately Funded Toll Roads are Failing in the Region: At $6 to $12 per car, alternatives will keep cars on local streets. • Earthquakes: the danger of digging a tunnel through faults. • Concentrating Congestion: 4.9 miles with no on or offramps. • Danger: a truck fire could engulf the tunnel. • Expense: Could be $5.4-billion, more than 1 billion per mile. • “405 Congestion Relief Project is a Fail.” After $1.1 Billion, freeway speed at Sepulveda Pass is no faster (LA Weekly). • Traffic Equilibrium: Inconvenience dictates traffic levels. • Boston’s Big Dig and Seattle’s stuck tunnel boring machine. • The Shift from arterial to distributed routing of automated cars. • Insufficient study of concentrated tunnel exhaust carcinogens. A 4.9 Mile Tunnel This is a one possible scheme for the tunnels.

CRITICISM OF THE PROCESS The Question of Bias The though an EIR is supposed to be an impartial study of options, it is often cited for steering to preconceived conclusions. Both the Environmental Protection Agency and the Southern California Air Quality Management District have responded to the EIR by calling its air quality assessment insufficient. Readability Citizens complain the 2000 page EIR and its 20,000 pages of analysis has the overbearing complexity, even at 12 point 20,000 pages equates to pages of fine print, like a congressional bill or iTunes agreement only consultants have read. It is unrealistic to expect anyone to read them. Outmoded Format The 710 EIR is made primarily for print and secondarily for electronic format (ie PDF), but as only one person paid the $1400 for the print edition, it is primarily used in its digital format. In Volume 1 alone, 173 pages are labeled “intentionally left blank.” A Lack of Hyperlinking Requiring readers to go through a 2000 page EIR and 20,000 pages without hyperlinking in the predominantly used digital version makes the EIR unusable. Two different page numbering systems also have to be juggled. Impenetrable Acronyms—The viewer is required to memorize acronyms (TDM, TSM, etc, etc,) some at the beginning of the EIR or in a nine page appendix of 383 acronyms, making understanding the EIR very difficult. Translating acronyms each time they appear does not occur. Expense Thus far, the cost of the EIR and accompanying studies was $40 million. That is for a report and studies alone. A copy of 2000 page report is $1,400. One copy was sold. Effectiveness Perhaps more important than what the 710 EIR proposes is the larger question of whether the CEQA process of analysis is effective public planning. Considering the issues of legibility, readability and expense, the EIR process may not be the right tool to achieve the desired outcome. Six 50-Foot Tunnel Exhaust Stacks Gateway to Old Pasadena

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LESSONS

the Planning Profession Turns 100: Lessons Learned in Cities Today

“to make the city attractive is to make it prosperous” Investment Yields Dividends: Among the key precepts of Pasadena’s City Beautiful Movement is George Ellery Hale’s quote of San Francisco’s Willis Polk. The people of both Pasadena and San Francisco have reaped rich rewards by investing in their city.

“How to Get Started in City Planning: The Pasadena Way” The October 1916 issue of “The City Plan” focused on helping cities understand how to approach city planning. Dean Damon’s article described the “My City” approach, which can be found on page 44.

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LESSONS

the Planning Profession Turns 100: Lessons Learned in Cities Today

A Century of Lessons The planning of cities originates in the growing tribal villages and towns of the ancient world. And yet, until the invention of the automobile and the rise of the modern city, the profession of planning was part of the general practice of architecture and building.

C O N T E N T S

In 1909, the first National Conference on City Planning was held. In a later publication of the proceedings, it was noted that“the conception of planning as a separate profession was not apparent in the 1909 meeting… it was clear that the delegates were not thinking about forming an organization that would treat city planning as a new profession.”1

Turning Vision into Results...............91

By 1916, however, that had changed. Opening that year’s conference, Dean George A. Damon presented a paper called “How to Get Started in City Planning the Pasadena Way” (p.44). He set the tone for the conference theme of helping cities understand the value of planning by introducing the “My City” approach and discussing the value of public participation. Raymond and Colorado Blvd.

A block from Pasadena’s original main intersection at Fair Oaks, the corner of Raymond Avenue and Colorado Boulevard is seen here in 1986. Illustrated by Bruce Litz.

Another 1916 article by planning pioneer Charles Mulford Robinson noted the first ten colleges to teach courses in City Planning (including Dean Damon’s in Pasadena). These courses, in turn, would yield the first planning professionals. That same year, New York City’s Zoning Resolution began the planned allocation of city areas by usage.

A Century of Modern Planning.......88

Momentum...............92 A Question of Open Space...............94 Lessons of Form.......96 Lessons of Process...98 Fixing the Broken Link...............99

The 2016 centennial of the profession of planning presents an opportunity to take stock of some of the changes in the planning and compare the current conversation and best practices with the lessons learned in Pasadena a century ago.

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1. Horace Dobbins on his elevated cycleway in Pasadena, sitting in his new automobile, circa 1903. 2. The Colorado Street Bridge construction, 1913. 3. The Foothill Freeway (210) under construction in 1976. 4. Reconstruction of the Colorado Street Bridge, 1992 5. The Gold Line Bridge over the 210 Freeway, constructed in 2009, which was the result of a public competition.

The Natural Cycle of Change In the evolution of cities, the view of the future is a repeating pattern that cycles between periods of great inspiration, a slow diluting of that inspiration, a time of anti-optimism and then, in a fit of nostalgia for previous visions of the future, a new cycle of reinvention. As discussed in the introduction (p.20), this Natural Cycle, containing both opportunities and pitfalls, is useful in understanding the last century of planning. 1. INVENTION

2. REFINEMENT Beginning in the mid-1920s and continuing through World War II, the refinement stage of the cycle shifted planning from a romantic vision of civic design and public participation, to a more top-down, methodical and scientific approach to bring order and efficiency to the increasing complexity of the modern city.

The first quarter of the 20th Century was influenced by the Progressive Era’s focus on citizen initiative. Planning emphasized the competition of ideas and public participation. Along with reforming city government, citizens created the momentum needed for the ambitious projects of the City Beautiful Movement.

4. Revitalization

3. Inversion 2. Refinement

LESSONS

FORM

the Planning Profession’s Century of Lessons Learned

The impulse to refine and separate the functions of the city became zoning policy during this time. This eventually resulted in the growth of distinct residential, industrial and commercial districts. As the practice of zoning evolved, separate shopping and business districts were created as well.

Example: The refining approach of handling auto traffic is shown Examples: Pasadena’s Four in the 1912 vision for the Arroyo The Natural Cycle of Change Corners Competition of 1914 Seco Parkway (p.30). Over time, (p.33) helped launch Paul and especially after LA’s 1932 This pattern is introduced on page 20 and Williams career and raised Olympics, the vision shifted and recurs on pages 156, and 158. awareness about city planning. from a greenbelt linking parks The Civic Center competition a decade later to a more efficient, autobahn-style solution called a produced great civic spaces, also with the benefit of freeway, which opened in 1940, just before the US public representation and input. entered World War II.

1. Invention

Transforming the Arroyo Seco at the Los Angeles River: A Return to the Original Vision

The adoption of this ambitious plan to restore 719 acres and tear out three miles of concrete marks a shift towards revitalization. 110 Tunnels Arroyo Today

LA River

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

The Arroyo Seco

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

Abandoning the Sidewalk As city planning became more top-down after World War II, architecture cut off pedestrians, seen here in Pasadena’s windowless Bank-Americard building of 1971 and the black-glass “Darth Vader” building of 1980.

“…THAT THE SIGHT OF PEOPLE ATTRACTS STILL OTHER PEOPLE, IS SOMETHING THAT CITY PLANNERS AND CITY ARCHITECTURAL DESIGNERS SEEM TO FIND INCOMPREHENSIBLE. THEY OPERATE ON THE PREMISE THAT CITY PEOPLE SEEK THE SIGHT OF EMPTINESS, OBVIOUS ORDER AND QUIET. NOTHING COULD BE LESS TRUE. THE PRESENCES OF GREAT NUMBERS OF PEOPLE GATHERED TOGETHER IN CITIES SHOULD NOT ONLY BE FRANKLY ACCEPTED AS A PHYSICAL FACT THEY SHOULD ALSO BE ENJOYED AS AN ASSET AND THEIR PRESENCE CELEBRATED.”

3. INVERTING (AND REDEVELOPMENT) With enough refining and fine-tuning, any process or idea can eventually take on an inverted form that is the opposite of what was originally intended. As policies were refined to manage the increasing complexity of the modern city, the focus shifted from a bottom-up to a more top-down approach. By the 1960s, public participation and the competition of ideas had faded from planning. As detailed in the Main Street chapter, Redevelopment Agencies were given top-down power to tear down the state’s decaying downtowns. Over 30 blocks of Pasadena were torn down in the 1960s and 1970s. In place of old buildings, Modernist architecture brought a “building as machine” approach to urban design, often resulting in isolated “lunar landscapes” lacking in human scale. In Pasadena of the 1980s, after building the doomed Plaza Pasadena mall at great public expense, future mayor Bill Bogaard led an effort to push out the Redevelopment Agency and increase participation. The Pasadena Playhouse began as a community playhouse in

1916 and built its theater in 1924 amidst a flurry of great civic building. By the late 1960s it closed and revived in 1989. Today, the tradition of great theater continues.

Jane Jacobs: The Death and Life of Great American Cities, 1961.

However, over time complaints of closed meetings have returned and participation has waned in response. In the Natural Cycle of Change, professions tend to evolve away from their original focus. The same is true of planning. Perhaps these changes can be more easily understood by comparing related professions. Engineers originally focused on engines. Today, work on an engine is generally done by a mechanic. Likewise, building a stone arch was once accomplished by an architect. Likewise, a stone mason would a much better choice as architecture has broadened to the point that it involves more design, administration and computer work than construction. As the modern city increasingly relies on top-down policy, planning has naturally shifted away from its original focus on bottom-up vision. As a result of this top-down emphasis, many planning administrators today do not hold a degree in planning. Instead, Geography, Public Administration, Journalism and Public Relations majors are increasingly in control of the planning process. IDS: Playhouse Plaza A massive building proposed across from

the Playhouse was challenged legally by now Mayor Terry Tornek. Moule & Polyzoides, the new architects create a massing that steps down and improves the urban fabric.

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LESSONS Desiderio Park is the City of Pasadena’s project to transform an Army Reserve Center below the Colorado St. Bridge into a 3.8 acre park and nine-units of Habitat-for-Humanity housing that aims to fit in the local tradition of the Craftsman courtyard.

In an October 2015 editorial, former administrator of Pasadena’s Development Department Marsha Rood writes that participation has “devolved” and describes: a) late information timed for the least public involvement; b) lack of plans online, requiring special appointments; c) elimination of community-based task forces; d) shifting to developer meetings with no public notice and developer-picked citizen participants; e) unlimited developer time and citizens given only three or four minutes each at public meetings; f) closed sessions of Council that should be public; g) lack of public information on key project documents (For its part, the City points out the need for meetings to discuss legal and negotiating tactics that must be held in closed-door sessions, as is standard business practice). 4. REVITALIZATION AND REINVENTION Viewing the present from the vantagepoint of the 1950s and 1960s, what might surprise most people from that time is that the city of the 2000s does not look like Tomorrowland. Instead, the city of today has come full circle, as the signs of revitalization and reinvention have come to reflect the values of a century ago.

to create authentic localized neighborhood centers. Pasadena is planning such centers at Lake Street and Washington Avenue, as well as on Lincoln Avenue—which recalls the original “My City” vision of 1916. New parks are also being planned along with continued efforts to revitalize the lower Arroyo Seco. The signs of the impulse towards revitalization can be found throughout the region. LA’s Planning Department is working to revitalize the Los Angeles River, neighborhood centers, and a Complete Streets Network. New Neighborhood Councils now actively review development proposals as well. As the public demonstrates the desire to increase bottom-up participation, developers find they are more likely to head off controversy with public outreach. As the citizen initiated “Connecting Pasadena” event of 2014 demonstrated, the public is increasingly interested in being involved. But as the official process of planning remains too complex and uninviting, the larger public continues to tune out planning.

Compared to 1916, when there were only 40,000 people in Pasadena and 8000 Colonial Revival architecture of the attended “My City,” very few people 1920s, Urth Cafe of 2013 draws new Due to the success of recent participate in planning today. Revitalizing life to Pasadena’s Playhouse District. revitalization efforts and a yearning “My City” would complete the cycle, for the authenticity of the downtown the public once marking a return to citizen involvement and driving knew, planning departments are now focusing on ways planning from the bottom-up. Urth Cafe A return to the Spanish

CONNECTING PASADENA John Chan helped initiate the Connecting Pasadena Coalition in 2014, with a focus on creating a public process to explore potential solutions for the 710 freeway stub. Two public charrettes were widely attended.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

Bottom-up and Top Down Planning Balancing bottom-up and top down processes requires a strong city government and an active public sector to build bottom-up input and support. This description of top-down and bottom-up approaches builds on the introductory description on page 22-23 and is a thread of logic that weaves through pages 79, 105, 115,

THE TOP-DOWN, LATER LOGISTICAL STAGES OF CITY PLANNING GOVERNMENT

ENFORCEMENT

INSPECTION

Top-down momentum requires expertise and resources. Police, fire, water and power, flood control, zoning, plan-checks and building inspection are areas where top-down expertise is necessary. Top-down agencies exhibit a narrowing vision, focused on identifying problems enforcing rules.

LINEAR

BIG BUSINESS

SPENDING MONEY

DECREE

Filtering-out, caution and taking incremental steps characterize top-down endeavors. As detailed in the Main Street and 2015 chapters, top-down focus is not well-suited to the patience needed for the open-minded, non-linear exploration that defines and is required by the early, visioning stages of planning a project.

THE BOTTOM-UP, EARLY VISIONING STAGES OF CITY PLANNING INDIVIDUALS

GRASS-ROOTS

REFERENDUM

Imagination, a sense of history and the rigorous application of common sense is needed for bottom-up planning. Exploration, experimentation, and multiple approaches characterize bottomup vision, and are the key to momentum for large projects.

NON-LINEAR

SMALL BUSINESS

ECONOMY

CONVERSATION

The “My City” process of 1916 is the bottomup approach that helped create a landmark civic center in Pasadena in the 1920s. Revitalizing this approach can help create a stronger link between vision and results in your city today.

See also, Design Thinking, page 159.

THE WORD “BEAUTIFUL” IS MISSING, ALONG WITH THE POETICS OF PLANNING

A century ago, the word ‘beautiful’ and ‘visionary’ could be found throughout the planning process. A search of planning documents today reveals an alphabet soup of acronyms, but rarely do the words beauty, vision, worker or protest appear, nor the suggestion that people think of their city as their home, all of which indicate the lack of a bottom-up approach. The topic of beauty in planning continues on page 162.

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Complexity Slows Momentum THE LOSS OF A “COMPREHENSIVE” GENERAL PLAN As planning becomes ever-more complex, documents regularly number in the thousands of pages; too large to absorbed and evaluated. Until this past decade, Pasadena produced a single Comprehensive General Plan. Today, the Land Use and Mobility Elements have been updated, producing no single Comprehensive

Plan document, and there is no single place where they can be all found together all at once (p.83). As a result, there is no singular vision and it is very difficult to There used to be a single Comprehensive get the big picture. document citizens could hold in their hands.

THE LACK OF A UNIFIED MAP Among the most surprising aspects of planning today is how far behind planning has fallen technically. While it is now possible to see any street in any city with Google Earth’s Street View feature, the profession of planning has yet to make it standard practice to produce online views of the city as it will appear in 6-months, or a year from now, even though the information exists. Longer term visions of one and two decades are even more rare. While the map of the present has never been so precise, the map of the future is far too vague to be engaging. To follow planning in most cities, a citizen must study many maps—one for land use, one for transportation, etc. Then they must to study many documents and plans and then synthesize it all to understand and envision the totality.

There are good reasons city planning does not get this detailed. When drawings and maps are detailed, citizens see conceptual plans as a done deal. Also, there is no obvious funding for such a map. “California as an Island” (p.15) illustrates the issue of conjecture in coordinating the changing maps of state and regional agencies, which involves out of date errors and omissions. Nonetheless, having a unified map is essential for planning to succeed. Without a map uniting all city and regional projects, previous proposals and the united vision of developers and citizens, it is not possible for citizens to envision their city. The lack of “plan” of the city keeps planning from reaching its true potential. (See also, The Unified Map Project, p.107)

THE LACK OF A SCHEMATIC MAP A schematic diagram represents elements of a system using abstract lines that omit details and scale for the sake of a more abstract clarity. The Metro maps of inter-urban train systems are a classic example, making the network and links to outside systems easier to understand. When used in planning, schematic diagrams “crystallize emerging points of view, framing challenges and choices in a new light.”

The lack of a schematic map in transportation planning— such as Pasadena’s General Plan Mobility Element—is another common standard in city planning today that holds planning back. Planning without a schematic map is like trying to navigate an interurban train system without the usual diagram, making it difficult to understand how the system works, what is included or excluded, and how the elements connect with adjacent cities.

SCHEMATIC MAP OF LA METRO SYSTEM Though county rail agencies use schematic maps, cities are reticent to use them in planning.

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PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

Issues Preventing Momentum THE TOO EARLY, TOO LATE PARADOX STOPS PUBLIC INPUT (AND TAKES MORE TIME)

Robert Oliver, Caltech professor and Planning Commissioner describes attempts to discuss the Plaza Pasadena mall proposal, “I was told to wait. It was too early. Then we were told that agreements with the developer had already been signed. There was no turning back. Suddenly it was too late.” A SLOWING OF THE PLANNING PROCESS PREVENTS TIMELY SOLUTIONS

Independent of the rate of growth, projects move through the planning process in cities across the US at an ever slowing pace. From the World Trade Center to the creation of new commuter train lines, the pace is slowing. Ironically, as this slowing makes planning recede into the background, it often has the qualities of moving too fast as detailed next. THE PUBLIC IS SURPRISED & CAUGHT OFF GUARD (FURTHER SLOWING THE PROCESS)

Too often people find out about changes to their city after it is too late. Public notices are often attached to a pole where no one notices, or posted during the holidays when people are busy, or they find out after the meeting was already held. It is a phenomenon found in cities everywhere. By focusing on the early visioning stages, “My City” addresses this. TOO MUCH FOCUS ON PERSONALITIES CAN KILL CONVERSATION & THE BEST OF IDEAS

While society today is more tolerant, there are people in every city who clash with others for one reason or another, particularly when a new idea is being proposed. Too often, this clash becomes a reason to not support an otherwise good idea. By handing initial proposals over to a Project Team, and by using blind surveys (p.124), the distraction of personalities is diminished. PREVENTING THE “INVISIBLE HAND OF THE MARKETPLACE” FROM SELF-CORRECTING

The decline of downtown Pasadena in the 1960-80s was addressed with an experimental suburban mall that required citizen subsidy. In retrospect, it seems clear that had the mall not been built, the market would have self-corrected. Though there are places for public investment, patience is also key. THE INCOMPLETE MARKETPLACE OF IDEAS: THE LACK OF DIVERSE INPUT

Problem solving and good design requires considering the complete range of potential and possibility before narrowing options. When delayed projects are fast-tracked, the visioning stage of planning is squeezed out from public discussion. Pasadena’s Gold Line promenade is an example of this today.

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The two small parks across the street from Pasadena’s Civic Auditorium were lost to the Plaza Pasadena Mall in 1979, which included a small piece of lawn and plaza in consolation, which was then subsequently lost in 2015.

Pasadena’s Civic Center Masterplan CARMELITA GARDENS, THE ART INSTITUTE & THE NORTON SIMON MUSEUM Once Pasadena’s most elaborate garden, Carmelita Gardens was a cultural nexus. Residing guests included John Muir, who worked the 42-acre garden, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Helen Hunt Jackson (who wrote part of Ramona there). There was also a horticulture school for women. Gifted to the city for the Pasadena Art Institute, nearly half was lost to the 134 freeway. The last 9.5 acres became the Norton Simon Museum. See, also, pages 16, 30, 45 & 50). “RESERVOIR PARK of the lands of the San Gabriel Orange Grove Association,” remained open space until the 1980s when it was developed for condominiums.

Building consensus towards a ballot initiative on the 1923 Bennett Plan for Pasadena’s Civic Center (p.50) began with the “My City” Exhibit of 1916. The January 1923 plan also shows extensive open space along both axes of the Civic Center, with small parks throughout. Without the vigilant focus of the City Beautiful Association, incursions into Pasadena’s parks and open space occurred over time as indicated by the red lines on this map. As detailed below, Parsons Engineering was built on the Holly Street axis in the early 1970s. In 1980, the Plaza Pasadena mall was built across the Garfield Avenue Civic Center axis and on two parks across from the Civic Auditorium as well.

RESERVOIR PARK PARSONS ENGINEERING

HOLLY STREET AXIS: 1941 TO 1969

PIONEER MEMORIAL This small vestige of Carmelita Gardens survives today. THE 710 FWY

A Question of Open Space

CARMELITA

Pioneer Memorial

Carmelita Gardens, now known as the Norton Simon Museum.

In 1941, the Colorado proposed Holly St. Bridge Street Extension was completed to Carmelita Gardens as part of the original Bennett Plan for the Civic Center. This block is now a truncated sixblock stretch of freeway that was stopped midconstruction by the “Freeway Revolt” of 1969, though not in time to save the Civic Center axis to the museum nor the Old Neighborhood Church. The freeway is actually an example of private property that became public property.

PARSONS ENGINEERING An addition closed Holly Street and the Civic Center axis. Today, a new developer seeks to develop this area with an urban village and remedy this mistake by opening the Holly Street axis in some way.

