Truly, the Town's Hall

Ask folks what they feel is lacking in many American "communities" these days and the answer may well be that the very concept of "community" itself is missing. Community can be defined as, "a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals." From the birth of our nation up until around the time of World War II, America was rich with community groups and the "third places" in which they could easily meet. "Third places" being defined as "the social surroundings separate from the two usual social environments of home and the workplace," and included at that time: taverns, inns, public squares, village greens, lodges, meetinghouses, coffee shops, etc. Even during times of civil unrest and troubled economic periods, America never turned its back on community engagement and the idea that the public realm symbolized the common good.

Woodbury's Town Hall in its final day. It was torn down for a gas station.
image: Gloucester County Historical Society

However, early 20th century America saw a gradual shift from the importance it placed on communal, civic engagement (a "we're all in this together" mentality), to an increased interest in isolation and escapism largely brought on by the rise of suburban development and the increasing presence of the automobile. Simply, it became easier to distance oneself from problems than to address them in a civic forum. For example, where in pre-turn of the century America most adults participated in public societies (through the involvement in various lodge groups), and therefore actively engaged in direct civic contributions, by today's comparison there is very little involvement. The belief that it is always someone else's job to fix, is commonly expressed nowadays.

Take the morphing idea of the Town Hall (aka City Hall) as example. The original concept of the American Town Hall is nearly a foreign one by today's standards. Historically the Town Hall was truly an open-access hall or meeting space for the community and usually filled with art, performances, plays, educational lectures, and entertainment. Most towns and cities still retain a Town Hall, but this is in name only. Look inside today's Town Halls and we may find one or two meeting rooms that may or may not be used for community groups, but will predominantly consist of offices for the various bureaucratic functions of a municipality. It is the place you go to pay your tax bill or inquire about a zoning variance or have an ordinance passed. It is certainly not the place you would go to a Halloween ball and dance to a full orchestra band, or enjoy a family evening of roller skating (all things that regularly occurred in Woodbury's former Town Hall).

Research shows that Woodbury's original Town Hall sat on the SE corner of German (now Barber) and Broad Sts and was completed in 1875. It was cherished by the community. The Woodbury Constitution reported the opening as, "The reproach which we, as a community, so long endured, the mortification to which our citizens were for so many years subjected, is now happily a thing of the past. To-day we have an evidence of our city's growth and improvement, and addition to the long list of advantages which our City enjoys, a creditable and satisfactory answer to the imputations that we are standing still. The opening of the City Hall on Thursday evening last was an event which reflected no little  honor on the people of Woodbury, - it is marked a new and better era which is dawning, or has opened, upon this lovely habitation."

Woodbury's Town Hall consisted of a large hall on the second floor affording a comfortable seating capacity of 500, a gallery, and dressing/preparation rooms. It was lit by 37 lamps, heated with two large portable heaters, adorned with cypress and walnut trim, and boasted a 22 foot ornamental ceiling. A dumb-waiter provided convenient access from the basement kitchen. Various local commercial enterprises including a dry goods merchant, restaurant, shoe cobbler, grocery, oyster saloon, J. Elmer Jackson's patent medicine enterprise, barbershop and more thrived on the street level, truly making the building a mixed-use community center. It was also the location of the community library and reading-room, headquarters for the German Singing Society, Salvation Army Headquarters, and housed the town's first gymnasium hosting the Woodbury basketball team's home games. It was also transformed weekly as a skating rink and the town's first (silent) moving picture house in 1907 which featured a live female soloist to sing the illustrated parts. The hall throughout the years hosted many civic lectures and nights of entertainment and amusement for the community. It was the perfect culmination of American ingenuity and expression through culture.

This was Woodbury's Golden Age and with the above in consideration it becomes clear that the more value a community places in the recognition and engagement in Arts and Culture, the greater the health of that community. But as the years progressed and American communities slowly drifted apart to live quite literally among greener pastures, the very concept of community played a decreasing role in American civic life. Woodbury's Town Hall was torn down in 1936 for a gas station, which no doubt paradoxically provided the fuel for many one-time residents to leave Woodbury for good. Nothing replaced the Town Hall as the "civic, social, and athletic" center of Woodbury, and city leaders increasingly focused their energy on converting a residential-based city of proud locals to a drive-through business district and in doing so, forgot about Woodbury's remaining residents and their quality of life. A side effect of this quest to maximize short-term profit is that city leaders essentially forewent the trouble to worry about the town's aesthetic appeal. The story is no different across the nation during this time, when a quick transformation occurred and America's cities and towns went from proud human habitats, to current-day dilapidated, plastic strip malls clusters where consumers go in one end and out the other.

Despite America's decline in participation in civil activities over the past decade, the concept of Creative Placemaking through the arts is gaining steadfastly. Creative Placemaking "is an evolving field of practice that intentionally leverages the power of the arts, culture and creativity to serve a community's interest while driving a broader agenda for change, growth and transformation in a way that also builds character and quality of place." Traditional towns seemingly left for dead have been revitalized through Arts and Culture and have simultaneously increased an awareness of their own local History and importance. Quite simply, the arts stimulate local economies. The NJ Arts Council reports that, state arts funding employs an estimated 17,000 workers, supports 37,000 cultural events, and attracts 5 million visitors who spend $125 million. Perhaps more importantly however, is that the arts have been shown time and again to have the power to bridge divides and bring a renewed sense of pride to residents.

APA's latest national poll surveyed Millennials and Baby Boomers on community preferences and dispels popular assumptions on how to improve local economies and attract new residents. The wide-ranging national survey finds that Millennials and Baby Boomers want cities to focus less on recruiting new companies and more on investing in new transportation options, walkable communities, and making the area as attractive as possible. With the apparently failing model of 'business recruiting as economic development,' city leaders will be forced to look at alternatives. Creative Placemaking organizations such as the recently established FAF Coalition may hold the secret to the future success of the City of Woodbury.

Today the former site of Woodbury's Town Hall sits as an empty corner pocket-park along Broad Street in the heart of our once-bustling downtown. Not the best location for such a space and what some in the urban planning field might refer to as a "nature band-aid," but an open, green space nonetheless. With such a space there at least exists the potential for something to flourish. Perhaps "community" through Arts and Culture will once again sprout in the heart of our classic American downtown, and perhaps in towns across the entire nation, as a result of effective Creative Placemaking. Only then will we have the chance to come together, connect, and grow as a community. This is the formula for real progress, not only in 1875, but for today as well.

