Curt Ailes recently pointed me at this post from Historic Indianapolis showing the before, during, and after of freeway construction in the southeast quadrant of Indianapolis. The pictures say it all:
Before:
In Case You’ve Forgotten How Much Damage Freeway Construction Did to Our Cities
I wish there were street level pictures of the area before. A Kansas City version of this post would show an area where post Civil War houses were destroyed to make a highway, houses that I’ve read were unique to Kansas City, Missouri.
I frequently drive from my Northwestside home to Fountain Square via I-65 and I seldom fail to notice and think about all the destruction that highway brought. It’s so visible as you head toward Downtown — all those neighborhoods torn in two by the superslab.
When you look at the economic health of central cities in Europe (even those flattened by WWII) where highway construction through the heart of the city is unheard of, the thought process behind this seems insane.
It apparently not only destroyed a community and neighborhoods, but it’s now completely unfriendly to human beings, save those ensconced in cars.
I know nothing of the area, but I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that the majority of homes destroyed to make room for the freeway belonged to non-whites, too…
Actually, Riley, the area described was largely inhabited by Caucasians, many of Appalachian-American origin by the time the interstate went through in the 60’s and 70’s. Some Italian and Irish, too.
But the Indianapolis freeway loop was equal opportunity; north and northwest of there I-65 slashed through African-American neighborhoods.
Also, that view “today” really isn’t the view today. The one-lane-wide Indianapolis Cultural Trail now passes over the bridge at the left edge of the picture and was cropped out of the picture shown in the blog post. (Go to Google Maps and search “835 Virginia Ave. Indianapolis” to see the rest of the picture.)
Which is to say…it is very pedestrian friendly now.
In my native Pawtucket I95 drilled through the heart of the thriving blue collar parishes.As a boy I recall my excitment watching huge Campanella equipment bulldoze&blast the below street level path through the core of the city.My dad told me much later that the mayor partitioned St.Germain(our congressman)to get downtown exits.Well he got them and he also got a huge “Model City”dream.Not only did 95 swath through,but we received towers and business blocks of brutalistic structures.St Germain took great care of the elderly so the boots on the downtown streets had little cash in hand.If one looks at nostalgic streetviews of my city,it’s amazing what was razed.Thank God Eisenhower’s program left out our majestic churches.
“…it is very pedestrian friendly now.”
I do hope you’re just being facetious Chris.
Sooner than later freeways will become obsolete, since the “Obama Economy of Utter Doom” has virtually annihilated employment and 104 million able-bodied Americans no longer have full time jobs (1/3 the entire U.S. population) to commute to; and there is no need to drive to a job, since they don’t exist. I can already tell here in car-loving Los Angeles that the traffic is 50% lighter, and there is no more 3pm to 7pm rush hour gridlock and congestion where we used to just literally park the car and shut off the engine for 10 to 15 minutes and sit there on the freeway in a complete standstill and even get out of our cars and wonder about, greeting and chitchatting with one and other; the congestion is literally and completely gone, and the traffic is swiftly flowing at the 1970s rate once again.
Jeffrey, I am not being facetious. The trail does follow Virginia Avenue across that bridge. It does make for a far more pleasant walk or ride from downtown to Fountain Square, even across the interstate. The Indianapolis Cultural Trail is heralded by people who don’t live in Indianapolis as a marvelous ped-bike asset.
But I am working from a modern view. Most people alive today only know that neighborhood as it exists since 1970 or so, with an artificial channel containing a freeway cutting through it. The Cultural Trail passage is most definitely an improvement on the built-in-1972 environment.
Ok well, point being that simply having a trail, or a sidewalk, fancy lights, brick paving, etc., does not make an area “pedestrian friendly.” For that to be the case there needs to be actual things for a pedestrian to walk to or walk by. No amount of “pretty” can overcome being surrounded by fast-moving roaring cars. Sure it’s better than having no ped/bike facilities at all, but it’s putting lipstick on a pig.
Jeffrey, I understand where you’re coming from and agree with you in spirit. I know you mean well but it sounds like you are unfamiliar with this area.
The bridge over the interstate is indeed a dead zone, but Virginia Ave on either side of the bridge is once again thriving. The cars have largely been put in their place and their are plenty of things to walk to or walk by.
Now, if we can only get the interstate torn out…
Anyway, why does the so called “environmentalist, urbanist” president know about the damage freeways have done? Quite simply, he can’t afford to admit a government program did so much damage. Hence the excuse that somehow, GM made them do it.