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MY CITY 1916

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Once known as Library Park, this piece of Civic Center open space was renamed Memorial Park after World War I.

In 2015, another controversy about the open space of the Civic Center was in question, this time regarding the 1922 YWCA designed by Julia Morgan. It remained vacant and neglected until the city protected it by acquiring the historic property through eminent domain.

Opponents view this open space as a symbolic embodiment of democracy, and that building upon it is a breach of public trust. For its part, the City of Pasadena points to the 1924 Civic Center diagram on page 47 and the Central District Specific Plan Appendix adopted in 2004 in support of its position.

In order to recoup its costs and put the building back into use, the City issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) in July 2012. The winning submission by Kimpton Hotels included a detailed restoration with additional rooms being added to a newly constructed wing.

All would seem to agree that an issue so fundamental should not be in question at the final stage of the planning process.

While there is praise for the restoration of the YWCA and acceptance for creating a new wing, there has been fierce opposition. The issue stems, in part, by a perceived error in the initial RFP, which did not define or alert the public to a shift in the boundaries of the Bennett Plan.

With these ongoing questions of what constitutes open space, the patterns of development are clear: When the public is informed and involved—as was the case in building the City Beautiful Movement’s momentum for a Civic Center— exemplary results follow. When the public is not engaged as a common stakeholder, disagreement, legal action, and delay follow. The “My City” process that helped produce this Civic Center goes far in addressing these fundamental questions.

CENTRAL LIBRARY

MEMORIAL PARK

NOW PARKING

YWCA

SR. CTR

The width of the space on the right will not be maintained on the left. KIMPTON (YWCA) HOTEL: A CURRENT OPEN SPACE DISAGREEMENT A hotel planned for the former YWCA building has faced controversy in the 2010s as it seeks approval. Proponents argue that the Bennett Plan of January 1923 was actually superseded by an heretofore unknown plan later in 1925. Opponents argue that new construction will extend into what currently comprises the Civic Center open space and that it will also crowd the two busts of the Robinson Memorial (above). CIVIC AUDITORIUM

When the Plaza Pasadena (Paseo) mall was built across the Garfield axis of the Civic Center, the parks were lost. Within 20 years of its publicly subsidized construction, the mall was demolished at public expense, and the Civic Center axis reopened in 2000. The two small parks, however, were not replaced. By 2015, the open space at Green and Los Robles was lost as well.

THE MALL AUDITORIUM

NOTE: Green has been added here to highlight open spaces. Central Park was not originally differentiated.

THE AUDITORIUM PARKS & PLAZA PASADENA MALL, 1979

AUDITORIUM

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LESSONS

FORM

the Planning Profession’s Century of Lessons Learned

Old Lessons of Form The following assumptions about the basic requirements of a modern city were used in the planning of Pasadena. Over time, especially during the post WWII building boom, many fell out of favor. Today most of them are being revitalized.

CIVIC SPACES Among the characteristics that make Pasadena a great city is its grand Civic Center. The courtyards and grand arcades of its Classical Mediterranean City Hall, Central Library and Civic Auditorium, serve as the embodiment of Pasadena’s open democracy and a source of civic stature and pride.

GREENBELTS AND OPEN SPACE In 1912, the vision of a greenbelt park system joining “the mountains to the sea” left a legacy of parks on the Arroyo Seco. It has since been paved with a concrete channel and pieces lost. Pasadena’s Civic Center suffered a similar fate. Since the 1990s, the city has worked to revitalize the Arroyo, a great start for planning.

“A CITY HOME FOR THE LIFE OF ITS PEOPLE” In 1916 “My City” presented “A Vision of the City Plan” that included “small parks and restful places, with frequent neighborhood centers made up of schools, playgrounds, branch libraries and swimming pools and family parks for picnic suppers.” A century later the effects of this endeavor can still be found in Pasadena.

CONVENTIONAL ZONING AND SEGREGATION BY USE Isolating industry from residential areas, later separating shopping and office districts has characterized zoning and modern planning. Today, the limitations of this once sensible approach can be found in many suburbs, office parks, and shopping malls that have proved to be sterile and isolating (p.71).

RESTORATION AND REVITALIZATION After over 30 blocks of downtown Pasadena were lost to redevelopment, the remaining core was finally preserved. Today, it is hard to believe the same structures that helped reverse the decline of downtown—including Castle Green, the Colorado Street Bridge and even City Hall—were once in danger of demolition.

THE INFUSION OF ARTISTIC ENERGY A century ago, when Pasadena’s planners viewed the city as a kind of “people’s home,” architecture was imbued with a richness of detailing and feeling of care that persists to this day. After the decline of downtown, cheap rents attracted artists and with them an infusion of energy that helped to revitalize Old Pasadena.

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PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

the Planning Profession’s Century of Lessons Learned

New Lessons of Form The following represents the emerging best practices in planning today. As the challenges and opportunities of city life have changed over time, these issues have emerged to become part of the current planning dialogue.

WALKABILTY (AND A HIERARCHY OF WALKING SPACES) Though a drivable city is still very important, developers and planners have learned that motorists become pedestrians after parking and that walkability is also key. A mix of uses and a hierarchy of walking spaces at parking (from sidewalks to arcades to green spaces) makes for a more walkable and valued city by citizens.

MULTI-MODAL TRANSIT & COMPLETE STREETS With the advent of self-driving cars, zones for cars to let out passengers will continue the shift to the experience outside of the car. As the use of the complete street returns, the importance of walking, rail, bicycling and other modes of transportation creates a balance common a century ago.

LOCALIZED PLACEMAKING AND HUMAN SCALE Placemaking is a response to the “could-be-anywhere” quality of many parts of modern cities. By focusing on locations lacking in a sense of care and place, searching for ways to imbue a greater sense of interaction between the realm of the public, private, street and sidewalk, a sense of place can be achieved.

THE IMPORTANCE OF DISTRICTS & NEIGHBORHOODS Old Pasadena and the Playhouse District demonstrate the many benefits of creating focused areas of improvement and distinct areas of identity. Neither existed before the 1980s. Potential drawbacks include the capacity for districts to have good centers but neglected edges and a lack of continuity in the urban fabric.

INTEGRATING FUNCTIONS LEADS TO CONNECTION Modernist urban planning’s focus on isolating functions—as well as lifting and building up—promised to relieve congestion by creating open space. In practice, isolating function resulted in cold concrete landscapes lacking in human scale. Pedestrian bridges (as at LA’s Bonaventure Hotel) can also be too isolating at times.

ALL LESSONS HAVE EXCEPTIONS Thankfully, cities are not derived by rules, but are rich in diversity. San Francisco’s Crown Zellerbach building (left) is an example of a pure expression of Modernist urbanism that has value on a multitude of levels, including the richness of a city’s diversity of approaches over generations. Pedestrian bridges also have exceptions.

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LESSONS

THE PLANNING PROCESS: LESSONS LEARNED THE LATER LOGISTICAL STAGES OF PLANNING REQUIRES A TOP DOWN APPROACH;

The later, logistical stage of planning is characterized by the need for an element of caution and the enforcement of policy. As plans and solutions approach construction, the process needs to search for any potential problems. Building inspection is also a necessary top-down process that protects the public. (p.23, 78) IN TURN, THE PLANNING PROCESS HAS COME TO FOCUS ON POLICY STATEMENTS.

Planners have to field a wide range of planning applications from developers. To that end, city planners need the guidance of clear policies stated in planning documents that are specific enough to address a very broad range of potential contingencies. Because of this, policy has replaced vision as a driving force. TOP DOWN TENDS TO FILTER OUT PUBLIC INPUT: THE PROBLEM OF ‘PREDIGESTING.’

Pasadena’s new Mayor Terry Tornek complains “City Hall staff often ‘predigests’ information about city projects and programs, giving elected officials and the public only the conclusions reached by the staff. I would rather let people know what the alternatives are and then make a decision.” ‘PREDIGESTING’ LEADS TO ‘PREDETERMINING’ AND UNLINKING THE VISION STAGE.

As the planning process makes a show of requesting public input, the options often favor a particular solution. This leads to the perception that the final decision was actually made before the presentation and citizens are being led to a predetermined solution, precluding an authentic bottom-up visioning process. UNLINKING VISION, THE PLANNING PROFESSION HAS FALLEN BEHIND TECHNICALLY.

In 1916, detailed renderings of development ideas inspired visionary planning. Predigesting and predetermining by civic government makes it less important to convince people. Complex written proposals often deter public comment, whereas modern visual media could be used to encourage participation. A MORE PARTICIPATORY PLANNING PROCESS IS THE KEY TO POSITIVE RESULTS.

Fundamental questions about the underlying vision of a proposed project in the final stages of planning indicates the lack of a strong bottom-up approach. Reinvigorating the early visioning stages helps achieve the consensus required to address the core challenges of planning in the 21st Century.

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PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

THE KEY CHALLENGE

THE BROKEN LINK BETWEEN VISION AND RESULTS The early visioning stages of planning are where ambitions are measured, scope is determined and momentum is set. While a blending of top-down and bottom-up efforts is essential, the development

of Pasadena demonstrates that planning needs to be driven from the bottom-up to engender an enduring public commitment and revitalize a more effective process to planning the future.

SPENDING MORE MONEY THAN ATTENTION

TOP-DOWN PLANNING IS TOO COMPLICATED Planning documents today are so complex that people cannot read them. At the same time, planning images lack detail, are too abstract and very difficult for the public to relate to.

Today, as projects works their way through the complicated review process that can take a decade or more, few politicians, planners or citizens can follow the complicated documentation process and continuity is lost.

HIDDEN IN PLAIN VIEW

PLANNING DOES A POOR JOB OF ENGENDERING AN ENDURING COMMITMENT Exploring and representing ideas “in a manner that all can understand” takes time and patience. In 1916, the official municipal process lacked the patience to openly explore ideas and it was a citizen-led group that measured the public’s ambition. As the City Beautiful Movement put time into the early visioning stage, the city

then took notice. Today, few planners or politicians remain involved over the often decade long process. More likely it is the well informed and involved citizen who has the patience to endure. Without the support of “My City,” their patience and vision do not gain support and a key link is broken. See also, Design Thinking, p159.

GOING BEYOND BUSINESS AS USUAL

THE BROKEN LINK: REVITALIZE PLANNING FROM THE BOTTOM-UP “My City” and Dean Damon’s work in the City Beautiful Movement are key sources of Pasadena’s “reputation as a model for other cities to emulate.”

continuity, vision, beauty, and public involvement suffer. By planning from the bottom-up, the process is driven by what the public wants, a proven path for any city to successfully navigate from the community’s vision to the results it will live with for generations into the future.

When the top-down, later logistical stages of planning drive the entire process,

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Overview C

103

This chapter describes the basic principles in updating the “My City” process for the 21st Century. Along with the Projects and Events chapters, issues of process are described here, independent of the question of creating a permanent “Planitorium.”

Projects 111 C

Projects initiated by individuals or groups are at the foundation of this bottom-up approach to the early visioning stages of planning. This chapter discusses examples of projects and how a short proposal can be revised and elaborated upon in succeeding drafts.

100

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MY CITY 1916

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LESSONS

119 Events C H A P T E R

In the “My City” process, project-based events take the place of meetings, beginning with small gatherings that lead up to midsized events in temporary spaces. Eventually, momentum leads to a large event. Events do not require a Planitorium.

“MY CITY” THE PROCESS Planning from the Bottom Up “My City” is a proposal to revive and update Dean George Damon’s participatory process for any city that seeks to reconnect the vision they have for their city with the results that follow. As in 1916, an updated process would “support, not supplant” the city’s current process, helping provide the bottom up momentum needed to accomplish a common community vision. UPDATING “MY CITY”—WHAT IS DIFFERENT? Formalizing An updated process would make formal the Project-Event-Survey-Plan approach of “My City” in 1916, a process to refining an emerging vision that is common to all cultures: there is an idea, feedback is sought, a plan is created. The Myth of Style Though the City Beautiful Movement is often associated with Classical architecture, the Pasadena movement was explicit in not endorsing a particular style of architecture, but instead sought to generate public dialogue and format input into a spectrum of potential options.

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INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

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LESSONS

A PROPOSAL TO REVIVE AND UPDATE

“My City” THE PRINCIPLES OF THE PROCESS “Recognizing the important fundamental that the city as a whole is wiser than any one citizen or committee… if some way could be devised for the city to express its own wishes, the resulting plan would be much better than a collection of theories from a single individual, or even from a limited group.” Dean George Damon

Using Pasadena, California as a case study, the process outlined in the chapters that follow are presented for any city that seeks to create a more enduring commitment and the momentum needed to successfully plan the next century of growth and development. In 1916, Pasadena’s City Beautiful Association, under the leadership of Dean George A. Damon, created a participatory planning process known as the City Beautiful Movement which helped shape much of what is loved about this city today. Building on the efforts of 1916, this chapter gives an overview of how the “My City” exhibit can be updated to encourage the bottom up momentum needed for planning to succeed today. A simple ProjectEvent-Survey-Plan approach provides an early visioning proposal supported by a survey of public sentiment. This input into the city’s official planning process seeks to “support not supplant” and in so doing it helps strengthen this essential and too often disconnected first half of the planning process. This bottom-up process focused on the early visioning stages of planning and providing a spectrum of potential solutions and public preferences for consideration in the official process.

CONTENTS “MY CITY” PRINCIPLES 1. Bottom-Up Planning that Supports the Current Public Process............104 2. Present Ideas in a Manner that All Can Understand......106 3. A “Clearing House” Policy...............112 4. The Revision Principle: Not Approved, But Improved.........115

By gathering public input further upstream, “My City” creates a stronger link between the early visioning and later logistical stages of planning to better face the challenges of growth and development in the 21st Century.

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“MY CITY” PRINCIPLE ONE

LATER, LOGISTICAL STAGES OF PLANNING

Bottom-Up Planning that Supports the Public Process

Reviving “My City” does not change the later stages of the planning process described on page 79, but instead strengthens its connection and continuity with the early visioning stages of planning.

The process of city planning can be characterized by an open focus in the early visioning stages and then a methodical narrowing of options in the later logistical stages (as detailed on pages 7879). This process is represented by the winding white line on the opposite page. An updated “My City” process includes: A FOCUS ON THE EARLY STAGES OF PLANNING The bottom-up planning process of “My City” takes place before projects are formalized. A spectrum of potential scenarios is investigated through events, surveys and preliminary proposals.

An actual project is formally initiated and financed between the early and later stages of planning (see page 79).

SUPPORT, NOT SUPPLANT Reviving the “My City” planning process would support, not supplant, the good efforts of the Pasadena Planning Department and its Commissions. This bottom-up approach is complementary to the existing process, emphasizing the early visioning stages of the planning. By facilitating greater participation and building a common vision earlier in the process, “My City” does not change or modify the later stages of planning, but instead creates a stronger link between the public vision and the reality of what is built.

EARLY, VISION STAGES OF PLANNING Reviving “My City” strengthens the early visioning stages of planning, before a funded project proceeds through the current planning process, focusing on a spectrum of schematic solutions.

CROWDSOURCING “My City” uses an open call for public participation, allowing people to bring their knowledge, experience and ideas to bear in finding planning solutions. For their part, participants receive the satisfaction of making a difference. The Projects and Events chapters in this document detail this approach. MOMENTUM FROM THE BOTTOM UP The role of the “My City” planning process is not to create a final plan, but instead explore a range of potential directions and measure public sentiment for a range of scenarios. By presenting its work to the city for potential input into the existing process of planning, “My City” can provide both momentum and formatted input for the city’s official planning process.

This description of top-down and bottom planning continues from the introductory description on page 22-23 and is a thread of logic that weaves through pages 79, 91, 115, 156 & 159.

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MAIN ST.

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THE “MY-CITY” APPROACH TO BOTTOM-UP PLANNING

4. Proposal City Council

EXISTING PROCESS

Design Commission Planning Commission

Historic Preservation Commission Arts and Culture Commission

Environmental Advisory Commission

2. Event

The city’s existing planning process, remains as it is; or it may adopt any“My City” Project for a Specific Plan or any approach, were it to choose to do so.

3. Survey

“MY CITY” PROCESS

1. Project • Any person, group, enterprise or public agency may present a preliminary vision proposal as a pilot project. • If the project receives enough surveyed support, a series of draft Documents and a Supporting Video based on feedback is created by a Project Team (p.115) with a full range of potential scenarios, including a “do nothing” option. • The last draft of the vision proposal is then presented to the official municipal process, which may choose to continue the momentum by developing the project further, building on public input generated by the “My City” process. See the “Projects” and “Events” chapters for details.

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“MY CITY” Principle Two: Transparency

Present Ideas in a Manner That All Can Understand Before 1910, the profession of planning did not exist separately from the professions of architecture, landscape architecture and engineering. In the Progressive era spirit of direct democracy, the 1916 exhibit was characterized by one reporter as having “ideas presented in a manner all can understand.” Today, planning language presents projects uses indecipherable coded acronyms and specialized language that the public can not understand. The following approaches would help make the presentation of ideas easier and more effective. SIMPLE LANGUAGE: A SHIFT AWAY FROM CODED ACRONYMS TSM, TDM, BRT, LRT: Planning is riddled with acronyms, abbreviations and coded language that is meaningless to the general public and a barrier to understanding and involvement. The 710 Freeway Environmental Impact Report includes an appendix listing over 380 acronyms: At 2260 pages, there is no reason big phrases can’t be spelled out.

VIDEO SUMMATIONS OF PLANNING DOCUMENTS As the public is reading less than it did a generation ago, planning documents must adjust accordingly. Two types of video introductions help people better understand projects and documents: 1) The Video Overview and 2) The Page-by-Page Video (p.113). THE TIMELINE FORWARD VIEW: WHAT THE CITY WILL LOOK LIKE Citizens want to see what their city will look like as projects are proposed. Allowing citizens to visualize changes to their neighborhood and making it easy to see the city a year in the future would help realize the goal of better connecting the early visioning and later logistical stages of planning. See the Unified Map Project on the opposite page. THE POTENTIAL OF A FORM-BASED VISION Where Use-Based Code regulates primarily by use (residential, commercial, etc) and includes guidelines of building form, Form-Based Code regulates primarily by basic building forms and secondarily by use. The “My City” approach has the potential to begin the form-based code process in its approach to Projects (p.111) and Events (p.119).

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THE UNIFIED MAP PROJECT Among the most surprising aspects of planning today is that the view of the future in city planning is as vague and lifeless as modern media and virtual reality is alive and vivid. While it’s possible to see just about any street in any city today with Google Earth’s Street View feature, planning has yet to produce regularly updated views of the city as it will appear in 6-months, or a year from now, even though the information exists. Writing about “My City” in 1916, Dean Damon noted that “It was thus found desirable to be in a position to answer any question regarding the physical part of the city and a set of maps was

prepared showing the topography, the drainage, the street systems, the parks, the boulevards, the transportation systems, the water systems, the fire zones, the industrial districts, etc; and as far as possible, approved proposed extensions of all these systems were shown on the same maps.”

The Unified Map

As in 1916, the Unified Map combines all plans into a single map. The need and potential of the Unified Map Project is also covered on page 92, 137 and 145.

A revived “My City” Unified Map Project creates a cross-jurisdictional, multi-agency layering of all available maps into a Unified Map that includes proposals and previous plans, as in 1916. Projections into the near and distant future would allow citizens to see potential directions for their city, serving as a visual link to what’s being proposed in their neighborhood and across the city.

SHIFT PRIMARY FORM OF DOCUMENTS FROM PRINTED TO DIGITAL FORMAT Today, planning documents are designed to primarily exist in printed form and secondarily as a digital document, generally a pdf. The 710 Freeway Environmental Impact Report (p.85) and Pasadena’s 2015 General Plan (p.83), both lack extensive hyperlinking, bookmarks and other digital features. Using digital Project Documents would save on expensive printed documents that are not easily updatable and so complex they’re not very readable. The Projects Chapter also details potential features of Project Documents.

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“MY CITY” PARTICIPATORY PLANNING: CITIZEN ROLES

Roles With a goal of involving more people in the creation of their future and planning of their city, a revived “My City” process would encourage involvement from a broad range of people. To that end, it is worth considering the ways in which people can engage with the process. THE CITIZEN

THE STUDENT

Civic inheritance is not only found in the contributions of past generations, but also in the rights and responsibility people have for shaping the future. “My City” creates a forum for meaningful civic engagement.

Students are encouraged to submit and respond to the “Request for Solutions” contained within each project and display their ideas in the science fair atmosphere of a “My City” event. THE POLITICIAN

THE NEIGHBORHOOD ADVOCATE

Neighborhood Watch keeps eyes on the street and helps keep the city safe. Neighborhood advocates, in turn, are often the most informed of citizens. They help maintain continuity and are key to “My City.”

The “My City” process makes room for any public servant, member of council or aspiring politician to take any active role they deem fit in leading the development of a common vision.

THE ARCHITECT & PLANNER

THE DEVELOPER

Within the “My City” process, the citizen architect is invited to delineate their vision in the realm of architecture and planning, including proposals related to the project “Request for Solutions.” See page 122.

Developers have a key role to play in both the evolution of the urban landscape and the “My City” process and are encouraged to take an active role in presenting and molding a common vision for the city.

THE ENVIRONMENTALIST

THE CRITIC

Citizens who are active environmentalists can take a more engaged role in advocating for their agenda in the early stages of the planning through the “My City” process, which is a ready forum.

For some, being an active member of the community involves the ability to take a critical stance when others are not. The citizen critic has a key role to play in the “My City” process.

THE SOCIAL ACTIVIST

THE PUBLIC INTEREST GROUP

Citizens who are active in advocating for any social cause are encouraged to bring their agenda and its priorities to the table within the “My City” process.