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From the 1877 G.G. Green Daily Advertiser

former Town Hall location today 

Control Car Culture for Better Living

"We have more to gain [by consulting] our planners than our psychiatrists. We can achieve more to improve our relationships with others by participating in community planning, rather than group therapy encounters. What ails us—most of us, anyway—is not that we are incapable of living a satisfactory and creative life in harmony with ourselves, but that our habitat does not offer sufficient opportunities. It hems us in. It isolates us. It irritates and disrupts." – Wolf Von Eckardt

My good friend's mother was killed in an automobile accident last weekend right here in Gloucester County, NJ. A drunk driver took her life. By now, we have all heard the story and the easiest way to deal with it is to shame the irresponsible driver.... but it really goes beyond that. Ray Oldenburg, author of the Great Good Place writes, "Why should a nation of drinkers arrange their municipalities such that drinking and driving are frequently and almost necessarily combined? “Gasoline and alcohol don’t mix,” says the American slogan. Of course they do. Our urban planners mix them all the time and in great doses. See the zoning codes for confirmation." It's time America holds their town and city planners responsible for what they have built and demand change.

Is this the America we all envision?

I grew up with Mister Rogers' Neighborhood and Sesame Street so forgive my leanings towards a properly functioning urban neighborhood rich with community and mass transit. But unfortunately my real life upbringing was quite different. My parents moved us from Philadelphia to the New Jersey "suburbs" because by then car culture was in full swing and had most Americans under a sort of spell. I suppose my parents ultimately felt it would be safer to raise children in a less urbanized environment, not an uncommon thought in those days. However, recent studies show in actuality the opposite to be true. “A 2013 University of Pennsylvania/Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) study challenges the entire notion that suburbs are safer. The study examines, for the first time comprehensively, all kinds of accidental and violent deaths in America. Contrary to conventional wisdom, urban streets are significantly safer than leafy suburbs and rural areas. While counterintuitive at first glance, the finding is not hard to fathom if you think about it. The number one US cause of death from ages 5 to 34 is automobile crashes, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Deadly automobile crashes are far less likely on lower-speed urban streets.” (Top 10 Reasons for a New American Dream)

Sesame Street set... nice mixed use, walkable neighborhood.

“Social mobility is higher in compact urban places, Arizona State University researchers found. The more walkable the census block — as measured by Walk Score — the more likely someone from the bottom fifth of income will reach the top fifth in their lives.” (Top 10 Reasons for a New American Dream)  I spent the later years of my childhood inherently feeling that something was not quite right about my car-centric hometown. Of course once I reached adolescence I felt downright trapped and ineffectual. When I was told that I NEEDED to drive and own a car to survive in today's world, even then, I felt the perversity of it all. It felt as if my parents told me I needed an artificial appendage grafted on to me to become really human. All the while, I found my visits to Philadelphia with my friends (via Patco Speedline) to be rich with friendly and rewarding human experience and acceptance, compared to my (dangerous) walks around my small-minded town or local mall which were replete with deriding insults and bullying. My favorite was getting stuff thrown at me from cowardly anonymous drivers.

But how does the presence of the automobile really effect community? Cars, as essential as they have become to survive in America have a serious unintended side-effect. They ruin our living environments. We need only to look at Ye Olde Broad Street here in Woodbury to see it. Pre-auto dominant Broad Street was once lined with mansions. Now you'd be hard pressed to find anyone that would want to live there amongst the roar and rush of the auto. Fortunately, with the recent road diet, we have taken a step in the right direction in returning our downtown to a place for people and not merely a state highway through-road. But with most things, it could be better.

The safest roads in America are ones that are not made for easy speeding. The more "obstacles" such as trolley tracks, twists and turns, or even a nice tree-lined median significantly tame the car and signify to the driver that they have entered the domain of humans. The Charter for the Congress of New Urbanism states, "road engineers [once] put the safety of motorists first by designing road and intersections for speeds beyond the posted limit. The idea was to protect those motorists who drive carelessly or too fast. But when the road is designed for speeding, more drivers take advantage of that invitation, and more mayhem results. Proper traffic engineering today reverses that approach by providing physical cues--including street trees, narrower lanes, and intersections designed for pedestrians--that urge motorists to slow down rather than speed up."

Typical Woodbury, NJ Broad Street residence is now the former Bottom Dollar PARKING lot.
Once a grand residence for people has been relegated as a domain for the automobile.
image courtesy Gloucester County Historical Society

“If you plan cities for cars and traffic, you get cars and traffic. If you plan for people and places, you get people and places," says Fred Kent. If you go with the former you get an unsightly, unfriendly, and unwelcoming place devoid of real community. Millions of American's flock every year to the most successful Main Street in America to experience what a downtown could look like devoid of the damaging effects of the automobile. Unfortunately it's all a mirage and goes by the name Disney World, but it was once a reality all across small town America and still exists in other countries. One of the reasons Disney theme parks do not do well outside of America is that in most other countries there exists public realms that are far superior to the artificial ones presented by the Disney corporation. They don't need the fakery, they have the real thing. They don't need to lose themselves in the fantasy realm because their everyday urban life experience is rewarding enough.

People have the upper hand in this typical European street scene

Thankfully even in "the most car-mad country" of America, driving statistics have been steadily falling since 2004. Combine this with studies that show 3 out of every 4 US Millennials expressing they would like to live in a place where they do not need a car to get around, and throw in of course rising gas costs, rising car costs, car maintenance costs, carbon emission damage to the planet and war for oil… the alternative for smart growth to build better, aesthetically-pleasing, human-scaled neighborhoods is a no-brainer. Only 10% of Millennials and Active Boomers want to live in a suburb where most trips are made by car.

