Ray Oldenburg <roldenbu@uwf.edu> Date: Thu, 04 Nov 1999

Dear President Stukel:

I wish to join the chorus of voices who have spoken in behalf of the preservation of Maxwell Street and the Market. The historical importance of the area, its musical heritage, its legacy of providing both the immigrant and native poor the means to rise in our system, have been dealt with passionately and eloquently by others. I need not echo their refrain.

My interest and my professional efforts focus is upon the public life of our cities. I have documented and lamented its decline in a considerable number of publications, the best known of which is a book entitled The Great Good Place which identifies informal public gathering places as essential to community and public life. My interest in Maxwell Street is simply that of preserving its vitality and its inclusiveness against the sterility which threatens.

I was appalled when I toured the area some weeks ago. The campus expansion seems a lifeless, desolate-looking waste of space compared to what remains of the Maxwell community. It is as though Chicago has learned nothing of the ravages of urban renewal and the destruction of neighborhoods lost in its wake.

Maxwell Street represents a setting which many cities would cherish as a key to revitalization. The market feature, so deliberately discouraged now, is a proven asset which responsible planning and far-sighted policy should heartily encourage. Consider the abundance of examples from other cities. New Orleans’ French Quarter and its Market have become the mainstay of that city’s identity and economy; yet not many years ago, the powers that be nearly succeeded in destroying it by dissecting it with several lanes of highway. Seattle’s Pike Street Market was rescued by a citizens group against the designs of several elected officials. It now attracts both locals and visitors in great numbers, and in contrast to the cold emptiness amid the downtown skyscrapers, the market has life.

A half-dozen blocks from the Capital in Washington D.C., the Eastern Market is regaining vitality thanks to weekend flea markets and street vendors. Consequently, area businesses are doing much better, the streets are safer, and the crime rate is down. Charleston’s market offers a popular alternative to the cloned uniformity of shopping malls. In Harrisburg, the weekend market affords a festive family outing for many of that city’s residents in addition to providing fresh, low-cost fruits and vegetables.

Enjoyable cities are careful to provide for the full diversity of their populations. An acquaintance of mine, a renowned and highly successful architect, has homes in San Francisco, Vancouver and London. He told me that he doesn’t much care for San Francisco anymore. "It’s become a city of 700,000 yuppies", he said, "the interesting people can’t afford to live there anymore."

His observation was astute and reflects the fact that the affluent people in our society contribute relatively little to a vital public life. It is people with limited means and possessions in their private lives who, of necessity, do more of their living in public settings. Moreover, they tend to acquire habits of human interaction that lend vitality to the places they inhabit.

Lively streets are not easily restored in American cities. An enterprising student of the late William Whyte Jr. presently consults in 60 to 70 municipalities a year and his clients all want the same thing --- to return life to downtown areas. For several years now, I’ve watched my native Minneapolis spare little expense trying to revitalize Nicollet Avenue but with limited success. In fact, the city is fare more effective in evicting the poor from the area than in attracting the affluent.

Maxwell Street, even in its present beleaguered condition, remains an urban success story. Here you have a diverse population living in harmony. Here you have an economy that offers entry for those at the bottom. Here you have a low, almost non-existent crime rate. Here street vendors are selling legal goods, not drugs. Here you have an intricate social organization in which reputations and trust are formed and recognized.

Maxwell Street is also something of an economic safety valve. If the bubble of our prosperity should ever burst, it is neighborhoods like Maxwell which are best equipped to deal with legions of the "Newly Poor."

At greater length, I risk not being read at all and so I will close having made my major points. I hope you will consider them in the spirit in which they are offered. I firmly believe that not only Maxwell, but the city as a whole, will benefit more from preservation than destruction.

Sincerely,

Note (by Steve Balkin): I call Professor Oldenburg the "Einstein of Place". His book, The Great Good Place (New York: Paragon House, 1991) illuminates the importance of "third places". The first place is where we live; the second place is where we work; and third places are where we meet informally. "The character of a third place is determined most of all by its regular clientele and is marked by a playful mood, which contrasts with people's more serious involvement in other spheres. Though a radically different kind of setting for a home, the third place is remarkably similar to a good home in the psychological comfort and support that it extends. …They are the heart of a community's social vitality, the grassroots of democracy, but sadly, they constitute a diminishing aspect of the American social landscape."

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