New Geography

Category: Urban Issues

  • Are Cool Downtowns the Solution to Suburban Ennui?

    Recently, former Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi took a turn answering The Foggiest Five, a new segment that asks influential Long Islanders five questions regarding the future of the Nassau-Suffolk region. His answers gave an interesting look at our issues, and I appreciate the time he took answering the questions.

    Suozzi served Nassau’s County Executive from 2002 to 2009. Since Nassau is an older, first ring suburb, the County has limited opportunities for a complete overhaul of its physical imprint. In recent years, their redevelopment efforts have been skewed towards infill and revitalizing already-existing areas.

    His answers reflected Suozzi’s unique experience gained thanks to the years he ran Nassau County. When asked about the biggest change he’s witnessed on Long Island, Suozzi highlighted property taxes as a “root of all evil” of sorts concerning our regional problems. Suozzi gave five causes to our tax problem:
    1)Waste, Fraud and Abuse, 2) Long Island residents pay much more in income taxes to the federal and state governments that we get back in federal and state aid, 3) unfunded state mandates, 4) too many governments, and 5) lack of growth.

    It’s hard to argue with the realities Suozzi laid out. While we often squabble about our local land usage, the reality is that our costs are unsustainable. Further – we are getting diminishing return on our sky-high costs of living. Our infrastructure is still crumbling and inadequate, and our water quality is still being degraded.

    One possible solution, according to Suozzi, lies in his “cool downtowns” approach, building off  of the clusters, corridors and centers theory that has been mentioned for Long Island — and much of the nation — since the 1960s and early 70s. Suozzi writes:
    We have a few cool downtowns now but not enough. Rockville Centre, Garden City, Westbury and Great Neck have downtown rentals, offices, restaurants and shops that are all near train stations. Long Island residents flock to these parts for entertaining and relaxation. Mineola, Farmingdale, Glen Cove, Hempstead, Freeport and Long Beach are trying to create cool downtowns but to be successful, we need more of them. We need to create at least 20 cool downtowns so it will make sense to link them by bus and mass transit. 

    The planning theory behind Suozzi’s solution makes some sense, given the existence of numerous village-like nodes through the county. In Nassau, his vision for cool downtowns works easier than it does in neighboring Suffolk, mainly because of their limitations in infrastructure and generally later development. Further, economic and housing realities must be addressed.

    Simply put, Nassau is where the infrastructure is more conducive to mini-downtown intensification. However, what Suffolk lacks in infrastructure, it gains the advantage in sheer space. Suffolk’s developmental destiny isn’t fully charted yet as it is in Nassau. This means two things: it’s not too late to execute sound land use planning, and that we still have the opportunity to take action to reverse our fortunes, which would resonate across Route 110 into Nassau as well.

    It is important to realize that Suozzi’s downtown solution in of itself should not be an excuse to merely increase density on Long Island for the sake of increasing density. There will always be pressure from developers to densify well beyond local wishes, and seek subsidies to do so. These “cool downtowns” must mesh with comprehensive and regional strategies for attracting jobs to these targeted areas that take advantage of Long Island’s educated workforce.

    Also we should look at the quality of the density. Urban-like density alone does not create the atmosphere of a village; anyone who has spent time in the dense suburbs of cities like Seoul or even Los Angeles can tell you that. Tall structures and related commercial developments tend to be inhabited by generic stores with little resonance with the history and culture of their communities. Village systems work best when they develop organically, and grow, as much as possible, within the confines of already existing architecture or in new buildings that fit with local styles.

    Form also matters. There is a difference between the “little” downtown areas of Long Island that have charm, which is in a direct contrast to dense, almost urban centers. In our pursuit for suburban renewal, we cannot lose sight of what makes Long Island special, it terroir, if you will, of small communities that in many cases have been in existence for well over a century. Long Island may be expensive by national standards, but the staggering price increases in New York City for similarly appointed residential units, makes the Island comparatively affordable, and with excellent access to the city.

    While New York City has a variety of urban centers, Long Island’s approach to suburban revitalization should build off of Suozzi’s cool downtowns, but in a suburban manner. Part of the Island’s charm isn’t so much its Queens-like centers, but rather, villages such as Rockville Centre, Babylon and Patchogue – low slung, vibrant areas with good access to transit and the infrastructure needed to support their growth. By just blindly throwing density at Long Island’s regional issues, we are at risk of creating urban problems in a suburban environment.

    Long Island has other assets, particularly in terms of better schools. Many people who live in the city in their twenties and early thirties tend to look towards areas with good public schools, ample parks, and high levels of public safety. This is already leading to the much discussed growth of “hipsturbia” in the Hudson Valley river towns. Long Island could be a strong competitor for these people if it understands its’ primary appeal. 

    Finally for “cool downtowns” to work you must address the fundamental economic and demographic challenges facing the region. Although it can’t hope to compete head-to-heard with Manhattan for some very high end jobs, the area should be attractive to a lot of back office and specialized companies. If employment opportunities expand, then you might be able to more easily persuade younger workers to move to the Island, creating a consumer market for cool downtowns. Being “hip” isn’t enough, but getting more competitive and richer might work.

    Richard Murdocco writes regularly on land use, planning and development issues for various publications. He has his BA in both Political Science and Urban Studies from Fordham University, and his MA in Public Policy from Stony Brook University, and studied planning under Dr. Lee Koppelman, Long Island’s veteran planner. You can follow Murdocco on Twitter @TheFoggiestIdea, Like The Foggiest Idea on Facebook, and read his collection of work on urban planning at TheFoggiestIdea.org.

    "19 Main St Roslyn jeh" by Jim.henderson – Own work. Licensed under Creative Commons Zero, Public Domain Dedication via Wikimedia Commons

  • Wrong Way Cities

    In a New York Times column entitled "Wrong Way America," Nobel laureate Paul Krugman again reminds us of the high cost of overzealous land-use regulations. Krugman cites the work of Harvard economist Ed Glaeser and others in noting that "high housing prices in slow-growing states also owe a lot to policies that sharply limit construction." He observes that "looser regulation in the South has kept the supply of housing elastic and the cost of living low" (Note 1).

    Supply is the Issue

    Krugman specifically cites Houston, Atlanta and the Sunbelt for their lower house prices and less restrictive housing regulation. In contrast, he points to New York and California as having high house prices and greater housing regulation. Krugman further observes that the secret of growth is "not getting in the way of middle- and working-class housing supply." 

    This concern about housing supply is echoed by former World Bank principal planner Alain Bertaud who notes that the solution to the housing affordability problem "is to increase the supply of land" (Note 2). Bertaud further points out that "Restricting land supply and imposing too many controls also stifles business growth."

    Wrong Way Cities

    However, the real problem is not a "Wrong Way America" that "gets in the way of middle- and working-class housing supply, but "Wrong Way Cities" (metropolitan areas) that have adopted land use regulations severely restrict the supply of land for urban development. The price increasing policies are often referred to as "smart growth" or "urban containment" and routinely involve restricting the supply of land for development through urban growth boundaries, large lot suburban, and exurban zoning and other strategies.

    This destroys what Brookings Institution economist Anthony Downs (p. 36) calls the "competitive supply of land." The result is higher house prices, because, all things being equal, the price of a good or service is likely to increase if its supply is severely limited. Otherwise, OPEC oil supply restrictions would never have raised concern.

    Where more traditional, liberal land use policies remain, housing remains affordable. For example, during the housing bubble, an analysis by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas attributed the lower, and still affordable house prices in Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth, and Houston to avoiding more restrictive land use polices: "… these markets have weathered the increased demand largely with new construction rather than price appreciation because of the ease of building new homes."

    Housing and the Standard of Living

    Housing is the largest category of household expenditure. Moreover, housing costs vary far more between metropolitan areas than other expenditure categories, such as transportation, food and apparel. As a result, housing is the most important driver of the standard of living, especially for middle and lower income households. Where house prices are higher compared to incomes, households have less in discretionary income — the amount left over after taxes and necessities. With less left over, a lower standard of living and greater poverty is inevitable.

    The differences are even greater for young households moving to metropolitan areas with restrictive land use policies. These households must pay elevated house prices, not having benefited from the lower housing costs that longer-term residents were able to lock in by purchasing years ago.

    The higher housing costs prices can more than offset higher wages. Thus, a prospective domestic migrant may choose to move to Houston rather than New York, because Houston’s wages, although lower, translate into higher discretionary incomes and a higher standard of living.

    These price increases create a "double hit" to the standard of living. Not only do households have to pay higher house prices, but they usually get less, as house size and lots are reduced in size as a result of the more restrictive regulations. Indeed, regulations in California are being interpreted to make it difficult, if not impossible to build the detached housing most Americans prefer (See: California Declares War on Suburbia). The irony is that smart growth advocates claim this increases "housing choice," an Orwellian turn of phrase if there ever was one.

