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GEOGRAPHY_OF_GEOGRAPHY

                                           October 30, 2001
"The Geography of Nowwhere" (1993)             
by James Howard Kunstler:                      
                                               NOWHERE_MAN

   "Civic-minded Portlanders, eschewing
   'big footprint' schemes like
   Detroit's RenCen, paid attention to
   the details of what was already
   there, and particularly to the way
   the elements of the city fit
   together."               p 201 
         
   "The main business district, and most
   of the important civic institutions  
   in Portland, reside on the west bank 
   of the Willamette, hemmed in by      
   steep, wooded foothills.  The rugged 
   geography has kept the downtown area 
   necessarily compact."   p. 201        
         

Okay, so here we're singing    
the praises of urban        
planners wise enough to pay    
attention to what's "already    
there".

What exactly is "already there"?  
      
   In this case, as       
   is often the     
   case, it's quirks                     
   of geography.                     UNINTENDED                
                                         

You must plan with that 
which is unplanned. 

                               geography = fixed landscape = unplanned 
  One of the big               
  advantages of                   Think about                         
  cities like                     computer geography                  
  New York and                    as opposed to                       
  San Francisco                   architecture.                       
  is that                                                             
  they're                              Urban geography?               
  squeezed by                          Applied Geography              
  the ocean.                                                          
                                            (Why isn't this book titled
  When land is                              "Architecture of Nowhere"?)
  scarce, it                 
  must be used               
  well...                    
               

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