Local groups have a key role to play in the process and would be encouraged to come to the table and advocate at “My City” Events as also discussed on page 59.

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LESSONS

“Recognizing the important fundamental that the city as a whole is wiser than any one citizen or committee.” Dean George Damon—The American City, 1916

THE ARTIST

From proposals and mock-ups of public art projects to helping enliven the atmosphere at events, artists are key to establishing a more artistic approach to planning.

THE CITIZEN WRITER/EDITOR

As spelled out on page 115, the Revision Principle to Project documents calls for: 1) Repeated rewrites for the sake of clarity. 2) Revisions based on changes to the previous draft. ARCHITECTURAL ILLUSTRATORS

THE MUSICIAN

Pasadena’s experience with MUSE/IQUE demonstrates how musicians can bring a new generation of energy to public events. A “My City” Event would be greatly enhanced with live music.

Professional and amateur illustrators can be of great benefit in replacing cold renderings with a human touch. A revising of the case-study Passages Project renderings with better representations is an example.

THE PHOTOSHOPPER

THE CITY EMPLOYEE AS CITIZEN

Photoshop is a tool that has changed the face of graphic expression. A volunteer brigade of Photoshop users led by a coordinator can aid average citizens and “My City” in expressing their vision.

The hierarchical nature of city government means that city employees cannot and should not take an independent position on important issues. “My City” Events could provide a relaxing of this rule.

THE VIDEOGRAPHER

With so many talented people making movies for Hollywood, a volunteer brigade helping articulate the community’s vision of the future is a key component in the success of the “My City” process.

THE “MY CITY” BOARD

THE CITIZEN HORTICULTURISTS

THE “MY CITY” STAFF

With a goal of amalgamating public opinion, the Board oversees operations, agendas, and synthesizes public input into revisions of project documents.

“The art, science, technology, and business of plant cultivation” was a key piece of the 1916 exhibit. Today, amid epic drought, a new concept of greenspace is needed to help create a modern “Horticultural Court.”

Focusing on collecting ideas and visions for the early stages of planning, the “My City” Staff coordinates events, volunteers and the creation of project documents and videos. See also, page 143-145.

“The atmosphere here is that of planning a future home to which everyone who is to live in it has an opportunity for contributing something… This expression of public opinion is the crux of the whole exhibit.” Dean George Damon—The American City, 1916

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THE PASSAGES PROJECT

TRANSIT PROJECTS Among the potential projects that could be addressed by a “My City” process focusing on the vision stages of the planning process, specific transit projects such as Pasadena’s Bicycle Plan would greatly benefit from a “My City” INFRASTRUCTURE process.

& WATER

Whether the historic and scientific data suggesting the potential for California’s drought to last decades is true or not, a project and science fair type of event focusing on water and landscape architecture could be of great benefit in helping focus public sentiment and developing common solutions using the “My City” process.

The Passages Project expands on the 1916 proposal for a pedestrian promenade where the Gold Line is now buried and exists as a companion document available online. This proposal is used as an example case study and potential pilot-project in this document to illustrate how the “My City” process can be used today.

THE CIVIC CENTER With the potential of two prime building sites being available for development, Pasadena’s Civic Center is a prime candidate for a new Specific Plan by the Planning Department.

THE

The “My City” CIVIC process could help the early CENTER stages of amalgamating and synthesizing public opinion and ideas to serve as input to the Planning Department’s creation of a new Civic Center Specific Plan.

PROJECT

NEW DOWN TOWN PARKS Pasadena has two downtown COMPLETE parks STREETS on either side of Old This approach to transportation Pasadena: design and policy prioritizes safe, Central Park convenient and comfortable street and Memorial access for all modes and ages, Park. East of Old encouraging safe and convenient Pasadena, there is travel for those walking, a dearth of parks. bicycling, driving, Recent public discourse or using public and advocacy by the transportation. COMPLETE Downtown Pasadena As Complete Neighborhood STREETS Streets has now Association calls for been adopted new mini-parks. A“My as state and City” process would municipal law, the help develop public “My City” approach sentiment. would go far in allowing users of all modes to express their wishes.

YOUR PROJECT HERE This page provides a range of potential project topics to help illustrate the potential of Dean Damon’s “My City” process. Your idea, project, plan, vision or issue can be turned into a “Version 0: Initial Project Proposal” as spelled out on page THE 116 of this chapter.

ARROYO SECO

The preservation of the Arroyo Seco was one of the key projects in the 1916 “My City” Exhibit. A century later, calls for restoring the Arroyo can be aided by a “My City” process that builds public THE sentiment towards its restoration. ARROYO SECO

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PROJECTS

The “My City” Approach to Initiating

Projects PASADENA PASSAGES PART II: A PILOT PROJECT OF “MY CITY” 2016

THE PASSAGES PROJECT EXPANDING ON A 1916 PROPOSAL FOR A PEDESTRIAN PROMENADE

M A R C H 3 0, 2 0 1 4

ABRIDGED DRAFT

PA S A D E N A PA S S A G E S .O R G

The Passages Project Document serves as an example case study and potential pilot project. The latest draft can be found at pasadenapassages.org

Writing in 1916, Dean Damon describes the way in which “My City” created “‘Orders for a City.’ The concluding feature of the exhibit is the display of ‘projects.’ A number of bristol board screens of standard size are arranged along the walls and on frames extending out onto the room, upon which are displayed photographs and diagrams, calling attention to the many suggestions which have been sent to the City Planning Committee. A ballot was also prepared, in the form or an order blank, and the visitors given an opportunity to express their preferences for the various projects. This expression of public opinion is the crux of the whole exhibit. Everything else is accessory.” As in 1916, creating a stronger connection between the early visioning and later logistical stages of planning would concentrate primarily on Projects. Potential topics explored to the left suggest a range of existing landscapes in Pasadena that can be effectively explored through a more inclusive and engaging visioning process before the planning department starts creating a Specific Plan. Through the pages that follow, the process for drafting both a Project Document and companion Overview Video will use the Passages Project as an example case study of how the “My City” process can be updated for the 21st century.

Passages Project Overview Movie serves as an introduction to the project. A draft can be found at pasadenapassages.org

Dean Damon’s “Clearing House Policy” of combining history, a frank assessment of the present, and then collecting new ideas along with a public survey, provides an effective way to explore a broad range of potential solutions.

PROJECT

CONTENTS A “Clearing House” Policy.................112 Project Document Structure............113 The Project Document and Video Approach..113 Project Document Process..............114 The Revision Principle.............115

The goal of the project document and companion overview video is to provide bottom-up momentum for those projects the city may choose to adopt or modify, helping to better connect the public’s vision with the results that follow.

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PROJECTS

Principle Three: The “My City” Project Document

A “Clearing House” Policy Crowdsourcing a Spectrum of Scenarios & Alternatives In 1916, Dean Damon called participation the crux of democracy and planning its physical embodiment. In updating his “Clearing House” Policy, exploring a full spectrum of ideas, scenarios and schematic solutions helps citizens to become stronger advocates of their future. The following approaches are key to this process. THE PROJECT DOCUMENT: FIRST AND SUBSEQUENT AUTHORS A project document can be initiated by any individual, group or enterprise. After the initial drafts, projects with community support pass to a Project Team, which produces subsequent drafts that include a full range of scenarios. See page 115. A BROAD VOICE The Project Document expresses as broad a public sentiment as possible, including variations of the initial proposal and opposing views. To that end, the approach of many authors attempts to express not only the views of the growing list of authors, but also the people with different opinions about project. THE PROJECT RFS: “REQUEST FOR SOLUTIONS” All planning proposals begin with limited specificity. That is the nature of planning. To better address this unavoidable quality, a section called “Request of Solutions” acts as a sincere agent in building on previous drafts. (See also pages 122, 133). GROWING SPECIFICITY As in 1916, proposals are “presented so that they may be, not approved, but improved,” as details are clarified. Feedback causes each section to grow in length. In the end, the final version of the Proposal is passed on to the official municipal process, enumerating options and the range public sentiment that has been gathered. REQUEST FOR REVISIONS: THE RFR A Request for Revisions, in turn, occurs during the circulation of documents generated by the “My City” process, requesting that readers submit revisions to the wording of any “My City” document including this one.

???

QUESTIONS THAT REMAIN Every plan or proposal has its limits of specificity. By laying out the questions that remain in their own section, the public can help add to any document winding its way through the “My City” process before it is submitted to the municipal process.

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Principle Four: Ideas Presented so they May be, Not Approved but Improved

The Typical Project Document & Video Until recent decades, Pasadena had a Comprehensive General Plan bound in a single document. Today, the general plan spans more than eight documents. Planning has become so laden with jargon and coded acronyms that it is unrealistic to expect anyone to read or comprehend it.

Even with a revived “My City” approach and planning documents that are easy to understand, it is still unrealistic to expect many to read a graphic document without there also being an introductory video that introduces the topics covered within. Coupling project documents and videos is the key.

PROJECT DOCUMENT VIDEOS In a revived “My City” approach, two types of videos compliment the project document. The first is the Project Overview Video, which uses the graphic document as a backdrop to cover the main themes. The second is the Page-by-Page Video, which gives a quick description of what’s on each and every page. An example of project document videos can be found at pasadenapassages.org.

PASADENA PASSAGES PART II: A PILOT PROJECT OF “MY CITY” 2016

THE PASSAGES PROJECT EXPANDING ON A 1916 PROPOSAL FOR A PEDESTRIAN PROMENADE

M A R C H 3 0, 2 0 1 4

ABRIDGED DRAFT

PA S A D E N A PA S S A G E S .O R G

STRUCTURE OF PROJECT DOCUMENT With the Passages Project serving as a case study of how a Project Document can be structured, it’s color-coded organization utilizes simple standards for graphic documents, including the following broad guidelines.

HISTORY AND BACKGROUND As laid out in the 1916 exhibit, history and background are essential to understanding the unfolding logic of planning over time. Planning today is often devoid of meaningful history. By presenting previous plans and proposals, “My City” has the potential to provide greater continuity. PRESENT CONDITIONS As in the Progressive era, a frank assessment of current conditions might also include approaches similar to Dean Damon’s “We Object Corner,” pointing out what needs improvement. OPTIONS FOR THE FUTURE The heart of the Project Document is the presentation of scenarios that grow in specificity with each revision of the document. QUESTIONS THAT REMAIN, COUNTER-NARRATIVES AND CRITIQUES The“My City” document lists topics yet to be studied, Requests for Solutions (opposite page) and criticism received.

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PROJECTS

Principle Five: The Revision Principle

Creating a Project Proposal

THE EXISTING

MUNICIPAL

Focusing on the visioning stage of planning, the Project Proposal describes a design challenge that can benefit from an official Specific Plan developed by the city. The role of the Project Proposal is to give input and a foundation to the Specific Plan, detailing the range of potential options. The Project Proposal goes through several drafts circulated for public feedback before being passed to the City, which may choose to use its momentum in creating a Specific Plan.

PROCESS OF PLANNING

The “My City” process helps in the formatting and graphic needs of the Project Proposal and Project Video proposed by any individual, agency, group, or developer. Though the planning department continues all its usual and current approaches, it can also choose to adopt a “My City” approach. After a large “My City” Event measures public sentiment, revisions can be made to a proposal to reflect of the full spectrum of public input. The Project Proposal is then presented to the city by the Project Team.

Currently, all cities allow the submittal of written suggestions from the public. The problem is that there is rarely a formal process that insures public input gets sufficient consideration, continuity and momentum to affect the formal planning process.

THE PROPOSED VERSION 0

“MY CITY”

INITIAL PROJECT PROPOSAL Overview circulated for feedback and to find support. For the Passages Project, this corresponds to the original 11-page, November 2010 proposal.

PROJECT TEAM

VERSION 1 THE STARTER KIT VERSION This is a “container version” suggesting potential directions. Sections divided by themes include history, a range of schematic solutions, Questions that Remain, and potentially a Request for Solution. The Passages Project found at mycity.is is an example of version 1. VERSIONS 2-5 PANEL REVISION: ADDITIONS, DETAIL After circulating Version 1 at a mid-sized event, the original author passes the “container version” to a panel for revision to include further public input.

The first drafts of the Project Proposal can be generated by any individual, group, business, agency or the Planning Department itself, were it to wish to do so. If a proposal garners enough interest it is passed to a Project Team of interested volunteers, which could include the original author. The project then continues development, led by the Project Team which receives technical and graphic support services from the local “My City” organization. See also, pages 144-145.

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PROJECTS

THE PROJECT PROPOSAL IS A POTENTIAL SPECIFIC PLAN

Specific Plan

EXISTING PROCESS The city’s existing planning process remains as it is. It may adopt any “My City” Proposal for a Specific Plan if it so chooses.

City Council Design Commission Planning Commission

Historic Preservation Commission Arts and Culture Commission

Environmental Advisory Commission

The Hand-Off to the City VERSION 5 VERSION 4 VERSION 3 VERSION 2

REVISION PRINCIPLE The revision of a draft plan for input to the Planning Department is discussed on page 105 of the Overview chapter as well as page 126 of the Events chapter, where the process of amalgamation is discussed. Formatted rough revisions that are released as they are produced allows input into the evolution of planning in the early visioning stage’s process of collecting ideas and public sentiment. THE PRINCIPLE OF

VERSION 1

INCREASING DETAIL

VERSION 0

The “My City” Proposal The “My City” process does not change the existing planning process, but instead formalizes the neglected early visioning stage to build momentum, collect input on a spectrum of potential directions to benefit the municipal process by presenting a proposal developed by the “My City” Project Team.

Successive drafts of the Project Document delve into the addressed topic in greater detail.

This description of top-down and bottomup planning continues from the introductory description on page 22-23 and is a thread of logic that weaves through pages 79, 91, 105, 156 & 159.

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PROJECTS

Memorial Park Gold Line Station The existing passage above the buried Gold Lien continues above and to the right. Memorial (Library) Park HOLLY ST.

UNION ST.

Existing Arcade La

THE PASSAGES PROJECT

Play house

COLORADO ST.

From “Pasadena Plan” of 1915, orange shows the path of “a promenade connecting the parks” where Gold Line is buried. (Color added for emphasis). See mycity.is/ pasadenaplan.pdf Below, is the buried Gold Line today. AVE

Memorial Park

RAY

HOLLY ST.

UNION ST.

This project expands on the 1915 vision of “a promenade connecting ES AVE. LOS ROBL the parks” in Pasadena, between Memorial and Central Parks, where the Gold Line now runs underground, reintegrating the struggling Paseo Colorado mall back into the larger urban fabric.

O SE PA

The Promenade

T. ES AVE.

LOS ROBL

D. BLV

Central Park

NS EE

O AD OR COL

The Passages Project is presented as a case study of how a “My City” proposal could be presented in a revived process.

GREEN ST.

COLORADO BLVD.

HOLLY

. N ST

UNIO

This proposal links passages that exist now and are in use today. It creates not an arterial FICE AXIS ST OF R O E P T CEN route or a direction of CIVIC City Hall travel, but instead serves to connect districts, parking for LINKING EXISTING PASSAGES 10,000 cars and two Most of these pedestrian pasMetro Gold Line sages exist now and are currently in use, as shown in the Stations. This “0. Do Nothing” scenario. proposal supports OVERVIEW MOVIE walkability Pasadena Passages on vimeo.com THE PASSAGES and repairs the DOCUMENT fragmented pasadenapassages.org urban fabric.

’S OLD MACY TEL HYATT HO

ST.

STATS

UNIO . N ST

Empty Passages Gold Line Station

AY EW ON

Where the Metro Gold Line runs underground for three blocks, the resulting space left behind has been empty for over a decade.

G IAL BLD POTENT LOT ON

MEMORIAL PARK

Parking

VE OND A

RAYM

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From the 1915“Pasadena Plan.” pasadenapassages.org/padenaplan.pdf

LINK EXISTING PASSAGES The goal of “My City” is not to create a final design, but instead to initiate a discussion of what is possible and desired. Through a spectrum of scenarios, “My City” gauges public sentiment and focuses momentum. The first three scenarios include options without a link from mall to Old Pasadena, as shown in the larger map.

0. DO NOTHING

1. IMPROVE EXISTING

Gold Line Station

A NEW OWNER FOR THE PASEO COLORADO

CIVIC AUDITORIUM

& CONVENTION CENTER

ING EXIST GE BRID

Gold Line Station

3. ADDITIONAL LINKS

The larger map shows Scenario 3. The red in the scenarios above indicate new links. These scenarios are more fully detailed in the Pasadena Passages document, found at pasadenapassages.org

SE PA

Paseo Parking Structure

2. CROSSWALKS

Gelsons is now “Rose Theater” VE NGO A

B of A

MARE

K BL

BLAC

Paseo Parking Structure

The new east end of the mall opens the main east-west axis of the mall at Los Robles, further reintegrating the mall back into the fabric of the city as has been suggested in the Passages proposal since 2010. Opening the west end with a new park has several options in addition to what is shown on Gold Line this page. See pasadenapassages.org for detailed Station scenarios.

G ON IAL BLD

es tor Spac

POTENT

Incuba

Y YO PK ARRO

After tearing down the east end of the mall (where Macy’s once stood) in December 2015, the Paseo Colorado was sold in January 2016 to Cypress Equities, a Dallasbased property development and management firm.

LOT

FISHBECKS

T G ONGLO IAL BILLDDIN

NPEOTWENTBU

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NEW BU

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The Crossroads

STATS CASTLE GREEN (HOTEL GREEN)

GOLD LINE PROMENADE

CENTRAL PARK

Existing Mercantile Originally envisioned in 1915 as “a promenade connecting Place the parks,” the burying of the Gold Line right-of-way in Old

. LVD

Pasadena has left a paved space with bicycle parking, benches, a few potted plants, but little else. Like the High Line in NYC, activating its use by creating public spaces, encouraging adjoining businesses would go far in improving this vital link to and from both parking and two adjacent Gold Line stations. Considered with and without crosswalks and the Stats segment, see Gold Line section of the Passages Document for details.

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HORTICULTURE

MUSIC IDEAS

SIDE SHOWS

PROJECT ART FORUM

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RESOURCES CONTENTS

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INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

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“My City ” Project Based

Events Building a Common Vision “A ‘home-made’ exhibit, such as herein described, with its backward look into the past and its forecast of a future linked together with a satisfactory representation of the present, goes a long way toward clarifying a vision of the city’s possibilities.” Dean George Damon The American City: 1916.

As described in the two previous chapters, the goal of the “My City” process is to create a bottom-up approach that includes a “science fair” for planning within a larger social and cultural event that includes music, food and a toast to civic ideals. A Main Project Theme “My City” events focus on the approach to projects discussed in the previous chapter. These events explore public collaboration, articulating the spectrum of viewpoints. Events build towards a large event combining the community quality of an early Rose Parade with a science fair of urban design. With teams and individuals competing to solve the project’s Request for Solutions, “My City” has the potential to plan communities in new and exciting ways. TYPES OF EVENTS

CONTENTS Events Overview..........120 Schematic of a Large “My City” Event................121 The Four Types of Public Participation.....122 Competition.....123

1. Small Gatherings over a meal may include preliminary proposals and presentations to local groups. They always include a small exhibit of a draft document and/or movie that blends history and planning, the “breaking of bread,” music, and a toast to the project at hand. 2. Mid-sized Events refine the original vision to better reflect and build a common community vision. Building on the ingredients described above, a revision of the document and video is also presented. Includes 25 to 100 people.

Presentations...123 The Event Survey..............124 The Revision Principle...........125

3. Large Events occur after one or more mid-sized events refine the original proposal to better reflect the common vision of the community. The rest of this chapter describes large events that include over 100 people beginning with an overview on the following page.

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The “My City” Project-Based

Events Overview

PROJECT

My City Events, especially large events, are a marketplace of ideas. This science fair for planning is an incubator space for developing a vision of the city’s future and a public design studio for an interactive exhibit of ideas. In many ways, these events have aspects of a county fair, town hall meeting, hacker event, political convention and community picnic.

EVENT INPUT 1

PROJECT Events are based on a Project, presented first with draft plan documents in small gatherings and mid-sized events before proceeding to a large event.

In 1916, the “My City” process and “home-made city planning exhibit” attracted 8000 people, serving as an essential bridge to building public support for approval of Pasadena’s Civic Center. Today, such events have the potential to draw more people into the process of planning their future. The Project Video Orientation: As every project has a short online video introducing the issues involved, the public comes to these events already informed. Other than a potential online presence, creating an exhibit today could use the original to serve as its template. As in 1916, the goal of the “My City” event is to combine:

EVENT INPUT 2

A “Backward Look into the Past” is how the 1916 exhibit began, covering 42 years of development. Today, Pasadena’s development spans 140 years of growth.

CULTURE Planning is a cultural question that can be better achieved with cultural solutions. “My City” Events are designed to help better infuse the visioning stages of planning with community values.

“A Satisfactory Representation of the Present” An unvarnished view of Pasadena today. A “Forecast of a Future” In 1916, scenarios for a civic center and a competition to design treatments for intersections and neighborhoods were a part of the original exhibit. A similar approach today could also include public and private submissions and competitions.

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SCHEMATIC OVERVIEW OF A TYPICAL “MY CITY” LARGE EVENT The Realm of

The Project

Financial Parameters

Horticulture and Water

The realm of the project has the greatest similarity to a science fair as the three A solid foundation The 1916 exhibit’s types of participants display their ideas. This is where: 1) Attendees can vote on which in the economic “First Horticultural solutions most resonate with the direction they wish to pursue. 2) Walk-in participants realities of Hall” can be engage in “Sketch-Solutions.” 3) Responses to the project’s “Request for Solutions,” funding is as adapted to prepared projects by members of the public, students, design firms and professionals also appear. important drought today as in conditions 1916. today.