BTW, I think Historic Indy does have images and history of some of the housing destroyed, which included several very high quality apartment buildings.
I linked to it before in a comment.
Here it is. Looks like this is about the same area.
Flats Lost: I-65 Construction
http://historicindianapolis.com/flats-lost-i-65-construction/
Hopefully this will dispel the usual excuse that only, “substandard” & blighted housing was destroyed by highway construction.
Of course in most cities, a chicken an egg problem emerges since many areas as fears of highway construction discouraged investment. The Pittsburgh region is still haunted by Mon Fayette Expressway plans.
Presumably the property owners displaced were compensated. Perhaps, even some were happy to have an unexpected offer for their property, enabling them to move to greener suburban pastures. Of course, those unfortunate folks these days being priced out of their urban neighborhoods by gentrification get no such windfalls. (Dare we speak of the disparate impact of gentrification by ethnicity? See Portland, OR, as Exhibit A.)
That’s like telling a rape victim, sex is healthy.
From the link I posted.
“Prices offered for homes and other buildings were protested by owners; the Community Service Council of Indianapolis pushed for assistance for displaced families to assuage the situation (The Polis Center, IUPUI). The state built the I-65 interchanges between 1968-1971. Ultimately, particularly Fountain Square felt a dramatic decrease in population (17,000 residents in the downtown area total were displaced) as well as access to social services.”
In many cities, projects remained in limbo for years or were never done leaving owners with disrupted lives, lower property values and no compensation at all.
Some thoughts:
It’s easy to say now that it would be nice to have some additional old buildings and homes in what later became trendy and improved areas such as Fountain Square but realize it was not so obvious at the time. I recall the highway system in general as being extremely popular though it’s true the cuts through the urban areas all across the country were more controversial in their day such as the Cross Bronx of course.
Issues of eminent domain and the role of government are a whole other aspect of this by the way.
But is it at least plausible though that in the case of Indianapolis the downtown I-70/I-65 loop ended up being a net benefit to the eventual resurgence of downtown through providing ease of access? For example, I think another commenter mentioned taking I-65 in order to come in and visit Fountain Square and the general consensus at least seems to be that downtown has improved and is doing fairly well. Would that be in spite of the highways downtown, because of it, or simply too complicated to be correlated? Did downtown I-65/I-70 delay what would have happened anyway or make it less as good? I think these issues are much more complicated than they are often made. It seems true that they created a type of physical barrier and of course that buildings were bulldozed to make them is also fact. However, the resulting overall effects to Indy I see as a little murkier.
Now it’s a trend to want to dismantle these interstates. It’s like some sort of ironic reverse Robert Moses but feels like the same hubris. At this point I think it prudent to leave them but indeed keep making efforts to improve their interaction with the areas they surround possibly such as were done on the Virginia overpass.
John Seisa’s post says it all. Thanks for sharing.
Claude Masse’s were also revelatory and highly worthy of mention.
Rural quality highways in highly urban environments were one of great, post-WW II urban disasters. Like the massive environmental problems created by the U.S. Corps of Engineers, they provide plenty of opportunities for self corrective strategies that will also employ many warm bodies in a more enlightened age.
Except they won’t, because no one gives a rat’s behind about cities or USACE projects — otherwise cities and agencies like the ASACE would be awash in cash doing things that enhance the American’s quality of life.
Unfortunately, Federal cash today goes to the the military, their numerous private sector partners and SpookWorld, the ultimate black hole of Federal spending.
This Indianapolis example with its disregard for the irregular street grid appears as if the highway planners at the time wanted to do as much damage to the city as possible. The irony is that unlike many east coast cities, Indy mostly has an orthogonal grid. They potentially could have designed the highways to have less impact if another path was chosen. In cities where interstate construction occurred earlier during the late ’50s or early ’60s, large junctions are often more compact, which required lower ramp speeds. The Indy junctions appear large in area and ramps look as if it’s easy to maintain a typical travel speed when exiting to another route, which perhaps is because Indy’s construction came later (’68-’71) when the interstate “standards” were more defined or established.
Peter, INDOT has one only design, a rural type interstate, and they use it everywhere. Even at near downtown streets like Raymond and Rural, there are large partial cloverleafs. Only one short section of I-65 (on the north edge of downtown), is built to an urban type design standard. It is a on viaduct running mid-block, with slip ramps to parallel streets.
