HomeDiagramsDatabaseMapsForum About
     

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Discussion Forums > City Discussions


Reply

 
Thread Tools Display Modes
     
     
  #1  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 2:46 PM
the urban politician the urban politician is offline
The City
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Chicago region
Posts: 21,375
Post-pandemic, who will fight for our big cities? NO POLITICS

When the pandemic is eventually over, lots of people are assuming that things will return to normal.

I am not so sure, and I’ve raised the alarm bells elsewhere.

I’m quite worried about our densest urban centers (NYC, Chicago, SF, DC, etc) that particularly rely on concentrating a lot of people into small areas, and have historically relied heavily on rail transit.

My concern is that the very same class of people who populated downtown office buildings and patronized restaurants, museums, entertainment, etc are also the ones whom technology has allowed to more easily work from home. In some cases, for good.

Office users will shrink their footprints. Dramatically. And along with that, a collapse of service retail districts and hotels.

Add in a general disdain from many for landlords (oh, they are rich anyway, serves them right!) and I am very worried that nobody is going to really fight for our central cities when the pandemic is over.

Who is going to bring people back?
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #2  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 2:51 PM
llamaorama llamaorama is offline
Unicorn Wizard!
 
Join Date: Oct 2008
Posts: 4,204
It will be the same people who cared about cities in the 90s and early 2000s before gentrification chased them all off.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #3  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 2:54 PM
the urban politician the urban politician is offline
The City
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Chicago region
Posts: 21,375
^ So you think that Chicago and New York will see a blue collar boom in their office cores?

Having a hard time wrapping my head around that one.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #4  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 6:23 PM
llamaorama llamaorama is offline
Unicorn Wizard!
 
Join Date: Oct 2008
Posts: 4,204
Quote:
Originally Posted by the urban politician View Post
^ So you think that Chicago and New York will see a blue collar boom in their office cores?

Having a hard time wrapping my head around that one.
Well no, I was thinking more along the lines of:

Local companies and/or those with local roots
Longtime stalwarts in the entertainment and publishing business
Bohemians
Artists

What I can see happening is the nicest, newest, highest quality office buildings would still be occupied as companies downsizing would take advantage of lower rents and move to better spaces, and then the vacancies in old buildings would result in conversion to other uses. There are so many people living in New York in undersized and overpriced accommodations that an increase in vacancy would just enable folks to move up to a nicer unit without needing a roomate. Just a thought.

Of course just factories in Brooklyn, maybe some buildings will meet the wrecking ball. Who knows. But it won't be the end of the city.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 7:07 PM
TWAK's Avatar
TWAK TWAK is offline
Resu Deretsiger
 
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Lake County, CA
Posts: 14,905
Quote:
Originally Posted by llamaorama View Post
It will be the same people who cared about cities in the 90s and early 2000s before gentrification chased them all off.
…being that one person in the room saying riding the bus/train is ok .
__________________
nobody cares about your city
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #6  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 7:48 PM
Qubert Qubert is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2009
Posts: 506
Quote:
Originally Posted by llamaorama View Post
Well no, I was thinking more along the lines of:

Local companies and/or those with local roots
Longtime stalwarts in the entertainment and publishing business
Bohemians
Artists
My intention is not to sound disrespectful, but this ideal of cities subsisting on organic farmers markets, coffee shops, art galleries and artisan maker spaces is simply not realistic. Sure, that might sustain New Hope, PA or even Chapel Hill, NC but not Chicago. Cities are primarily economic creations first and cultural phenomena second and this has held true across the entire span of history, cultures, and spectrum of governmental, economic and societal structures.
Even Detroit's comeback has been propelled by a reversal of job flight from the city and a large amount of capital investment, not to mention still being the anchor of a pretty wealthy and dynamic metro region.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #7  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 8:23 PM
benp's Avatar
benp benp is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Buffalo, NY
Posts: 627
Centrally located residential and business districts are not losing their locations, and will remain attractive in the future because of their locations.

Many offices and hotels will be repurposed to residential. The city cores will become more densely populated, but with fewer day workers commuting in. There will be an increase of work-from-home and an increase in neighborhood oriented retail and services. Less destination shopping, and the larger retail rental market could decline, best case being rents decrease enough to encourage and allow more low-overhead local oriented businesses. Common outdoor spaces (parks, etc) will continue to be more utilized as there will be more residential and live-work from home, and will be expanded. Quality of life for local residents may likely improve, although the overall business and commercial industries may be contracting.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #8  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 8:27 PM
llamaorama llamaorama is offline
Unicorn Wizard!
 