What

Other Cities

the

We Object

ARE DOING

CORNER

Each event will also include a small exhibit on best practices and case studies of what other cities are doing as it relates to the main project theme.

“A unique feature of this room,” wrote Dean Damon in 1916, “is a ‘slam corner,’ containing blights to the beauty of our city. The caption: ‘We Protest —These Things are Not Beautiful.’”

Vision

Resource Library

A Place for Food

The discussion of ideas over a toast and the breaking of bread helps create a social bond.

A library corner with books on planning relevant to the main project and comfortable seating is another way to experience the event.

Central Stage

The Realm of

An Area for

Public Presentations

Art & History

Sideshows

Design Review Panels

Art proposals displayed in live

Art and History Interludes

mock-up adds culture and life to both public spaces and “My City” events.

Music, Etc.

Live Music sets the mood of the event. Films on relevant planning topics round out the offerings of larger and longer events.

Living History reenacts

historic moments such as a Dean Damon presentation.

Community Groups

Any community group involved in the public planning dialogue is invited to host a table at the event. Examples include Pasadena Heritage, the Downtown Pasadena Neighborhood Association and Complete Streets Coalition.

Small side proposals not related to the main project can also be shown. Generated by the public or interested parties, sideshows have the potential to become the mainline theme of a future event.

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PARTICIPATION If participation is the crux of democracy and planning its physical form, events serve as a bridge between. A revived “My City” would have strong online presence. The driving energy, however, would be

found in small events that lead to larger events that bring people together, helping build community involvement and enduring project commitment. These are the ways people can participate.

TO ATTEND THE EVENT AND GIVE PROJECT FEEDBACK

The general public attends events and enjoys the larger offerings while learning about the featured project. They hear potential directions and give feedback to the “project sketch solutions” or “prepared projects” discussed below through the types of surveys described on page 124. WALK-IN: “PROJECT SKETCH SOLUTIONS”

Members of the public and design professionals are invited to delineate ideas, visions and proposals on the same day of the event without any preparation on their part. The Event Team, on the other hand, prepares design aids such as 3D outlines of spaces that can be drawn over, for example. Approaches, such as full-size modeling of spaces, are explored. Side participation on tangential ideas is also encouraged PREPARED PROJECTS SOLVING THE:

RFS

“REQUEST FOR SOLUTIONS”

In the development of projects, larger design questions arise that have a wide array of potential solutions and directions. The Project Team develops a “Request for Solutions” document, base-files, webpage and video inviting solutions. Outreach to schools and design firms invite both the experienced and the uninitiated to enter. Anyone who wants to create a casual or formal investigation ahead of the event is invited to set up a table at the event. Participants include interested members of the public, students, developers and design professionals. (See also pages 112, 133). VOLUNTEERING FOR SUPPORT TEAMS

Though a fully developed “My City” organization necessitates paid employees, work is also supported by volunteer teams (see page 145), including a Event Place Making Team that transforms the venue into a dynamic, exciting and festive space for “My City” events.

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WWI Generation: Damon Comfort stations

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

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LESSONS

EVENTS THE WINNING ENTRY Andrew Leicester’s entry won a national competition to design a new bridge for the Gold Line (see bottom).

COMPETITION The marketplace of ideas are often the essence of economy. The plans for Pasadena’s City Hall, Library and Civic Auditorium were selected from a range of plans submitted in an architectural competition, yielding much better results than a single “professional.” The Gold Line bridge above is another example. When both novices and the experienced participate, careers are also launched. Paul Williams’ winning First Place in the Four Corners competition is just such a story.

Paul Revere Williams

MASTER OF CEREMONIES The quality of an event that is focused on entertaining ideas relies on an outstanding Master of Ceremonies. As described on page 114, “My City” Events are a kind of planning-palooza with a main stage and side shows. The pre-Event search to find the most engaging personality possible to interview, unify and guide is a key to a successful “My City” event.

The largely forgotten beginning of the first prominent AfricanAmerican architect was launched by his First Place entry in Pasadena’s 1914 “Four-Corners Competition.” Bringing his design to life in 3D would be a worthy competition.

PRESENTATIONS PANEL RESPONSE AND A BLUE-RIBBON AWARDS BANQUET AT THE EVENT The large version of “My City” events is about entertaining ideas. The presentations segment at the end is the culmination of the public’s feedback (p.122 & p.124) and a panel perspectives. This native basket weave design was the winning entry in the competition to design the Gold Line Bridge over the Foothill Freeway (210).

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Above is the 1916 “My City” Survey

SURVEYS As in Pasadena’s 1916 “My City” process, moving the community’s vision towards a common goal is greatly enhanced by using surveys to measure public sentiment. These surveys are an informal straw poll that allows people to comment on proposals, helping to build momentum in a way that is difficult to match. This is how Pasadena started building consensus for creating its Civic Center. As it gives the city a better idea of where the public wants to go, an updated “My City” process could adopt a similar approach and explore other methods

of creating a straw poll. Surveys also address the issue of “predigesting” discussed earlier. The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has held planning meetings with tables demonstrating different choices. Attendees were given a dozen “vase beads” which they used to indicate their preferences by depositing beads in each project’s jar according to their preferences. This type of approach could be used to create a survey for event projects and could be used to decide which “side-show” proposals advance to the next event.

Scenarios & Schematics Schematic maps provide a simple way to understand complex networks. The London Underground Map is a prime example. They also offer a means to quickly represent and organize a spectrum of scenarios . The scenarios offered in the accompanying Passages Project document serve as an illustrative example.

0. DO NOTHING

1. IMPROVE EXISTING

Gold Line Station

2. CROSSWALKS

Gold Line Station

3. ADDITIONAL LINKS

Gold Line Station

A SPECTRUM OF SCENARIOS AND SCHEMATICS The goal of “My City” is not to create a final design, but to instead initiate the dialogue surrounding public choice through a spectrum of scenarios that gauge public sentiment. Pasadena’s Bicycle Plan lacks a schematic map. The Passages Project provides an examples of both and can be found at pasadenapassages.org.

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PRINCIPLE FIVE— THE REVISION PRINCIPLE

Ideas “Presented So That They May Be Not Approved, but Improved” The purpose of the “My City” process is to reconnect the early visioning stages of planning to the final outcome. To that end, Dean Damon put forth the results of the 1916 exhibit’s survey as ideas that were presented so that they may be not approved, but improved. An updated “My City” process would follow the same principle, presenting

the Department of Planning with a Project Document and Project Video that helps initiate the conversation on a project. The Planning Department can either decide they are not interested despite public sentiment (a move then subject to public scrutiny), or adopt the proposal and refine it further as a formal project.

THE REVISION PRINCIPLE: PARTS AND PIECES The following approaches describe how the “My City” Board works with the Project Panel in a fiduciary capacity to revise the Project Document through the drafts described in the Projects chapter (p.114). MULTIPLE NARRATIVES The public is invited to submit rewrites, improve graphics, develop alternative approaches and counternarratives that question the underlying assumptions. These narratives are either adopted outright or included as an alternative point-of-view in the Project Proposal.

BUILDING CONSENSUS The goal of the revision principle is to build consensus towards a common vision without trying to achieve perfect consensus or a lack of dissent, which is as unlikely as it is undesirable. Nonetheless, building towards this imperfect goal is a proven path to accomplishing a worthwhile vision.

RECURSIVE VERSIONS Multiple drafts of the Project Proposal means that the public has an ample chance to give their input and that the public vision is given a chance to incubate.

SYNTHESIZE AND AMALGAMATE The role of the “My City” process is not to create a final plan, but to instead organize all ideas and points-of-view into a coherent document and movie.

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PLANITORIUM “Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.” Andrew Carnegie

The “My City” process described in the preceding chapters does not require a Planitorium anymore than reading requires a library. What a library has done for reading in a city, a Planitorium does for planning, helping increase literacy and a bringing a more enduring commitment and greater passion for envisioning the future. This chapter describes the rationale, spaces, ingredients, actions and benefits of this incubator space for the early visioning stages of planning.

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“MY CITY” PL ANITORIUM An Incubator Space for the Future

CONTENTS The Planitorium....................128 Carnegie Library 21st Century........................130 Planitorium Ingredients........132 Initiatives.............................133 Spaces.................................134 Activity Guide.......................136 Top-Down Benefits...............138 The Lollapalooza Effect........139

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Ch. XIII

MY CITY PLANITORIUM Planning from the Bottom Up

“The atmosphere here is that of planning a future home to which everyone who is to live in it has an opportunity for contributing something.… This expression of public opinion is the crux of the whole exhibit.”

Dean George Damon— The American City, 1916

A planetarium is a building where images of stars and planets are projected onto the inner surface of a dome to educate the public about the solar system. Planetariums include models and telescopes to observe the celestial heavens. This proposal to create a planitorium turns the focus from celestial bodies to the world that surrounds us. Building on the “My City” principles inspired by the work of Dean George A. Damon in 1916 and his vision of a permanent civic planning space discussed earlier in this document. A planitorium would do for planning literacy what a library does for general literacy. As the challenges of our rapidly changing world continue to gain velocity, this proposal creates a permanent incubator space for the early visioning stages of planning; a prudent step to engender the enduring public commitment that is missing today.

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PASADENA

THE “MY CITY” PLANITORIUM IS ABOUT

RESILIENCE

The capacity to recover from difficulties, a quality greatly needed to face the challenges of the future.

PREPARING The 1916 generation laid the groundwork for Pasadena’s development through the 1930s by

building the foundation of public consensus needed to fund a new Civic Center plan. Today, this same bottom-up planning dialogue is essential to preparing for the rapid pace of change and growth faced by cities today. RELINKING VISION Currently, city planners are both advocates and facilitators of information. Keeping this

structure while supporting a spectrum of ideas broadens the dialogue. Supporting facilitators and advocates fills gaps in the public planning process while engendering the enduring commitment required of long range planning. THE “MY CITY” PLANITORIUM IS ABOUT

PRUDENCE

Prudence is a mix of caution, wisdom, common sense, foresight, thrift, and economy.

“Know Your City Better,” read the sign at the 1916 exhibit. The educational strategy used to build the needed consensus to approve the Civic Center bond initiative, included emerging best practices, creates a more informed public, elevating the dialogue and helping cities make more thoughtful and informed planning decisions. THE “MY CITY” PLANITORIUM IS ABOUT

HUMILITY

Humility is the quality of having a clear perspective of ones importance and respect for one’s place in the world. It is the quality of thinking of yourself less and more about the greater good.

CROWDSOURCING

SUPPORT THE PROCESS

A “CLEARING HOUSE” POLICY

“The city as a whole is wiser than any one citizen or committee,” wrote Dean Damon in 1916. “If some way could be devised for the city to express its own wishes, the resulting plan would be much better than a collection of theories from a single individual, or even from a limited group.”

“My City” is designed to support, not supplant the current planning process. In the same way the History Museum helps citizens better understand their present by better understanding the past, Dean Damon’s vision would help people to better understand the planning of their future.

A clearing house collects and gives out information about a specific thing. As citizens complain they don’t find out about key meetings or that information is deeply buried, this approach of 1916 would encourage participation and assist citizens and all involved in becoming stronger advocates in planning their future.

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Carnegie Library for the 21st Century

The First Carnegie

In his hometown of Dunfermline his first library was built.

In exploring the potential of a “My City” Planitorium, the invention of the public library presents a model to emulate. Just as a library democratizes knowledge and supports the research of all who use its resources, a “My City” would operate in the public interest, providing planning information to support a full spectrum of advocates and points of view. The life of Andrew Carnegie illuminates as well. Between 1883 and 1929, over 2,500 Carnegie Libraries were created with his help. He donated $60 million for 1689 libraries in US and gave away $350 million of his wealth. From the Carnegie Foundation’s funding of libraries to the funding of universities to the existence of “Sesame Street,” Carnegie’s legacy has touched the lives of most people alive today in one way or another. THE LESSONS OF ANDREW CARNEGIE

South Pasadena This Carnegie Library helped stop the 710 freeway.

Washington DC

Open to women, children and all races, it was the “intellectual breadline” during the Depression” quotes Susan Stamberg on NPR. “No one had any money, so you went there to feed your brain.”

As a child, Carnegie was a dirt poor immigrant who worked as a child laborer 12 hours a day, 6 days a week for $1.20 per week. The secret of his meteoric rise relied on these ingredients. Borrowing Though he lacked a formal education, the young Carnegie borrowed books to expand his capabilities. “My City” would lend technical resources to anyone involved in planning the future of the city. The Power of Intellectual Capital Planning does not collect or retain the wisdom of history. Insights, experience and ideas are lost and contributions discarded. “My City” amends this. Helping those who help themselves was a key philosophy of Andrew

Carnegie. “Put all your eggs in one basket and then watch that basket,” he said. Allowing the public to control their input follows his lead. Teamwork “is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results,” said Andrew Carnegie. A Planitorium helps create that teamwork. The Power of Insider Information Carnegie’s early investments were made possible using insider information of the type now illegal. Democratizing insider information empowers all involved, repeating the success formula of both Carnegie and his libraries. Philanthropy Carnegie believed in giving back. “My City” assists those who want to give back today.

Andrew Carnegie

If ever a person embodied the Natural Cycle of invention, refinement, inversion and revitalization discussed on page 22, that man would be Andrew Carnegie.

From an impoverished childhood to the richest man in the world, he was a complex man of immense contradictions, best remembered for his philanthropy in giving away 90% of his fortune.

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“Let There Be Light” was the motto of the first Carnegie Library opened in 1880 in Carnegie’s hometown of Dunfermline, Scotland

“Let there Be Light” A number of parallel institutions shine light on the value of a permanent “My City” Planitorium.

“There is not such a cradle of democracy upon the earth as the Free Public Library, this republic of letters, where neither rank, office, nor wealth receives the slightest consideration.” ‘Do your duty and a little more and the future will take care of itself.” “As I grow older, I pay less attention to what people say. I just watch what they do.” ANDREW CARNEGIE

It is a largely forgotten fact that the archive of the Pasadena History Museum began with the efforts of Dean Damon and the 1916 “My City” exhibit. Today, the museum serves as in incubator space for cultivating a better understanding of the present by bringing together different perspectives on history. If a city can produce such a well funded representation of the past, a similar space in the form of a Planitorium would serves as a living ambassador of the future. Mt. Wilson Observatory is another century-old institution founded by a member of Caltech who was also involved in planning Pasadena. Located in the mountains above Pasadena, George Ellory Hale’s observatory contained the world’s largest telescope from 1917 to 1949. As one of Pasadena’s original business incubator spaces, significant contributions to our understanding of the solar system were made there. IdeaLab is a business incubator based in Pasadena that prototypes ideas, forming and operating more

than 125 companies. According to their web site: “Bill Gross started Idealab in 1996 to create, build and operate companies that challenge the status quo. IdeaLab has prototyped and tested hundreds of ideas, and from those, has formed and operated more than 125 companies spanning a wide range of markets. IdeaLab accelerates technology innovation and provides the infrastructure to help early stage technology companies succeed.” The Rose Palace is one of several spaces set aside for creating Rose Parade floats. This uniquely Pasadena institution is a type of maker space that supports the designers, tools, materials and months needed to create a parade float which are designed for the New Years Day Rose Parade. Taken together, libraries, museums, maker spaces and business incubators provide the information and the means to explore and realize. From the democratization of resources to the mundane and practical, these temples of learning and doing give fuel and shelter to the ambitions and aspirations of ordinary people like Andrew Carnegie, nurturing visionaries who become invaluable agents of change.

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The “My City” Planitorium: Parts and pieces

“My City” Planitorium While the traditional Planning Department continues to function with the same scope and responsibilities, the “My City” process contributes to the early stages of the planning process as outlined in the Overview section. Creating a combined exhibit hall, simulation lab and meeting space would support any public dialogue that benefits from dynamic and updatable graphic displays that represent present and potential future of the city.

INTERACTIVE EXHIBIT SPACE

EVENTS: AN INTERACTIVE

EXHIBIT SPACE

The exhibit space itself uses multi-screen displays that can swap one exhibit for another with a push of a button. Available to citizens, advocates, public agencies, developers and schools of design. With public and private uses, each group can prepare its own exhibit, allowing a range of organizations to utilize the space throughout the day.

MEETING SPACE

AN INTERACTIVE

MEETING SPACE PLANNING SUPPORT

In 1916 the exhibit space was used for meetings by the City Beautiful Association, the Horticultural Club and other groups. Today, a meeting space that is connected to a “Mission Control” wall could greatly enhance the meetings of any group dealing with Pasadena’s growth and development. Commissions and local agencies would also benefit from such a facility.

SYNTHESIZING PUBLIC INPUT

“MY CITY” PLANNING SUPPORT The “My City” Board oversees the operations of the organization, sets the agenda for upcoming events. The “My City Project Team helps synthesize public input and shapes the revisions of project documents with support from staff.

The “My City” Staff gives technical support in helping synthesize public input, running the Simualization Lab, helping manage the Unified Map Project and assisting in the creation of project documents and video overviews. Staff also helps coordinate and support “My City” teams that are discussed on page 145 of the Next Steps chapter.

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The “My City” Planitorium: Parts and pieces

Initiatives OUTREACH

VIRTUAL REALITY AND SIMULATION LABS

Education is the first role of “My City’s” outreach efforts. Educational efforts focus on the general public, developers, children, college students, local groups and the city staff on a host of issues surrounding planning, growth and the environmental.

Citizens want, need and deserve to be able to genuinely understand and envision what their neighborhood will look and be like in 6 months, a year, five years and into the future along with the city’s general long-range vision. It should be easy to see a proposed building set in context at the time it is first discussed.

Request for Solutions: As detailed on pages 112 and 122, the RFS is a way of exploring potential solutions by sending out design issues that would benefit from a wide variety of potential resolutions explored by design professionals, the public and students of design. Competitions: The Paul Revere Williams Prize As with the 1914 “Four Corners Competition” soliciting ideas for developing Pasadena would help inform the public dialogue. A PLANNING LIBRARY AND ARCHIVE Today, planning resources of past, present and future are spread between the History Museum, Planning Department and the Central Library, which makes it difficult to maintain comprehensive and up-todate information. Repeated instances of missing or unavailable documents through the city’s current tracking system of the Pasadena City Clerk and Planning Department are a clear indication that a third entity, such as a Planitorium, is needed to better serve the public and secure the provenance of documents.

With the emergence of virtual reality, it is not possible deliver a compelling vision of the future that can meet the public’s expectations for receiving a compelling visual presentation that is on par with modern entertainment. Having the Visualization Lab lead crowdsourced volunteers to create a Unified Map (p.107), including projects currently in the planning pipeline, would help realize the “My City” goal of better connecting the early and later stages of planning. The Planitorium helps citizens and developers to be more effective advocates of their future by providing graphic services and generating visual studies of proposals for development. HORTICULTURAL HALL In 1916, the “Horticultural Hall” of the “My City” Planning Exhibit displayed collections of flowers and exotic plants from local nurseries, private gardens, the Park Department and high school botany classes. Today, a focus on native vegetation and drought tolerant landscaping could help educate the public.

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The “My City” Planitorium

The Exhibit Space uses an array of LCD panels that can swap out an entire exhibit with the push of a button. Creating a combined exhibit hall, visualization lab and meeting space would support any public dialogue that would benefit from dynamic and updatable graphic displays that represent Pasadena’s present and potential future. The Exhibit Space is used for mid-sized and large

EXHIBIT SPACE events and in conjunction with public meetings, and educational exhibits. Available to citizens, advocates, public agencies, developers and schools. Each group can also create its own exhibit, allowing a broad range of organizations to utilize the space.

“My City” Planitorium is an Incubator Space for the City’s Future

“My City” Planitorium is a Place to Entertain Ideas

COMMUNITY SPACE A Space for the Breaking of Bread and Toasting Ideas A cafe/restaurant concession serves the social functions associated with Events, Exhibits and Meetings.

Support Teams

While the Planitorium has a staff, much of its work can tap the energy of volunteer teams. Pasadena’s Rose Parade is a great example. From Event and Project teams to ongoing Visualization Services, volunteer teams can make key contributions. Also, see page 141.

Education and Classes A public forum and speaker series serves the educational mission of the Planitorium. Classes range from best practices in city planning to real estate, tools of virtual reality to courses in horticulture, serving the social and educational needs of the constellation of the community, organizations and enterprise.

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Spaces and Ingredients

MEETING SPACE In the same way that the design of a The “My City” Planitorium Meeting Space city affects the lives of its citizens, the Combines Disney’s Circle-Vision 360º with Google Street View design of a room affects the ideas being discussed. When those ideas are about civic design, the way that photos, maps, plans, and renderings are seen is key. A meeting space that can show a virtual city showing alternative plans for the future is a key component of the Planitorium, available for any community meeting that can benefit from this valuable and now attainable technology.

“My City” Planitorium is an Incubator Space for the City’s Future

“My City” Planitorium is An Inviting Atmosphere to Envision

SIMULATION LABS

At the Intersection of Exhibition and Research...

THE HORTICULTURAL COURT

As in Pasadena’s 1916 “First Horticultural Court,” an updated version would use local enthusiasts and professionals to create ongoing exhibits that demonstrate today’s best practices. In light of the ongoing drought, the Horticultural Court would serve a critical and important educational role.

As the transformation of city streets that began with the 1870s-1920s “Good Roads Movement” continues with the Complete Streets trends of today, an adjoining streetscape mock-up lab would help a city easily create mock-up examples being discussed.