Early designers of interstates did often consider the removal of “bad” or “substandard” housing to be a side benefit of highway construction and many routes and designs look like that was the main goal.
In this era, apartment buildings were defined as something to remove.
The historical problem is that the very existence of these plans and this mentality influenced how cities developed. One didn’t have to be smart or racist to understand the characteristics like density, multi- family housing, anything old; short blocks; large numbers of minority residents or proximity to a downtown would mark an area for future removal.
It’s funny. In retrospect-analysis people tend to overlook the mindset of the era, and instead in hindsight impose and project their own ideals on the past, but not realizing what is always true, being that what is new and futuristic is ultimately embraced in any society with minimal opposition, because it makes sense at that point in time, is fresh, cutting edge and never seen before, and the discarding of the antiquated, outdated and old becomes the order of the day. This is a tendency innate in human nature since civilization began. In 50 years, a retaliatory movement will emerge against the New Urbanism Movement (I predict it will be an anti-urban agrarian provincial movement) and will view its recommended proclivity towards highly dense concentration of urbanicity as a great foil having produced unforeseen ramifications of urban horrors. Then another Great Deconstructionism emerges, and someone will cleverly pen an article: “In Case You’ve Forgotten How Much Damage New Urbanism Did to Our Cities”. Nothing is an end-all or total solution. It has always been that way. So we move from one cycle, fashion and trend to the next, and then the next, and so on, readdressing mistakes of the past and new emergent problems generated by the previous cycle. It’s never ending.
“…what is new and futuristic is ultimately embraced in any society with minimal opposition, because it makes sense at that point in time, is fresh, cutting edge and never seen before…”
Really? In Indiana?
I’ve often wondered about New Urbanism myself. What is new and futuristic about New Urbanism? How is the movement connected to the previous one? A question should be framed as to whether or not New Urbanism or any other “-ism” is a fad or a trend, or if parts are a fad or others parts a trend.
New Urbanism is an outgrowth/reaction to 20th century Modernism. The movement differs from Modernism with its rejection of Modern architectural style and planning principles. The movement refers back to the past to understand what worked in previous pedestrian oriented settlements and Transit Oriented Developments (TOD). Some aspects of New Urbanism, especially at its beginning, embraced Modern ideas, such as the use of modern materials (though in a traditional manner), building or project scale and programming, and the acceptance and accommodation of the automobile (though granted in a new way).
A distinction should be made between New Urbanism and Urbanism. High-density pedestrian oriented Urbanism has had a pretty successful seven thousand year long run. The rail/pedestrian city has been around, depending on how you count it, for 125- to 175-years. Auto culture has been dominant for 60-years and began to show signs of difficulties only after 30-years. New Urbanism didn’t emerge until the 1980s and 90s. The fashion or fad aspects of New Urbanism are already becoming dated, such as the adherence to Neo-classical architectural features or restrictive/regressive land-use regulations.
Nothing is an end-all or total solution. However, more than other solution, the imposition of auto-centric land use patterns has been particularly artificial and damaging worldwide. No other time in history has the impact of human activity been so amplified as with auto-centric design, except perhaps for the agricultural revolution ten thousand years ago. In many metropolitan areas population has only increased slightly, yet consumption of land for urban uses has increased five times within a 50-year period to accommodate cars, while densities have plummeted. The other technological insertion, the railroad, could coexist and complemented or enhanced existing pedestrian oriented settlements–highways and cars don’t.
The underlying trend of New Urbanism has succeeded at reframing the assumptions of the 20th century city and its dependence on cars and highways. Rural agricultural and urban pedestrian oriented settlements have existed for millennium. It’s doubtful that the same will be true for auto-centric culture.
Actually, all ‘new’ design movements are retaliatory movements or protest movements, outcroppings that emerge from intolerance against a previous mode or status quo. This is true for ‘new’ political movements as well, art movements, and even multitudes of the musical genre spectrum that have emerged. What emerges is not necessarily ‘good’, i.e. Italy’s Futurism Movement embodied the manifestos that formed the very foundation of Mussolini’s Fascism, but it is an expression against the previous norm. To some extent, its ‘appearance’ is just seemingly ‘new’ to the untrained eye.
The New Urbansim Movement is a retaliatory movement against the egalitarian Garden City Movement birthed by Sir Ebenezer Howard (godfather of the 20th Century modern suburban model) that was repackaged with the modern euphemism “Suburbanism” or “Suburban Movement”, a flight from metro core density and deterioration for rural-like freedom and natural aesthetics.