Join Date: Oct 2008
Posts: 4,204
Quote:
Originally Posted by Qubert View Post
My intention is not to sound disrespectful, but this ideal of cities subsisting on organic farmers markets, coffee shops, art galleries and artisan maker spaces is simply not realistic. Sure, that might sustain New Hope, PA or even Chapel Hill, NC but not Chicago. Cities are primarily economic creations first and cultural phenomena second and this has held true across the entire span of history, cultures, and spectrum of governmental, economic and societal structures.
Even Detroit's comeback has been propelled by a reversal of job flight from the city and a large amount of capital investment, not to mention still being the anchor of a pretty wealthy and dynamic metro region.
Cities can't subsist on snowless winters, golf courses, and beaches either. Someone needs to tell the 3 or 4 million or so folks in Tampa-St Pete's that. By this logic it shouldn't exist as a major city since it's only real economic function is phosphate mining and a rail served port complex

If a city has something attractive to people, then people will want to live there even if they could live somewhere else. IMO American cities since the postwar era have existed in a consumption oriented service economy context. Companies that employ white-collar workers locate offices where their workers are as much as workers locate where their office is. It's not like Wall Street has to literally trade in slips of paper or retailers need to be close to Amazon's mail room.... It also needs to be noted that again, a lot of people don't work in jobs that are remote. A lot of people work in the service industry or in blue collar occupations. And people are often anchored to a place by family.

There's probably an argument to be made that economic complexity concentrated geographically has economic benefits too? Organic farmers markets and coffee shops might all lease commercial restaurant equipment, so you get a dealer who specializes in that. Maybe the regional warranty service center for these machines locates nearby. Then you get a car dealer who specializes in Ford Transit and Dodge Sprinter vans to sell to these repairmen, and then someone who has a side gig doing spray on bedliners. Oh and light industrial space, real estate, a trade school. It just snowballs from there, right?

In a rural area where everyone lives miles apart all these services are less viable since it would take a whole day for the repair man to go fix the one broken Hobart machine in Middlebury Vermont, he'd have to charge a lot more for labor to make up for it being his only gig of the day and charge a lot in mileage. The cost of building a commercial kitchen increases as equipment costs more and the guys who build it want more, and so there are fewer organic farmers markets and coffee shops in this little town and they charge more for an apple pie or a latte. Slowly but surely I think the economy would yield more jobs and wealth per dollar that "trickles down" in the form of consumption spending by some work-from-home tech or finance worker in the city where things are clustered and more efficient than in the little town, and as a result the city would sustain itself.

Last edited by llamaorama; Nov 8, 2020 at 8:55 PM.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #9  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 10:57 PM
Qubert Qubert is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2009
Posts: 506
Quote:
Originally Posted by llamaorama View Post
Cities can't subsist on snowless winters, golf courses, and beaches either. Someone needs to tell the 3 or 4 million or so folks in Tampa-St Pete's that. By this logic it shouldn't exist as a major city since it's only real economic function is phosphate mining and a rail served port complex
Yes, it's true that Florida isn't an economic powerhouse nor is Phoenix. I'd argue however that this somewhat is in line with what I'm talking about:

Let's begin with the inherent fact that 330 million Americans have to live somewhere, and clearly there will be population agglomerations that spring up as a result. With this being said, one, we do have to account for the fact that these are ultimately retirement centers. You can make the argument that just like humans concentrated in places like Europe, The Fertile Crescent, The North China Plain, North India, etc for their fertile lands tens of thousands of years ago, people will go to naturally scenic and climatically desirable places if no other concerns are present. I tend to think of climate as something similar to oil: It's a natural resource you either have or you don't. Tough luck.

Quote:
If a city has something attractive to people, then people will want to live there even if they could live somewhere else.
To an extent...attractiveness is a balancing act of multiple variables for every individual. A lot of the things people look for in cities could be cultivated even in small towns (see: college towns)

Quote:
IMO American cities since the postwar era have existed in a consumption oriented service economy context. Companies that employ white-collar workers locate offices where their workers are as much as workers locate where their office is. It's not like Wall Street has to literally trade in slips of paper or retailers need to be close to Amazon's mail room....
Let's keep in mind that prior to the 1990s the post war era had been brutal for cities. The inherent mobility of white collar work *did* at one time fortell the doom of large urban areas with the rise of the suburban office park. The line about "Companies moving to their workers" can come back to haunt urban areas as much as it's helped them. One can argue that Dallas and Atlanta are modern examples of business following population.