A STREETSCAPE MOCK-UP LAB IN CHALK AND PROPS

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THE “MY CITY” PLANITORIUM

A SAMPLE ACTIVITY GUIDE

What’s Happening at the Planitorium

Here’s what could be happening at the “My City” Planitorium. This page is an example of a Planitorium activity guide. THE MAIN EXHIBIT SPACE

THE

AUDITORIUM

SPACE

GENERAL EXHIBITIONS

FILM SERIES

Multimedia exhibits to accompany any event in the auditorium or meeting space (right column), any film, talk, proposal or meeting helps acquaint the public with key ideas that need more focus than a sideshow can allow.

From William Whyte’s “The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces” to documentaries on cities to ongoing shorts made locally by citizens with cell phones, the film series is a key feature of the Planitorium.

“MY CITY” PROJECT EXHIBITS

“TED TALK” FORUM SERIES

Includes civic or regional projects (such as reviving the L.A. River). Ongoing topics such as large parks (the Arroyo Seco), water, energy and transportation are topics worthy of repeating exhibits as well.

A well-equipped auditorium helps host presentations and forums related to any aspect of design and future development. Town-hall type gatherings also use the auditorium to discuss ideas and proposals.

SIDE SHOWS

CITIZEN PROPOSALS

Introducing a proposal or “My City” Project begins with a small “science-fair” table presentation. The “Side Show” gives the public an introduction to possible projects, gauging interest by survey or straw poll.

As citizen proposals gain steam, side-shows graduate to auditorium presentations, helping citizen initiatives to gain ambassadors and allies (p.164-165), who also key to the momentum needed for projects to succeed.

WHAT OTHER CITIES ARE DOING

DEVELOPER PROPOSITIONS

From ancient Rome and Athens to New York and Chicago, cities have always taken their cues from other cities. This ongoing series helps educate cities about the innovations and solutions of other cities.

Developers can also present proposals to the public. For example, a developer might want build public support for a project or a potential variance. From the creation of project visualizations to a forum for outreach, developers can also benefit from a Planitorium.

HORTICULTURE EXHIBITS

GOVERNMENT PRESENTATIONS

Pasadena’s “City of Gardens” focus is a key piece of its past and future. The Planitorium includes an outdoor exhibit space to model the emerging best practices in native and drought tolerant planting.

Local agencies managing public resources such as water, power or transportation have a real need, yet narrowing opportunities, to communicate with the public. The Planitorium provides an excellent forum.

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MEETING

SPACE

OTHER

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THE

HAPPENINGS

MEETING SPACE

RESOURCES

With a space that combines Google Street View with Disney’s Circle-Vision 360º, the Planitorium meeting space can be used for neighborhood and local advocacy groups (p.135).

Planning, growth and development resources include a reading room of planning books. Visualization Services (p.133), and the “My City” Archive of planning documents and previous proposals are also found in a resources archive.

COMMISSION MEETINGS

WORKSHOPS

Less formal than Council Chambers but larger and than Pasadena’s Design Commission room, the Planitorium’s meeting space can host sizable meetings. Larger meetings utilize the auditorium.

As part of the Planitorium’s educational mission, a range of related workshops are offered. Example topics include: best practices in planning, gardening, development, planning tools and mapping.

SUPPORT TEAM MEETUPS Like the creation of Rose Parade floats, support teams gather to coordinate the work of the Planitorium as described on page 145. The vitality of the Planitorium makes for a great place to meet others with similar interests and help citizens to support their city.

THE CITY CAFE A cafe concession is a key centerpiece of the Planitorium, serving the breaking bread and toasting ideas for all events.

THE UNIFIED MAP PROJECT is utilized throughout and forms a graphic centerpiece to the Planitorium as well (p.107).

LIVE MUSIC Live music at key junctures helps create atmosphere and vitality at the Planitorium.

CIVIC BROADCASTING Broadcasting events, interviews and news of proposals, projects, support teams and upcoming events helps both the organization and local TV, newspapers, radio, podcasts and bloggers. Live simulcasting to the web also helps strengthen the presence of the civic eye.

ARTIST’S DEMOS

PILOT PROJECTS

The infusion of artistic energy is key to the evolution of civilization. Artst’s proposals, reflections of the city, and live demonstrations help create an atmosphere of creative energy and vitality.

The outdoor simulation lab includes space for mock-ups of streetscape proposals and construction method demonstrations. The indoor simulation lab also includes space for mock-ups such as building details.

THE WE OBJECT CORNER

FIELD-TRIP PROJECTS

In 1916, the We Object Corner of the original “My City” exhibit conveyed the aspects of growth and development that were not beautiful. Today, it would also aid in creating a balance of perspectives.

The Planitorium also supports outside field trips, often in support of other organizations. For example the Arroyo Seco Foundation’s annual “Clean Up Day” could be promoted from the Planitorium.

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The “My City” Planitorium: Forces at Work

Logistical and Top-Down Benefits “My City” and the Planetorium help strengthen the early visioning stages of planning and in so doing, they also help benefit many of the logistical characteristics of the later stages of planning.

FIXING THE “TOO EARLY, TOO LATE” PARADOX By strengthening the early visioning stages of planning, the public does not get squeezed out, which may cause them to stop projects at the last minute, destabilizing the later logistical stages and stalling momentum. See Professor Robert Oliver’s paradox (p.62).

SPEEDING THE SLOWING OF THE PROCESS By handling vision earlier, late objections that slow the process can be better avoided. The slowing of the planning process is common to many cities, often accompanied with the characteristics of a process that goes too fast. “My City” can help steady the pace. THE RETURN OF THE STOCKHOLDER DIVIDEND In the 1916 exhibit, the sign on the wall read, “You are stockholders in a $60,000,000 corporation.” Fiscally conservative Progressive Republicans understood investment yields dividends. “My City” embodies this mentality. SPENDING TOO MUCH MONEY AND NOT ENOUGH ATTENTION Today, the visioning stages of planning have become so complex, many think only consultants and professionals can unravel the indecipherable wishes of the public. “My City” helps raise planning literacy, making the process more efficient and effective. INSURANCE: LONG TERM THINKING ON LONG TERM ISSUES Cities have insurance against disaster and loss. Libraries and schools are a form of insurance against ignorance. The persistent application of community thinking helps hedge risk and save money. “My City” helps apply long-term thinking to key issues. CLOSING THE TECHNICAL GAP A revitalized “My City” brings planning into the 21st Century, infusing the excitement and vision evoked by renderings a century ago modern entertainment today. Advanced technology helps better educate the public, clarify choices and form a more complete vision. DISASTER PREP AND SPACE FOR FLASH-PLANNING With ever increasing velocity, the environmental challenges of a changing world fall on the shoulders of cities and their citizens. The “My City” Planitorium provides a place to both prepare and respond to the increasing frequency of natural disasters.

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The “My City” Planitorium: Forces at Work

The

Lollapalooza Effect

THE KEY TO OUTSTANDING RESULTS (AND AVOIDING EXTREMELY BAD RESULTS)

The word lollapalooza describes something outstanding. Originating in the 1890s, a lollapalooza is “an extraordinary or unusual thing, person, or event; an exceptional example or instance” Wiki. The word lollipop is a derivation. Today, most associate lollapalooza with a music festival. Lollapalooza is also a word Charlie Munger likes to use. Mister Munger is Warren Buffet’s partner at Berkshire Hathaway. He attended Caltech and resides in Pasadena. Known for possessing a wise intellect, Charlie Munger uses “Lollapalooza Effect” to describe combining influences that can lead to magnificent results. Google the phrase with the word Munger and 22 pages follow describing both its upside and downside. On the upside, the Motley Fool’s wiki offers “A lollapalooza effect is a combination of factors, filtered through multidisciplinary models, that lead to an outstanding result.” Crossfit enthusiasts use the phrase, “as personified by Charles Munger, the critical mass obtained via a combination of concentration, curiosity, perseverance, and self-criticism, applied through the prism of multidisciplinary mental models.” In describing the success of his partnership with Warren Buffett, Mister Munger is quoted as saying “If that success in investment isn’t the best in the history of the investment world, it’s certainly in the top five. It’s a lollapalooza.” He elaborates,“the turtles who outrun the hares are learning machines. If you stop learning in this world, the world rushes right by you.”

Dean Damon’s “My City” approach of a century ago is an example both of a positive version of the effect and a learning machine, aiding the public “in choosing the best out of the good; in deciding what shall be done first, and of proving to them that it is within their power to do anything they please.” as the Pasadena Star-News would write. In building the momentum needed to create an ambitious and magnificent civic center, Pasadena created yet another positive Lollapalooza Effect, their investment paying great dividends to the value of every parcel of land that persists to this day. In a talk titled “The Psychology of Human Misjudgment,” Charlie Munger also describes how the stacking of multiple biases can lead to bad decisions. A live auction is an example, the bias of ticking clock urgency, a sense of competition and the potential of feeling of loss leads people to sometimes buy when they would otherwise not. For Pasadena of the 1970s, the draw of nearby malls made it invest nearly $100 million into a mall that’s failing now for the second time. The negative bias of irrational exuberance was also fueled by a sense of loss of the downtown along with an insider mentality that pushed out public involvement. In addition to being a Learning Machine, a “My City” Planitorium has the potential to become something of a Lollapalooza machine as well. It is uniquely positioned to help insure positive outcomes by creating a more authentic invitation to engage and enhance public participation to once again create outstanding results.

Google the phrase lollapalooza and Munger and 22 pages of content will follow including this image.

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Library Civic Auditorium

Art Museum

“My City” Planitorium

CITY HALL Council / City Manager Planning Department)

History Museum

Schools Police-Fire Water-Power

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Potential

Next Steps For any City Interested in the “My City” Process This document is a proposal for any city that seeks to make a stronger link between the community vision for the future and the results that follow. This chapter looks at potential next steps in creating “My City” in your city. BRINGING NEW PEOPLE UP TO SPEED AND INTO THE FOLD

The “My City” process can more effectively communicate the current planning culture to a new generation, passing the torch to a new generation that will guide the city’s continued development into the future. INCUBATING PREVIOUS PLANS, CONTINUITY & ADVOCATES

Planning often takes decades. While stakeholders come and go, local advocates are often the one constant presence. Even the professional planners may not have the experience and knowledge of local advocates. A COMMITMENT TO PERPETUAL IMPROVEMENT

Incremental improvements over time require momentum. By gathering public input earlier in the process, “My City” helps sustain continuity as ambitions are measured, scope is determined and goals are set. LINKING PEOPLE TO THEIR COMMON FUTURE

Creating a link between citizens is key to long-range planning. When people envision the future of their community together, the process builds consensus. A SOCIAL LINK IS THE KEY: THE BREAKING OF BREAD

Planning is a cultural question that requires cultural solutions. The 1916 generation often met over the breaking of bread. A comfortable space with food, music and graphic displays, helps citizens make the social connections to “aim high in hope and work.”

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Stages The following stages describe how a “My City” process could compliment your city’s official planning process. Details can be found in the Overview, Projects and Events chapters. STAGE 1: A Side-Show Presentation Pilot project, small gatherings and “sideshow” presentations within a larger existing community event helps to introduce “My City” and a pilot project in your community. STAGE 2: A Moving Pop-Up Exhibit. A movable exhibit that visits schools, libraries and local public venues could then be a second stage that helps a “My City” organization to gain momentum locally. STAGE 3: “My City” in a Temporary Space Unleased storefronts could be used before shifting into a more permanent space. The interactive, participatory aspects of “My City” can also bring life to vacant storefronts and streetscapes. STAGE 4: The Permanent Planitorium What libraries and schools do for reading and educating, “My City” does for planning. Like building a library, creating a Planitorium is a long term project that pays rich dividends through the century that follows.

SIDE-SHOW

1-DAY 1. A “side-show” exhibit to a larger event.

POP-UP

WEEKS 2. A Pop-Up Space: From a weekend to a year.

TEMPORARY

MONTHS 3. In 1916 the Board of Trade shared its space.

PLANITORIUM

PERMENANT 4. A Planitorium

AT ANY STAGE: OPTIONAL INTEGRATION OF “MY CITY” OUTPUT INTO THE OFFICIAL MUNICIPAL PROCESS The objective of the “My City” process is to create greater momentum for the early visioning stages of planning and a stronger link to the later logistical stages of the city’s official process. As the city acquaints itself with what “My City” can produce, it may choose to incorporate its process and adopt a more formal relationship.

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A Local Organization The Objective of the local “My City” organization is to create greater momentum in the early visioning stages of planning and to encourage a stronger link with the city’s official process, helping the public to be more effective advocates of their common future.

Project Teams There are two types of “My City” projects: Ongoing Projects are topics that need continual attention, such as downtown streets, open space, infrastructure, resources and transportation. Special Vision Projects introduce new ideas and approaches. A rails-to-trails project is an example.

The Principle of Neutrality Like a library, “My City” does not represent one interest or position over another, but instead supports all who use its resources, seeking to support the full spectrum of top-down and bottom-up advocates.

A Pilot Project Though “My City” has the capacity to accommodate opposing sides of controversial projects, such as the 710 freeway in Pasadena, the inaugural pilot project that introduces the process, ideally one that has broad appeal.

The Clearinghouse Principle The role of the local “My City” organization is to help characterize a full spectrum of potential directions, to amalgamate and synthesize, to help both citizens and developers to build momentum for their projects, and to help create and format presentations for the city’s official planning process.

Funding Fundraising in the early stages is key to “My City” in your city. Like the first generation of libraries, funding from public and private sources would be needed to create a local organization.

Measuring Public Sentiment is also among the principles spelled out in the preceding chapters. Initiating a local organization necessitates a range of potential projects. See page 110 for examples.

Agency A fully developed “My City” organization has the potential to serve as project consultants while the local organization makes increasingly significant contributions to municipal efforts. See “My City” in Your City on page 187 for more information on creating a local organization.

A Parent Organization All bottom-up efforts can greatly benefit from the guidance of a top-down organization. Like the Carnegie Foundation’s sponsoring of libraries around the world, a parent organization could collect and distribute funding to local organizations.

and maker-space infrastructure, help provide educational resources, exhibits on what other cities are doing and help administer a Creative Commons license and the standards of excellence found in the Appendix.

A parent “My City” organization could also assist local organizations in donations of exhibit

A parent organization would also require its own board, an executive director and staff.

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You Are Here

A Local “My City” Board There are many ways a local “My City” organization could operate, but having a board to guide an Executive Director in steering the organization would be key, especially for a non-profit organization. The board sets agendas for events, prioritizes projects, and at times helps synthesize public input, shaping revisions of the project document and video to help better represent the full spectrum of public input. The following are potential members of a board of directors. BOARD CHAIR Outreach, liaison, funding, clarity of vision and direction. A driven personality who has the time and passion. VICE CHAIR Same as above with a focus on coordinating. EXHIBIT LEADThis is the member who coordinates the general securing of an exhibit location and serves to help coordinate the “home-made planning” aspects of the exhibit objective This person ideally has experience developing and curating exhibits, public planning or interactive experiences. Coordinates subcommittee of volunteers. HISTORIAN LEAD As initial project proposals suggest potential themes, this board member coordinates and helps flesh out the historic background of projects, the inclusion of previous plans and proposals. Also helps direct planning archive (p.133).

FUNDRAISING A talented grant writer would help serve as the engine of “My City,” soliciting financial support and potential permanent space. EDITORIAL LEAD This board member coordinates the re-editing of documents and videos so that information is understandable, interesting and succinct. SOCIAL & TEAM COORDINATOR This board member helps make sure the setting and atmosphere for events and volunteers is exciting. The public is drawn to opportunities to be involved in their city, but are especially interested if it is inspiring and in a social venue. Events for the “Friends of the High Line” in New York were transformed by a new social coordinator, an effort that helped insure its success.

ARTS INFUSION LEAD This member from the arts community helps set goals and approaches for infusing artistic expression into projects and events.

UNIFIED MAP AND VISUAL STUDIES This board member helps lead the effort to create a unified map of the city (p.107) by helping set technical and interface standards flexible for both the online, meeting and exhibit presentations.

CITY LIAISON: This member of the board is either someone working for municipal government, someone with a strong relationship with the city, or a direct representative.

THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Serving at the behest of the board, the director executes the decisions of the board which in turn takes its cues from the public which is the true leader of the organization.

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NEXT STEPS “My City” Teams can build social and community bonds as was the case with “Connecting Pasadena.”

Tournament of Roses Association Pasadena’s model of community oriented volunteer teamwork.

Support Teams The role of Support Teams is key to the functioning of “My City.” As the forgotten father of civic Pasadena, Dean George A. Damon was the ultimate model of the citizen who worked well in teams. Dean Damon was a leading organizer of the City Beautiful Association, the Natural History Museum, Carmelita (now the Norton Simon Museum), Throop (now Caltech) as well as being a director of Pasadena’s famous Tournament of Roses Association. The Tournament of Roses sets an excellent example. From its Rose Court, to its Board, the White Suiters, and all the teams that create the floats—the nationally televised Rose Parade is largely accomplished through the coordinated efforts of 32 committees and 935 volunteers that spend an estimated 80,000 hours each year. What attracts such dedication is a tradition of commitment to excellence, service, social camaraderie and community. The Association also is a fine example of how “My City” support teams could operate. Though not needing a home as stately as the Wrigley Mansion, the Support Teams are deserving of a great setting.

“My City” should offer Support Teams an inviting atmosphere in which to meet (p.137), with a setting that has the same capacity to engender the enduring commitment held by the Tournament of Roses Association or in the effort to build great libraries. Like the efforts to create a library from scratch, the essential aid of support teams is used to build the “Unified Map” project (p.107), a planning resource library, and many of the ingredients listed in the Planitorium chapter. The following are potential teams supporting a fully functioning “My City” process.

Project Teams............................................page 115 Event Teams .............................................page 122 The Venue Place Making Team ..............page 122 Unified Map Team.....................................page 107 Visual Simulation and Services Team.....page 133 Planning Archive Team.............................page 133 Public Outreach Team..............................page 133 Arts Infusion Team, see Passages Project. . page 022 “TED Talk” Public Forum Team . ..........page 136 Request for Solutions Team......................page 122 The Videography Team............................page 113 See also pages 137 for more details on the potential of Support Teams.

“50 Ways to Support, Join-in or Grab Hold” While support teams are geared to continual efforts, a “My City” process has the potential to draw participation from a public that loves their city, is interested in its future, and wants to contribute and help in the planning effort. By publishing an ongoing “50 Ways to Support, Join-In or Grab Hold” list in the organization’s activity guide (p.136), a long list of opportunities is offered ranging from “Requests for Solutions” (p.112 & 122), donation requests, event efforts, and outreach to students. For details on initiating “My City” in your city, see page 187.

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“Restoring the City to its Rightful Position” THE POTENTIAL OF REVIVING “MY CITY” IN PASADENA FOR THE 21ST CENTURY THE NATURAL CYCLE OF GENERATIONS

THE NEW GENERATION GAP

This exploration began with Mayor Tornek’s vision to “restore Pasadena to its rightful position as a model for other cities to emulate.” As introduced on page 22, “My City” is one of the sources of that reputation.

For much of the 20th Century, adults in their 20-40s helped lead Pasadena at a time that older generations were more often moving into retirement. Today, the idea of retirement is less common and too often those under 50 are under-represented at civic meetings in Pasadena.

Pasadena’s World War I generation left a legacy of reform, direct democracy (p.27-51), and the classical buildings of the 1920s. Like many cities, the architecture of this period forms the city’s historic core, much of it inspired by the City Beautiful Movement of the 1910s. The World War II generation brought Modernist Redevelopment to the city. Though Modernist homes are widely admired, the perspective of citizens is consistent in its regret of Redevelopment replacing (p.71) pre-WWII downtown blocks with cold, flat, lifeless modern landscapes that followed. The generation gap between the Boomers (1946-1964) and their parents saw an anti-war, pro-conservation rebellion, saving the old buildings their parents were tearing down. Time has inverted their reputation for rebellion, as the Boomers were heroic in their preservation of all that was planned a century ago.

In 2015, Mayor Bill Bogaard left office at the age of 78. Newly elected Mayor Terry Tornek is 70. By contrast, Pasadena’s mayor in 1900 was 32. Council member Tyron Hampton is 34 and an exception to this trend. There are others as well, but very often, those in their early 50s are among the younger people in the room. While there are doubtless benefits that come with aging civic leadership, there are obvious pitfalls as well. People in their 20s-40s are more forward looking. They tend to focus more on vision as have more future at stake. The younger generations are also more likely to have up-to-date technical know-how and a more current cultural perspective. A new generation of informed civic advocates is essential to reinvigorate the planning process and provide energetic vision and leadership for planning the future of the city.

The Greying of Involved Citizens In 2015 a group called Connecting Pasadena Plan held a wonderful two-day planning charrette to study the potential of the 710 freeway stub abandoned 50 years ago. Amidst the broad public invitation, there were very few in their 20s-40s.

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George A. Damon

Dean of Engineering Damon led planning efforts in Pasadena and around the Caltech campus when it was first being devveloped. “My City” is based on his work.

The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena

Pasadena’s Art Center College of Design

In 2015, Caltech was rated as the world’s top university. Dean Damon’s “Four Corners Competition” was sponsored by the school, and “My City” is also the work of its Dean of Engineering. Revitalizing Dean Damon’s effort would once again benefit both Pasadena and the Caltech community.

Utilizing the imagination of Art Center College of Design students is a recurring strategy of corporations and government who want to protype ideas. Art Center has students in every imaginable aspect of design who could contribute in mutual benefit to “My City” projects today.