    It is no wonder that young and aspiring households are drawn to metropolitan areas where housing is more affordable. Meanwhile, house prices have escalated strongly in the restrictively regulated metropolitan areas of California and the Northeast despite low demand. This has much to do with the significant domestic migration loss, as Paul Ganong and Daniel Shoag of Harvard have indicated. Between 2000 and 2013, more than 4,000,000 loss in net domestic migrants between 2000 and 2013, according to Census Bureau data.

    The problem is acute for lower income households, which are disproportionately minority. The Thomas Rivera Institute, a Latino oriented research organization, found that California’s land regulations "are making it particularly difficult for Latino and African American households to own a home."

    The Consensus

    There is virtual agreement that more restrictive policies are associated with higher house prices. The only issue in dispute is the extent of the impact. But even seemingly small differences can be important. Downs (p. 36) characterizes a modest 10 percent differential to be socially significant, because of the number of households that the higher prices made ineligible for home purchase.

    In fact, the differences in house prices relative to incomes are substantial, ranging up to a nearly 250 percent difference between Atlanta and San Francisco. The differences are so significant as to attract the attention of economists like Krugman, Glaeser and others for their influence on domestic migration.  This is socially significant.

    The Risks

    No city in the United States can expect immunity from low housing affordability due to overly restrictive land use regulation, even in more depressed areas with lower housing demand. This is illustrated by Liverpool, in the United Kingdom, where smart growth policies are well entrenched. Liverpool has lost a larger percentage of its population since 1950 than any of the other 1,700 urban areas in the world with more than 300,000 population. Yet Liverpool has seen its housing affordability deteriorate to among the worst in the UK, US, Canada, Australia or New Zealand.

    The smart growth planning philosophy now pervades virtually all of the urban planning community, which seeks its spread to virtually everywhere (Note 3). Current targets include Minneapolis-St. Paul (see Thrive 2040: Toward a Less Competitive Minneapolis-St. Paul), and San Antonio and the rest are on the list. The research is clear, where there is more restrictive land use policy, house prices can be expected to rise relative to incomes.

    Cities for People

    Current urban policy is misdirected and needs correction. Fundamentally, urban policies should be aligned with the purpose of cities. Cities are for people. People have moved to cities principally for economic reasons, as they aspire to better standards of living. Public policies that raise the price of housing substantially interfere with the reason that cities exist.

    There is a need for a paradigm shift. Currently in-vogue urban policy focuses on tactics, such as urban form, legally mandated higher densities, mode of transport and urban design ("place-making"). Economist Glaeser writes that "Bad policy puts place-making above helping people…" Bad policy should be discarded. The focus should instead be on the fundamental objectives of improving the standard of living and reducing poverty. At a minimum, this requires housing that is affordable (See Toward More Prosperous Cities).

    —–

    Note 1: In the column, Krugman suggests that differences in housing regulation are more important than business regulation and taxation in explaining the migration patterns that have people generally moving from higher cost areas with higher housing costs to lower cost areas. There is strong research on both issues, and both issues are important.

    Note 2: Housing affordability refers to the price of houses across the entire spectrum of income, not just low income housing.

    Note 3: Perhaps the most frequently cited justification for restrictive land use policies is greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction. A growing body of research indicates that urban land use policies are a generally minor and expensive means to that objective and that technological improvements are far more effective. Smaller scale strategies are also better than "one-size-fits-all" land use regulation. It is notable that the most comprehensive US review (Jones and Kammen at the University of California, Berkeley) of GHG emissions at the local level (zip codes) found: "Generally … no evidence for net GHG benefits of population density in urban cores or suburbs when considering effects on entire metropolitan areas." They suggest "an entirely new approach of highly tailored community strategies."

    —-

    Wendell Cox is principal of Demographia, an international public policy and demographics firm. He is co-author of the "Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey" and author of "Demographia World Urban Areas" and "War on the Dream: How Anti-Sprawl Policy Threatens the Quality of Life." He was appointed to three terms on the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission, where he served with the leading city and county leadership as the only non-elected member. He was appointed to the Amtrak Reform Council to fill the unexpired term of Governor Christine Todd Whitman and has served as a visiting professor at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, a national university in Paris.

    Photo: Minneapolis-St. Paul, by author

  • Class Issues, Not Race, Will Likely Seal the Next Election

    Recent events in Ferguson, Missouri and along the U.S.-Mexico border may seem to suggest that race has returned as the signature issue in American politics. We can see this already in the pages of mainstream media, with increased calls for reparations for African-Americans, and expanded amnesties for the undocumented. Increasingly, any opposition to Obama’s policies is blamed ondeep-seated white racism.

    Yet in reality, race will not define the 2014 election, or likely those that follow. Instead the real defining issue—class—does not fit so easily into the current political calculus. In terms of racial justice, we have made real progress since the ’60s, when even successful educated minorities were discriminated against and the brightest minority students were often discouraged from attending college. Today an African-American holds the highest office in the land, and African Americans also fill the offices of U.S. attorney general and national security advisor. This makes the notion that race thwarts success increasingly outdated.

    But at the same time that formal racial barriers have been demolished, the class divide continues to grow steeper than in at any time in the nation’s recent history. Today America’s class structure is increasingly ossified, and this affects not only minorities, who are hit disproportionately, but also many whites, who constitute more than 40 percent of the nation’s poor. Upward mobility has stalled under both Bush and Obama, not only for minorities but for vast swaths of working class and middle class Americans. Increasingly, it’s not the color of one’s skin that determines one’s place in society, but access to education and capital, often the inherited variety.

    Worries about upward mobility have been mounting for a generation, and according to Pew, only one-third of Americans currently believe the next generation will do better than them. Indeed, in some surveys pessimism about the next generation stands at an all-time high.

    But race is not the main determinant in looking to the future. The greatest dismay, in fact, is felt among working class and middle class whites, who are generally much more pessimistic about the future for themselves than are either African-Americans or Hispanics.

    This pessimism—for all the discussion on campuses about “white privilege”—is even more deeply seated among young whites. According to a poll conducted by the left-leaning advocacy group Demos, only 12 percent of whites 18 to 34 believe they will do better than their parents, compared to 31 percent for African-Americans and 36 percent among young Hispanics.

    This suggests that the issue of restoring upward mobility has more widespread resonance than a more narrow race-based approach. The political party that best addresses this concern will be in the strongest position to dominate the political landscape not only in 2014, but well beyond.

    The problem for the Democrats in this regard: the record of the last six years. President Obama has presided over an economy that, even when healing, has done little to improve the economic conditions of most Americans. The incomes of middle class Americans have remained stagnant, or shrunk, even as we have seen record corporate profits, a soaring stock market, and huge run ups in elite property markets.

    This failure may explain why some Democrats and progressives feel tempted to go back to race-related issues—as well as social concerns such as gay and abortion rights—to stir their political base. The president’s suggestion of executive action on immigration would be in part to “galvanize” support among Latinos, many of whom can relate personally to the dilemma faced by the undocumented.

    The stirring of resentment among African-Americans has become the critical component of race-based Democratic strategy. The president’s embrace of hoary racial warlord Reverend Al Sharpton, a well-known charlatan and occasional anti-semite, as his “go to guy” demonstrates the administration’s willingness to use the tragedy of the Ferguson shooting case to rally African-American voters for the off-year election.

    These tactics may have some political efficacy, but it’s doubtful that ’60s progressive bromides of race-based politics or calls for redistribution can seriously address inequality or poverty. Certainly the idea that greater dependence on government handouts—the main social focus of modern progressives—has not aided minority uplift or promoted upward mobility. The Great Society may have reduced poverty initially, but in the past decade poverty rates have risen to the highest level since the ’60s.

    If anything, under the most progressive-dominated regime since at least the New Deal, things have gotten even worse. African-American youth unemployment is now twice that of whites while according to the Urban League, the black middle class, once rapidly expanding, has essentially lost the gains made over the past 30 years.

    In the same vein, Hispanic income also has declined relative to whites. Latino poverty rates now stand at 28 percent. The administration’s leniency that permits impoverished kids to flock here from Central America may make moral or political sense, but its actual impact on communities could prove problematical.

    Indeed one has to question the viability of new mass immigration of poor, poorly educated kids at a time when poverty among Latino children already here has risen since 2007, according to the American Community Survey, from 27.5 percent to 33.7 percent in 2012, an increase of 1.7 million. Given their own economic problems, and the vital need to improve their educational performance one has to wonder whether African-Americans or even many Latinos, as opposed to the activist base, actually would welcome a fresh infusion of impoverished refugee children from Central America into the country. A recent Pew survey found that not only half of all whites, but nearly two-fifths of African Americans and roughly a third of Hispanics approved of increased deportations of the undocumented.