But before this trend of the Garden City Movement materialized, there was the highly dense urbanization of city tenements that morphed into ghettos during the Industrial Age of city centrality in which agrarian based provincial societies migrated to city cores for opportunities, education, manufacturing labor employment and developing cultural and business exchange environs, but simultaneously produced unforeseen problems that a dense concentration of people in a beehive complexity eventually and ultimately manifests; i.e. in that particular case being opportunistic exposure to communicable diseases, child labor abuse, pollution from coal factories, and so on.
So what can be vividly detected here is a recurrent oscillation pattern from rurality (Agrarian-Provincial) to urbanicity (Industrial Age Density), back to rurality (Garden City/Suburban), then back to urbanicity (New Urbanism/Beehive), and then (eventually) back to rurality (Neo-Agrarian-Provincial), each being a retaliatory protest movement from the previous mode and status quo that preceded it.
“The New Urbansim Movement is a retaliatory movement against the egalitarian Garden City Movement birthed by Sir Ebenezer Howard”
I don’t think that’s right. If you look at pictures of Andres Duany’s developments, and then, say, Forest Hills Gardens, which was explicitly inspired by the Garden City concept, you’ll find they’re actually quite similar. Ebenezer Howard imagined buildings that addressed the street, that were walkable to local shopping districts, and communities that were connected to each other by mass transit. He may have put more emphasis on greenery than New Urbanists today, but that’s because he was reacting, as you say, to an era when greenery was in much shorter supply. In the actual execution, there’s not much that’s incompatible between Garden Cities and New Urbanist suburban or outlying city neighborhoods.
I think the right reading is that New Urbanism is a reaction against Corbusian models like the Radiant City, which is the first really influential design to deny the importance of the street, to fetishize “open space” in such a way that you get towers in parks, and to imagine that everyone will get around by car. Even executed brilliantly – in Brasilia, say – the Radiant City is pretty much anathema to urbanists in ways that Garden Cities just aren’t, even if the average urbanist themselves would rather live in a denser-looking area.
^ And I would add that I think what this says, although obviously this is just my interpretation, is that Corbusian design really does represent an extreme swing on the urban-rural pendulum: it’s the first model that doesn’t really allow for a pedestrian experience at all, and that relies totally on private transportation. Which, as we’ve seen, causes certain serious logistical problems, in addition to all the other somewhat more ideologically-contingent issues. In contrast, the Garden City also relied on new transportation technology, trains, to allow there to be suburban “pods” that were still connected to a metropolis, but a) trains don’t have the same logistical issues as cars in high-population areas, and b) each Garden City, within itself, allowed for the same kind of walkability as cities have relied on for literally the entire existence of human urban living.
So my guess – obviously I can’t see the future, and also obviously this is somewhat hopeful – is that Corbusianism will be a high water mark for car-dependence, for those reasons. I think that just as there is probably some basic, universal impulse not to live in super-high-density cities, or at least to have access to greenery, there’s also an impulse to interact with your environment as a pedestrian. The two aren’t really incompatible.
Mr Brassard’s(a man who’s writing I’ve been reading for years)take on New Urbanism get’s a pass from me on several fronts.Readers need to know he was and may still be an engine to planners and visionaries throughout Providence’s generation long drive to find balance in inventing something that was not there before.New Urbanism wasn’t there before,simple.Pride of place,like preservation&new development seem at odds.
As a young 20 something back in the 70’s,just a crane on the skyline gave me hope for my city.How tall?How big?Providence always ,at least to me,always had some project in play.The preservationists meanwhile kept the old fabric intact.A walk on Benefit st.informed me how delicate the Providence marrow was even during decline.When r.r.tracks were lifted and moved&rivers exposed ,It was overwhelming to most of us locals(what the heck is goin’ on here?).Yes it was vision that set a new language for the city.
A few years ago I195 was moved 1/4 mile south of its former path.What a breath of fresh open space revealed.Interesting how we were jaded by then.After 30 or so years change we barely bat an eye at herculean projects in Providence.
Now we can paint,create loud electronic symphonies,&watch braziers of scented wood light the night.That’s New Urbanism.