Manhattan neighborhood event
image credit: PPS

We can choose to demolish every last vestige of humanity from our towns in favor of more freeways and faster byways or we can choose to relocalize our communities and reduce the necessary miles needed to drive on a daily/weekly/monthly basis. I've blogged before about the self-sufficiency of 18th, 19th and early 20th century Woodbury, and the story is no different from any town in the United States at that time. Everything needed to survive and live happily could be found within a 5 minute walk from one's home. Why are we now forced to get in a car for virtually everything? It is seriously frustrating, wasteful, polluting, and severely imprisoning especially for Americans who claim to value their so-called freedom. I can't help but view the car as some sort of gas-powered wheelchair. We have voluntarily disabled ourselves through planning and zoning. 

Top is what happens when the car is allowed to dominate (looks scarily like most of our rt.45 sprawl)
Bottom is what happens when you bring people into the equation

1.61 people die on average EVERY DAY in New Jersey alone from automobiles. Here we are in America talking about gun control, when really we need auto control. Death by firearms in NJ is actually lower than death by automobile, but Americans in general evince a sickening complacency when it comes to cars and the violence they can inflict. "Between 2003 and 2012, 47,025 pedestrians were killed by drivers in the United States. To put that in perspective, that’s 16 times the number of fatalities caused in the same period by the natural disasters – floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, and the like – that get so much more attention. An additional 676,000 were injured, the equivalent of one person every eight minutes." Of course banishing the auto is just not going to happen in our car-crazy-country (not until the last drop of affordable oil is squeezed from the Earth) but we have the means to tame the automobile where they enter our immediate living areas, our downtowns and our streets and avenues. And of course ultimately we need better mass transit options... trains, trolleys, etc. 

In the latest poll from the American Planning Association, two thirds of all respondents and 74% of Millennials believe investing in schools, transportation choices, and walkable areas is a better way to grow the economy than recruiting companies. It's time to really get serious about transportation reform especially with bankruptcy looming for the nation's transportation trust fund. We can't keep throwing good money after bad trying to prop up the unsustainable network of automobile-based infrastructure. NEVER put all your eggs in one basket. We need more options. Had the drunk driver had the ability to walk or take effective public transit home from a neighborhood pub, perhaps my friend’s mother would still be here today.

For many of us, we drive because we are forced to, not because we want to and our sense of community suffers all the more for it... not to mention our safety. The automobile must be tamed. We should never let a machine dominate our lives... or give it the opportunity to take it from us so freely.

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This post dedicated to the memory of Katherine C. Steponick and for all who have been taken from this Earth by a machine.

Progress or Regress?

The subtitle of this post could very well be: How to Start Your City's Downward Spiral with One Fell Swoop. I have blogged about the loss of the Lewis M. Green mansion before but some recent historic artifacts were turned over to me that once again sparked my dismay over the whole matter. The outcome of the senseless demolition still affects us today and we should really take note.

 In 1869, Lewis M. Green, a five-term Mayor of Woodbury, NJ, had built for the pride of the city a magnificent four story residence of handmade pressed brick, featuring 10 bedrooms, walnut floors, French glass windows, gas lit crystal chandeliers, white marble steps, wrought iron trim, and formal gardens across from the Town Hall at the corner of German (now Barber) and Broad, the most public street in town. After many happy years in the community, the mansion was sold to Gulf Oil Corporation in 1944 and promptly torn down for a gas station. Don't believe me? Let's have Gulf Oil tell the story for you. Here is the postcard they sent out to Woodbury residents (this particular one to G.G. Green, Jr.) announcing the "great" news!

Front

Back

In case you don't believe your eyes, let me transcribe what the back of that postcard actually says. For added effect, try reading the following in your best 1940's narrator-voice... you know, the same voice that told you to "Duck and Cover" in case of a nuclear bomb blast in your area.

"Do you recognize this picture? 

Yes, it's the corner of Broad Street and Barber Avenue as it looked not so long ago. Now this familiar landmark has given way to the construction of a modern "One Stop" Service Station and Merchandising Center. When completed, we know you'll be proud of this modern addition to Broad Street. Watch for the opening date announcement. 

Gulf Oil Corporation"

There's a word for this sort of candy-coated corporate public relations nonsense... it's called "bullshit."

The lesson? Let's take away that not all "progress" is very progressive when you consider the future health of your community, especially when it calls for eliminating proud historic structures from the urban fabric, negatively impacting the quality of life for everyone. I would LOVE to sit down today with the very folks at Gulf Oil, city leaders and citizens in 1944 who sat back and let the Green Mansion "give way" for "modernity." Mostly I would want to know how that worked out for them. Did they make that killer profit!? I have said that an ounce of forethought is worth a pound of future investment, and apparently no one in 1944 had even close to an ounce.

I heard a great story recently of an 85 year old lifelong Woodbury resident standing up to City Council in the late 1970s when they proposed to return the brick sidewalk and decorative streetlamps along Broad Street. His statement was simple, "You might call this progress, but we had all of this and more when I was a kid. Why did the city rip it all out in the first place?" I think it's wonderful to recognize that certain actions were bad in the long run, such as originally removing the brick pavement and decorative streetlamps the first time around, but by then the damage is done and I'm certain that what has replaced the originals is a second rate knockoff, an insincere fake.

So the next time you hear someone argue the senseless destruction of quality urban fabric in the name of "progress," question that it will not ultimately be in the name of regress. I've said it before, the art of a good preservationist is concerned more so with the future and for the quality of life for residents in the "here and now" and for generations to come. It should alarm every one of us that America is starting to look like a substandard, plastic-wrapped, third-world country. This affects us all, whether you want to see the bigger picture or not.

Top: circa 1900 Mayor Lewis M. Green's mansion on Broad, a place worth caring about
Bottom: Same location now, the curb cut between the Bottom Dollar and the Rite Aid
(both currently vacant buildings, humorously enough)

Do we really wonder why we can't attract new residents, customers, and businesses to the area when these are our aesthetics... fake windows, unwelcoming storefronts, and MORE setback parking lots? The bottom photo does nothing to inspire the soul.

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Many folks are quick to blame the current climate of politics, etc. for the ills of the world today, but the truth is that things were set in motion after WWII in America that has lead us to today. Since roughly the 1940's, all across America, seemingly nothing better has replaced what was torn down for "progress." The Lewis M. Green mansion stood for 75 years, the cheap plastic gas station that replaced it only lasted about 30 and then a vacant lot stood there for nearly the same amount of time. The Rite Aid business that eventually replaced the gas station lasted about 20 years... are we getting the picture, yet!? We are constructing increasingly worthless buildings, housing increasingly worthless enterprises.

