City Bound

E. Frug Gerald, J. Barron David

Description

Many major American cities are defying the conventional wisdom that suburbs are the communities of the future. But as these urban centers prosper, they increasingly confront significant constraints. In City Bound, Gerald E. Frug and David J. Barron address these limits in a new way. Based on a study of the differing legal structures of Boston, New York, Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, San Francisco, and Seattle, City Bound explores how state law determines what cities can and cannot do to raise revenue, control land use, and improve city schools. Frug and Barron show that state law can make it much easier for cities to pursue a global-city or a tourist-city agenda than to respond to the needs of middle-class residents or to pursue regional alliances. But they also explain that state law is often so outdated, and so rooted in an unjustified distrust of local decision making, that the legal process makes it hard for successful cities to develop and implement any coherent vision of their future. Their book calls not for local autonomy but for a new structure of state-local relations that would enable cities to take the lead in charting the future course of urban development. It should be of interest to everyone who cares about the future of American cities, whether political scientists, planners, architects, lawyers, or simply citizens.

Sujets

• Sociologie, société et politique
• USA
• Local government law
• Administrative division
• États-Unis

Informations

• Publié par: Cornell University Press
• Date de parution: 15 janvier 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780801460081
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

CITY BOUND

CITYBOUND

How States Stifle Urban Innovation

CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS

Gerald E. Frug and David J. Barron

ITHACA AND LONDON

Copyright © 2008 by Cornell University

All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850.

First published 2008 by Cornell University Press First printing, Cornell Paperbacks, 2013

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data

Frug, Gerald E., 1939–  City bound : how states stifle urban innovation / Gerald E. Frug and David J. Barron.  p. cm.  Includes bibliographical references and index.  ISBN 978–0–8014–4514–9 (cloth : alk. paper)  ISBN 978–0–8014–7901–4 (paper : alk. paper)  1. State–local relations—United States. 2. Municipal home rule—United States. 3. Municipal government—United States. 4. Municipal corporations— United States. 5. Urban Policy—United States. I. Barron, David J. II. Title.

JS348.F78 2008 320.8'50973—dc22

2008024375

Cornell University Press strives to use environmentally responsible suppliers and materials to the fullest extent possible in the publishing of its books. Such materials include vegetablebased, lowVOC inks and acidfree papers that are recycled, totally chlorinefree, or partly composed of nonwood fibers. For further information, visit our website at www.cornellpress.cornell.edu.

Cloth printing Paperback printing

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For Stephen and Emily—Gerald Frug For Juliette—David Barron

Contents

Par t I

Preface Acknowledgments

CITY STRUCTURES  1.  City Structures and Urban Theory  2.  City Structures and Local Autonomy

Par t II SEVEN CITIES  3.  Home Rule  4.  Revenue and Expenditures  5.  Land Use and Development  6.  Education

Par t III CITY FUTURES  7.  The Global City  8.  The Tourist City  9.  The Middle Class City 10.  The Regional City

Conclusion Notes About the Authors Index

vii

ix xv

1

12

31

53

60

75

99

121

141

144

165

185

205

231 235 249 251

Preface

Traffic is terrible. Why doesn’t the city do something about it? The answer, this book suggests, is simple: it may not have the power. Cities have plenty of problems: schools, housing, crime, and global warming are just examples. Traffic congestion and inadequate mass transit are certainly on this list. Many ideas have been advanced about dealing with each of these issues. We focus in this book on the extent to which cities can implement any of them, however good they are. Only if the city has power to act can it be blamed if solutions are not implemented. This point probably seems as straightforward to you as it does to us. If so, it should seem as odd to you as it is to us that there is almost no literature analyzing in any detail how the legal system empowers and disempowers cities. We aim to fill the gap. Let’s take a closer look at the traffic problem. In April 2007, New York City’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg, proposed a bold idea for dealing with traffic in mid town and lower Manhattan: congestion charging. Under congestion charging those who want to drive to the busiest part of town during peak hours must pay to do so. Mayor Bloomberg’s proposal was to charge $8 for cars that sought to enter Manhattan south of 86th Street during the workday (trucks would pay more). As the mayor recognized, congestion charging is not a new idea. Its most wellknown example is in London, where the current charge is £8 (twice as much as Mayor Bloomberg proposed) to enter a large section of central Lon don. Recently, London’s affected area was enlarged, and the price of entering it was raised, due to the success of the original experiment launched in 2003. The impact of the congestion charge so far has been impressive. Traffic congestion in