That’s really inaccurate, the Duany-FHG example cited is contradictory, because FHG is one of the first American examples of suburban sprawl of a majority of single-family dwellings patterned intentionally by architect Olmsted after the Hampstead Garden Suburb of London, an influence from Howard’s Garden City, and Duany is adamantly anti-suburban and anti-sprawl, forming the foundation of his New Urbanism Movement as a retaliation to the former. The Corbusianism (or Modernism) is merely the sprawl of Suburbanism maximized to its greatest extent (sprawl on steroids) and dovetailed with Monumentalism, a glorified Garden City, of which the New Urbanism is a countermovement; that, I do agree.
Don’t bother reading/responding to anything Jon Seisa writes. His first posting (#9 above) contained enough misinformation to warrant writing him off as a crackpot.
“…104 million able-bodied Americans no longer have full-time jobs (1/3 the entire US population…”
Bureau of Labor Statistics, July 2013 (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm):
The number of unemployed persons: 11.5 million
The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary
part-time workers): 8.2 million
That adds up to about 20 million under-/unemployed Americans. I guess when you are writing about the ravages of President Obama though, you have to inflate your figures by an order of 5.
And the same goes for this despicable Dave character, a hack of half-truths casting dispersions to instigate character assassination, preferring to cherry pick data to artificially uphold his own biased and hollow argument of complete and ludicrous nonsense.
The truth is back from data gathered in March, 2013 by the Bureau of Labor, it was cited “90 million working age, able-bodied Americans are no longer in the workforce”. This data factored in with the BOL statistic of approximately an average of 663,000 American job seekers dropping off the job hunting process each month in addition to the monthly full time unemployed rate (not jobs gained by part-time employment that is being used as a ruse by the Obama Administration for job gains) results in a trend after 6 months of unabated accumulation to roughly 104 million able-bodied Americans no longer in the workforce.
SOURCE: “663,000 Americans Dropped out of Labor Force in March; Total Number “Not in Work Force” Approaches 90 Million”
http://bhcourier.com/663000-americans-dropped-labor-force-march-total-number-not-work-force-approaches-90-million/2013/04/05
These unemployment numbers are glaringly huge.90 million?The us has approximately 312 million.Including children and the seniors maybe.This is a bogus number otherwise.
No, it was reported also on a U.S. national radio show on CBS Radio. I heard it with my own ears. What’s bogus is the partial-info propaganda data spoon-fed to the unquestioning and gullible masses, like lapdogs. Here’s more data with graphs for the skeptically inclined: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-04-05/people-not-labor-force-soar-663000-90-million-labor-force-participation-rate-1979-le
Additionally, there are reports on the Net by highly reputable economists who estimate the real unreported unemployment rate hovers between 25% and 30% (“Hiding a Depression: How the U.S. Government Does It”: http://danielamerman.com/aSix.htm ), which appears to mutually correspond to this separate data, exceeding the 24% unemployment rate of the Great Depression. This translates into a much more catastrophic economic scenario and the reality of the presence of a U.S. Mega Depression being covertly concealed by TPTB. Demonstratively visible behemoth soup lines of starving masses is being circumvented and completely eradicated by merely providing electronic food stamp credit cards (EBT) that was not available during the Great Depression; hence, the real gravity of the situation is entirely and cleverly masked. Current food stamp recipients have escalated to nearly 50 million Americans, a staggering number. Also, half of all Americans (50% of the U.S. population, or roughly 165 million Americans) are now at or BELOW the poverty line, though the U.S. Census Bureau only reports a sanitized number version of 15% (a half-truth), and this trend is creeping into the bottom half of the upper 50% tier via expanding wealth erosion: http://www.salon.com/2013/05/30/half_of_americans_living_below_or_near_poverty_line_partner/
Additionally, the 2013 average American annual income has plummeted to 1979 standards. All this despite a titanic $8 TRILLION flagrantly spent by this administration in 4 measly years, since 2009 (DOUBLING THE NATIONAL DEBT since George Washington and exceeding all the money spent by ALL the previous 43 presidencies, COMBINED [yes, including GW Bush’s spending and the cost of his 2 wars], and over a 237-year span0, to artificially prop up the U.S. economy and federal government; when in reality it has been a fleecing of America with untold sums unaccountable, and just plain missing. In comparison, Bush spent $5.2 trillion over 8 years, which pales to Obama’s planned recklessness. Before this, the U.S. national debt was $3 trillion since Washington. Today the grand total is $16.2 trillion of debt, but is much higher and worse when compounded interest on the debt and inflationary dollars are factored in; some economists estimate a super grand total of a gargantuan $32 TRILLION of debt.