Today, many studies show that the auto-centric "modernizing" of America through horizontal development (sprawl) has had devastating effects to our once proud towns and cities. The effects reveal themselves through crime, anti-socialism, depression, segregation, isolation, and more. "Anybody who travels back and forth across the Atlantic has to be impressed with the differences between European cities and ours, which makes it appear as if World War Two actually took place in Detroit and Washington rather than Berlin and Rotterdam." - JHK. Do not Americans deserve better?

Progress should be measured over time, and the demolition of the Lewis M. Green mansion certainly did not progress the city, but rather I would argue the opposite holds. By tearing down that mansion and other proud buildings during the same time period, Woodbury entered an age of blight. Holes or "missing teeth" from senseless demolition and an over-catering to the automobile were beginning to form downtown which eroded its walkable functionality and aesthetic appeal. Coupled with the growing trend of suburban flight, it was a one-two-punch that has left Woodbury reeling.

Lewis Morris Green Mansion in a wintry photo from 1898

Moving forward we must realize that our actions today WILL affect future generations. It's not all about the immediate rewards... how about some forward-thinking? A single action in the past, by a single-minded person (or corporation) can deprive all future generations from enjoying a better quality of life and experiencing our American Heritage in the form of our proud local landmarks.

"Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set." - Proverbs 22:28

The dreaded For Sale ad!

Thanks for nothing, GULF Oil!

Below: some rare photos of the mantels that once adorned and warmed the interior of the Lewis M. Green mansion.

A Short History of America

American artist, R. Crumb's "A Short History of America" from 1979. He moved to France in the 1980s.

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Arrested Redevelopment

What has become of the places I loved? - Sarah Guimond

When historic buildings come down, the predictable cries from preservationists are heard throughout the land. But the reason behind these cries is often misunderstood. The cause of the outcry is not merely based on historic sentimentality due to the often misguided demolition of an old building, just because it is old, but it is actually what replaces these demolished structures that is at the root of good preservationism and the more serious of issues. The decline of our stately architecture within American cities, towns, and communities replaced oftentimes with slabs of tarmac or significantly inferior structures in the form of unadorned and windowless boxes (not to mention what we put in them) signify a frightening symbolic collapse of American standards and ultimately America as a whole. The great majority of what has been built over the past 50 years in America has been either blatant and wasteful sprawl or a sad attempt at urban infill with little, if any, aesthetic appeal. Aesthetic appeal to foster pedestrianism is worth more than we could ever imagine. We can no longer continue to ignore the damaging side-effects that disposable architecture wreaks in our towns.

Our standards have gone downhill fast...
8th and Chestnut, Philly. Then and Now

 A good preservationist's role is about more than just saving historic buildings. It is more so concerned with the overarching ideal of preserving once-proud American standards of urban fabric --our neighborhoods, our communities, our places worth caring about. That is what a good preservationist is ultimately trying to preserve when they question and oftentimes resist the status quo of poor choices and inferior development that the past 50 years of automobile-centric planning, AKA sprawl, has brought to the table. Architect and Urbanist Dhiru Thadani defines sprawl as a pattern of low density development that is characterized by dependence on the automobile, large lot residential development, and strict commercial development.

Unfortunately the general American public does not know any better to question these inferior living environments as we have nearly all been forced to live in them and accept their short-comings. There is a definite connection between our living environments and how they affect our psychological makeup. If sprawl development was the right way of doing things, it would not have failed... but it has on so many levels. Auto-dependent-suburbs in the form of the single-use subdivisions have only been successful in establishing segregation, higher taxes, declining property values, higher fatality rates, higher obesity, more traffic congestion, higher suicide rates, higher carbon footprint, higher pollution, and a slew of other horrible things. Even good old mainstream TIME magazine is finally announcing The End of the Suburbs! 2.7 million more poor now reside in car-dependent suburbs as compared to intact walkable downtowns and cities.

NOW is a crucial time to ask our city officials exactly what direction we plan to go in. A greater number of individuals now seek a denser, walkable, bikeable town, especially the young creative class Woodbury so desperately needs to attract and retain. More people every year are choosing not to drive (the numbers of drivers in the U.S. has steadily decreased since 2007). City planners should absolutely take this into account when proposing any new development. As an aside, I have always asked myself if we as Americans value our freedom so much, why do we continue to develop our towns in ways that enslave us to machines in the form of automobiles? Can there exist a better-planned suburb, one that is not a large metropolis that retains a respectable amount of personal space which made the original "idea" of suburbia so alluring? Yes, of course but it must favor Smart Growth over sprawl growth!

Why do I Care?

I, among a growing number of younger individuals I have met, moved to Woodbury for two things: 1) the city's remaining intact aesthetic historic architecture and 2) its potential to be a thriving urban center as it once was. My wife and I have spent many years living previously in Collingswood and watched the town go from desolate downtown (not unlike Woodbury's today) to active and thriving. Why we left is an unrelated story but we saw the same potential in Woodbury and decided to take a chance. Downtown Woodbury currently has a Walk Score of 65 (Somewhat walkable), which is not too bad, but we absolutely need to work on getting this higher. It should also not be limited to Broad Street. The Country Club Redevelopment would have been a perfect opportunity to introduce proper urbanism, to build a better neighborhood, but more on that below. Why should we care about this? Because higher Walk Scores are directly linked to higher home values. Homes with above-average Walk Scores are worth between $4,000 – $34,000 more than similar but less walkable homes. Other benefits of a high Walk Score include:

·  People in walkable neighborhoods weigh 6-10 lbs less.

·  Walkable places make you happier and healthier.

·  Significantly decreased carbon footprint.

