Revitalizing American Cities

Afterword

Afterword Jeremy Nowak The nation’s economy has slowly evolved from an agricultural to an industrial to a postindustrial base, transforming our cities along the way. Some cities have grown, reinventing their economies and physical landscapes. Other cities have deteriorated. How, when, and where does revitalization occur? What factors contribute to cities’ capacities to prosper despite a changing economic environment? What strategies have successful cities used to reinvent their economies in response to economic disruption? This volume presents some answers, showing how cities have revitalized by recreating their economic, social, or physical systems to fit a new economic environment. There is one lesson that appears in every chapter in this book: revitalization will not happen by itself. It requires action—action based on a clear understanding of the drivers of growth and an appropriate vision and plan. In the first section of this book, we focus on understanding the drivers that encourage and enhance growth: • Glaeser explores the historic drivers of city growth, demonstrating the enduring vitality of the city center; how the successful city provides essential services and, beyond this, the role that human capital—in particular levels of education and “collective entrepreneurship”—plays in explaining growth in city “outperformers .” • Duranton points to the evidence the research literature provides on factors that cause metropolitan areas to grow. Research shows Afterword 257 the critical role played by transportation, industry clusters and, again, human capital. • Fee and Hartley identify the important relationship between density at the center and metro area growth, with new empirical results , noting the competitive advantage of cities that attend to their central business districts. • Cochrane, Koropeckyj, Smith, and Ellis provide data on the historical losses of manufacturing jobs in the nation’s 100 largest metro areas and highlight trends in city versus suburban growth. Historically, employment and population gains have occurred in the suburbs with cities’ growth share declining over time; surprisingly , most recent suburban employment and population growth is outpaced by employment and population gains in central cities, for the first time in the data, in 2010–2011. Authors of chapters in the second section ground their discussions in the experiences of cities with various degrees of success in revitalizing themselves, including a comparative examination of capacity to adapt to economic change. • Kodrzycki and Muñoz examine mid-size cities that have successfully weathered shocks over the past half-century and identify common strategies and characteristics, what worked and what did not, and the factors associated with cities changing course and recovering from decline. • Zeuli compares historically similar cities that have undergone similar economic shocks with dissimilar consequences, pointing to how the capacity of local actors to effect change matters and the importance of diversifying local economies in cities where one industry predominated. • Mallach creates a typology of vitality and resilience for small cities which that have lost their industrial base. He shows how cities that have succeeded in “coming back” leverage strengths and project a vision to attract citizens based on their assets, from natural resources to historical significance to blossoming artistry. The chapters in the book’s third section discuss policies to grapple with the legacy of the deteriorated physical fabric of many cities in the wake of deindustrialization. 3.144.93.73] Project MUSE (2024-04-25 13:06 GMT) 258 Jeremy Nowak • Brophy argues for the importance of targeted neighborhood policies , including for the “forgotten middle” to buttress the ability of cities to deliver quality of life outcomes. He emphasizes the importance of efficient provision of essential services, such as good schools and low crime rates, which improve economic outcomes for the city’s citizens, as well as expanding the tax base to improve fiscal resilience. • Mallach tackles the question of urban spatial reconfiguration, pointing to the virtues of an incremental approach to physical transformation that addresses real-world political and practical obstacles. • Alexander describes options for new legal and regulatory frameworks on the state and local levels, to confront the legacy of physical decline in order to repurpose land and rebuild communities. Chapters in the book’s final section showcase new strategies cities are using to revitalize, including building their capacity to adapt to change: • Birch shows the role of anchors in revitalizing small- and midsized cities. She shows how “eds and meds”—educational and health care institutions—have positive spillovers that translate into clusters of productive businesses. • Tumber looks at new economic activities cities can explore, making the argument that mid-size cities are in an especially strong position to...