I suggest you read about the coming discontinuity “critical complexity threshold” published in Forbes Magazine by John Mariotti, projecting the complete collapse of the U.S. federal government in 2017-18 (see graphs), when it will reach the critical vertex of exceeding spending of the amount of revenue it actually takes in, thus becoming top heavy and collapsing by virtue of its own weight: http://www.forbes.com/sites/prospernow/2012/01/26/america-in-danger-of-collapse/
When this federal discontinuity event happens it doesn’t take much imagination as to what will subsequently transpire. The entire U.S., its states and its CITIES will radically transform over night into an unfathomable Ultra-Dystopia of the worse case scenario, because the federal government will be made nullified and cease to exist; and all its gravy train assistance will be permanently severed and made entirely void. Hungry federal dependents will be made extremely desperate, unleashing their fury and madness as an incendiary that will most likely trigger mass anarchy (think ‘Greece’ and ‘Egypt’ on mega-steroids). There will be food shortages and technology grid breakdowns affecting everything from water, electric and fuel deliveries and availabilities. Think ‘Detroit’ on mega-steroids from coast-to-coast. In the riotous and genocide aftermath, survivors will convert to an agrarian-based economy/lifestyle and abandon the post-anarchic hollowed out and conflagration ruined cities with their empty edifices, given over to un-policed regional and territorial brutal street overlords (think ‘Urban-Somalias’ or “Dead Men’s Zones’) inflicting great inhumane atrocities… to, instead, migrate to rural areas and live in self-reliant, self-sufficient, self-governing and protected agrarian provincial commonwealths with their own local insulated economies, barter systems and/or regional currencies. These will be cluster-net communities of relocalized provincialism economies, where globalism will be a beastly thing of the past, and possess downgraded internet activity, and foster development of hydroponic technology, super foods, agri-tech breakthroughs and natural medicinal sciences (Monsanto and Dupont bioengineered toxic and cancer accelerant GMO seeds will be completely rejected and purged). A federation of states will most likely be nonexistent at that point in time and it will be the absolute termination of the shadowing tyrannical government of non-transparency and oppression.
There are 197 million 18-64 year olds in the US. There are 156 million people in the labor force. This leaves a gap of 41 million. Not sure where all these stats are coming from.
Whatever the real numbers are, we do know they are not the Media and BOL so-called “official” numbers that are spoon-fed to the masses; these numbers need to be questioned rather than accepted blindly.
Forbes Magazine states: “…the ‘official’ unemployment rate does not count… discouraged workers who have settled for part-time jobs or have given up looking altogether. Tracking those individuals, under what is called the ‘U-6’ rate, gives a very different measure of the nation’s unemployment rate: 14.3%.”
“Why The ‘Real’ Unemployment Rate Is Higher Than You Think”:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/dandiamond/2013/07/05/why-the-real-unemployment-rate-is-higher-than-you-think/
The unemployment rate is actually 100% since none of the population is doing work that gets paid in gold. Fiat money is tyranny and all work done for fiat money is like forced labor at a Soviet gulag and should count as unemployment.
Lol, extremely astute observation, Mr. Alon Levy. And those worthless Fed Reserve banknotes printed 24/7 by Rothschild and Culprits towards the USD collapse and mega-hyperinflation (2017-18) don’t even make good toilet paper. You should see the stunning YouTube video: “The Money Masters”, it acutely explains the entire fiasco. If Americans only knew that the Republic has been nonexistent for 80 years; that the Republican-Democrat hostile dynamic strategy is a superficial decoy facade; that Americans actually live in the 14th Colony; and that the lease is up.
Before we go down, perhaps we can plan a beautiful city as a token memoriam of the once flourishing American Civilization, a sort of artifact museum piece for future archeologist to ponder, “This mysterious and barren wasteland Usa must have been splendid at one time. What is that curious green colossus over there on the horizon near those ruined towers? It is a ruinous woman crowned with a diadem of broken spikes; her damaged erect right arm must have held a sword, or torch. Obviously, she was their great goddess. Clearly, it was a matriarchal society where men were worms.”
I have been looking at homes in Fountain Square, and it is amazing how 65 cuts off the south part of the neighborhood. Even with two-way protected bike lane on Shelby Street, the area just north of Pleasant Run Parkway just feels so isolated.