Quote:
It also needs to be noted that again, a lot of people don't work in jobs that are remote. A lot of people work in the service industry or in blue collar occupations. And people are often anchored to a place by family.
Both blue collar and service jobs exist anywhere there is people, and thus are highly mobile. And as far as family is concerned, the mass migrations (Africa -> Europe, Rural China -> Urban China, Latin America -> US, etc) of the 21st century have shown people do go where the money is, as cynical as that sounds.

Quote:
There's probably an argument to be made that economic complexity concentrated geographically has economic benefits too? Organic farmers markets and coffee shops might all lease commercial restaurant equipment, so you get a dealer who specializes in that. Maybe the regional warranty service center for these machines locates nearby. Then you get a car dealer who specializes in Ford Transit and Dodge Sprinter vans to sell to these repairmen, and then someone who has a side gig doing spray on bedliners. Oh and light industrial space, real estate, a trade school. It just snowballs from there, right?
This is true, but we're also forgetting economies of scale. Places like Paris, NYC, and Tokyo did not come into being due to restaurants (Osaka and Lyon are said to have better restaurants respectively, FWIW)

Quote:
In a rural area where everyone lives miles apart all these services are less viable since it would take a whole day for the repair man to go fix the one broken Hobart machine in Middlebury Vermont, he'd have to charge a lot more for labor to make up for it being his only gig of the day and charge a lot in mileage. The cost of building a commercial kitchen increases as equipment costs more and the guys who build it want more, and so there are fewer organic farmers markets and coffee shops in this little town and they charge more for an apple pie or a latte. Slowly but surely I think the economy would yield more jobs and wealth per dollar that "trickles down" in the form of consumption spending by some work-from-home tech or finance worker in the city where things are clustered and more efficient than in the little town, and as a result the city would sustain itself.
While again accurate, this doesn't really refute either me or the OP (which, in true SSP fashion, we are light years off-topic from). People aren't all going to rush out and buy farms. The more realistic scenario is the age of the mega-city may be in danger and instead it will be the age of the small to medium regional center like Des Moines, IA or Orleans, France. Even worse is a super-charging of the suburbs since if you're going to be in your house almost 24/7 you'd at least like some space, right?

The OP asked whose going to fight for big cities and it seems the political zeigist at least here in NYC is to tell the economic powers that be to shove it, and hope that off-off-broadway theaters and fair-trade organic juice bars are enough to sustain a 9 million person metropolis.


My verdict: Urbanism will survive, but the mega city will get dialed back. If things continue this way, what you'll see is a boom of 100k to 1m sized regional cities and a drain away from expensive mega regions including even Dallas, Houston, Atlanta et al
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #10  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2020, 11:46 PM
llamaorama llamaorama is offline
Unicorn Wizard!
 
Join Date: Oct 2008
Posts: 4,204
Quote:
Originally Posted by Qubert View Post
While again accurate, this doesn't really refute either me or the OP (which, in true SSP fashion, we are light years off-topic from). People aren't all going to rush out and buy farms. The more realistic scenario is the age of the mega-city may be in danger and instead it will be the age of the small to medium regional center like Des Moines, IA or Orleans, France. Even worse is a super-charging of the suburbs since if you're going to be in your house almost 24/7 you'd at least like some space, right?

The OP asked whose going to fight for big cities and it seems the political zeigist at least here in NYC is to tell the economic powers that be to shove it, and hope that off-off-broadway theaters and fair-trade organic juice bars are enough to sustain a 9 million person metropolis.


My verdict: Urbanism will survive, but the mega city will get dialed back. If things continue this way, what you'll see is a boom of 100k to 1m sized regional cities and a drain away from expensive mega regions including even Dallas, Houston, Atlanta et al
People's movement is always a combination of push and pull factors. We've discussed the push factors that come from existing mega cities that represent the pre-covid status quo, but what are the specific pull factors of small cities? I agree that small cities do start out with advantages surrounding cost of living, cultural and amenity features unspoilt by gentrification, etc, but then even a small amount of growth tends to end that, such as in the case of Austin.

If economic complexity contributes to job and wealth creation (a pull factor) then all else being equal a mega city that doesn't have the push factors we normally associate with them would outperform a neutral small city.