    Some Latino and African-American Democrats have already departed from the party line on immigration. Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar, a moderate border district Democrat, has called “the border incursion” “Obama’s Katrina moment” and he is co-sponsoring legislation with Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas to speed up the deportation process for kids detained at the border.

    Perhaps even more serious are divisions among Democrats on key economic and regulatory issues. In California, for example, Latino Democrats, particularly from the hard hit interior, have revolted against their party’s “cap and trade” policies, which will lead to ever higher energy costs, and threaten industries that tend to employ working class Latinos. Similarly some unions in the interior, notably the Teamsters and Laborers, have taken strong positions favoring energy development, notably the Keystone pipeline, in sharp opposition to the president’s core supporters.

    And then there’s the reality that blue states—with all the usual progressive policies—suffer the widest gap between the classes. Indeed, notes demographer Wendell Cox, New York City now has an income distribution that approaches that of South Africa under apartheid.

    Similarly a recent Brookings report found the greatest income disparity in such bastions of progressivism as San Francisco, Miami, Boston, Washington D.C., New York, Oakland, Chicago and Los Angeles. Oddly enough, minorities seem to do better, relative to whites, in states that have had more conservative governance, in part because they also tend to have lower costs of living.

    This disconnect between progressive aims and reality stems from the shift in the Left’s class and geographic base. Once dependent on industrial and construction workers, many of them unionized, the party increasingly depends for support from green activists, urban land speculators, and “creative class” workers in expensive regions where regulatory constraints tend to discourage industrial and housing growth. In contrast many red state metros such as Houston, Oklahoma City, Salt Lake, and Dallas-Ft. Worth tend to produce more higher paid, blue collar growth.

    Given these realities, perhaps progressives need to move away from symbolic issues, such as reparations and racial name-calling, and instead directly address middle class and working class concerns. Yet this creates a potential for internecine conflict with other key party constituencies, which seem more interest in suppressing middle class aspirations than fulfilling them.

    It should be clear by now that regulatory and tax regimes imposed in blue states tend to stunt middle and working opportunities, with the worst effects on minorities and working class whites. Blue-state progressive can whine about race, inequality, and poverty with the best of them, but they would contribute far more if they started to address these issues with something other than well-rehearsed indignation and rhetoric.

    But while progressive attempts to address the class divide have been less than successful, can the Republicans fill the breach? Already working class whites are arguably the GOP’s strongest base and Republicans should be able to exploit class resentment toward the increasingly gentrified Democratic leadership. Yet to date, they have shown a remarkable inability to do so, in part due to the ideological constraints and racial baggage of the increasingly Southern-oriented GOP.

    Republicans, particularly those closest to Wall Street, also seem to have a problem even admitting the existence of the class issue. Conservatives economists repeatedly downplay ever greater insecurity about jobs, the affordability of decent housing and generally lower net worths for all but the highly affluent. Convinced that any discussion about these issues constitutes unseemly “class warfare,” the right’s intellectual leadership seems incapable of addressing these concerns.

    What would a policy that addresses inequality look like? Some steps would offend some Republicans, such as restarting a modern version of the Depression era Works Progress Administration. Instead of a stimulus directed at government workers and crony-capitalists, as Obama employed in 2009, a program that brought young people into the work force would help them gain needed practical skills while repairing our increasingly woeful infrastructure.

    Other reforms would include a major overhaul of the tax system, particularly equalizing capital gains and income taxes. Whatever the benefits we may have seen from lower capital gains rates in the past, the current, incredibly unequal recovery undermines the legitimacy of this approach. Rather than stir investment and create middle income jobs, capital gains have become a ruse for the rich to get even richer, largely through asset inflation. Companies, notes a new Harvard Business Review study, have used the low interest bonanza and access to cheap money to boost profits, not by expanding employment but by buying back their own stock.

    Ultimately, the best way to address class concerns, as well as those of minorities, would be to spark strong economic growth, particularly in the energy, manufacturing, and construction sectors, which tend to offer higher wage employment for them. Both Latinos and African-American made their biggest economic strides when the economy was booming under Presidents Reagan and Clinton, both of whom have been criticized for “trickle down” policies.

    A growth agenda is a winning one for the party that embraces and effectively advocates it. A recent analysis (PDF) of public opinion by the Global Strategy Group found that although roughly half of Americans believe inequality per se is a major issue, more than three-quarters believe that faster economic growth should be the main priority.

    In the old Democratic Party, from Truman to Clinton, this approach would be an easy sell. A policy that encouraged building new water facilities, expanding domestic energy , manufacturing and construction, particularly single family homes, would have widespread appeal to working and middle class voters. But a growth agenda likely would face much opposition from the president’s green gentry base, who seem perfectly content with an economy that rewards insiders, venture capitalists, and companies that employ few people, largely the best educated and positioned.

    Republicans could seize the momentum here, but to do so would require shedding some ideological baggage, as well standing up to some of their more ruthless backers on Wall Street and the corporate community. Similar a return to a more traditional growth oriented liberalism would help hard pressed Democrats, particularly in red states, who desperately need to recapture some of their traditional working class backers. It will be here, in the nexus of policy and class, not racial posturing, the political future of the country may well be determined.

    This piece originally appeared at The Daily Beast.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and Distinguished Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University, and a member of the editorial board of the Orange County Register. His newest book, The New Class Conflict is now available at Amazon and Telos Press. He is author of The City: A Global History and The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050. His most recent study, The Rise of Postfamilialism, has been widely discussed and distributed internationally. He lives in Los Angeles, CA.

  • On The Pitfalls of Urban Food Production

    In her August 21 pieces “Can Urban Agriculture Work on a Commercial Scale?” and “Five Urban Farms that are Growing Big” published in Citiscope, journalist Flavie Halais enthuses over the potential for  small scale urban agriculture, vertical farming, and innovative ways to connect producers and consumers. In doing so, she ignores some very real pitfalls that have long relegated urban food production to the realm of hobbyists.

    Pitfall #1: Urban land is too valuable to be devoted profitably to food production

    Until a century ago many foods that did not travel well, or benefitted from organic waste (primarily horse manure) generated in cities, were still produced in and around large urban agglomerations.

    For instance, in the late 19th century Parisian maraîchers grew more than 100,000 tons of produce annually by using about one-sixth of the city’s land area.1 Beginning in the 1820s with green asparagus, many of them managed to grow several things year round and a few even became pineapple producers. Unlike today’s locavores, who advocate eating locally-produced foods, they always sought the best customers and exported some of their harvests to   markets as distant as London. 

    In the absence of modern technologies such as electricity, refrigeration, and synthetic pesticides though, this de facto “organic” system required much human labor. Accounts describe how most Parisian producers worked between 18 and 20 hours a day during their busiest months and between 14 and 16 the rest of the year. Much of their time was spent in or around horse manure and was devoted to controlling pests and irrigating crops manually.  

    Urban agriculture in Paris and elsewhere quickly faded away at the turn of the twentieth century. The development of new technologies such as the railroad, refrigeration and improved fertilizers made it possible to grow food much more cheaply where nature provided more sunshine, heat, water and better soils. The movers and shakers in more profitable industries that benefitted from an urban location were willing and able to pay more for land while urban agricultural workers moved in ever-increasing numbers into more lucrative manufacturing operations. These realities haven’t changed. Urban farming simply does not create enough return on investment from scarce capital relative to other activities in cities.

    Pitfall #2: The productions costs of vertical farming are prohibitive

    The fundamental problem with growing food in high-rise buildings has always been that the additional costs (from building and powering to lighting and heating them) quickly negate any benefits attributable to an urban location. As the agricultural economist Dennis Avery observed a few years ago in a discussion of a 59-story proposal of this kind:2

    •    500,000 such skyscrapers would be needed to make up for the 400 million acres of American farmland;

    •    Buying a comparable amount of Iowa cropland would cost about $5 million, a sum that would at best buy about an acre of land in Manhattan, on top of which a very costly high rise structure would need to be built;

    •    Each floor of the vertical farm would have to support about 620,000 pounds of either water or water-soaked soil (by comparison, 200 people and their office furniture weigh about 40,000 pounds);

    •    Replacing sunlight with “grow lights” and heating the structure in winter would require gigawatts of power (ask the illegal marijuana growers about their need for a lot of electricity);

    •    Feeding livestock (typically chickens and pigs) in vertical farms requires trucking in large amounts of animal feeds (typically a four-to-one weight ratio in the case of pigs) while the current alternative is simply to transport pork chops into cities;

    •    City taxes and labor costs are always much higher than in the countryside.

    Other problems with vertical farms and rooftop operations include the facts that they can never be as convenient and generate the same economies of scale as large land-based operations (try using a tractor on a rooftop). They might also mandate the nearby construction of additional processing operations if these cannot be incorporated in the original structure. Imagine the impracticalities and the smell of a vertical slaughterhouse and the additional traffic problems that would result from moving livestock between buildings in a downtown area.  