WHAT “MY CITY” WOULD PROVIDE

Leveraging Community Wisdom

Continuity and a More Enduring Community Vision

“Recognizing the important fundamental that the city as a whole is wiser than any one citizen or committee,” Dean Damon knew the resulting plan would be much better than a collection of theories from it single individual, or even from a limited group.” Leveraging the wisdom of Pasadena’s world-class citizens, students, educators, and local design professionals in the visioning stages of planning is an opportunity to revitalize Pasadena’s bottom-up tradition.

Part I documents the history of bottom-up and top-down approaches to planning. Part II shows how revitalizing “My City” would create a stronger bond between the visions of past, present and future generations. Revitalizing the Critical First Step Writing in 1917, Dean Damon reports how, through “My City,” they first determined “Pasadena is particularly interested in the possibilities of a civic center.” It was “My City” that refined the vision so that “its program for civic improvements includes nearly all of the elements which go to make up the very heart of the city’s design. The exact location of this center, its size, its arrangement and its style of architectural treatment are details to which the city will, very shortly, address itself.” Gathering solutions and building community vision is essential to bottom-up momentum. Both Dean Damon’s “My City” and Abbot Kinney’s library effort (p.16) are examples of the early visioning stages of planning that can be difficult to see in retrospect. Revitalizing the “My City” approach is that critical first step.

An Approach of Broad Support In 1916, “My City” had representation from over 50 of Pasadena’s leading organizations. In that same role today, “My City” would serve to both provide and gather support and participation from citizens, organizations, schools, developers and government; a non-partisan resource for creating a more united vision of future, serving (p.133) all who are involved and who care. WHAT IT WOULD TAKE The potential for revitalizing “My City” in Pasadena or any city is further explored in the appendix, on page 187.

The Participation Gap When Mayor Bill Bogaard retired at 78, the runoff election between council members Terry Tornek (71) and Jacque Robinson (36) did not draw the 20-50 demographic into the mayoral debate, which was won with only 5% of the total population.

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“Society…is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in every virtue, and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born.” Edmund Burke 1729-1797

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The Grand Mix Where Bottom-up and Top-Down Meet

The Future is the City............................. 150 The Broken Link..................................... 156 Reconnecting Vision and Results........... 158 “My City” is the Ship.............................. 160 The Proposal and Benefits..................... 161 Makers of the Grand Mix: Be a Maker.... 163 Make Your Garden Grow........................ 166 You are Here.......................................... 167 Appendix: “My City” in Your City............ 185

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MY CITY IN YOUR CITY

BIBLIOGRAPHY

ENDNOTES

Conclusions The Future is the City, Planning is the Key In the evolution of civilization, empires rise and fall, nations come and go, but through it all, the city endures, often for thousands of years. As the origin of civilization, it is the city that is the clearest barometer its health. A true conservationist knows that the world is not given by his fathers, but borrowed from his children. John James Audubon 1785–1851

“Whenever and wherever societies have flourished and prospered rather than stagnated and decayed, creative and workable cities have been at the core of the phenomenon. Decaying cities, declining economies, and mounting social troubles travel together. The combination is not coincidental.”

By the dawn of the modern city, around 1900, world population reached 1.5 billion. Within a century it had doubled, and then doubled once again. Today, world population is projected to rise from nearly seven to over nine billion by 2050, an increase of one-third in less than four decades. 1 In the same span of time that the world will grow by 33%, its urban population will rise by nearly 50%. India’s need is projected to be “comparable to building every US city in just 35 years.”2 In the last three years alone, China has used more cement than the US did in the entire 20th Century. “It’s a statistic so mind-blowing that it stunned Bill Gates.”3 With numbers so daunting and issues so vast, it is only natural to be overwhelmed and seek escape from what the future might bring. But as the world grows smaller and smaller, the only effective way to address the challenges of growth is locally, neighborhood by neighborhood. It is in the city that these challenges can be more readily understood and more easily addressed in a more familiar atmosphere closer to home.

Jane Jacobs

“The ice was here, the ice was there, The ice was all around: It cracked and growled, and roared and howled” The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, 1797

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The Myth of the Mariner The word “myth” has evolved to mean something false. The origin of the word, however, the Greek “mythos” or “true narrative,” is a parable that tells a larger truth and helps make sense of an often chaotic world.

“Water, water,

In the repertoire of story and song, the recurring Myth of the Mariner provides an enduring metaphor for facing the challenges of everyday life. This hero’s journey into the vast unknown tracks the mariner’s elusive quest; to overcome great obstacles and break free of what is thought to be humanly possible; to survive, thrive and somehow triumph in the end.

to drink.”

everywhere; Nor any drop

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner 1797

From the story of Noah’s Ark, to Queen Calafia (p.14), and from The Rime of the Ancient Mariner to the plot lines of modern day film, the myth of the mariner is a story that often channels the anxieties of the age in which it is told. The Mariner’s journey is fraught with the peril of that larger fear and apprehension: the wrath of God, the temptations of spirits, survival, violence, slavery, oppression, war, nuclear annihilation; each has formed the subtext of the retelling of the tale, and the underlying anxiety about what happens next. With the suspense of this challenge, success hinges on persistence, fortitude and the ability to find clever solutions as problems arise. Once the mariner reaches the goal of the quest, the story invariably ends by completing the cycle and returning to the safety and comfort of home.

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MY CITY IN YOUR CITY

BIBLIOGRAPHY

ENDNOTES

CONCLUSIONS Los Angeles and Pasadena California cities still have the worst smog in the United States.

Mexico City has chronic

smog & little green space.

Almaty, Kazakhstan

Even the former USSR.

Salt Lake City, Utah

has bad smog as well.

THE SUFFOCATION OF CITIES In 1900, Pasadena’s 9000 residents owned 4000 bicycles and its millionaire mayor built the first leg of a cycleway (p.24) to LA. The automobile also arrived that year and within a decade the city had more cars per capita than anywhere in the world. The West’s first freeway followed the route of the cycleway, and polluted air was close behind. By the 1980s, the region’s smog spiked at 200 “bad-air days” per year. Though air quality has vastly improved, with 92 bad air days in 2014, it has spread to the Central Valley and the two regions have the most polluted air in America. The patterns of development in US cities are now repeating in China with five times the population.“From 1995 to 2005, the country’s bike fleet decreased by 35%, going from 670 million to 435 million. Private car ownership skyrocketed from 285,000 in 1985 to 18.5 million in 2005.” In 2015 alone, there were another 124 million cars and the smog is killing people.

Ghost Cities of China “Kangbashi New Area, built for a million people, it sat deserted and for a decade and is now reaching 10% occupancy.

Western Style Cities Beijing has acquired the trappings of Western cities from architecture to smog.

Pollution kills more than 4,400 people per day in China, more than 1.5 million people per year, accounting for 17% of Chinese deaths. “Chinese smog is so bad it’s like a ‘nuclear winter’ that’s even stopping plants’ photosynthesis.” Wearing a mask is often a essential in China’s industrialized cities. With an autocratic, centralized planning approach reminiscent of 1960s and ‘70s topdown Redevelopment in Pasadena, planning in China is producing “Ghost Cities” that are empty of people for many of the same reasons as failing redevelopment. Together China and India have 36% of the world’s population. As they follow the same trajectory, countless other cities are repeating the same patterns. As unique, centuriesold cultural landmarks are demolished and replaced with generic urban sprawl, smog, and gridlock, the mistakes are being repeated at an ever increasing velocity. It is clear that something must be done.

“Under the Dome” a documentary on China’s Air Pollution by Chai Jing

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“Bring Him Home.” The Martian at JPL’s Mission Control Room

THE MODERN MARINER Neil Armstrong said it.

Dr. Edward C. Stone

“The Voyager mission has opened up our solar system in a way not possible before the Space Age.” “It revealed our neighbors in the outer solar system and showed us how much there is to learn and how diverse the bodies are that share the solar system with our own planet Earth.”

In the old frontier of westward migration, two paths diverge. One branch leads to Los Angeles and on to the sea. The second, less traveled, leads further on, through Caltech’s Jet Propulsion Laboratories where NASA’s Mariner and Voyager missions shift the journey skyward into the heavens and out into space. From the Mars Pathfinder’s role in the film The Martian to Voyager’s role in the first Star Trek movie, the retelling of the mariner myth repeats the themes: the awesome power of nature, the power of belief, the need to take action, survive or die, fight the good fight and then get back home. As the true heirs of the mariner myth, the astronauts repeat the same theme. After blasting into space, the benefit of distance turns the focus of astronauts from looking further into space to gazing back down upon the Earth. There they see what no photograph can capture: the majesty of taking in the entire planet at once as it hangs suspended in space.

Star Trek repeats the

myth: the Cold War, Race, Religion, pollution—each has been an outlet for anxiety about these issues and the message that something must be done. All told, StarTrek has made $1.23 billion.

Seeing what very few have seen, the astronauts share a similar observation. It has been called the Overview Effect. Like looking into a mirror for the first time, the perspective of seeing the entire earth from a distance causes a “cognitive shift in awareness.” Each speaks of how delicate the Earth appears spinning in space; and that something must be done to protect it.

THE MARTIAN

SURVIVE OR DIE

Made with JPL, The Martian is a 2015 version of the Myth of the Modern Mariner that is focused on the sole mission of getting home.

CONCLUSIONS

PROPOSAL

YOU ARE HERE

Earthrise 1968

“When astronauts first saw Earth from afar during the Apollo 8 mission in 1968 — the US’s second manned mission headed toward the moon — they described a cognitive shift in awareness after seeing our planet “hanging in the void.”

Yuri Gagarian said it first:

“Orbiting Earth in the spaceship, I saw how beautiful our planet is. People, let us preserve and increase this beauty, not destroy it!

THE GEEK RISES

Costing $108 million, The Martian made $629 million in world-wide screenings. The Modern Mariner’s “Friday” is often a geek who saves the day. The Martian Continued on DIY on steroids as JPL page 157…

xcientists bring the hero home in a “My City” atmosphere.

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THE OVERVIEW EFFECT

Detroit “Intellectually, I knew what to expect. I have probably looked at as many Chicago pictures from space as anybody … so I knew exactly what I was going to see … But there is no way you can be prepared for the emotional impact … It brought tears to my eyes.”

Don L. Lind “You think about how long the human race has existed, all the way to the beginning of time and how small a fraction actually get to see the Earth and the heavens from where you are. That’s very humbling. That grips you, that stays with you for a lifetime.”

Tracy Caldwell Dyson July 19, 2011

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THE OVERVIEW EFFECT

Some 533 people have orbited the Earth, 24 have risen above low Earth orbit and 12 have walked the Moon. This page and Chapter 11 (p.167) offer their reflections on what has come to be known as the Overview Effect of looking at the Earth from the perspective of space.

Ronald J. Garan, 2011

Scott Kelly

“The more I look at Earth, the more I feel an environmentalist. This is a human effect that is not a naturally occurring phenomenon.”

Int. Space Station 2016

Ronald J. Garan Int. Space Station 2011

“When we look down at the earth from space, we see this amazing, indescribably beautiful planet. It looks like a living, breathing organism. But it also, at the same time, looks extremely fragile … Anybody else who’s ever gone to space says the same thing because it really is striking and it’s really sobering to see this paper-thin layer and to realize that that little paper-thin layer is all that protects every living thing on Earth from death, basically. From the harshness of space.”

“You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, ‘Look at that, you son of a bitch.’”

Yang Liu

First female

Chinese Astronaut, 2012.

“The Earth is like a vibrant, living thing.”

Ed Mitchell Apollo 14

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ENDNOTES

U.S. Smog in China The U.S. can take credit for about 21% of emissions in China due to exports according to the Proceedings of the National Academy

of Sciences. Both images above are of air pollution as seen from the International Space station. On December 7, 2015, NASA captured the top left image of eastern China thick with smog (gray). The Chinese government issued its first “red alert” that day, closing schools, factories and forcing cars to stop.

The Broken Link between Vision and Results With pollution visible from the International Space Station growing worse by the year, the planning of cities is key to the health of both civilization and democracy. “Something must be done” is the persistent drumbeat of NASA, nations, news, and neighborhoods. Something must be done, but what?

in an otherwise carefully spoken world. While this sentiment is not an accurate reflection of the planning staff of cities, which have many dedicated believers in its potential, or planners in general, the high burnout rate and low retirement age of planners is a testament to the level of frustration and the corrosive effects of money on the process of planning the future.

2. Refinement

4. Revitalization

If the growing problem of pollution is to be addressed, real change is essential. Bureaucracies 3. Inversion tend to not learn from mistakes of the past and continue with “business as usual” until redirected. But without a strong bottom-up process for exploring solutions, change cannot achieve the necessary momentum for revitalization to take place.

The question of money is also another sign that incremental refinements have inverted the process. Vision no longer drives planning, which has become more about preserving interests than promoting the common good.

For example, the California Some call for a “City Beautiful 2.0,” Environmental Quality leaving out the word Movement as if 1. Invention Act is a top-down solution with it were software and automated output, The Natural Cycle of Change great momentum. It led to a 22,000 repactkaged as a set of marketable This pattern is introduced on page 20 page, $40 million Environmental trends. Hiring consultants to “make and is discussed on pages 88, and 158. Impact Report for the 710 freeway big plans” without an authentic that left out a sufficient study of air quality and sold participatory planning process and meaningful public only one copy for $1,400 (p.85). input is not a movement. Nor can it provide the momentum needed to reconnect vision and results. In the course of this study, one planning consultant was asked how to improve CEQA. In a moment of stunning The signals are clear that revitalization and invention candor, the quick response cut to the bottom-line: “I want are needed once again. Completing the Natural Cycle it to stay [messed]-up, that’s how I make my money.” returns the focus of the planning process back home For planning, it was a rare moment of blunt honesty to where it started so it can begin once again. CHINA IS ADDING 20 MILLION NEW CARS PER YEAR AND THE NUMBER WORLDWIDE IS NOW PAST 1 BILLION

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DISCIPLINE • MORAL TOUGHNESS• COMPETENCE • COMMITMENT • TEAMWORK

RETURNING TO A MORE SCIENTIFIC APPROACH TO

NAVIGATING THE FUTURE THE MAP IS MADE BY LEARNING FROM MISTAKES

Apollo I: Grissom, White and Chaffee A January 27, 1967 fire killed the crew that named their own mission Apollo I. Subsequently, the names Apollo IIApollo 14 were named in honor of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee.

NASA Flight Director Gene Kranz helped lead the massive effort of putting a man on the moon, but before that happened, NASA faced a horrendous tragedy. After hearing the terrifying deaths of the Apollo I astronauts, Kranz declared: “Somewhere, somehow, we screwed up. It could have been in design, build, or test. Whatever it was, we should have caught it. Mission Control was behind in virtually every area… procedures changed daily.” “We were too gung ho about the schedule and we locked out all of the problems we saw each day in our work. Every element of the program was in trouble and so were we. The simulators were not working…

NOT ONE OF US STOOD UP AND SAID, ‘DAMMIT, STOP!’ …We are the cause! We were not ready! We did not do our job. We were rolling the dice, hoping that things would come together by launch day, when in our hearts we knew it would take a miracle.”

The Right Stuff NASA Flight Director, Gene Kranz ran Apollo 11 (the first landing on the moon) and Apollo 13’s safe return after an explosion. A topdown leader, he coordinated arguing and frantic teams. YouTube: Gene Kranz Mission Control Tough & Competent. He could be talking about “My City.”

“From this day forward, Flight Control will be known by two words: ‘Tough’ and ‘Competent.’ … These words are the price of admission to the ranks of Mission Control.” To be on the team, a daily recommitment to a list of core principles was required. It proved key to the success of the moon landing and was cited again after the Columbia disaster in 2003 as forgotten core values. The Challenge of the Modern Mayor is

leveraging the do-it-yourself spirit of citizens. As pictured above in 1900, Pasadena Mayor Horace Dobbins (32) built a cycleway in a time of handmade technology. “My City” provides the modern mayor a way of helping citizens help the city.

A STANDARD OF EXCELLENCE Planning efforts deliver diminishing returns. Excellent results require outstanding efforts. A SENSE OF BALANCE Over 3,200 deaths per day are due to traffic accidents. Public safety and urban design deserve greater attention. MIXING SEASONED LEADERS AND YOUNG VISIONARIES The average age of Kranz’s team was 26 years old. As advancing generations now run planning, the energy of forward thinking youth is lost (p.146). “My City” helps revitalize planning, getting a new generation involved in the future they will inherit.

The Double Bind of the Modern Planner, expects

them to lead both bottomup visioning and top-down logistics, both facilitator and advocate. A heroic effort ensues, but it is unreasonable to expect the same person to be both mariner and flight director. “My City” supports the heroic planner of today.

THE SURVIVOR’S SECRET: THE RISE OF GEEK CULTURE

DO-IT-YOURSELF Being good with hands-on challenges is the key to survival.

CONCLUSIONS

The movie “The Martian” wove the theme of geek culture through its storyline as NASA and Caltech-JPL famously rely on bottomup leadership from an odd assortment of peculiar visionaries adept at both science, technology and thinking outside the box.

PROPOSAL

YOU ARE HERE

Among his JPL-based rescuers is a very geeky JPL astrodynamicist, seen on the right showing his idea with a stapler, trying to get through to the top-down leadership of NASA.

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Reconnecting Vision and Results The great challenges faced by the next generation are common to all nations. While nations struggle to solve these issues, cities offer great opportunities for change, where the challenges appear in everyday life and the fruits of planning and action can be experienced first-hand.

Expecting a top-down planning department to create the bottom-up momentum needed for the public’s ideas and vision is unrealistic. Just as it’s impossible to make home-made cookies in a factory, for a top-down planning agency to suddenly implement grass-roots planning is a contradiction of both its structure and its inherent nature.

2. Refinement

How Citizen Input Works Now

4. Revitalization

However, for cities to thrive, people need to feel at home in the public sphere; that they are full participants and An ongoing conversation is what allowed Abbot Kinney not spectators; that they are respected and that their and Dean Damon to make big plans (p.192). As cities voices and priorities matter. Though planning requires continue inviting public input, citizens often perceive expertise as projects approach construction, the early planners are going through bottom-up motions without visioning stages need the input, ideas, the authenticity of potential momentum 3. Inversion background and the commitment of and too often people leave feeling that citizens for the results they will live in their involvement in planning their city’s to be realistic and effective. future is a waste of their time. How to Revitalize Planning

Pasadena’s citizen-led commissions The answer to inertia, needless complexity are effective in rendering opinion, but and citizen disconnect can be found it is often too late in the process. In in the City Beautiful Movement and an effort to involve more people, the Old Pasadena in the 1980s, when more 1. Invention city also invites citizens to “charrette” involved citizens accomplished from The Natural Cycle of Change or develop and share their vision. below what the top-down approach of the This pattern is introduced on page 20 The public brings worthy ideas with time could not, providing the patience and recurs on pages 88, and 156. the expectation that the invitation is required to create lasting momentum. sincere and that planners can advance their vision. A return to the approach of 1916 is a proven solution to This interchange is a regular staple of municipal this broken link in the public planning process. Bottomgovernment. The idea is shared and a polite nod given by up, participatory planning has the potential to help create the capable planner or council member, often knowing more informed and involved citizens, and along the way, they lack the time or resources to lead effort needed, and to build a better city in the process. “My City” is a path the proposal is lost and forgotten. home and into the future. Both the Natural Cycle (above) and the Bottom-Up/Top-Down themes weave through pages 20-23, 79, 91, 105, & 116.

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LESSONS OF JPL-CALTECH & ART CENTER COLLEGE

DESIGN THINKING Albert Einstein was.

Seen here riding a bicycle during his time at Caltech, Einstein was the original geek to go mainstream. With uncharted connectivity between left and right hemispheres, hisYard wild The Mars creativity also made is JPL’s area for testing for extreme eccentric. rovers that its makerHis unkempt hair has spaces are producing. become trademark, JPL is ageek heaven. but he wason also known drawing a sci-fi to“sense smoke of cigarette butts wonder.” picked off the street and his chauffeur claimed to see pick a grasshopper off the ground and eat it. He never wore socks and was known to play his violin on bird-watching treks with tears streaming down his face.

Jet Propulsion Lab is

If you define a geek as Richard Feynman someone peculiarly The brilliant Caltech intelligent, obsessive and scientistol’ describes the eccentric, Al would guesswork in surely fit the bill. the laws and 1 MIN YOUTUBE methods of FEYNMAN, science, a data SCIENTIFIC driven, bottom- METHOD up approach with many top-down aspects as well.

The Pasadena Geek In film and TV, geek culture has gone mainstream.

DO IT YOURSELF & THE RISE OF GEEK CULTURE

As urban design has been eclipsed by the power of policy, the approach of design thinking is key to finding effective solutions. Top-Down Design is Policy Based: Form Follows Function

The technical, deductive and narrowing approach of topdown design is effective for infrastructure, objects, and linear systems that do not need feedback loops. In Modernist architecture top-down often produced a lifted separation of people from the street. This machine-in-the-garden aesthetic has had great success in suburban settings such as Art Center College (top), and in the architecture of homes and housing. In an urban setting, top-down design often results in a lack of human scale. Redevelopment in Pasadena and the story of its mall are examples of a top-down design process (p.58). Both utilized a process of planning that involved few people, had a promising grand opening and then quickly failed to thrive. Bottom-Up Design is Process Based: Form Follows People

Bottom-up design includes a plurality of approaches. It is handson, experimental, recursive and includes feedback loops, making it flexible to new information. Along with being driven by investigation, data, and stacking disciplines, bottom -up approaches excel at guess-work, which Richard Feynman described as being key to the laws and methods of science. Top-down approaches often lack the patience to do guess-work. “Science is the Belief in the Ignorance of Experts”

Albert Einstein was.