Quote:
off-off-broadway theaters and fair-trade organic juice bars are enough to sustain a 9 million person metropolis.
Let's be fair though, you are picking out these specific examples because you think they are frivolous, and they are. But taken as a whole the service economy is huge. We knock it, but what is the economy anyways except a closed loop where people do jobs they are good at in exchange for goods and services performed by others?
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #11  
Old Posted Nov 9, 2020, 12:42 AM
jd3189 jd3189 is online now
An Optimistic Realist
 
Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Loma Linda, CA / West Palm Beach, FL
Posts: 5,571
If the cities decline somewhat, I don’t see it as a bad thing. One thing for sure, it’s not gonna be like the post war era. Crime did rise somewhat recently, but it was mainly around the levels of the 90s and early 00s, and cities were doing decently then.

NYC will still be around for folks who want to live there and invest in it. Same for SF, LA, Boston, Chicago, Seattle, Houston, Dallas, Miami, Atlanta, Austin, etc. Fortunately for the rest of us millennials and zoomers who currently can’t afford to live in the city without being stretched thin between rent and paying back student loans, the first part of that equation will be a tad less of an issue.

After COVID, I assume there will more public health initiatives to better control spread of airborne diseases while maintaining the normal lives we all took for granted in the past. That could actually lead to the cities becoming cleaner and better suited for the people that remain and move in.
__________________
Working towards making American cities walkable again!
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #12  
Old Posted Nov 9, 2020, 11:48 AM
Yuri's Avatar
Yuri Yuri is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 4,478
It’s an interesting debate, but I’m afraid the bulk of Qubert’s argument is that people don’t like to live in big cities and they will leave as soon as they are not required to do so due jobs.

I don’t think that’s accurate at all. People don’t need to live in big cities as today, specially in the US where suburbs is just out there providing homes for people who works in the city.

Those people living in the cities today do it despite all the high costs. For one thing the pandemic will probably flatten prices allowing more people to live up n the big cities.

Where are those tons of people who were just looking for an excuse to leave Seattle, Atlanta, Washington DC or even Pittsburgh or Cleveland?
__________________
London - São Paulo - Rio de Janeiro - Londrina - Frankfurt
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #13  
Old Posted Nov 9, 2020, 3:40 PM
skysoar skysoar is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2018
Posts: 238
Post pandemic i believe first tier cities like N.Y, Chicago, etc, will once again thrive. And probably thrive even greater as long as people truly believe the threat of the pandemic is basically under control. What it reminds me of is people staying away from the beach after a shark attack, then believing the threat has been eliminated, they slowly but gradually return and enjoy the water once again...
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #14  
Old Posted Nov 9, 2020, 9:41 PM
Qubert Qubert is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2009
Posts: 506
Quote:
Originally Posted by yuriandrade View Post
It’s an interesting debate, but I’m afraid the bulk of Qubert’s argument is that people don’t like to live in big cities and they will leave as soon as they are not required to do so due jobs.

I don’t think that’s accurate at all. People don’t need to live in big cities as today, specially in the US where suburbs is just out there providing homes for people who works in the city.

Those people living in the cities today do it despite all the high costs. For one thing the pandemic will probably flatten prices allowing more people to live up n the big cities.

Where are those tons of people who were just looking for an excuse to leave Seattle, Atlanta, Washington DC or even Pittsburgh or Cleveland?
The key is this: I did say urbanism and the desire to live in dense walkable environments will always be there, but the idea that one must go to London, Paris, SF or NY to advance in their career would die down if WFH becomes mainstream.

What will happen is more and more small to midsize cities will densify to demand with mid rises and townhomes due to lower costs while larger mega cities will slowly see less and less demand until an equilibrium is met. Regional centers, small railroad towns, etc could boom. Big cities won't go away (at all), but won't be the only game in town.

If for anything, WFH might turbo charge urbanism (yes, I realize that contradicts myself) by causing people to want some kind of outlet other than sitting at home all day every day.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #15  
Old Posted Nov 10, 2020, 3:03 AM
uaarkson's Avatar
uaarkson uaarkson is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Nov 2008
Location: Back in Flint
Posts: 2,079
Bottom line is this: traditionally developed cities are resilient and have withstood decades or even centuries of turbulence from war to famine to pandemic. American cities are generally a little different, but I think the pandemic will force them to adapt. Who knows. Everything about the American experiment is basically unprecedented in history.
Reply With Quote
     
     
End
 
 
Reply

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Discussion Forums > City Discussions
Forum Jump


Thread Tools
Display Modes

Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 5:35 PM.

     
SkyscraperPage.com - Archive - Privacy Statement - Top

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.