    In the best case scenario, vertical farming can only ever hope to be profitable through the production of high-end/higher-margin plant items that cater to a wealthy customer base – typically one that believes in the alleged benefits of reducing food miles or the superior nutritional value of organic products, and can afford to pay the higher prices necessary for such productions.3 This is a far cry from the affordable and abundant food promised by local food activists.

    Pitfall #3: Undervaluing wholesalers and retailers  

    A foundational pillar of the local food creed, Halais reminds her readers, is the desire to “limit the number of intermediaries along the supply chain”. Unfortunately, many idealistic producers whose heart was in producing things rather than selling them quickly found themselves drowning “under marketing and distribution costs” and “struggling to find retail channels for their products.”  “Getting food to consumers,” Halais adds, typically turned into “a logistical nightmare.”

    There is another obvious question: How is it that wholesalers and retailers are now as important as ever when no producer is ever forced to deal with them?  In reality, the   benefits of intermediaries is so obvious that they were even noted in Plato’s Republic more than two millennia ago. As one philosopher observed to another, permanent salesmen used “money-token for purposes of exchange” to facilitate transactions between “those who desire to sell” and “those who desire to buy” when individuals could not meet in person.4

    Closer to us, in 1815 Benjamin Constant wrote approvingly of the middleman class found “between the grain producer and the consumer.” These people benefitted society, he argued, because they had “more funds than the producer and more resources for setting up warehouses.” Because they dealt “solely with this trade,” they could “study better the needs they undertake to meet” and “free the farmer from having to get involved in speculations which absorb his time, divert his resources, and drive him into the middle of towns.” While these middlemen had “to be paid for their trouble,” so did “the farmer himself” although “at greater cost” because he was not as effective and skillfull. “This extra expense,” Constant observes, “comes back to the consumer, whom [anti middlemen] people thought they were helping.”5

    Pitfall #4: An urban location does not keep agricultural pests at bay   

    Halais further tells us that the founders of Lufa Farms, a Montreal based urban agriculture firm, have developed an approach that “exclude pesticides, herbicides or fungicides” while using “biological pest control to get rid of harmful bugs.” Not surprisingly, the reader later learns that they had never worked on a farm or in the food industry before launching their business.

    Suffice it to say that insecticides, rodenticides, herbicides, fungicides and other pesticides were developed because of the very real shortcomings of biological methods. Although they are costly, all commercial agricultural operations (including organic ones) feel compelled to use some of them because they deliver value for money. Given enough time, agricultural pests will show up in Lufa Farms’s greenhouses and they will need to be dealt with quickly, cheaply and efficiently. After all, insects and plant diseases found their way in the Biosphere 2 project, a self-contained ecosystem in the middle of the Arizona desert, where they ruined the experiment.6 When this happens, these sustainability pioneers will understand why commercial producers use means they do not approve of.

    Pitfall #5: Failure to learn from failure

    Halais  doesn’t ask whether pretty much anything that can be achieved in an urban context could be done for much less money in rural areas. She  does not discuss the failure of past local food movements as well as more recent high tech urban farming operations.

    The history of all advanced economies over the last two centuries is replete with local food initiatives triggered by either economic recessions (to boost regional economic activity or as a form of protection against price inflation), wars or their threat (to increase local food security), romantic impulses during relatively prosperous times (for environmental and social considerations),  alleged excessive commodity travel (meaning too much transit between various points as opposed to a more straightforward distribution itinerary between producers and final consumers), and unnecessary handling by too many profit-seeking intermediaries.7 Yet, none of these ever survived the end of armed conflicts, economic recovery or competition from more efficient commercial operations.

    At the same time, projects similar to those described by Halais have already gone out of business. Indeed, had she written her report out of Vancouver instead of Montréal she would have had to mention and analyze the bankruptcy of the heavily subsidized parking lot rooftop greenhouse run by Alterrus Systems about a year after its launch.8

    Failure to analyze failures can only result in more failures. History may not repeat itself, but can be instructive as we learn from the failures of others.

    The More Things Change…

    What today’s enthusiastic locavores ultimately fail to understand is that their “innovative” ideas are not only up against the Monsantos of this world, but also in a direct collision course with regional advantages for certain types of food production, economies of scale of various kinds in all lines of work and the fact that pretty much anything they can achieve in urban environments can be replicated at lower costs in the countryside. These basic realities defeated sophisticated local food production systems in the past and will do so again in the foreseeable future.

    While no one argues against the notion that our modern food production system can be improved, and entrepreneurs are always searching how to do so, the desire to make urban agricultural a viable commercial reality distracts from more serious issues such as international trade barriers and counterproductive domestic agricultural subsidies. The sooner well-intentioned activists understand these realities, the better.  

    Pierre Desrochers Associate Professor of Geography at the University of Toronto and co-author of The Locavore’s Dilemma. In Praise of the 10,000-mile Diet, PublicAffairs, 2012.

    1 See, among others, G. Stanhill. 1977. “An Urban Agro-Ecosystem. The Example of Nineteenth Century Paris.” Agro-Ecosystems 3: 269–284.

    2 D. Avery. 2010. “City Farming – Pigs in the Sky” Center for Global Food Issues (October 19) http://www.cgfi.org/2010/10/city-farming%e2%80%94pigs-in-the-sky-by-dennis-t-avery/

    3 On why many customers are wrong on these topics, see among others G. Edwards-Jones. 2010. "Does Eating Local Food Reduce the Environmental Impact of Food Production and Enhance Consumer Health?" Proceedings of the Nutrition Society 69 (4): 582-591; P. Desrochers and H. Shimizu. 2012. The Locavore’s Dilemma. In Praise of the 10,000-mile Diet. http://www.globavore.org , Public Affairs; L. Bergström, H. Kirchmann and G. Thorvaldsson. 2008. "Widespread Opinions about Organic Agriculture – Are They Supported by Scientific Evidence?" In H. Kirchmann and L. Bergström (eds). Organic Crop Production – Ambitions and Limitations. Springer, pp. 1-12; and C. Smith-Spangler et al. 2012. "Are Organic Foods Safer or Healthier than Conventional Alternatives? A Systematic Review." Annals of Internal Medicine 157 (5): 348-366.

    4 Plato’s Republic was written around 360 BCE. The quotes can be found in the second book of Plato’s Republic written around 360 BCE http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.3.ii.html

    5 B. Constant. 1815. Principles of Politics Applicable to all Governments, trans. Dennis O’Keeffe, (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2003). Chapter Four: On Privileges and Prohibitions  http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/861/109045/2279752 on 2013-03-10

    6 D.V Marino, T. R. Mahato, J. W. Druitt, L. Leigh, G. Lin, R. M. Russell and F. N. Tubiello. 1999. “The Agricultural Biome of Biosphere 2: Structure, Composition and Function.” Ecological Engineering 13: 199-234

    7 For a discussion of such initiatives in the American context, see among others L. J. Lawson. 2005. City Bountiful: A Century of Community Gardening in America. University of California Press. For a few additional international cases, see P. Desrochers and H. Shimizu. 2012. The Locavore’s Dilemma. In Praise of the 10,000-mile Diet.  http://www.globavore.org, PublicAffairs.

    8 CBC News. 2014. “Parking Lot Greenhouse Goes Bankrupt in Vancouver. Alterrus Opened North America’s First ‘Vertical Farm’ Just over One Year Ago.” (January 24)  http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/parking-lot-greenhouse-goes-bankrupt-in-vancouver-1.2510245

  • Traffic Congestion in the World: 10 Worst and Best Cities

    The continuing improvement in international traffic congestion data makes comparisons between different cities globally far easier. Annual reports (2013) by Tom Tom have been expanded to include China, adding the world’s second largest economy to previously produced array of reports on the Americas, Europe, South Africa and Australia/New Zealand. A total of 160 cities are now rated in these Tom Tom Traffic Index Reports. This provides an opportunity to provide world 10 most congested and 10 least congested cities lists among the rated cities.

    Tom Tom provides all day congestion indexes and indexes for peak hours (heaviest traffic peak morning and evening hour). The traffic indexes rate congestion based on the additional time necessary to make the trip compared to those under free flow conditions. For example, an index of 10 indicates that a 30 minute trip would take 10 percent longer, or 33 minutes. An index of 50 means that a 30 minute trip will, on average, take 45 minutes.

    Congestion in Peak Hours: 10 Most Congested Cities

    This article constructs an average peak hour index, using the morning and evening peak period Tom Tom Traffic Indexes for the 125 rated metropolitan areas with principal urban areas of more than 1,000,000 residents. The peak hour index is used because peak hour congestion is generally of more public policy concern than all day congestion. This congestion occurs because of the concentration of work trips in relatively short periods of time. Work trips are by no means the majority of trips, but it can be argued that they cause the most congestion. Many cities have relatively little off-peak traffic congestion.