·  Short commutes reduce stress and increase community involvement. (read more reasons: here)

Collingswood, with a Walk Score of 86, gets this and are accomplishing it by following a New Urbanism style Smart Growth plan incorporating their existing historic infrastructure with a firm grasp on aesthetic beauty. They are most fortunate to have a much narrower main street thoroughfare and therefore have predominantly escaped the damaging effects of the past 50 years of unsightly commercial strip mall development which unfortunately surrounds downtown Woodbury on both ends of Broad Street; the unfortunate consequence of having a state highway (45) run through your town. This is why I completely opposed the way Bottom Dollar was allowed to ignore our Main Street and Historic Preservation District designations AND Redevelopment Plan and build the junk of a building they did which is more aligned to an automobile strip mall than something you should see in a functioning walkable downtown. From this point forward we must strive to keep this stuff out of our downtown at ALL COSTS. Anyhow, I digress and I'm sure there are plenty of folks quick to dismiss the Woodbury/Collingswood comparison but it must be noted that for being a smaller location they have done a great job at retaining their urban density and as a result, Collingswood has nearly 4,000 more people that choose to call the borough home... and many of them are of a younger set. According to the 2010 Census, Collingswood boasted 2,337 citizens between the ages of 25 - 34, the slightly larger City of Woodbury reported 1,548. This variance will only grow in Collingswood's favor if we don't focus on bringing the right kind of development and better aesthetics to Woodbury.

"Usually, terrible things that are done with the excuse that progress requires them are not really progress at all, but just terrible things." - Russell Baker

Whereas Group Melvin Design created a fairly nice Downtown Redevelopment Plan with semi-New Urbanist principles for Woodbury a few years back (which the city has yet to follow), I'm not quite certain why this same design firm dropped the ball on the recently announced Country Club Redevelopment Plan. This plan, complete with sprawling driveways, expansive parking lots, McMansion subdivisions, single-use convalescent rehab medical facilities, and what will be Woodbury's first cul-de-sacs (welcome to the 1960s!), is a completely outmoded waste of space that does nothing to contribute to pedestrianism, commerce, or to the betterment of the city. This will do nothing to attract residents to live here and will ultimately contribute to more traffic congestion. It is the complete antithesis of Smart Growth. In other words, and as shown by population trends, it is exactly what young, educated professionals do NOT want to live near. I'm not against progress, I'm against bad progress and I really oppose development for the sake of development.

I'm disappointed that City Council voted 6-0 to approve this McMansion padded office park. Why did they not question the unsustainability of its design and the potential effect it will have on Woodbury's increasingly vanishing allure? The defense of  "more-rateables-is-good" will be touted I'm sure but we should all realize by now that it's the design of the development that will dictate whether these added taxables will be of any benefit when compared to the added "tax" the same development will have on our towns' resources and residents. The Sierra Club further explains that: our tax money subsidizes new sprawling developments, rather than improving our existing communities. Sprawl costs our cities and counties millions of dollars for new water and sewer lines, new schools, and increased police and fire protection. Those costs are not fully offset by the taxes paid by the new users. Instead, sprawl forces higher taxes on existing residents and hastens the decline of our urban tax base. In other words, this type of progress rarely even pays for itself and only serves to hasten the decline of residency and the overall attraction of the area.

On a side note: It was recently explained to me the reason for the sparseness of the design lay in the fact that the Country Club grounds are largely wetland and that our current school system could not handle a more densely designed, mixed-use community. Fair enough, but I still find it worrisome that the Country Club, something designed to increase health and fitness of the social community, is being replaced by a convalescent rehab medical center. In other words, a proactive health establishment is being replaced by a reactive health establishment. The symbolism is crushing. Like some kind of self-fulfilling prophecy, we are constructing medical-building monuments to America's increasingly destabilizing health which is largely brought on by our increasingly unhealthy living environments and lifestyles.

So this is what we're getting:

When we could've had this:

Or this (Rowan Blvd):

I speak for the growing number of us that are frankly tired of living in U.S. cities and towns that for the past 50 years have been self-destructing. That is why I continually advocate via social media the positives and negatives of living in Woodbury, a classic small American city, to over one thousand unique visitors to my sites every week. At times I use this blog to vent, as in this post, but ultimately it is in hopes that someone in a position of power in our city hears the cries of the younger generation. We simply want a better functioning place to live, one that is designed to place its residents over damaging commercial enterprises, a city that places people over automobiles. I hope our city officials realize that the growth they so crave is contingent on attracting new residents... not quite sure long-term convalescents count as that, but again it's more a question of how a development is designed that will align it with Smart Growth principles and the Country Club Redevelopment Plan is sorely lacking in proper density. Personally the deadline for how long I will continue to call the city "home" has now been set. Until then, I refuse to sit back and watch the decay of our standards and intellect which are constantly being weakened by the status quo of doing nothing and I will continually advocate:

aesthetically pleasing Smart Growth...

... over psychologically damaging and unsightly sprawl:

All in all, I know that New Urbanism style planning is still widely unknown in local circles and I will need to conjure a certain amount of patience while the predominant thinking that has led us down the wrong path dissipates in the face of solid facts and growing population trends. Anyone who is concerned with the future of our country should absolutely be concerned with these issues. We're at the forefront of a new modern sustainable city ideology, one that looks as good as it functions... one that uplifts the psychology of its residents and makes them proud. If it is anyone that could be considered "old-fashioned" it is those that persist in continuing down the same path that for the past 50 years has culminated in this current pitiful state. As a preservationist I am not merely concerned with our history but rather the future of our history. Good preservationists are not "stuck in the past"... they are truly concerned with what's to come.

- Bryan Alka

Want to learn more about building better cities and towns? Visit:

http://bettercities.net/
http://nextcity.org/
http://www.pps.org/
http://www.cnu.org/
http://www.strongtowns.org/
http://www.placeeconomics.com/

A Study in Urban Density & a Case for Historic Preservation

After recently coming across a June 1st, 1897 issue of Woodbury Daily Times and seeing ad after ad for Woodbury business diversity and self-sufficiency that was once located within a few blocks distance, I was inspired to write the following post. The date of this particular newspaper is not important, but rather the sense of community and sense of place that it conveyed to me and I began pondering our city's current predicaments and our compromised downtown core. Woodbury's story is no different than many American downtowns, and in this post I will attempt to explain how these areas wound up largely as "areas in need of redevelopment." I will also explain why historic preservationists are seen by the uninformed as 'hysterical,' but why historic preservation measures are essential for healthy revitalization. In addition, I will again question why city leaders (at the time) chose to mangle their own redevelopment plan for Bottom Dollar and finally illustrate why Woodbury, if correctly managed, can once again flourish.

