A Brief History of U.S. City Planning

Summary

In this video, City Beautiful unravels the intricate history of city planning in the United States, beginning with the pre-European cities built by the Pueblo and Mississippian cultures. The video covers significant events such as the foundation of early cities by the Spanish, French, and English, the impact of industrialization, and the evolution of urban planning into a distinct profession by the 20th century. Key focuses include the sanitation reforms in the mid-1800s, the City Beautiful movement, the rise and fall of centralized planning, and the ongoing challenges of urban development such as segregation, zoning, and environmental considerations. Planners today learn from past trials and triumphs, reflecting on over a century of urban planning while navigating contemporary issues and innovations like transit-oriented development and smart growth.

Highlights

• The Law of the Indies in St. Augustine marked early European planning efforts! 🇪🇸
• Industrial cities faced severe overcrowding and sanitation issues in the 1800s. 💩
• The City Beautiful movement, although flawed, shaped many American urban landmarks. ✨
• The Great Migration significantly altered the demographic landscape of U.S. cities. 🚶🏿‍♂️
• Urban renewal and freeway expansion led to significant displacement in the mid-20th century. 🚧
• Activists like Jane Jacobs fought against disruptive urban renewal projects successfully! ✊
• Modern city planning balances technical solutions with community needs and sustainability. 🌿

Key Takeaways

• City planning in the U.S. has roots dating back to pre-European settlements. 🏛️
• The Law of the Indies introduced organized city structures as early as the 16th century. 🏙️
• Industrialization sparked rapid urban growth and transformational changes in city life. 🚂
• The City Beautiful movement aimed to beautify and reform urban spaces. 🌆
• Modern urban planning emerged in the 20th century with a focus on regulation and zoning. 📏
• Movements against top-down planning grew as awareness of their disruptive impacts increased. 📣
• Planners face modern challenges like segregation and gentrification, reflecting lessons from the past. 🔎

Overview

The video kicks off by exploring various phases of city planning in America, from the impressive settlements of the Pueblo and Mississippian cultures to the structured designs by European colonizers, as laid out in the Law of the Indies. Cities like St. Augustine and Santa Fe grew under these early planning frameworks, setting a precedent for organized urban development.

As America progressed into the 19th century, the video highlights the impact of the Industrial Revolution, which transformed rural populations into urban dwellers. Rapid urban growth led to significant concerns over overcrowding and sanitation, spurring early planning efforts focused on health and housing reforms, setting groundwork for later organized city planning.