    The two most congested cities are in Eastern Europe, Moscow and Istanbul (which stretches across the Bosporus into Asia). Four of the most congested cities are in China, three in Latin America (including all that are rated) and one is in Western Europe (Figure 1).

    Moscow is the most congested city, with a peak hour index of 126. This means that the average 30 minute trip in free flow conditions will take 68 minutes during peak hours. Moscow has a limited freeway system, but its ambitious plans could relieve congestion. The city has undertaken a huge geographical expansion program, with the intention of relocating many jobs to outside the primary ring road. This dispersion of employment, if supported by sufficient road infrastructure could lead to improved traffic conditions.

    Istanbul is the second most congested city with a peak hour traffic index of 108. The average free flow 30 minute trip would take 62 minutes during peak hours.

    Rio de Janeiro is the third most congested city him with a peak hour traffic index of 99.5. The average free flow 30 minute trip takes 60 minutes due to congestion during peak hours.

    Tianjin, which will achieve megacity status in 2015, and which is adjacent to Beijing, is the fourth most congested city, with an index of 91. In Tianjin, the peak hour congestion extends a free flow 30 minute trip to 57 minutes.

    Mexico City is the fifth most congested city, with a peak hour traffic index of 88.5. The average free flow 30 minute trip takes 57 minutes due to congestion.

    Hangzhou (capital of Zhejiang, China), which is adjacent to Shanghai, has the sixth worst traffic congestion, with a peak period traffic index of 87. The average 30 minute trip in free flow takes 56 minutes during peak hours.

    Sao Paulo  has the seventh worst traffic congestion, with a peak hour index of 80.5. The average 30 minute trip in free flow takes 54 minutes during peak periods. Sao Paulo’s intense traffic congestion has long been exacerbated by truck traffic routed along the "Marginale" near the center of the city. A ring road now is mostly complete, but the section most critical to relieving traffic congestion from trucks is yet to be opened.

    Chongqing has the eighth worst traffic congestion, with a peak hour index of 78.5. As a result, a trip that would take 30 minutes in free flow conditions takes 54 minutes during peak hours.

    Beijing has the ninth worst traffic congestion, with a peak hour index of 76.5. As a result a trip that should take 30 minutes in free flow is likely to take 53 minutes during peak hour. In spite of recent reports of its intense traffic congestion, Beijing rates better than some other cities. There are likely two causes for this. With its seventh ring road now planned, Beijing has a top-flight freeway system. Its traffic is also aided by its dispersion of employment The lower density government oriented employment core , is flanked on both side by major business centers ("edge cities") on the Second and Third Ring Roads. This disperses traffic.

    Brussels has the 10th worst peak hour traffic congestion, with an index of 75. A trip that would take 30 minutes at free flow takes 53 minutes in peak hour congestion.

    Seven of the 10 most congested cities are megacities (urban areas with populations over 10 million). The exceptions are Hangzhou, Chongqing and Brussels. Brussels has by far the smallest population, at only 2.1 million residents, little more than one-third the size of second smallest city, Hangzhou.

    Most Congested Cities in the US and Canada

    The most congested US and Canadian cities rank far down the list. Los Angeles ranks in a tie with Paris, Marseille and Ningbo (China), at a peak hour congestion index of 65. It may be surprising that Los Angeles does rank much higher. Los Angeles has   been the most congested city in the United States, displacing Houston in the 1980s. The intensity of the Los Angeles traffic congestion is driven by its highest urban area density in the United States and important gaps in the planned freeway system that were canceled. Nonetheless, Los Angeles is aided by a strong dispersion of employment, which helps to make makes its overall work trip travel times the lowest among world megacities for which data is available). Part of the Los Angeles advantages is its high automobile usage, which shortens travel times relative to megacities with much larger transit market shares (such as Tokyo, New York, London and Paris).

    Vancouver is Canada’s most congested city, with a pea period index of 62.5 and has the 27th worst traffic congestion, in a tie with Stockholm. Vancouver had exceeded Los Angeles in traffic congestion in the 2013 mid-year Tom Tom Traffic Index report.

    Least Congested Cities

    All but one of the 10 least congested large cities in the Tom Tom report are in the United States. The least congested is Kansas City, with a peak period index of 19.5, indicating that a 30 minute trip in free flow is likely to take 36 minutes due to congestion. Kansas City has one of the most comprehensive freeway systems in the United States and has a highly dispersed employment base. US cities also occupy the second through the sixth least congested positions (Cleveland, Indianapolis, Memphis, Louisville and St. Louis). Spain’s Valencia is the seventh least congested city, while the eighth through 10th positions are taken by Salt Lake City, Las Vegas and Detroit.

    Cities Not Rated

    There are a number of other highly congested cities that are not yet included in international traffic congestion ratings. Data in the 1999 publication Cities and Automobile Dependence: A Sourcebook indicated that the greatest density of traffic among rated cities was in Seoul, Bangkok and Hong Kong. Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta, Tokyo, Surabaya (Indonesia), while Zürich and Munich also had intense traffic congestion. Later data would doubtless add Manila to the list. The cities of the Indian subcontinent also experience extreme, but as yet unrated traffic congestion. It is hoped that traffic indexes will soon be available for these and other international cities.

    Determinants of Traffic Congestion

    An examination (regression analysis) of the peak period traffic indexes indicates an association between higher urban area population densities and greater traffic congestion, with a coefficient of determination (R2) of 0.48, which is significant at the one percent level of confidence (Figure 2). This is consistent with other research equating lower densities with faster travel times and an increasing automobile use in response to higher densities.

    At the regional level, a similar association is apparent. The United States, with the lowest urban population densities, has the least traffic congestion. Latin America, Eastern Europe and China, with higher urban densities, have worse traffic congestion. Density does not explain all the differences, however, especially among geographies outside the United States. Despite its high density, China’s traffic congestion is less intense than that of Eastern European and Latin American cities. It seems likely that this is, at least in part due to the better matching of roadway supply with demand in China, with its extensive urban freeway systems. Further, the cities of China often have a more polycentric employment distribution (Table).

    Traffic Congestion & Urban Population Density
    Urban Poulation Density
    Peak Hour Congestion Per Square Mile Per KM2
    Australia & New Zealand 49.2                4,600              1,800
    Canada 49.4                5,000              1,900
    China 64.9              15,700              6,100
    Eastern Europe 80.8              11,800              4,500
    Latin America 89.5              19,600              7,600
    United States 37.1                3,100              1,200
    Western Europe 47.4                8,700              3,400
    South Africa 52.4                8,300              3,200
    Peak Hour Congestion: Average of Tom Tom Peak Hour Congestion Indexes 2013
    Population Densities: Demographia World Urban Areas

     

    Both of these factors, high capacity roadways and dispersion of population as well as jobs are also important contributors to the lower congestion levels in the United States.

    Wendell Cox is principal of Demographia, an international public policy and demographics firm. He is co-author of the “Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey” and author of “Demographia World Urban Areas” and “War on the Dream: How Anti-Sprawl Policy Threatens the Quality of Life.” He was appointed to three terms on the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission, where he served with the leading city and county leadership as the only non-elected member. He was appointed to the Amtrak Reform Council to fill the unexpired term of Governor Christine Todd Whitman and has served as a visiting professor at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, a national university in Paris.

    Photo: On the Moscow MKAD Ring Road

  • America’s Fastest-Growing Small Cities

    Coverage of America’s changing urban scene tends to focus heavily on large metropolitan areas and the “megaregions” now often said to dominate the economic future. Often missed has been a slow, but inexorable, shift of migration and economic growth to smaller cities, a geography usually ignored or dismissed, with the exception of college towns, as doomed to lag behind by urban boosters.

    Part of the problem is that analysts often assume that the decline of small towns, which have been losing population, also means small cities are in trouble. Yet this is simply not true. Since 2000 small cities with between 100,000 and 250,000 residents have enjoyed a 13.6% population growth rate, more than twice that of New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, and roughly 10% faster than the national growth rate. The main driving force, notes demographer Wendell Cox, appears to be domestic migration, which is negative in the largest cities as well as in small towns. However the 167 metropolitan statistical areas with between 100,000 to 250,000 in population have added a net 675,000 people due to domestic migration since 2000.

    This performance is also seen in the economic sphere. All five of the nation’s fastest growing economies in 2013 were small cities, which, despite their smaller size, possess the basic infrastructure — hospitals, schools, airports, broadband — that are essential to economic growth.

    Of course, not all small cities are doing well. Many, particularly in the industrial heartland, continue to suffer; virtually all the bottom 10 small cities on our list are in old industrial areas in the Great Lakes, the Southeast and Massachusetts,  the birthplace of America’s first manufacturing boom.