It's amazing how effective urban density was around the turn of the century. How can something that grew out of organic living seem as remarkable as it does these days? Have we become that disposable and plastic of a society? The citizens of 1897 Woodbury, amounting to roughly half the number in population as today, had within a few blocks everything they needed to survive, complete with a supporting agricultural belt immediately surrounding the city. By today's standards, this is remarkable but Woodbury was not out of the ordinary. Think Disney's most popular attraction, Main Street U.S.A., and you will have pictured the quintessential pre-war American town, albeit in a non-fantasy realm. Over the last 50 or so years, our once lovely towns and supporting farms have been severely damaged by 'sprawl' development that have segregated and s-p-r-e-a-d everything from our homes to our schools to our work places to our shops to our entertainment across great distances; all of which at one time co-existed in a functional urban core. 

The existence of sprawl, was fueled, mind the pun, by the abundance of cheap oil, along with government assistance measures such as the 1946 Veterans' Emergency Housing Program, the creation of the interstate highway, and the growth of the planning profession. These factors combined with the unregulated industrialism at the time made many cities challenging to live in and spurred the unprecedented growth of automobile-centric suburban development; which is often negatively referred to as "suburbia." The term is confusing as it does not refer to all suburbs, as not all suburbs were created for autos; for example, take the extremely walkable towns that developed around train stops around the turn of the century which were quite lovely and functional. 'Suburbia' as I am referring to it, can be defined as the auto-centric single-use subdivision zoned areas which effectively segregated, intentionally or not, nearly every aspect of our lives. Fortunately this type of zoning and developing has recently been deemed outdated by industry professionals, although we are still feeling the trailing residual flashbacks of builders and city planners that have not quite gotten the message as of yet.

The effect that sprawl mentality had in our older downtown communities was devastating. Jeff Speck, successful city planner and co-author of the landmark book Suburban Nation writes in his new book Walkable City, "In the absence of any larger vision or mandate, city engineers-worshipping the twin gods of Smooth Traffic and Ample Parking-have turned our downtowns into places that are easy to get to but not worth arriving at. Outdated zoning and building codes, often imported from the suburbs, have matched the uninviting streetscape with equally antisocial private buildings, completing a public realm that is unsafe, uncomfortable, and just plain boring. As growing numbers of Americans opt for more urban lifestyles, they are often met with city centers that don't welcome their return. As a result, a small number of forward-thinking cities are gobbling up the lion's share of post-teen suburbanites and empty nesters with the wherewithal to live wherever they want, while most midsized American cities go hungry." For the good of the future of Woodbury what we need now is to completely rethink how we have zoned things for the past 50 or so years and encourage a better aesthetic and walkability in our downtown. Let us (re)build a place worth caring about and worth living in. Historic preservation plays a massive part in this, as I will illustrate later.

High St to W.Centre (L-R) proud density: proud residents circa 1928

Same area today... sad structures: sad residents

Winston Churchill famously stated, "We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us." Nothing says the project of suburbia failed more than by looking at our current way of life in America today and our disintegrating standards which has been directly correlated to the way we were forced to live over the past 5 or 6 decades. Anyone travelling across the Atlantic has to notice the differences between European cities and America; it appear as if World War Two was fought here and not there! Do I dare say that the cities of Berlin and Rotterdam are far nicer places to live these days than ANY segregated cul-de-sac you can zone up? At the very least European cities' murder rates are substantially lower than America's. How did this happen? To simplify it, it happened like this: The American Baby-Boomer generation and many of their parents' generation fled cities and older downtowns in droves for an illusion of "country living," which was made possible by the previously mentioned occurrences. Businesses followed close behind, ultimately leaving our original downtowns largely vacant. Of course this vacancy was quickly filled with an unproportional amount of America's poor that could not afford to leave and no longer had any positive role models or support systems.

These series of events never occurred at the level they did in Europe, hence their predominantly healthy cities. If I have to hear how nice Camden, N.J. once was from former residents that go on tell the story of how their decent middle-class families moved to the suburbs, I'll bust. Do they not see the connection? Most of these families left, not for any sort of issues that Camden currently deals with, but because it was actually encouraged by government assistance and planning trends at the time. Unfortunately the result, which was in the form of the automobile suburb has been shown to promote isolation and antisocial attitudes and has created a huge imbalance in today's communities. Just because a certain amount of the American public chose (and a decreasing minority still choose) to hideaway in 'McMansion' subdivisions, and no longer directly experienced some of the more annoying or perceived issues relating to a more communal 'city-life,' did not mean that those issues disappeared. The next few decades should continue to prove the failure of suburban development such as cul-de-sac subdivisions, office parks, malls, and big-box 'Walmart' style shopping centers. At the same time small cities are predicted to grow in popularity, or at least the small cities that aim to restore their urban density and aesthetic charm.

We should forget about building more parking lots or widening the roads or any other automobile-centric zoning. It's going to be very difficult for many to adjust to a contracted way of life, but believe it or not, there are those, especially in younger generations, that have no desire to drive, own a car, or live in suburbia. More than 77% of Generation Y and Millennials when surveyed said they would much rather live in denser, walkable traditional style neighborhoods and urban centers with quality mass transit options, e.g. light rail. Also a greater number of youthful and creative types every year are getting interested in homesteading, maker culture, and general DIY-style living; which is great, as these sorts of activities are often touted as the beginning stages of bringing America back to a more production-oriented existence. What is not so great is that although I know there are many of these types living in Woodbury, the city and local business community at this moment offers very little for them to stick around or encourage their like-minded friends, and other creative-class citizens to move here. This should be priority one. The FAF (Fall Arts Festival) committee along with our progressive public library are the only organizations I can think of that are actively attracting this group of people to our city. But it's not just the youth we appeal to by restoring our downtown's urban density. Think about what happens nowadays when older family members finally lose their ability or their right to drive... they also lose their independence to get around. They should have every opportunity to walk, shop, dine, and interact with their community and not remain cooped up in often distantly located old-age homes. A nod to the Woodbury Mews assisted-living center for being closely located to downtown and for their effective utilization of adaptive reuse of the 1880 G.G. Green Laboratory.