The journey continues into the 20th century, where city planning matured into a formal profession, juggling technical standards with aesthetic aspirations, exemplified by the City Beautiful movement. The video concludes by addressing modern planning challenges, such as gentrification and environmental sustainability, urging planners to learn from historical lessons and adapt to evolving urban needs.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 00:30: Introduction to U.S. City Planning This chapter provides a brief history of city planning in the United States, starting with pre-European settlements. It highlights the impressive cities built by the Pueblo and Mississippian cultures, mentioning Cahokia as a significant pre-European city. The chapter also notes the Spanish as the first European power to establish a presence in what is now the U.S.
• 00:30 - 01:00: Early European Influence This chapter discusses the early European influence on city planning in the Americas, starting with the founding of St. Augustine, Florida by the Spanish in 1565. It highlights the significance of the Law of the Indies, which established guidelines for the planning and design of new cities, including the requirement of a central square. The influence of other European powers like the French and English in city founding, especially along the U.S. Atlantic seaboard, is noted with examples such as New York, Boston, Charleston, and Philadelphia being founded during this period. By the time of U.S. independence, numerous cities had been established.
• 01:00 - 02:00: Urban Growth in the 19th Century The chapter explores urban growth in the 19th Century, highlighting the contrast between urbanization on the East Coast and the more rural, frontier-like settlements near the Appalachian area. Major cities like Boston began to exhibit urban characteristics, while other settlements acted as defensive forts against indigenous tribes. Despite the founding of the United States, the nation remained predominantly rural, influenced by the Land Ordinance of 1785 which aimed to establish a nation of farmers. This ordinance was partly inspired by Thomas Jefferson's disdain for cities. During this period, 95% of the U.S. population was rural.
• 02:00 - 03:00: Challenges of Rapid Urbanization The chapter discusses the impact of rapid urbanization, emphasizing the historical context where the U.S. Constitution, which lacks reference to cities, was quickly followed by technological innovations like the steam engine and power loom. These innovations transformed the economy from artisan-dominated to factory-based, encouraging unskilled labor migration to urban areas. Consequently, as new firms and factories preferred urban locations for easy access to labor, cities underwent rapid population growth as more people moved seeking job opportunities, often outpacing the availability of housing.
• 03:00 - 04:00: Sanitation and Housing Reforms This chapter discusses the poor sanitation and housing conditions in cities during the mid-1800s. Many migrants could not afford decent housing and lived in overcrowded areas. Workers had to reside close to workplaces due to lack of mass transit. Poor sanitation, including the use of septic tanks and cesspools, led to foul smells and frequent disease outbreaks. Factory smoke further polluted the environment, making city life unpleasant and hazardous.
• 04:00 - 05:00: City Beautiful Movement The chapter discusses the challenges faced by people experiencing urban living for the first time during the Industrial Revolution, highlighting the need for reform in cities. It emphasizes the critical importance of addressing disease, which was a life and death issue. As a solution, new gravity-based, self-cleansing sewer systems were introduced in the 1840s. The establishment of these sewer systems required comprehensive sanitary surveys to understand the city's topography and map sources of waste, marking one of the earliest acts of urban planning in the United States. By 1907, comprehensive sewer systems were adopted in every major US city.
• 05:00 - 06:00: Emergence of City Planning as a Profession The chapter 'Emergence of City Planning as a Profession' discusses the evolution of city planning and its relation to public health and living conditions. It highlights the importance of sewer systems in providing fresh air and the development of urban parks, notably Central Park designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. Housing reform is discussed in the context of sanitation improvements, bringing attention to the work of reformers like Jacob Riis. His book, 'How the Other Half Lived', exposed the dire living conditions in 1880s New York, particularly in the overcrowded tenements often occupied by European immigrants in the Lower East Side.