    In order to determine which small metro areas are booming, and help us understand why, we asked Mark Schill at the Praxis Strategy Group to rank them based on four factors: population growth (2000-13), job growth (2001-14), real per capita personal income growth (2000-12), and growth of regional GDP per job (2001-12) — if GDP per job is increasing, it’s an indicator that the metro area is adding high-value, productive industries to its economy, as opposed to lower-wage jobs.

    Boomer Boomtowns

    Over the next decade, one major driver for growth in small cities may be demographic factors, notably the aging of the baby boom generation. Contrary to popular press accounts that suggest boomers are gravitating to big cities, demographic evidence suggests the opposite is the case. Demographer Cox says boomers appear to be, on net, leaving both big cities and older suburbs in favor either of exurbs or smaller cities.

    Some small cities already appear to benefiting from this trend, including the top-ranked city on our list: The Villages, Fla. This relatively new community, which focuses on “active” seniors has doubled in population since 2000, and last year was the nation’sfastest-growing metropolitan area. The area also has expanded its job base by 186% since 2001. Yet as much of the employment is in services, growth in economic productivity has been lackluster. Critically, this does not mean the area has been getting poorer. Personal income growth, largely from assets owned by seniors, has soared by some 60% since 2000, 10 times the national average growth rate of 6%.

    Thriving senior-oriented economies can be found throughout Florida, but they are also emerging elsewhere. St. George, Utah, which ranks 12th on our list, has long attracted downshifting boomers from the West Coast as well as the rest of the Intermountain West. This has helped to power its construction sector, a key element of the local economy. Another hot spot for boomers is No. 17 Bellingham, Wash., which is home to Western Washington University. In the coming decade, we can expect a growing competition among smaller towns for boomer residents, and their sometimes significant assets.

    Energy Towns

    The oil and gas industry doesn’t need bright lights, but sometimes its presence can create some. Of our top 10 fastest-growing small cities, five are energy-driven boom towns. This includes No. 2 Midland, Texas, which has logged 60% job growth since 2001 and 30% population growth since 2000. The west Texas  city, located in the heart of the booming Permian Basin is also getting richer, with personal income growth of over 96.7% since 2000, a rate well above the national average of 6% and the median for small cities of 10.2%. Last year, Midland led the nation in GDP growth at 14%.

    Other high-ranked energy cities include No. 3 Odessa, Texas,  and No. 8 Houma-Thibadaoux, La., which this February boasted the lowest unemployment rate in the nation at 2.8%.

    College Towns

    One would expect this list to be chock full of university towns, but to our surprise, only one made the top 10: Fargo, North Dakota-Minnesota. The metro area has caught our eye before. Fargo is far more than home to North Dakota State, with almost 15,000 students, but the school’s  expertise in engineering and energy dovetails perfectly with the state’s boom not only in energy but it’s rapidly growing tech and manufacturing sectors. Since 2010, manufacturing employment is up 18% in Fargo, to go along with 21% growth at corporate managing offices, 20% in wholesale trade, 17% in finance, and 14% in professional services.

    Perhaps a better example of a small city benefiting from university connections is  No. 12 Morgantown, W.V. The metro area of 135,000 is home to the nearly 30,000 people working or studying at the University of West Virginia. Other college towns that made it to the upper tier include No. 11 Hammond, home to Southeast Louisiana University , with 15,000 students; No. 13 Logan, Utah, which hosts Utah State’s 28,000 students; and No. 25 Auburn, Alabama, home to the 25,000-student university of the same name.

    Government Centers

    Throughout the Bush years and in the first years of the recession, government centers — such as greater Washington, D.C., Madison, Wisc., as well as towns with military bases — out-performed the overall economy. Today many of the small cities that are thriving remain largely dependent on government spending, including  No. 5 Jacksonville, N.C., home to the Marine Corps’ Camp Lejeune.

    Given the long-term fiscal crisis facing many communities, this dependence on government spending could prove problematic, leaving a metro area’s fate in the hands of others. Planned cuts in military spending could undermine growth in many of these communities and is already raising the hackles of some public sector unions.

    The Road Ahead

    These trends suggest that the future of small city America may be far brighter than suggested by many urban pundits. The movement of boomers and the growth of resource-based industries seem likely to accelerate this trend, although declines in government, and particularly military, spending may impact some communities negatively. Like big cities, their small brethren seem to be divided between those that are thriving and those that are not.

    Perhaps the biggest challenge facing small cities will be retaining or attracting enough young families. Already roughly two out of every five millennials lives in one of the country’s smaller communities, and proportionately this population grew faster in these small metro areas than in either core cities or suburbs. In the future the key question is how to get more of them, particularly the better educated, to stay.

    Economically, these areas also need to diversify, taking advantage of new technologies that allow many businesses to operate remotely. Too great dependence on government spending, or on boomer migration, tends to distort local economies by fostering too much dependence on Washington or  creates a labor market overly tilted towards low-paying service workers. These smaller places still have their work cut out from them, but their prospects may overall be brighter than many suspect.