Adjusted for population growth, the recent
decline in driving by Americans is
unprecedented. Image: Doug Short

So how do we ultimately transform Main Streets like Woodbury's from teetering forever on the brink of revitalization? Surely, it cannot completely fall on the hands of volunteers to engage this city in revitalization efforts, although they play a massive part. A portion of this falls on the responsibility of Gloucester County business leaders to resist the damaging status quo of locating their business forever on the perimeter of once properly functioning urban centers. They should absolutely think now about abandoning the strip malls they now populate and return downtown, where business thrived before the onslaught of the auto. Eventually they may be forced to, as people drive less and less, but wouldn't it be financially economical to be ahead of the curve, or rather ahead of the downward slope of oil production and upward slope of gas prices? Of course it is also the responsibility of city government to encourage Smart Growth (the antithesis of growth in the form of sprawl). Wonder why NJ taxes are so high? There is a direct correlation between sprawl and our taxes. The Sierra Club have issued a series of important reports indicating that "Sprawl wastes tax money. It pulls economic resources away from existing communities and spreads them out over sparse developments far away from the core. Taxes subsidize millions of dollars worth of new roads, new water and sewer lines, new schools and increased police and fire protection at the expense of the needs of the core communities. This leads to degradation of our older towns and cities and higher taxes." I encourage city officials to take another look at the redevelopment plan on file. It encourages Smart Growth. Nowhere does it recommend a single-story building, setback from the sidewalk, with a parking lot in front of it, as is the case of the new Bottom Dollar building. In fact in that very spot, the redevelopment plan called for a two to six story building to be constructed at the sidewalk's edge with PARKING BEHIND THE BUILDING:

Image from the City of Woodbury's
Redevelopment Plan showing Bottom Dollar
location with parking BEHIND the building.

Section 7.1 H.1-2 in the Redevelopment Plan further states city goals and objectives are to: "encourage development patterns adjacent to existing historic structures that complement the character of the historic structures" and "encourage parking design for historic districts that is unobtrusive, minimizing the effect on the historic character of the setting." Why have we spent unknown amounts of money for a redevelopment plan if we are not going to abide by it!? Side note: In 2012 I was offered a spot on the Planning/Zoning board. I turned it down as it was strongly presented to me that the position hinged on my backing the Bottom Dollar development. Something I could not morally support.

Top: Sprawl Development
Bottom: Traditional Neighborhood Development

Which would you rather live in?

My only complaint with the redevelopment plan on file is that it only minimally illustrates the importance historic preservation plays in revitalization. The plan can easily be misread as if it requires replacing historic buildings with contemporary monstrosities. I do not believe that is the intention of the plan but rather a limitation of the artist renderings and lack of example photos of properly functioning pre-existing downtown urban aspects that most form-based codes supply. That is not to say I would mind a few modern structures tastefully intermingled as long as they were built with a higher aesthetic and quality materials, aligned to proper urban design standards. The redevelopment plan indeed calls for the delicate balance between historic and newer structures. Unfortunately the only "modern" buildings that do get built these days have nothing to do with real modernist design and result in some lifeless slab of contemporary construction. Many people do not understand why those who "get" historic preservation become so fervent in their quest to save historic buildings. It is literally because preservationists have come to understand that almost nothing built within the last 50 or so years has produced anything of any lasting quality. What often replaces a demolished historic building pales in comparison and is usually devoid of aesthetic beauty. Historic buildings were built to last many lifetimes compared to contemporary buildings designed to last only 30-40.

Architect, Derek King recently pointed out that, "Preservation is progress. Historic preservation is one of the most effective economic development tools there is Dollar for dollar, no program is more efficient than historic preservation. Since 1981, 1,600 communities have revitalized their downtowns using "Main Street" principles of preserving the historic nature of the neighborhood, investing $16.1 billion. The 89,000 building renovations led to 56,000 new businesses, and 227,000 new jobs." A Rutger's University report found that historic rehabilitation creates thousands of local, high-paying, high-skilled jobs every year. In 2012 alone historic rehabilitation created 57,783 new jobs. Over the 30-year life of the historic tax credit program 1.8 million jobs have been created. Donovan Rypkema, principal of Placeconomics who incidentally spoke to Woodbury officials last year states, "If a community did nothing but protect its downtown and historic neighborhoods it will have advanced every Smart Growth principle. Historic preservation and downtown revitalization ARE Smart Growth." He goes on to say, "Many people think about economic development in terms of manufacturing, so let’s look at that. Across America for every million dollars of production, the average manufacturing firm creates 23.9 jobs. A million dollars spent in new construction generates 30.6 jobs. But that same million dollars in the rehabilitation of an historic building? 35.4 jobs." It is also worth mentioning the 'green' aspect of keeping historic structures around, as rehabilitating old buildings keeps existing materials out of landfills and eliminates the energy consumption that the process of demolition, landfilling, the production of new materials, and new construction necessitates. New construction methods and materials consume many times more energy than historic construction. Rypkema further explains: "Here is a typical building in a North American downtown – 25 feet wide and 100 or 120 or 140 feet deep. Let’s say that today we tear down one small building like this in your neighborhood. We have now wiped out the entire environmental benefit from the last 1,344,000 aluminum cans that were recycled. We’ve not only wasted an historic building, we’ve wasted months of diligent recycling by the good people of our community.* As the first U.S. city to mandate recycling in 1980, this particular issue should be at the heart of Woodbury.

Often the word 'historical' when denoting a group of preservationists is mockingly changed to "hysterical," but many believe the hysteria is understandable when one considers that modern Americans do not create buildings that are as good as the old buildings we are losing. Don't ever tell me that aesthetically pleasing historic buildings don't contribute to the progress and Smart Growth of this city. There are a few critics that feel our "old buildings" are detriments to attracting new business, but if those same people would stop and take a look around at the reality of the situation even today, they will find the opposite is true. There is a clear reason why successful, functioning businesses choose aesthetically pleasing historic buildings for their locale. There is a reason why Charlie Brown's, Woodbury Station Cafe, Marlene's Mangia Bene, Priya Art Gallery, and others choose the buildings they are in. These structures are well maintained, historic, built to last, aesthetically-pleasing, people like them, etc., etc., etc. Do you really think any of the above businesses would have chosen any of the buildings on Broad Street that were either built within the last 50 years or have been so seriously remuddled that they no longer appear historic? The former locations of Dollar Sea, Fitness Unlimited, the former Boost mobile and others are vacant for the reason that they are ugly and people subconsciously or deliberately do not value these places. Historic and traditional downtown structures work when they are correctly rehabbed. This is not to say they need to be 100% historically accurate, a common misconception, just tastefully refinished... not slathered in stucco or covered with unsightly facades as many of our buildings currently are. Our chances to attract better businesses increase the more we enforce the protection of our stock of older buildings and eliminate the slow whittling away of their aesthetics.