Seen here riding a bicycle during his time at Caltech, Einstein was the original geek to go mainstream. With uncharted connectivity between left and right hemispheres, his wild Cars from Clay creativity also made Artextreme Center’seccentric. auto design for program uses clayhas to His unkempt hair build life sized car bodies become a trademark, that influence the world. but he was also known to smoke cigarette butts picked off the street and his chauffeur claimed to see pick a grasshopper off the ground and eat it. He never wore socks and was known to play his violin on bird-watching treks with tears streaming down his face.

Art Center College

If you define a geek as sets the peculiarly standard someone for design as the and intelligent, obsessive world’s top school of eccentric, ol’ Al would automotive design and surely fit the training thebill. leading car designers.

Richard Feynman

Design Thinking is a more scientific approach to problemsolving, requiring the patience to explore options and find the solution first and then bring in top-down experts to complete and execute the vision. NASA/JPL’s Voyager probe contains this Golden Record.

The Golden Record connects the story of humanity’s past with the potential of its future.

Carl Sagan produced a “Golden Record” attached to JPL’s Voyager, a “message in a bottle.”

“The launching of this ‘bottle’ into the cosmic ‘ocean’ says something very hopeful about life on this planet.”

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Carl Sagan

CONCLUSIONS

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CONCLUSIONS

Pasadena

VEHICLE, PATH AND KEY

”My City” is the Ship The voyage forward necessitates a vessel to carry the many potential solutions that need exposure as people consider and contemplate in the ongoing planning of their city. By helping people more effectively understand ideas and one another, the link between vision and results is strengthened as the conversation about the future is elevated to the status it deserves. MENDING THE BROKEN LINK BETWEEN VISION AND REALITY

“My City” helps close this gap by focusing on the early visioning stages of the planning process. By helping educate, facilitate, format and measure public sentiment, the bottom-up public dialogue helps all involved to be more effective advocates of their common future. ELEVATING THE PUBLIC DIALOGUE: A STABILIZING INFLUENCE

When the public is engaged as a common stakeholder earlier in the planning of its future, the vision is better established, elevating the public dialogue and alleviating the tendency for hypervigilance and last minute challenges that destabilize planning. “My City” creates continuity. REVIVING CIVICS WHILE SUPPORTING THE PROCESS

“My City” is designed to support, not supplant the efforts of a Planning Department. It is not a disruption, nor does it change the Department’s top-down outreach, but instead it compliments their efforts with bottom-up input in the early visioning stages. REAL-SPACE: A TOWN HALL LINKING ALL GENERATIONS

As participation among the young has dropped, those who will live longest in the world being planned are under-represented (p.146). “My City” helps bring young and new people into the fold, educating new participants and providing a modern physical and social infrastructure. A PATH LINKING PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

The WWI generation had a strong focus on linking the past and the future (p.49). The 1916 process collected history, gave pointed critique of the present, performed a community survey and then presented tabulated priorities to the city. “My City” today revives that momentum. GOING BEYOND THE LIMITATIONS OF TOP-DOWN VISION

City planning does not control or plan everything, nor should it. The arena of public and professional planning is limited in scope and the range of issue that it has the right to address. There is more to planning that affects the public worthy of bottom-up exploration. ENGENDERING AN ENDURING COMMITMENT

Planning takes time and patience. It often falls short by the lack of enduring commitment. “My City” helps create better continuity and institutional memory (which has a reputation of missing key pieces) and stronger advocates in the process of translating vision into results.

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THE PROPOSAL

“My City” in Your City Adopt the “My City” approach to the early visioning stages of planning in your town or city. These are the key elements. BOTTOM-UP PLANNING THAT SUPPORTS THE CURRENT PROCESS See page 104 of the Overview chapter for details about this first principle.

PRESENTING IDEAS IN A MANNER ALL CAN UNDERSTAND See page 106 for details about this second principle of transparency.

A CLEARINGHOUSE APPROACH

See page 112 of the Projects chapter for details about this third principle.

THE REVISION PRINCIPLE

See page 115 of the Projects chapter for details about this fourth principle.

A STRUCTURE OF PROJECT-EVENT-SURVEY-PROPOSAL See page 105 of the Overview chapter for details.

SERVING CITIZENS, NONPROFITS, ENTERPRISE & GOVERNMENT See the Overview, Projects, Events and Planitorium chapters for details.

This document and “My City” are presented under the fair use clause of Creative Commons License detailed at the website “mycity.is”.

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ENDNOTES

Left, painted on the ceiling of the Castle Green turret’s collonade.

Beauty and Order Pasadena’s City Beautiful Movement of 1916 took great inspiration from Daniel Burnham’s quote below to “make big plans,” for “beauty” and “order” (p.29). It was through the lens of these two themes that they divided their “My City” survey (above and p.41) into one ballot for “Beauty” and the other for “Order.” The recurring themes roughly correlate to the bottom-up approaches of the early visioning stages of planning and the top-down efforts of the later logistical stages as order is brought to the original vision. It is this blending of beauty and order that creates tradition. “Intricate minglings of different uses in cities are not a form of chaos. On the contrary, they represent a complex and highly developed form of order.” Jane Jacobs

The power of imagination makes us infinite John Muir

“Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble logical diagram, once recorded, will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever growing insistence. Remember that our sons and grandsons are going to do things that will stagger us. Let your watchword be order, and your beacon beauty.” Daniel Burnham, 1910

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WE CAN, the motto of Judson Studios, where USC’s College of Fine Arts began.

Makers of the Grand Mix FORM FOLLOWS PROCESS: BLENDING BOTTOM-UP & TOP-DOWN

“Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.” Jane Jacobs

“The great lesson is that the sacred is in the ordinary, that it is to be found in one’s daily life, in one’s neighbors, friends, and family, in one’s backyard.” Abraham Maslow

The Pasadena wall (top), is a mosaic of arroyo stone and deformed clinker bricks, bound together by sand and cement, a labor of heavy lifting and a light touch, both hard work and reposed contemplation. It is a labor of love and legacy of care, laid by brick by brick, row by row, never straight or level; wavering with the natural flow of materials and landscape, as form and process merge and become one. In the life of cities, while top-down makers focus on making a civil society safe and secure to live in, it is often the bottomup approaches that make a civil society one that is worth living in, creating variety, artistic vision and beauty where top-down approaches do not. “We shape our buildings,” said Winston Churchill, “and afterwards, our buildings shape us.” It stands to reason: cold buildings tend to make people aloof, warm building tends to open people up. The same could be said of cities: we shape our cities and afterwards our cites shape us. “My City” and the Grand Mix are about this process, the essential blending of bottom-up and top down that is the mark of a great city. It is presented not as a prescription, but instead as a description of what is likely going right when life in a city is going well, and what is missing when a city fails to flourish. It is a return to the idea that the opportunity to participate is the crux of democracy, and the idea that “My City” is your city, that you too, can be a participant and a maker of the Grand Mix. The Grand Mix of blending bottom-up top-down introduced on page 22.

“The human heart is the first home of democracy. It is where we embrace our questions. Can we be equitable? Can we be generous? Can we listen with our whole beings, not just our minds, and offer our attention rather than our opinions? And do we have enough resolve in our hearts to act courageously, relentlessly, without giving up—ever— trusting our fellow citizens to join with us in our determined pursuit of a living democracy?” Terry Tempest Williams

Below: Inscriptions at Pasadena’s Central Library.

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Heather McLarty

Ernest Batchelder

Jane Jacobs

VISION AND BEAUTY: THE BOTTOM-UP MAKERS PRIMARY FOCUS

BE A MAKER In the public realm, bottom-up makers are involved citizens, representatives of the vision the community has for its future. Their concern for beauty does not preclude order or logistics as they want and need both. They also like to work together in teams.

Ernest Batchelder and Heather McLarty’s work in creating an art institute and a maker space speak of the synergy of makers working together. With specific roles found on page 109, these are general roles for bottom-up makers in planning your city today.

BOTTOM-UP

“Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.” Jane Jacobs

PLACE MAKERS make unique spaces at the transition between the

public and the personal realm, transforming the generic and nothing special into something unique and much loved. The Arroyo Seco’s Ernest Batchelder’s tile work and Heather McLarty’s blacksmith work today provide a model for aspiring place makers to emulate today in your city. BOTTOM-UP

PATH WORKERS In settling of the west, trail blazers get all the glory, but it was really the anonymous souls

who worked the trails and laid the rails that got the job done. Of all these types of makers, path work is by far the most important and the most crucial in the service of your city. The service of path work means finding someone with a solution and getting behind their project with the real work of providing momentum, making the film, raising the funds, and helping serve the greater good. See “Support Teams” on page 145. BOTTOM-UP

AMBASSADORS While path work helps move projects along, bottom-up ambassadors are activists who promote the work of other activists, helping spread the action of nodding for someone else’s project, which opens doors, provides encouragement and helps separate personalities from proposals. BOTTOM-UP

OUTSIDER PLANNING is a new an area of public planning that returns to the first impulse of those who envision a career in planning, to promote the great idea that supports the common good. In addition to planners hired by cities, Outsider Planning advocates initiate proposals and do not wait for the city. New York’s High Line is a triumphal example. As insider planners burn-out early, a career in Outsider Planning provides an alternative, and one worthy of funding. Louis McAdams is a poet who led the LA River effort.

New York’s High Line

The LA River Vision

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TOP-DOWN MAKERS

Baron Haussmann

Walt Disney

Steve Jobs

Lee Myung-bak

LOGISTICS AND ORDER: THE TOP-DOWN MAKER’S PRIMARY FOCUS

BE A MAKER In the public realm, top-down makers focus (p.22) on the city’s largest projects and the later logistical stages of planning. Government, big business, developers, politicians and agencies regulating smog are examples of their essential work. THE NEED FOR

Ensuring safety, stability, and order is the essential work of top-down makers. Top-down benefits of “My City” can be found on page 139. With more roles found on page 109, the following describes the key work of top-down makers in planning your city today.

THE NEED FOR

AMBASSADORS

ACTIVIST MAYORS

AS TOP-DOWN MAKERS

Project ambassadors make connections with key stakeholders, set-up meetings and presentations and invite people to gatherings.

AS TOP-DOWN MAKERS

Strong mayors are able to lead public opinion by helping push key proposals. The Cheonggyecheon in Seoul Korea is a prime example.

THE NEED FOR

DEAL MAKERS

PLANNERS

AS TOP-DOWN MAKERS

Developers, investors and attorneys are consummate deal makers who can help shape opinion, work as key allies and make things happen.

AS TOP-DOWN MAKERS

Top-down planners like Daniel Burnham and Frederick Law Olmsted can advocate for “My City” with the benefit of expertise.

THE NEED FOR

FUNDER-MAKERS AS TOP-DOWN MAKERS

Funders are key to supporting “My City” in your city by recognizing and funding projects and works of Outsider Planning.

THE NEED FOR

STRATEGISTS

AS TOP-DOWN MAKERS

Mentors come in many shapes and sizes. “Think tank” quality strategists can help play a key role in advising “My City” projects.

CREATIVE PEOPLE MAKE CITIES FLOURISH Willis Polk’s century-old wisdom that “a beautiful city is a prosperous city” paid great dividends for Pasadena. After World War II, the decline and revitalization of cities brought another key lesson for top-down makers, that a x creative class helps create the bottom-up momentum to make the city beautiful, dynamic, and make it flourish.

INCUBATOR SPACES LINK PEOPLE TO THE TOOLS AND RESOURCES From Walt Disney’s Imagineering facilities, to NASA’s JPL, Bill Gross’ IdeaLab, Pasadena’s Rose Palace and the Board of Trade hosting of “My City” in 1916, the greatest contribution of top-down makers is to make a creative space to explore ideas, test new concepts, incubate the collective imagination, and generate bottom-up momentum.

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Make Your Garden Grow The journey that began with the Enlightenment that fueled the American Revolution continues its shift, from top-down to bottom-up, from the divine right of kings to the inherent liberties of each person to rise to the occasion, to contemplate, consider and to then take action. WE MUST CULTIVATE OUR OWN GARDEN Voltaire

Cities, like the farms that once grew around them, are a living garden. The fields are plowed and seeds are sown. With water and sun, food and care they sprout and take root. Infrastructure is required, pests must be addressed. With the help of many hands, the city matures and bears fruit, and the time arrives to harvest and celebrate their bounty. And then, like the natural cycle of life, cities start to decay. Withered limbs are trimmed, spent fields are plowed, new crops planted and the natural cycle begins once again. As we cultivate the garden, all that can be asked is to strive to make some sense of life before we die, wrote Voltaire, to do good work and dream a good dream and to know that you are here. We are neither wise nor pure, he wrote, but try all the same we must to make the best of this very possible world. To both fight the good fight and live the good life, to build your house, chop your wood and make your garden grow.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.â&#x20AC;?

Albert Einstein

Einstein at the Mt Wilson Observatory Overlooking Pasadena

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Chapter 11

R E O R I E N T A T I O N

“When astronauts first saw Earth they described a cognitive shift seeing our planet “hanging in the void. This state of mental clarity, called the “overview effect,” occurs when you are flung so far away from Earth that you become totally overwhelmed and awed by the fragility and unity of life on our blue globe.

C O N T E N T S

It’s the uncanny sense of understanding the “big picture” and of feeling connected yet bigger than the intricate processes bubbling on Earth. ”

About the Author............ 191

Overview Effect II........... 168 Appendix........................ 185 “My City” in Your City.... 187 Acknowledgements........ 190

Bibliography................... 192 Endnotes........................ 194

Julia Calderone

PASADENA, CALIFORNIA

THE ISLAND This is Baja California. It is easy to understand how people could think it is an island (page 14). From space, it becomes clear that the whole planet is an island.

NORTH AMERICA

THE NORTH POLE IS HERE

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NORTH AMERICA World population is projected to grow from from 7.125 7.125 billionbillion people people to as to high as as high 11 as billion 11 billion by 2050, byless 2050, than less 35than years 35from yearsnow. from now. Almost Almost all that allgrowth that growth will be will in be thein the world’s world’s major major cities, cities, which which are are in in danger danger of of repeating repeating thethe same same topapproach down mistakes to planning in planning and hoping and for different hoping for different results unless results people people unless do something do something to change to change thethe expectations expectations of what is possible.

“My City” is a path to a better way.

PASADENA

“This planet is not terra firma. It is a delicate flower and it must be cared for. It’s lonely. It’s small. It’s isolated, and there is no resupply. And we are mistreating it. Clearly, the highest loyalty we should have is not to our own country or our own religion or our hometown or even to ourselves. It should be to, number two, the family of man, and number one, the planet at large. This is our home, and this is all we’ve got.” Scott Carpenter,

Mecury 7 Astronaut The second American to orbit the Earth

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“Here is your country. Cherish these natural wonders, cherish the natural resources, cherish the history and romance as a sacred heritage, for your children and your children’s children. Do not let selfish men or greedy interests skin your country of its beauty, its riches or its romance.” Theodore Roosevelt

“You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.” Jane Goodall

“...the care of the earth is our most ancient and most worthy and, after all, our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it, and to foster its renewal, is our only legitimate hope.” Wendell Berry The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays

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SOUTH AMERICA The population of South America was 386 million in 2011. By 2050 South America’s population is projected to rise to 507 million people, a rise of 31% in less than 40 years. Most of the growth is projected to occur in cities of South America. The planning of cities in North America affects the patterns of growth in South America, which affects the amount of oxygen in the rest of the world. “My City” is civic ciclovía of the Americas.

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“Democracy is not just a question of having a vote. It consists of strengthening each citizen’s possibility and capacity to participate in the deliberations involved in life in society.” Fernando Henrique Cardoso

President of Brazil (1995–2002)

“There is no insurmountable solitude. All paths lead to the same goal: to convey to others what we are. And we must pass through solitude and difficulty, isolation and silence in order to reach forth to the enchanted place where we can dance our clumsy dance and sing our sorrowful song - but in this dance or in this song there are fulfilled the most ancient rites of our conscience in the awareness of being human and of believing in a common destiny.” Pablo Neruda Chile

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AFRICA “The biggest change of our time’ is happening right now in Africa .” The population of Africa was 1.1 billion in 2013. It is projected to rise to 2.4 billion people by 2050. It is expected to reach 4 billion people by 2100, x according to projections by the United Nations. Much of that growth will take place in emerging cities, which follow the same patterns of growth as the developed world.

The planning of cities in the developed world, affects the patterns of growth in Africa. “My City” is a path.

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” African Proverb

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“Today we are faced with

a challenge that calls for a

shift in our thinking, so that humanity stops threatening its life-support system. We

are called to assist the

Earth to heal her wounds

and in the process heal our

own—indeed to embrace the

whole of creation in all its

diversity, beauty and wonder.

Recognizing that sustainable

development, democracy and

peace are indivisible is an

idea whose time has come.” Wangari Maathai

Kenyan Environmental and Political Activist

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ASIA “China’s environmental crisis is one of the most pressing challenges to emerge from the country’s rapid industrialization. Its economic rise, in which GDP grew on average 10 percent each year for more than a decade, has come at the expense of its environment and public health.” “China is the world’s largest source of carbon emissions, and the air quality of many of its major cities fails to meet international health standards. Life expectancy north of the Huai River is 5.5 years lower than in the south due to air pollution (life expectancy in China is 75.3 according to 2013 UN figures). Severe water contamination and scarcity have compounded land deterioration. Environmental degradation threatens to undermine the country’s growth and exhausts public patience with the pace of reform. It has also bruised China’s international standing and endangered domestic stability as the ruling party faces increasing scrutiny and public discontent.”

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“The earth, the air, the land and the water are not an inheritance from our forefathers but on loan from our children. So we have to handover to them at least as it was handed over to us.” Mahatma Gandhi

“Tell me, I forget. Show me, I remember. Involve me, I understand.” Ancient Chinese Proverb

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THE LIGHTS ARE ON

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“In the present circumstances, no one can afford to assume that someone else will solve their problems. Every individual has a responsibility to help guide our global family in the right direction. Good wishes are not sufficient; we must become actively engaged.” The Dalai Lama, “The Path to Tranquility: Daily Wisdom”

”In our every deliberation, we must consider the impact of our decisions on the next seven generations.” Horace, 20 B.C.

Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we be brethren. Abraham Genesis 13:8

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SPAIN & PORTUGAL

“We never know the worth of water till the well is dry.” Thomas Fuller, 1732

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““The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.” Robert Swan

The first man to walk the North and South Poles

SPAIN, PORTUGAL AND THE MEDITERRANEAN SEA AS SEEN FROM THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION

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EGYPT The city endures. Cairo is among the ancient cities of the world, dating back to the year 969 C.E. Today it is the 16th largest metropolitan region in the world with a population of 22 million. By the year 2050, the Cairo region is projected to grow by 72% to 38 million people.

THE CAIRO METROPOLITAN REGION

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181

Ozone Layer

Stratosphere

Toposphere

Earth

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Pollution is a Serious threat to Civilization

Global Oxygen Levels are Dropping

Cities are the Challenge

Planning is the Key

“My City” is the Ship

The Grand Mix is the Blend

Bottom-Up is the Path

You are the Maker

Make “My City” in Your City

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Appendix

CONTENTS “My City” in Your City...............................................187 Acknowledgements...................................................190 Author’s Note............................................................191 Bibliography..............................................................192 Endnotes...................................................................194

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Abbot Kinney Kinney envisioned the Pasadena Library and Village Improvement Society to foster culture and to create Pasadena’s first library. (see page 16 for details). As Chairman of the California Board of Forestry, he established the nation’s first forestry station and began first efforts to preserve the San Gabriel Mountains. He also campaigned to create a library in Pasadena, preserve the culture of Native Americans and build a Venice of America. Kinney’s home, “Kinneloa,” was located near this waterfall.

Pasadena’s Library Out of Abbot Kinney’s vision, Pasadena built a system of libraries.

Eaton Canyon Falls Located just above Pasadena and Abbot Kinney’s “Kinneloa Mesa,” Eaton Canyon Falls is at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains that he was also instrumental in helping to preserve. Photo by Eric Lowenbach ©

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Abott Kinney began the effort to preserve the mountains above Pasadena and Los Angeles.

Make “My City” in Your City The Critical First Steps................ continued from page 146. “My City” began as a study of past generations and the lost heritage of pioneer planners of a century ago. Revealed through the course of this journey are the invisible first steps to great endeavors: the time spent developing the vision itself. Preserving the buildings created by the World War I generation recognizes the enduring quality of their work. Reviving “My City” goes beyond honoring what they planned to the larger consideration of how they planned. The mission of “My City” is to restore that elegant process, emphasize its continued relevance, and promote its future use.

“Remembering that a noble logical diagram, once recorded, will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever growing insistence.” Daniel Burnham

Abbot Kinney Sets the Stage Long before developing Venice Beach in 1905, Abbot Kinney created Kinneloa in Pasadena near the waterfall to the left. Although the results of his “Pasadena Library and Village Improvement Society”(p.16) and San Gabriel Mountains preservation initiatives are revered today, his initial efforts were often dismissed and ridiculed. But these negative reactions did not dissuade him. The secret to Abbot Kinney getting to the first step of creating each project can be found in the actions of those who were:

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APPENDIX

“The Lions in the Way” In introducing the “Pasadena Library and Village Improvement Society” in 1880, Abbot Kinney a faced reactions in three distinct stages: Stage 1: First it is Ridiculed Writing about this period a decade later, the historian Hiram Reid recalls that at first, many thought a library to be an outlandish idea and that people were “too much scattered and too poor.” to support it.

“People grew more in favor of the undertaking as they kept talking about it.” Building momentum through discussion, was the key. Conversation is how the “noble logical diagram” that Daniel Burnham described, becomes a “living thing, asserting itself with ever growing insistence.” What any one person can do is simple: be the living thing asserting itself and continue this conversation. Be a Self-Appointed Ambassador

Stage 2: Second, it is Opposed Reid writes next of “the lugubrious ‘lions in the way’” and that they “proved to be empty air bubbles whenever punched with a pointed argument or a living purpose.” Stage 3: It is Accepted as Self-Evident Though there were many setbacks in the decade long effort to create a permanent building for the library p.16, as they continued the conversation, the people of Pasadena became such strong supporters that they expanded the library into a system of ten branch libraries. Building momentum by talking about it was the key for both Abbot Kinney’s vision of a public library in 1880 and Dean Damon’s “My City” proposal of 1916. And as they“kept talking about it,” community sentiment went through the usual stages of human conversation, and coalesced in a common vision.

No one needs to ask permission to be a supporter of a library, a school, or the hometown team. There is an open invitation to support any of these endeavors. And so it is with this “noble logical diagram” of Dean Damon’s “My City.” It is not owned by anyone, it belongs, instead, to anyone who participates and continues this dialogue of generations. Just as there has been no global leadership setting up libraries or schools in the cities of the world— only people that believe in education—“My City” relies on self-appointed ambassadors and people that decide their leadership is needed. Dean Damon’s project is a return to civil public discourse and your invitation to continue this conversation of ideas and democracy, passed down through the generations, from Kinney and Damon and the potential of “My City” in your city today.

“My City” is a path to more efficient and effective solutions.

You’re not stuck in traffic, you are traffic.

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INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

Gathering Together: A Toast to Ideals

Be a Champion

In promoting “civic ideals discussed around the table,” Dean Damon brought people together in the breaking of bread and the sharing of common ideals. Creating a gathering in your city around the dinner table, toasting to ideals and discussing the potential of “My City” in your city is the first step to creating a local organization.

The course of every life is touched by those of past generations who championed a cause. Every right, liberty, civic building, service, bridge, public utility, and convenience of civic life that is now taken for granted was once a proposal someone championed.

“My City” in your city only requires exposure to gain momentum and take hold. And as it takes on a life of its own, it starts to help people to better coordinate the solution, creating the bottom up vision necessary to realize your city’s potential.

Abbot Kinney and Dean Damon were champions for Pasadena. Their fostering of participatory democracy still pays great dividends today and will continue to do so into the future. Their hometown patriotism demonstrates the inherent power of open civic planning. This exploration of how “My City” can be revitalized initiates that conversation, but does not lead the effort in your city. Like the City Beautiful Movement, the potential of “My City” relies on the efforts of a new generation to champion the cause.

Topical and infectious, the more people talk and think about Dean Damon’s vision the more it takes hold, and “with ever growing insistence” it is a path to helping realize your city’s potential. In 1916, the words “My City” were used to evoke civic pride and a sense of responsibility and ownership among Pasadena citizens. Say it long enough and it becomes part of you. Repeat it to others in an open atmosphere and “My City” takes on a life of its own, because it’s what everyone wants: To play a meaningful role in creating a better world and to do it locally where its bounty can be home to the next generation.

Dean George A. Damon After “My City,” he turned his attention to Carmelita Gardens and the emerging Art Museum there (now the Norton Simon). He also spent time at a family cabin in Santa Anita Canyon where he liked to hike. George Damon passed in 1934, leaving a trusty penny and “My City” as his legacy.

“My City” helps people take stewardship.

This primer on “My City” can be used to initiate the conversation in your city. Once the seeds are planted, the light of conversation makes it take root. People joining in to fill the necessary roles make it grow. And in the harvest, there will grow the knowledge that everyone is born to make a difference. LINKS Pasadena: “Its Rightful Position”......146 Endnotes: More “My City” in Your City........195 “My City” is a not-for-profit project. See the website “mycity.is” for details.

With increasing velocity, “My City” is a solution.

“You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.”

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The Top of the Arroyo Seco: Switzer’s Trail Above JPL

Acknowledgements This project would not exist without the work of Dean George A. Damon. His writings have served as a civic timecapsule and a timely message from a forgotten generation. The commitment, enthusiasm and great imagination of this World War I generation has served as a guiding light. The project was also created from the conversations of Pasadena between the 1970s and today and in particular with Pasadena’s planning community in meetings and informal gatherings and a recurring “toast to ideals” between 2013 to 2016. Great appreciation is extended to Councilmember, former Planning Director and now Mayor, Terry Tornek. Thank you to the self-appointed ambassadors who helped expand the conversation and who contributed to making these gatherings so special. To Gazelle Wichner, Sylvia Holmes who were key to making these gatherings so special and run smoothly. Thank you to Councilmember John Kennedy and Jana West from his office for all your help and support. To my mother and father who still live in the house I grew up in on the Arroyo Seco. My father the problem solver and my mother the art docent at local museums for the last 35 years, thank you for teaching me the value of appreciation. A very big thank you to the teachers and advisors who gave encouragement along the way: Gil Young, Gary Sterling, Robert Novarro, James Pepper, David Greenberg, Richard Bender and Kevin Starr. The wellspring of research and historical insight from John Fode and the Pasadena History Museum, Loma Karklins and the Caltech Archives, Dan McLaughlin of the Pasadena Central Library and the Digitial Pasadena Website provided essential context and content. In the process of creating this document, many, people have given feedback, support, advice, corrections and editing

assistance. For the feedback, support, advice, corrections and editing assistance, thank you to: Pasadena Principal Planner Arthi Varma, Blair Miller, Bruce Litz, Danny Bayer, Pasadena Planning Director David Reyes, Erica Schatten, Greg Gunther, Janet Stone, Jonathan Edewards, Juan Ashton, Kate Hamilton, Kirsten Korot, Kyla Imburg, Larry and Phoebe Wilson, Lin Griffith, Liz Schiller, Leora Saul, Leah Kohlenberg, Lori Pond, Margaret Schermerhorn, Marsha Rood, Mic Hansen, Morey Wolfson, Nora Wright, Nina Hiken, Qrys Cunningham, Richard McDonald, Scott Haugaard, Spencer Dunbar, Sylvia Holmes, Stephanie Sandston, Stephanos Polyzoides, and Vicrim Chima, Planner for the City of Pasadena. Inspiration and the original link to Dean Damon and “My City” was supplied by Margaret Schermerhorn of The Espresso Bar, who also helped guide this project. Thank you Margaret. Thank you Don Kirby for being there and involved through the decade of working on this project. A big thanks to Ted Soqui for his great photos of the Espresso Bar. Thank you to everyone who helped with photos and images. Photo credits and details can be found on page 193. Great gratitude goes out especially to Dennis Campbell who helped edit “My City,” including suggestions and advice along the way, what to keep and what to change. Your friendship, generosity of spirit and enthusiasm for the project kept it going and on track. Also, to the City of Pasadena, and its Commissions, and Department of Planning, thank you for your help and assistance. I am very grateful to all of you. A warm and hearty thank you to each of you for your help and encouragement along the way. David Robert Wolf david@mycity.is

The Top of the Arroyo Seco: Switzer’s Trail Above JPL

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About the Author David Robert Wolf was raised on the edge of Pasadena’s Arroyo Seco, close to the landmark Colorado Street Bridge. A graduate of John Muir High School, he was in the first class to be educated under the first court-ordered desegregation of public schools in the West. He attended the University of California, Berkeley, graduating with a Masters Degree in Architecture. During the course of his career, he has worked across a spectrum of design disciplines, from planning and architecture to sculpture and architectural history. He has also taught a broad range of architects, artists and planners from around the world, developing a unique approach to simplifying the process of design in the emerging digital age. “My City” and The Passages Project were developed between 2010 and 2016 as a gift of gratitude to the much appreciated hometown of a proud and grateful native son.

The Arroyo Seco Behind JPL

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Bibliography Alexander, Chirstopher; Ishikarwa, Sara & Silverstein, Murray. A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977. More Andersen, Timothy; Moore, Eudorah M.; Winter, Robert W. California Design 1910. California Design Publications. 1974 (catalogue for an exhibit at the Pasadena Art Museum. More City of Pasadena. “Old Pasadena Streetscapes and Alley Walkways,” [Refmed] Concept Plan, adopted by the Pasadena City Council, July 24, 1995. City of Pasadena, Planning and Community Development. Crown City Medical Center, 550 E. Colorado Blvd., Conditional User Permit #5407. David Sinclair, Case Manager.http://cityofpasadena.net/Planning/Crown_ City_Medical_Center/

Cultivating Pasadena: From Roses to Redevelopment. Automobile Club of Southern California and the Labyrinth Project. Marsha Kinder, Matthew W. Roth, Karen Vos. 2004. Dumke, Glenn S. The Boom of the Eighties in Southern California. San Marino: Huntington Library, 1970. Frieden, Bernard & Sagalyn, Lynne B. Downtown, Inc: How America Rebuilds Cities. MIT Press, 1992. Chapter 5, “Pasadena: No Bed of Roses.” Gebhard, David & Winter, Robert. Los Angeles: An Architectural Guide. Salt Lake City: Gibbs -Smith Publisher, 1994. Damon, George A. A “Home Made” City Planning Exhibit and its Results. Throop College Bulletin, October 1916. Includes articles written about the process.

Damon, George A. How to Get Started in City Planning: the Pasadena Way. The City Plan, October 1916. Vol II, No. 3. Published Quarterly as the Official Organ of the National Conference on City Planning, Boston,Mass. Damon, George A. “The City Planning Movement in Pasadena.” Southwest Contractor. April 28, 1917. 735-738 Davis, Mike. City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles x Elliott, Francis Marshall. “What Happened in Pasadena: the Story of a Municipal Triumph.” Twentieth Century Magazine. Oct 1909. Hylen, Arnold, Los Angeles Before the Freeways.1850-1950, Dawson’s Bookshop, Los Angeles, 1981. Hill. Lawrence. La Reyna: Los Angeles in Three Centuries. Security and Trust Savings Bank. Los Angeles. 1929. Jacobs, Jane. The Death and Life of Great American Cities. New York: Vintage Books/Random House. 1992 Edition. McPhee, John. “The Control of Nature: Los Angeles Against the Mountains,” The New Yorker, parts I and II , Sept 26. 1988, and October 3, 1988. Moule, Elizabeth & Polyzoides, Stefanos. Streets, Blocks & Buildings. 2005. mparchitects.com/site/thoughts/streets-blocks-buildings

Ouroussoff, Nicolai. “Pasadena’s Paseo Colorado: Shopping for Reality, in Vain” LA Times. November 09, 2001.

articles.latimes.com/2001/nov/09/entertainment/ca-1961

“Old Pasadena Streetscapes and Alley Walkways” Refmed Concept Plan, The City of Pasadena, July 1995 Adopted July 24, 1995

Ogawa, Joan Takayama. Oral Interview with Susie Ling, July 25, 2012. “History of Asians in the San Gabriel Valley,” Pasadena Digital History Collaboration. cdm15123.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16237coll6/id/2602

Pasadena Unified School District, Pasadena Kindergartens: 1901-1919. Forward by Jeremiah M. Rhodes. Superintendent of Schools April 1919. Reid, Dr. Hiram A., History of Pasadena California.. Pasadena History Co. 1895. Chapter X: Page 202: “The Public Library” Scheid, Ann. Historic Pasadena: An Illustrated History. HPN Books, 1999. Charleston, NC: Arcadia Publishing, 1999. Scheid. Ann. Pasadena: Crown of the Valley, an Illustrated History. (produced in cooperation with the Pasadena Chamber of Commerce) Windsor Publications, 1986. Seims, Charles. Mt. Lowe: The Railway in the Clouds. Golden West Books, 1976. Seims, Charles. Trolley Days in Pasadena. San Marino: Golden West Books, 1982. Schubert, Mary. “Time Running Out on Plaza: Demolition of 20-Year Old Mall to Begin by Late Spring.t” Pasadena Star News. March 11, 2000. Starr, Kevin. Americans and the California Dream, 1850–1915. Oxford University Press. 1973 and 1986. Starr, Kevin. Inventing the Dream: California through the Progressive Era Oxford University Press. 1985. Starr, Kevin. Material Dreams: Southern California through the 1920s Oxford University Press. 1990 Wood, J.W. Pasadena, California. Historical and Personal. Pasadena: J.W. Wood, 1917.

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Key Sources A ‘HOME MADE’ CITY PLANNING EXHIBIT and its Results

DOWNTOWN, INC How America Rebuilds Cities

Dean George A. Damon’s 1916 article forms the foundations of this project, outlining“My City” in 1916. PDF includes articles on the exhibit, download at: pasadenapassages.org/homemade. pdf Also, see page 38.

This authoritative 1992 study and the chapter titled “Pasadena: No Bed of Roses” by MIT Dean Bernard J. Frieden and Lynne B. Sagalyn forms the foundations of the Plaza Pasadena section on pages 60-62.

Preliminary Suggestions for a Pasadena Plan

The California Outlook Magazine

In 1915, the Pasadena Woman’s Civic League produced this report on the work of Dean George Damon. Download at pasadenapassages.org/ pasadenaplan.pdf. Also, see page 38.

Published by the former chair of the California Republican Party, the 1913 and 1914 editions serve as a source of the “Progressive Republicans” section of the “‘My City’ 1916” chapter. See pages 31-32 or Google: California Outlook Magazine 1914.

“What Happened in Pasadena: the Story of Municipal Triumph

The Proceedings of the First National Conference on City Planning

This is an essential article in understanding Pasadena’s model city aspirations. It is abridged on page 34. The full article can be accessed at: pasadenapassages.com/ pasadena1909.pdf

Published by the American Society of Planning Officials in 1967. Discussed on page 87 and page 195 (bottom, left). See: pasadenapassages.org/1909_ National_Planning_Association_ Conference_Proceedings.pdf

The Passages Project

“My City” and the Passages Project Overview Movies

This companion document to “My City” serves as an example and case study of how a Project Document in a revitalized “My City” process. The latest draft can be found at pasadenapassages.org

See Pasadena Passages on vimeo.com to view the Overview Movies about both “My City” and the Passages projects.

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ENDNOTES P R E FA C E

I N T R O : WHAT MADE “MY CITY” POSSIBLE

a. Page 11, Left Column, Paragraph 2 “restore Pasadena to a its rightful position as a model for other cities to emulate,”

As this project was being developed in 2010-2016, critical feedback, guidance and inspiration from Council Member and now Mayor Terry Tornek as to what is possible and a priority gave inspiration to create the “My City” document.

From: “Nuances Separate Pasadena Mayoral Candidates in Final Debate.” Pasadena Start News. April 7, 2015. pasadenastarnews. com/government-and-politics/20150407/nuances-separate-pasadena-mayoral-candidates-in-final-debate

Model City Aspirations: “Restoring…its Rightful Position”

INTRODUCTION a. Page 15, Paragraph 2 “… maps showing California as an island still being produced as late as 1865.” From: Stanford University’s Glen McLaughlin Map Collection: California as an Island” has a collection of hundreds of maps perpetuating the myth: library.stanford.edu/collections/glen-mclaughlin-map-collection-california-island

f. Page 11, Left Column, Paragraph 2 “restore Pasadena to a its rightful position as a model for other cities to emulate,” “Nuances Separate Pasadena Mayoral Candidates in Final Debate.” Pasadena Start News. April 7, 2015. pasadenastarnews.com/government-andpolitics/20150407/nuances-separate-pasadena-mayoral-candidates-in-final-debate

Though some maps stopped showing California in the mid 1600s, Japanese maps by Shuzo Sato show California as an island in 1865.

g. Page 19, Right Column, Paragraph 3 “In Terry Tornek’s mayoral election of 2015, Pasadena’s former Planning Director pointed out that planning needs a “bottom-up” approach.”

https://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/wy568jc7945

b. Page 16 “…more in favor of the undertaking as they kept talking about it.” Reid, Dr. Hiram A., History of Pasadena California.. Pasadena History Co. 1895. Chapter X: “The Public Library.” Page 202. c Page 17 “By 1915, Pasadena had the highest rate of car ownership in the world.” Maryland-Huntington Life. “Pasadena, Motor Paradise,” February 27, 1915. d. Page 19 “make up the very heart of the city’s design”

Damon, George A. A “Home Made” City Planning Exhibit and its Results. Throop College Bulletin, October 1916. Page 12. PDF includes other articles. e. Page 19, Right Column, Paragraph 3 Though the City Beautiful Movement inspired results through the 1920s and early 1930s, the actual work of Pasadena’s “City Beautiful Association” occurs before and during World War I. In this second phase, when the Beaux Arts civic center was built, a new Civic Association was formed under the auspices of the Board of Trade and the phrase City Beautiful was no longer being used.

See YouTube: DPNA Mayoral Candidate Forum at 13 min

At the Downtown Pasadena Neighborhood Association’s “Mayoral Candidate Forum” of January, 2015, former Pasadena Planning Director Terry Tornek, laid out his vision: “There isn’t really consensus...My first priority would be to try to build that consensus. To try to understand how we can develop in a way that suits Pasadena’s needs, not just the developers needs but meets our community’s needs. I think that’s achievable.…The issue of advocacy about design: The way I started my career on council was in litigation against the City over the IDS project. [see page 89, bottom] And that was kind of a bold stroke, not one that I was happy about, but one that resulted in a change, I think an important change, in the way we do environmental analysis in Pasadena and frankly a much better project that’s emerging on the corner of El Molino and Colorado today. The Passages Project [once the name of this project]...has two pieces. One talks about walkability and making linkages downtown…which should be incorporated in all of the Specific Plans that we’re about to amend. The other piece has to do with changing the way we plan in Pasadena. So, my third priority would be to do bottom-up planning where citizens drive planning instead of City Hall.”

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CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

TODAY

LESSONS

“MY CITY” 1916 a. The early visioning stages of planning Pasadena’s Civic Center under Dean Damon and the City Beautiful Association focused on the potential of a civic center at Memorial Park (then known as Library Park). By rerouting the Santa Fe (Gold Line) tracks, their vision was to expand the park for a rectangular Civic Center plan beside a unified rail terminal at Colorado and what is now Arroyo Parkway, which would serve as a gateway to the city. Exiting the station, the visitor would be greeted by the civic center framed by mountains and arterial streets connecting to the rest of Pasadena (p.38). It would take another 75 years to reroute the tracks below ground, as the Santa Fe would not cooperate in altering their route. Pasadena’s new Civic Center would have to be built two blocks east using a long-axis plan instead of the more rectangular arrangement that has been so successful in San Francisco. Pasadena’s long axis plan would prove to much more problematic because as stretching the Civic Center over a six-blocks created interruptions in the middle and less of a cohesive whole than a rectangular arrangement. MAIN STREET a. “nineteen suburbs in search of a metropolis” H.L. Mencken

of city planning might have a part.” This document can be found at www.pasadenapassages.org/1909_National_ Planning_Association_Conference_Proceedings.pdf NEXT STEPS a. Page 147. In the 20th century, young people were active in public planning. In 1916, a young man of 20 from SouthCentral Los Angeles named Paul Revere Williams entered and won First Prize in an open planning competition in Pasadena. In the 1970s, Christopher Sutton was instrumental in the fight against the construction of the Plaza Pasadena in his early 20s. THE CONCLUSIONS a. Page 152. “China’s suicide rate has also soared 60 percent in the past 50 years, particularly among the young, as an average of 287,000 Chinese citizens kill themselves every year. APPENDIX: “MY CITY” IN YOUR CITY Page 188. The three stages. These stages are taken from a quote by Arthur Schopenhauer: “All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.”

b. “boosters and debunkers, of sunshine and noir,” are the names of the major chapters and themes explored in City of Quartz by Mike Davis. It is not a direct quote as “and, of, have been used to join his major themes.

PHOTO, IMAGE, AND ARCHIVE CREDITS

THE CENTURY OF LESSONS CHAPTER

The front photo of City Hall and the Civic Auditorium were taken by architectural photographer J.Miles Wolf for “My City.” Photos on page 66 and 67 by Ted Soqui. Thank you Ted!

a. “The Proceedings of the First National Conference on City Planning.” Published by the American Society of Planning Officials in September 1967. From the first page of the Preface, the ASPO writes, “In a statement in the proceedings of the second national conference on city planning held the following year, it would seem that there were 43 persons at the 1909 meeting. …. As a result of the first conference and the obvious interest in planning, the group organized itself as the National Conference on City Planning. The conception of planning as a separate profession was not apparent in the 1909 meeting. At several points in the discussion of organization matters, it was clear that the delegates were not thinking about forming an organization that would treat city planning as a new profession. The National Conference on City Planning was set up merely as a committee that would arrange the details of an “annual conference in which all organizations contributing to the development of the science

A debt of gratitude to Bruce Litz for archival materials, scratch-board renderings on pages 67 and 86 and general guidance. Thank you Bruce.

Special Thanks to the Pasadena History Museum and John Fode for all the great images and support. Images Courtesy Pasadena Public Library through Pasadena Digital History Collaboration.

FAIR USE In accordance with section 107 of the US Copyright

Law, Title 17, Section 107, the material in this publication is distributed without profit for research and educational purposes. Use of material from this publication for purposes that go beyond ‘fair use,’ must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

MORE “MY CITY” IN PASADENA In addition to page 146 and 187, more detailed next steps can be found at pasadenapassages.org/pasadena3.pdf See pasadenapassages.org/feedback

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CONCLUSIONS

PROPOSAL

YOU ARE HERE

MY CITY IN YOUR CITY

BIBLIOGRAPHY

ENDNOTES

CONTENTS

PREFACE

INTRO

MY CITY 1916

MAIN ST.

2015

LESSONS

OVERVIEW

PROJECTS

EVENTS

PLANITORIUM

NEXT STEPS

CONCLUSIONS