• 06:00 - 07:00: Rise of the Suburbs and Zoning In the early 20th century, New York City was one of the most densely populated areas globally, with over a thousand residents per acre. The Tenement House Act of 1901 emerged as a progressive measure mandating improved living conditions, including a separate bathroom in each housing unit, the creation of courtyards, and enhanced fire safety protocols. Following suit, various cities enacted comparable regulations, primarily targeting health and housing improvements as a means of urban reform. However, there were also less pragmatic reform advocates focusing on grander schemes such as monument construction and slum clearance initiatives.
• 07:00 - 08:00: The Great Migration and Urban Shift The chapter explores the period of the Great Migration and the significant urban shifts that occurred during this time. It highlights the 1893 World’s Columbian Exhibition in Chicago, which became a pivotal moment in city planning. The event, known as the White City and primarily designed by architect Daniel Burnham, set the stage for the City Beautiful movement. Although many of Burnham's plans, such as those for San Francisco, were not realized, his vision for Chicago and the Washington Mal were largely complete. The chapter notes the emergence of city planning as a profession in the early 20th century, rooted in the neo-classical architecture trends of that era.
• 08:00 - 09:00: Urban Renewal and Its Consequences The chapter discusses the evolution and consequences of urban renewal in the context of city planning. It begins with historical insights into the drafting of new cities from the colonial era, moving through the development of railroad towns in the west, and highlights the role of social reformers in major cities. It also touches on the grand visions of the City Beautiful movement designers. The differing philosophies of city planning were debated during the first city planning conference in 1909, showcasing conflicts between social reformers and technical/aesthetic planners. The chapter conveys that regardless of their perspectives, planners were optimistic about urban living, spurred by the advent of electric streetcars allowing new housing developments on urban peripheries, thus alleviating overcrowding. It ends on a note that another transportation technology had profound impacts on urban planning.
• 09:00 - 10:00: Resistance to Top-Down Planning The chapter discusses the impact of the Ford Model T on suburban development starting in 1908. The mass production of cars allowed people to move further from city centers, leading to suburban growth. This shift is compared to the urbanization of the previous century, highlighting a significant change in living patterns. During this time, planners viewed suburban development positively, as it promised an improved quality of life with larger homes and greener environments. However, there was also a recognition of issues with early suburban design, indicating a resistance to top-down planning approaches.
• 10:00 - 11:00: Environmental and Transportation Planning The chapter discusses the impact and responses related to environmental and transportation planning. It highlights the Federal Government's role in developing standard zoning and planning acts, which cities could adopt. These model acts empowered cities to conduct zoning, approve subdivision layouts, form planning commissions, and establish master plans. The introduction of these regulations and standards aimed to organize suburban development, with zoning ordinances initially driven by commercial interests to maintain land value.
• 11:00 - 12:00: Modern Urban Challenges and Future Directions The chapter discusses modern urban challenges and the future directions they could take. It explores the historical context of zoning laws, referencing the Village of Euclid vs. Ambler Realty case, which upheld the constitutionality of zoning. This legal framework made zoning a permanent fixture in urban development. The chapter also highlights the perspectives of Garden Suburb designers like Clarence Stein and Henry Wright, who were influenced by Ebenezer Howard and the English Garden City Movement. These designers proposed innovative suburban development concepts emphasizing shared greenspace ownership and separate pedestrian circulation, providing alternatives to the conventional suburban sprawl.

A Brief History of U.S. City Planning Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 This video is brought to you by Skillshare. Visit the link in the description for two months off a Premium subscription. This is a brief history of city planning in the United States, but our story begins before the US existed. Prior to European settlement, cities existed in the territory now known as the U.S. The Pueblo culture built impressive cities, as did the Mississippian culture. Cahokia is considered one of the largest pre-European cities north of Mexico. The Spanish were the first European power to set up shop in what is now the U.S..
• 00:30 - 01:00 St. Augustine, Florida was founded in 1565. As the Spanish were founding other cities in the U.S. Southwest , they also codified one of the first examples of European planning in the New World, the Law of the Indies. The Law laid out the requirements for locating a new city as well as its design and layout. Cities had to have a central square. Santa Fe is a great example. The 1600s saw the French and English join the Spanish in founding new cities, particularly along the Atlantic seaboard. New York, Boston], Charleston, and Philadelphia were all founded in this period. By the time the U.S. declared its independence, cities had popped up all
• 01:00 - 01:30 over the east coast and southwest. Some of the larger cities, like Boston were starting to look quite urban, while others closer to the Appalachian frontier were little more than forts to keep out the understandably unwelcoming native tribes. The founding of the United States didn’t do much to create an urban nation. The Land Ordinance of 1785, which begins the gridding of the American west, was designed to create a nation of farmers. Its author, Thomas Jefferson, hated cities. To be fair, at this point the U.S. population was 95 percent rural.
• 01:30 - 02:00 This rural emphasis was unfortunate, because shortly after the founding fathers signed the Constitution, which doesn’t even mention cities, something big started happening. In the beginning of the 19th century, technological innovations such as the steam engine and power loom started transforming the economy. Work that had been done by artisans in villages was now done in factories by unskilled labor. New firms and factories would locate in cities to find enough workers, and workers moved to cities to expand their options for work. Cities started to grow, fast. People were moving to cities faster than housing
• 02:00 - 02:30 could be built, and many of the migrants couldn’t afford good housing anyway. Workers also had to live within walking distance to work, as no practical mass transit existed yet. Overcrowding became a serious problem. Sanitation was terrible. Human waste was typically disposed of in an on-site septic tank or cesspools. Cities smelled terrible. Disease was a constant threat. The smoke coming from the factories added to the noxious environment. It’s really important to understand that the city of the mid 1800s was not a nice place to be.
• 02:30 - 03:00 For many people it was their first experience with urban living, and it was profoundly negative.Industrial revolution cities needed reform. Disease was literally a life and death situation, so that came first. New gravity-based, self-cleansing sewer systems came on to the scene in the 1840s. The implementation of a comprehensive sewer system, designed to clear away waste, required a citywide “sanitary survey” to understand the topography of the city as well as a mapping of the cesspools, outhouses, and sources of waste. These surveys are one of the earliest acts of planning in U.S. cities and by 1907 every major US city
• 03:00 - 03:30 had a sewer system. Sewers provided fresh air, and so too did some of the first comprehensive urban park systems. Some of the most notable designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, including Central Park. Housing reform followed sanitation reform. The problem was brought to the fore by reformers and journalists like Jacob Riis, whose photos published in the book, “How the Other Half Lived” exposed the terrible conditions people lived in during the 1880s. Tenements were claustrophobic and exceedingly overcrowded, filled with the many immigrants from Europe coming to New York by the day. The Lower East Side
• 03:30 - 04:00 was almost certainly the most crowded neighborhood in the world at the time, with over 1,000 people per acre. New York’s Tenement House Act passed in 1901 and required a separate bathroom in each unit, courtyards, and improved fire safety measures. Many other cities passed similar laws in the coming years. These early initiatives to fix the industrial city focused on practical social matters like health and housing. There were less-than-practical reformers too. Some wanted to improve the city through monuments, slum clearance,
• 04:00 - 04:30 and neo-classical architecture. Let’s move the timeline to 1893, he World’s Columbian Exhibition in Chicago. The White City, chiefly designed by architect Daniel Burnham. The White City became the template for he City Beautiful movement, a not-so-good method of improving cities, but a pretty good name for a city planning YouTube channel. Most of Burnham’s plans, like the one for San Francisco, never panned out, but his plans for Chicago and the Washington Mal were mostly completed as intended. At the beginning of the 20th century, city planning coalesced into a distinct profession. Its roots were in the
• 04:30 - 05:00 drafting of new cities from the colonial era through the railroad towns of the west, the social reformers of major cities, and the grand visions of City Beautiful designers. These differing visions of city planning were debated at the first city planning conference in 1909, with battle lines drawn between he social reformers and the technical/aesthetic planners. Planners, no matter their perspective, had begun to feel optimistic about urban living. Electric streetcars were zipping through streets, and their speed and low fares made it possible to build new housing on the periphery for the middle class, easing overcrowding. Another transportation technology changed everything.
• 05:00 - 05:30 The Model T started rolling off of Ford’s assembly line in 1908. Millions of the cars, and millions of other cars would be sold in the next decade or two. Cars allowed people to commute further out into homes in the suburbs and this radically altered cities. It’s a change similar to the urbanization of the last century. Most planners of the time thought that suburban development was a good thing. Cities were better than before, but what could be better than living in larger homes in greener surroundings? Enthusiasm about suburbs, combined with the poor quality of early suburb design
• 05:30 - 06:00 led to some key planning responses. First, the Federal Government developed a set of standard zoning and planning enabling acts that cities could adopt. These model acts gave cities the authority to do zoning, approve subdivision street layouts, form planning commissions, and adopt master plans. This added regulation and minimum standards to the development of the suburbs. Zoning ordinances were around in the two decades before the model enabling acts, promoted primarily by commercial interests trying to protect their land value
• 06:00 - 06:30 from new development that attracted immigrants and people of color. Zoning, then, as it does now, can be useful or used as a tool of exclusion. But the Supreme Court, in Village of Euclid vs. Ambler Realty, found zoning to be constitutional, so it was here to stay. Others saw the slapdash, speculative suburban development and believed there was a better way. They were the Garden Suburb designers, notably Clarence Stein and Henry Wright. Heavily influenced by Ebenezer Howard and the English Garden City designers, they developed new concepts for the suburbs that promoted shared ownership of common greenspace and separate circulation for pedestrians
• 06:30 - 07:00 that kept them away from cars. Their most famous community was Radburn, New Jersey, built in 1929. This rapid growth outward created entire metropolitan regions, and the notion of regional planning got its start in this era. Notable regional plans and planners include Patrick Geddes and his ideas about conurbations, the Regional Planning Association of America, with Stein and Wright as members, and the publishing of the Regional Plan of New York and its Environs, a landmark regional plan published in 1929. At the same time
• 07:00 - 07:30 people were moving out of the city in cars, others were moving in. It was one of the most dramatic demographic shifts in US history: the Great Migration. This was the migration of over six million African Americans from the south to northern cities from about 1916 to 1970. In the years after the Civil War and emancipation, 80 percent of black Americans still lived in the rural south, but by 1970, 80 percent lived in cities, half of them in northern cities. For immigrants, cities were a tool of assimilation and advancement, but for the millions of black Americans who moved to cities to work in urban factories, they found
• 07:30 - 08:00 segregation instead. Cities during the 30s and 40s were already very different than they were at the beginning of the century. Wealthy and middle class families were leaving for the suburbs for new tract housing, leaving behind poor and black families. At this time, most jobs and shopping was still done in the central city, and these new commuters needed a way to go back and forth. Cities started building freeways using state funding. To make room, they cleared immigrant and black neighborhoods, citing slum clearance and upgrading. The destruction of the city continued through urban renewal.
• 08:00 - 08:30 It’s a story told in three acts. The first is the Housing Act of 1937. The act pitted public housing activists like Catherine Bauer against commercial real estate interests who hated sharing the city with poor residents. They wanted to replace slums with flashy real estate projects. By the Housing Acts of 1949 and 1954, the real estate interests had won. The public housing that did get built was intended for middle class families, built in demolished black neighborhoods. Middle class whites didn’t move in, and they became homes for poor, black families. The Housing Acts assumed that
• 08:30 - 09:00 middle class rents would pay for all maintenance and didn’t provide Federal funding for upkeep. When poorer families moved in, the buildings quickly deteriorated without Federal funding. The result was cities bereft of historic neighborhoods, with bleak modernist towers in their place. It should be pretty clear that many of the planning "solutions" to the problems of the industrial city just created more problems themselves. It was certainly clear to those who were displaced by freeways and urban mega projects. In the 1960s and 1970s, urban residents began fighting back against
• 09:00 - 09:30 top-down planning that ignored the wishes of residents and disproportionately hurt poor and minority groups. One of the most prominent early battles is also one of the most famous—the battle over the Lower Manhattan Expressway between Jane Jacobs and Robert Moses. Jacobs was an activist and journalist living in Greenwich Village. Robert Moses was New York’s master builder, responsible for the construction of many bridges, freeways, and public housing projects. He was losing influence by the 1960s, however, and Jacobs, along with other activists, manage to halt the Lower Manhattan Expressway project. Jacob’s book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities,
• 09:30 - 10:00 is a critique of modernist planning and urban renewal and became one of the most influential books on planning. Jacobs was not the only one fighting against urban freeways and urban renewal. Residents of cities across the US had had enough. Freeway construction was halted in San Francisco and Portland. New metro systems in San Francisco, Atlanta, and Washington, DC were built. These impressive victories could not stop urban renewal and freeway construction entirely. The federal government still provided enormous sums of money to cities to build more freeways as fast as possible, thanks to
• 10:00 - 10:30 the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956. This continued exodus was called white flight because, for the most part, black families could not rent or own in the suburbs. Restrictive covenants, racism in the real estate profession, and redlining by banks meant that black families could not get mortgages, and even if they could, they would not be told of listings in white neighborhoods. This proved especially bad for black families, as jobs were now migrating to the suburbs, in some cases in what are known as edge cities. Many of these cities are only accessible by car, and located far from urban centers where black families lived.
• 10:30 - 11:00 The one-two punch of neighborhood-destroying urban renewal and suburb-generating freeway construction began to slow down in the 1970s. Urban renewal ended in 1973. Much of the interstate freeway network had been built by the end of the 1970s, and new regulations made it much harder to build them through urban areas. The revolts against top-down planning at the beginning of the 1960s had become popular opinion by the 1970s, particularly with people hostile toward government generally in the Vietnam and Watergate eras.
• 11:00 - 11:30 So-called “experts” were no longer trusted to know what was best for cities and people. People decided that planners didn’t deserve the power they had, and there would be no more Robert Moseses. At the same time, planning academics agreed with the people and rebuked top-down planning. Marxist theorists began to explain urban growth and change as movements of capital. Planning was a tool of capitalists. Planning became a lonely profession without a direction. The era of the master builder was over. What would become of planners? The evolved and specialized, thanks in part to many new laws that gave planners something to do.
• 11:30 - 12:00 The Environmental Protection Agency was founded in 1970 and the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Superfund Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act all made city planning much more complicated, as environmental concerns had to be considered with permitting new land uses. City planners became local experts on an increasing number of federal and state programs meant to minimize the negative impacts of new development. The Federal Community Development Act of 1974 replaced urban renewal and provided grants to communities to build and maintain a wide variety of projects, including
• 12:00 - 12:30 housing, public utilities, parks, and transportation. Planners had to develop plans to apply for the community development block grants. Transportation planning changed, too. The changes were slow, but transportation planners began to think about all modes of transportation, not just the car. The first bike lanes appeared in the 1970s. Cities began to invest in new light rail lines in the 1980s. The federal government began to require better regional transportation plans, as well. Planners became experts in all of the technical aspects of the job, but they also became educators, facilitators, and advocates.
• 12:30 - 13:00 They lacked some of the raw power they had before, but still pioneered new approaches to undoing some of the harm of the previous 60 years. Some cities implemented new smart growth measures, including urban growth boundaries. The practice of Euclidean zoning began to receive push back, criticized for its use as a tool of exclusion and its promotion of car only development. Cities encouraged transit-oriented development in the suburbs to give residents an alternative to ever-increasing freeway traffic. Urban challenges remain today. Gentrification and high housing prices are pushing
• 13:00 - 13:30 residents out of cities. Car usage is still incredibly high, even given what we now know about their negative impacts. Cities are still segregated by race and income. Self-driving cars could have far-reaching impacts, some we still can’t predict. There will be lots for planners to do in the future, and they now have a rich history to reflect on and learn from. Planners, as well as anyone else, can also learn a lot from the more than 25,000 courses over at Skillshare. Skillshare is an online learning community for creators, with more than 25,000 classes in design, business, and more. I’m not sure if people know, but I don’t make YouTube videos full time.
• 13:30 - 14:00 I’m also a full-time PhD student, husband, and parent. I have a lot going on, and I’m always looking for ways to be productive with my busy life. I really enjoyed this Skillshare class on productivity by fellow YouTuber Thomas Frank. With his help, I hope to keep myself organized and producing videos, even as we expect the birth of my third kid! If you want to fuel your creativity, curiosity, or career, give Skillshare Premium a try. The first 500 viewers who use the link in the description will get a two month free trial of Skillshare Premium.
• 14:00 - 14:30 And if you decide you love it, an annual subscription is super affordable, at less than 10 dollars per month. Go check it out now! Thanks for watching, CC folks!