You may ask then why historic preservation has not 'worked' in Woodbury as of yet. The Historic Preservation Commission, a volunteer board which can only advise changes within the Woodbury Historic District (most of downtown), has existed since 1977, so why have they not been successful in creating a pleasing historic downtown as of yet? As far as I can tell it all falls back to those in charge of upholding and enforcing the laws which has been very lax throughout the years. This is why businesses get away with illegally painting their brick building located in the historic district bright red with no ramifications; and buildings like the ones pictured below on the left, eventually replaced buildings like the ones on the right...

...and Bottom Dollar corporations can turn a local historic district and main street designated area into a parking lot. There are little to no negative ramifications for destructive actions in our community from business and homeowners alike. It is extremely damaging, much more than we care to believe. Do you think successful towns such as Haddonfield would stand for actions like these? Take their ACME for example. Even in the height of unmitigated sprawl development in 1954, ACME was not permitted to demolish a historic property they purchased downtown and instead Haddonfield officials demanded they incorporate the building in their design. Very smart, Haddonfield. Woodbury's HPC can advise all they want, but if no one in the city is backing them up or enforcing anything then what you wind up with is ultimately an unappealing wasteland of REMUDDLED buildings and parking spaces with no destinations left to drive to and park for. It takes strong municipal leadership that understands this and takes action against those that are in actuality, breaking the law. Why we as a city continue to bend over backwards for community destroying businesses, I'll never understand. An ounce of forethought is worth a pound of future investment. Until the city enacts these principles that they themselves have put into effect then we shall most likely continue to see our property values decline.

Emulating Haddonfield is one thing but take a look at other successful communities of nearby neighbors such as Swedesboro, Mullica Hill, Collingswood, Hammonton, Northern Liberties, University City, etc... even Westville looks good these days! They clearly have held on to their historic and aesthetically appealing architecture, limited the damage inflicted by the automobile by locating parking on the street or in hidden lots behind buildings and as a result have attracted many quality businesses to their downtown sections. In other words, they have largely retained their original density and it would be prudent to hold on to what's left of ours. As gas prices, car ownership, and cost of living continue to rise, coupled with America's near failing infrastructure, we may be seemingly forced to return to a more tight knit way of living. As I write this, news of yet another American bridge collapse has been reported in Washington. It is not encouraging to learn that many bridges across our country are in worse shape and could go at any minute. The way of the past 50 years of building things stretched across great distances is economically unsustainable. The easiest solution is to contract and focus all efforts on rebuilding our downtown communities by using the previously mentioned Smart Growth methods.

Unfortunately the bottom image literally surrounds us on all sides... what was once rich farmland. This method of business is becoming increasingly unsustainable and can be adequately handled downtown if we revisited traditional and successful main street development.

But it's not all doom and gloom and I apologize if it comes off that way. The positive here is that the future of America lies in our dense traditional downtowns like Woodbury. We stand to become a great urban center once again, but only if we stop catering to the lowest common denominator. The City of Woodbury's own redevelopment plan states some of our strengths as:

1. Traditional urban appeal. Regional and national trends toward smart growth, downsizing and energy conservation means renewed interest in small towns like Woodbury.

2. Regional position. Woodbury is uniquely positioned not only in terms of its small town appeal, but also as a community of regional significance.

3. Traditional bone structure. Woodbury has the higher density, mix of use, interconnected street network and multi-modal circulation system typical of a traditional main street community.

Here are a few additional reasons why I think we're aligned for future prosperity:

• As stated above, we still have a good amount of our core density intact and the more shoddily-built single-story contemporary structures and parking lots that were worked in over the past 50 years could easily be infilled with proper space utilizing structures that are sympathetic to a local historic district and Main Street designated area.

• As driving decreases to a critical point, we have the potential to reactivate our waterway access to the Delaware River, albeit limitedly for potential trading. It was once the major thoroughfare to the area before the original Kings Highway (which later became Broad St) was constructed by the British.

• Similarly as car dependency decreases we will need to rethink more sustainable means of travel. Thankfully we already have a project underway to link our city via passenger railroad once again to Philadelphia, Trenton, NYC, and beyond.

• As surrounding strip mall lots vacate, the process to convert these back to agricultural purposes exist. Thankfully we still have a good amount of local farming in the surrounding Gloucester County communities intact. It will be important to get as much food locally as possible.

• Unlike many of the other successful communities mentioned previously, we currently have a more diverse range of business rather than for example Collingswood which mainly consists of restaurants these days. In Woodbury, even today, my wife and I currently have a few minute walk to the dentist, doctor, barber shop, drug store, parks, bank, bakery, post office, chiropractor, library, various shops (of varying quality), and restaurants.

... but of course there is certainly room for much, much more. Let's see what an overview of Woodbury business looked like in 1897. While your gawking, keep in mind that this was just one newspaper's worth of advertising in one day, there was much more located within this same walkable 1 mile section including housing for many income levels, an opera house, horse and bicycle race track, the county court, hotels, pubs, etc. So, what do you think? Can you imagine us becoming a proud self-sufficient city again, like almost every pre-automobile city across America once was?

For even more vintage Woodbury Ads see my photo album on Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/q8j3bq3

* Want to figure out the embodied energy vs. demolition energy of a particular structure? Use the calculator found here: http://www.thegreenestbuilding.org/

For further reading:

Economic Benefits of Preservation Session, “Sustainability and Historic Preservation” by Donovan Rypkema http://www.preservation.org/rypkema.htm

Suburban nation: The rise of sprawl and the decline of the American dream by Duany, A., Plater-Zyberck, E., & Speck, J.
 

The great inversion and the future of the American city by Ehrenhalt, A.

Walkable City: How downtown can save America, one step at a time by Speck, J

For further viewing: