The architecture critic of the New Republic, Sarah Williams Goldhagen, writes about “American Collapse” – the decay of the nation’s infrastructure here.
And then she makes a few comparisons:
But forget, if you wish, the vast infrastructural building taking place across economically exploding Asia and the Middle East. Look no farther than Europe or Canada, areas in what used to be called the industrialized world, where metropolitan regions are facing the same problems of demographic shifts, higher labor costs, and aging infrastructure that we face in the United States. Again and again we find examples of metropolitan regions thathave successfully risen to these challenges.
Two of the most extraordinary recent success stories are Barcelona and Vancouver…. Vancouver’s physical remaking in the past two decades has been so remarkable that it has become a phenomenon, a brand: the “Vancouver Miracle,” a city that, twenty years ago, was an emptied-out downtown littered with disused industrial lots and is today a lively, highdensity, twenty-four-hour city filled with attractively designed high-rise residential and office towers, well-preserved historic buildings, plentiful public parks, and vibrant cultural institutions. Vancouver is currently the fastest-growing residential downtown inNorth America.
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