    Fastest Growing Small Cities
    Rank Region (MSA) Score Growth GDP/Job, 2001-2012 Job Growth, 2001-2014 PCPI Growth, 2000-2012 Population Growth, 2000-2013
    1 The Villages, FL 76.4 2.0% 186.0% 59.2% 99.2%
    2 Midland, TX 60.4 15.8% 59.7% 96.7% 30.3%
    3 Odessa, TX 54.4 32.9% 45.0% 49.4% 23.8%
    4 Fargo, ND-MN 43.4 24.8% 28.4% 23.5% 27.7%
    5 Jacksonville, NC 41.8 15.3% 27.2% 42.2% 22.9%
    6 Longview, TX 41.1 29.7% 18.0% 25.0% 11.5%
    7 Bismarck, ND 41.0 15.2% 35.5% 34.9% 22.5%
    8 Houma-Thibodaux, LA 40.7 18.0% 22.0% 49.7% 7.9%
    9 Watertown-Fort Drum, NY 39.9 22.1% 19.8% 39.5% 6.9%
    10 Madera, CA 39.4 20.1% 25.6% 22.0% 23.3%
    11 Hammond, LA 39.1 18.6% 20.5% 25.2% 24.5%
    12 Morgantown, WV 39.1 19.8% 22.7% 23.9% 22.3%
    13 Logan, UT-ID 39.0 23.1% 23.8% 12.4% 25.7%
    14 Las Cruces, NM 38.7 20.0% 21.0% 23.2% 21.9%
    15 Elizabethtown-Fort Knox, KY 37.9 27.8% 9.9% 18.6% 12.6%
    16 St. George, UT 36.9 -2.0% 48.7% 6.4% 62.1%
    17 Bellingham, WA 35.2 15.8% 20.1% 15.7% 23.1%
    18 Rochester, MN 35.1 24.7% 7.0% 12.7% 14.2%
    19 Sioux Falls, SD 34.9 13.6% 19.7% 13.0% 29.3%
    20 California-Lexington Park, MD 34.7 12.6% 20.0% 17.0% 26.7%
    21 Hanford-Corcoran, CA 34.7 10.2% 12.0% 36.6% 16.3%
    22 Sherman-Denison, TX 34.4 27.7% 3.1% 9.4% 10.3%
    23 College Station-Bryan, TX 33.8 9.0% 26.1% 16.5% 27.5%
    24 Elkhart-Goshen, IN 33.4 31.9% 3.8% -3.1% 9.4%
    25 Auburn-Opelika, AL 33.3 8.7% 33.9% 7.3% 30.8%
    26 St. Joseph, MO-KS 33.1 24.8% 8.7% 14.4% 3.0%
    27 Tuscaloosa, AL 32.7 19.4% 11.0% 10.2% 15.2%
    28 Billings, MT 32.6 13.2% 16.1% 17.3% 18.0%
    29 Grand Forks, ND-MN 32.3 13.5% 8.6% 34.2% 3.4%
    30 Hattiesburg, MS 32.3 13.3% 13.7% 15.9% 19.0%
    31 Idaho Falls, ID 32.3 10.8% 12.0% 10.6% 30.5%
    32 Charlottesville, VA 31.6 12.8% 12.7% 16.0% 17.5%
    33 Lawton, OK 31.5 15.4% 7.1% 23.2% 7.7%
    34 Burlington-South Burlington, VT 31.4 20.0% 4.9% 14.2% 7.6%
    35 Coeur d’Alene, ID 31.3 6.9% 23.9% 7.1% 31.8%
    36 Alexandria, LA 31.2 16.6% 4.8% 21.8% 6.6%
    37 Daphne-Fairhope-Foley, AL 31.2 3.2% 27.3% 5.9% 38.3%
    38 Johnson City, TN 31.2 19.5% 1.6% 13.2% 10.5%
    39 Bend-Redmond, OR 30.6 2.4% 23.9% 2.6% 42.4%
    40 Yuma, AZ 30.4 8.7% 13.1% 11.4% 25.3%
    41 Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA 30.0 15.2% 6.8% 21.6% 3.5%
    42 El Centro, CA 30.0 -0.2% 28.2% 21.9% 24.0%
    43 Binghamton, NY 30.0 27.1% -10.5% 11.1% -1.7%
    44 Grand Junction, CO 30.0 12.2% 13.7% 2.0% 25.4%
    45 Jonesboro, AR 29.9 9.8% 11.9% 17.0% 16.2%
    46 Eau Claire, WI 29.7 15.8% 9.3% 10.1% 10.7%
    47 Sierra Vista-Douglas, AZ 29.7 7.1% 8.2% 30.0% 9.6%
    48 State College, PA 29.6 10.6% 3.5% 20.2% 14.3%
    49 Iowa City, IA 29.6 6.3% 21.1% 12.4% 21.9%
    50 Winchester, VA-WV 29.6 9.7% 12.2% 4.3% 27.4%
    51 Greenville, NC 29.4 6.8% 13.6% 6.3% 29.8%
    52 Lafayette-West Lafayette, IN 29.0 17.6% 5.8% -0.9% 16.8%
    53 Tyler, TX 28.8 5.8% 16.4% 11.3% 23.0%
    54 Bowling Green, KY 28.4 9.2% 16.8% 4.5% 20.8%
    55 Bloomington, IN 28.2 15.0% 8.5% 2.5% 14.3%
    56 Champaign-Urbana, IL 28.2 17.5% -5.0% 6.9% 11.7%
    57 Yakima, WA 27.9 9.0% 12.9% 14.5% 11.0%
    58 Homosassa Springs, FL 27.9 8.7% 11.2% 9.5% 17.4%
    59 Carbondale-Marion, IL 27.8 13.7% 0.8% 16.9% 4.8%
    60 Rapid City, SD 27.8 4.9% 7.7% 19.0% 17.4%
    61 Panama City, FL 27.6 4.5% 15.7% 15.1% 17.1%
    62 Anniston-Oxford-Jacksonville, AL 27.5 17.7% -5.2% 10.0% 5.1%
    63 Columbia, MO 27.3 2.5% 20.8% 6.7% 25.6%
    64 La Crosse-Onalaska, WI-MN 27.3 11.9% 6.1% 13.8% 6.7%
    65 Chico, CA 27.2 10.5% 6.5% 13.6% 9.0%
    66 Abilene, TX 27.1 7.7% 10.2% 21.8% 4.5%
    67 Yuba City, CA 27.1 6.8% 4.4% 10.2% 20.9%
    68 Terre Haute, IN 27.0 18.8% -2.7% 8.7% 0.8%
    69 Kahului-Wailuku-Lahaina, HI 27.0 1.4% 13.0% 13.0% 24.2%
    70 St. Cloud, MN 26.9 8.0% 10.7% 10.8% 13.8%
    71 Chambersburg-Waynesboro, PA 26.9 7.5% 17.1% 4.7% 17.2%
    72 Oshkosh-Neenah, WI 26.8 15.4% 1.4% 5.3% 7.9%
    73 Dover, DE 26.6 -2.8% 23.0% 6.0% 33.2%
    74 Texarkana, TX-AR 26.6 12.4% -0.3% 15.1% 4.5%
    75 Dothan, AL 26.4 9.6% -2.5% 13.4% 12.7%
    76 Lake Havasu City-Kingman, AZ 26.3 2.8% 8.5% 3.9% 30.0%
    77 Lawrence, KS 26.3 10.2% 2.0% 7.9% 14.0%
    78 Fairbanks, AK 26.3 1.3% 8.5% 15.8% 21.0%
    79 Missoula, MT 26.3 5.4% 13.7% 9.4% 16.3%
    80 Joplin, MO 26.2 12.0% 2.0% 6.6% 11.1%
    81 Owensboro, KY 26.2 11.4% 5.2% 11.5% 5.8%
    82 Lake Charles, LA 26.2 6.8% 5.4% 22.4% 4.4%
    83 Williamsport, PA 26.2 12.5% 0.4% 20.0% -2.6%
    84 San Angelo, TX 26.1 5.0% 5.4% 20.1% 10.1%
    85 Flagstaff, AZ 26.0 6.2% 9.3% 8.3% 16.9%
    86 Glens Falls, NY 25.9 8.6% 3.7% 19.5% 3.4%
    87 Cumberland, MD-WV 25.8 9.6% 0.3% 22.4% -0.6%
    88 New Bern, NC 25.8 9.8% -1.1% 11.2% 10.9%
    89 Beckley, WV 25.7 6.2% 3.3% 28.7% -1.7%
    90 Bloomington, IL 25.5 9.5% -2.6% 8.4% 14.0%
    91 Longview, WA 25.4 12.2% -5.4% 8.2% 9.5%
    92 Kingston, NY 25.3 9.5% -4.7% 20.9% 1.8%
    93 Wheeling, WV-OH 25.3 14.2% 0.7% 14.7% -4.7%
    94 Florence-Muscle Shoals, AL 25.1 12.0% -0.7% 11.4% 3.0%
    95 Dalton, GA 25.1 19.3% -15.8% -10.6% 17.6%
    96 Sioux City, IA-NE-SD 25.1 10.5% 0.7% 16.2% 0.6%
    97 Sebastian-Vero Beach, FL 25.0 1.9% 12.8% 2.4% 25.3%
    98 Wenatchee, WA 24.8 1.3% 17.1% 11.5% 14.2%
    99 Blacksburg-Christiansburg-Radford, VA 24.8 6.9% 3.4% 12.4% 9.0%
    100 Harrisonburg, VA 24.7 3.8% 7.7% 6.2% 19.1%
    101 Albany, OR 24.5 9.8% 2.6% -0.8% 15.3%
    102 Battle Creek, MI 24.2 17.5% -9.7% 6.1% -2.2%
    103 Ithaca, NY 24.2 3.1% 5.9% 18.3% 7.3%
    104 Warner Robins, GA 24.1 -3.9% 13.5% 7.2% 28.6%
    105 Lebanon, PA 24.0 0.9% 13.0% 13.0% 12.6%
    106 Goldsboro, NC 23.9 7.8% -2.2% 9.2% 9.6%
    107 Monroe, LA 23.8 6.7% -2.5% 15.6% 5.0%
    108 Lewiston-Auburn, ME 23.7 9.1% 0.3% 9.9% 3.6%
    109 Sumter, SC 23.6 9.1% -9.1% 15.1% 3.2%
    110 Prescott, AZ 23.4 -3.7% 11.5% 5.4% 27.6%
    111 Vineland-Bridgeton, NJ 22.9 3.5% -0.4% 14.9% 7.6%
    112 Wichita Falls, TX 22.8 6.5% -9.7% 21.3% -0.4%
    113 Jackson, TN 22.8 6.5% 3.8% 6.6% 7.0%
    114 Decatur, AL 22.8 12.2% -7.7% 2.4% 5.0%
    115 Cleveland, TN 22.7 2.7% 7.5% 5.6% 13.6%
    116 Janesville-Beloit, WI 22.5 11.0% -3.7% 1.4% 5.4%
    117 Napa, CA 22.3 0.1% 15.0% 6.2% 12.7%
    118 Decatur, IL 22.3 11.6% -9.6% 12.2% -4.6%
    119 Sheboygan, WI 22.2 6.1% -3.1% 13.7% 1.9%
    120 Athens-Clarke County, GA 22.2 -3.3% 17.9% 5.3% 18.7%
    121 Kankakee, IL 21.9 7.1% -1.8% 3.2% 8.0%
    122 Morristown, TN 21.8 6.9% -4.8% 0.9% 12.1%
    123 Brunswick, GA 21.7 3.9% -4.9% -3.1% 21.9%
    124 Medford, OR 21.6 0.3% 7.9% 4.4% 14.7%
    125 Topeka, KS 21.4 6.4% -4.2% 7.7% 4.2%
    126 Wausau, WI 21.3 4.9% -1.6% 5.9% 7.5%
    127 Hilton Head Island-Bluffton-Beaufort, SC 21.3 -8.7% 8.4% -2.7% 38.8%
    128 Mount Vernon-Anacortes, WA 21.3 -1.3% 8.2% 6.0% 14.9%
    129 East Stroudsburg, PA 21.1 -0.3% 7.3% -1.1% 19.6%
    130 Bangor, ME 21.1 3.4% -0.9% 9.4% 5.8%
    131 Valdosta, GA 21.0 -6.2% 6.7% 11.6% 19.4%
    132 Gadsden, AL 20.9 5.1% -2.2% 11.0% 0.6%
    133 Jefferson City, MO 20.9 3.6% -1.4% 6.7% 7.3%
    134 Altoona, PA 20.8 6.7% -1.2% 9.2% -2.1%
    135 Appleton, WI 20.8 -0.6% 5.5% 5.2% 13.5%
    136 Gettysburg, PA 20.7 2.2% 6.3% 1.0% 11.0%
    137 Staunton-Waynesboro, VA 20.5 0.9% -3.2% 9.3% 9.5%
    138 Michigan City-La Porte, IN 20.3 11.8% -12.6% -0.8% 1.1%
    139 Lima, OH 19.9 12.6% -11.3% -0.6% -3.0%
    140 Springfield, IL 19.7 8.1% -12.6% 0.0% 5.0%
    141 Fond du Lac, WI 19.6 3.8% -1.5% 3.7% 4.5%
    142 Charleston, WV 19.5 3.4% -9.0% 16.9% -4.6%
    143 Redding, CA 19.0 -2.1% -1.6% 8.5% 9.4%
    144 Pueblo, CO 18.9 -4.2% 6.5% 3.6% 13.9%
    145 Farmington, NM 18.8 -15.5% 9.6% 28.5% 10.8%
    146 Gainesville, GA 18.8 -12.1% 13.9% -3.4% 33.2%
    147 Jackson, MI 18.3 7.8% -7.0% -4.0% 1.1%
    148 Monroe, MI 18.1 5.9% -5.8% -3.1% 2.7%
    149 Bay City, MI 18.1 9.4% -10.9% -2.1% -3.0%
    150 Florence, SC 18.0 -2.3% -3.4% 8.0% 6.7%
    151 Santa Fe, NM 17.9 -5.4% 4.5% 3.2% 13.7%
    152 Niles-Benton Harbor, MI 17.4 4.7% -9.0% 5.3% -4.4%
    153 Burlington, NC 17.3 -0.6% -6.2% -7.8% 17.5%
    154 Racine, WI 17.2 0.4% -5.4% 3.6% 3.2%
    155 Johnstown, PA 17.0 0.1% -6.0% 14.5% -7.6%
    156 Muncie, IN 16.7 7.2% -13.8% -4.1% -1.1%
    157 Punta Gorda, FL 16.3 -11.2% 12.9% 2.0% 15.8%
    158 Mansfield, OH 15.6 5.2% -16.6% 1.3% -5.5%
    159 Rocky Mount, NC 15.6 -0.1% -13.7% -0.1% 5.3%
    160 Pittsfield, MA 15.3 -5.7% -1.4% 13.2% -3.8%
    161 Barnstable Town, MA 15.3 -10.8% 3.2% 21.1% -3.6%
    162 Weirton-Steubenville, WV-OH 13.8 -1.6% -15.8% 9.0% -7.4%
    163 Albany, GA 13.7 -9.5% -5.7% 13.8% -1.2%
    164 Springfield, OH 13.1 -2.7% -10.4% 4.0% -5.8%
    165 Saginaw, MI 11.8 -1.3% -10.6% -4.0% -6.4%
    166 Muskegon, MI 10.8 -9.7% -4.1% -0.7% 0.4%
    167 Macon, GA 9.1 -18.3% -3.1% 5.6% 4.0%

    Analysis by Mark Schill, mark@praxissg.com. Measures are normalized and equally weighted. Sources: U.S. BEA (GDP/Job, PCPI growth), EMSI (employment growth), U.S. Census Population Estimates Program (population growth).

    This piece originally appeared at Forbes..

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and Distinguished Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University, and a member of the editorial board of the Orange County Register. His newest book, The New Class Conflict is now available at Amazon and Telos Press. He is author of The City: A Global History and The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050. His most recent study, The Rise of Postfamilialism, has been widely discussed and distributed internationally. He lives in Los Angeles, CA.

    Fargo photo by David Kohlmeyer.

  • L.A. Hanging on as a Top Global City

    For more than a century, Southern Californians have dreamed of their region becoming host to a great global city. At the turn of the 20th century Henry Huntington, who built much of the area’s first mass-transit system, proclaimed that “Los Angeles is destined to become the most important city in the world.”

    Of course, builders of other cities – St. Louis, New Orleans, Chicago and even Cincinnati, Ohio – have made similar predictions. But L.A.’s claim, unlike the others, had a significant resonance. Not only was the region growing rapidly throughout the previous century, and now stands as North America’s second-largest population center, but it dominated a host of fields, notably entertainment and aerospace, and was highly influential in energy, fashion and manufacturing.

    But it was a connection to the Pacific Rim that made L.A.’s ascendency so global. This is something that Midwest rivals, such as Chicago, never enjoyed. By the 1980s, when I was writing my first book, “California Inc.,” faith in Southern California’s global ascendency was commonplace among its business leadership, who almost universally saw the city as rising above New York, London and Tokyo to become the new center of a Pacific-centered world economy.

    This notion, and the region’s huge economy, has sustained its status among global cities. The 2014 A.T. Kearney global cities index ranked Los Angeles sixth, behind New York, London, Paris, Tokyo and Hong Kong.

    However, a new study of global cities, just released by the Singapore Civil Service College and Chapman University, shifted ranking criteria away from the size of economies or number of business producer service firms and concentrated, instead, on unique factors such as industry domination, diversity and global connectivity.

    Hooray for Hollywood

    The good news: Los Angeles ranks 10th among global cities, using our new measurement. But L.A.’s also clearly not gaining ground on the top two global cities, New York and London, and now ranks below such rising competitors as Beijing and Dubai. L.A. also only shares 10th place, with its primary rival, the San Francisco Bay Area, as well as Toronto.

    What is keeping Los Angeles in the top 10? For the most part, the Hollywood connection makes Southern California a “necessary” place for global business. Hollywood is nearly synonymous with the American entertainment industry and is by far the world’s largest in terms of revenue and influence. Last year, the industry enjoyed exports of almost $15 billion. Every major global movie studio is located in Los Angeles.

    Yet this industry – growing both nationally and internationally – is also increasinglydispersing. Indeed, this region’s share of film and television production has been plummeting in recent years, according to the California Film Commission, largely the result of films and TV moving to Canada, Louisiana and other less-expensive locales.

    This is troubling. Before 1980, Southern California’s global emergence rested on more than merely being “Tinsel Town.” It was once the hub of the global aerospace industry, but this former linchpin has declined as both industry headquarters and production have moved away. More than 90,000 aerospace jobs have left Southern California since the end of the Cold War, about 25 years ago.

    The region also retains a foothold as the U.S. base in the global auto sector, particularly for design and marketing, for some Asian carmakers. However, Nissan, a few years back, relocated its U.S. headquarters to Nashville, Tenn., and Honda moved some of its top executives to Ohio in order to be nearer to its manufacturing plants.

    More devastating is the departure this year from Torrance of the U.S. headquarters for Toyota, the world’s largest automobile firm and a consistent technological innovator.

    Still, the picture is not totally bleak: Southern California remains the base for North American operations of the two fast-rising Korean firms, Hyundai and Kia, both in Orange County.

    One bright spot is technology. Somewhat surprisingly, the Startup Genome project ranked Los Angeles as having the second strongest startup ecosystem in the United States, ahead of Seattle, Boston and New York. The entrepreneurial spirit is still here, although there’s a lack of capital and support from government or nonprofits, elements seen in other regions.

    Overall, Southern California has been losing ground to other regions on employment. This was acknowledged even by a recent commission made up of many of the region’s top business and political leaders, which concluded that the region “is barely treading water while the rest of the world is moving forward.”

    And some of these competitors are thriving on what used to be key Southern California industries. Los Angeles was once a center of the energy industry, with several major oil companies – Arco, Union Oil, Getty Oil and Occidental – anchored here. Today, all these firms have either disappeared or moved away. The big winner: Houston, No. 14 on our list, which now dominates energy in the same way L.A. once dominated aerospace and entertainment. Altogether, more than 5,000 energy-related companies call Houston home.

    A more profound challenge comes from the Bay Area, which shares with Southern California both a Pacific Rim location and a pleasant climate. If Hollywood is synonymous with the global entertainment industry, Silicon Valley connotes the same for technology. It is home to companies that overwhelmingly dominate the list of technology leaders, including Intel, Apple, Oracle, Google and Facebook. Many firms, including some from Asia, come with an idea and, as one Malaysian entrepreneur put it, “source in Asia, incubate in the U.S.”

    The Bay Area hosts the North American headquarters of such global tech firms as Samsung and Nokia. Top technology firms in other cities often have their key R&D functions in the Bay Area. Even a penny-pinching firm like Wal-Mart is growing its Silicon Valley presence.

    Though Silicon Valley firms are growing their employment base in places like Salt Lake City and Austin, Texas, the Bay Area retains its dominance and control over the industry. This is similar to how the financial industry remains heavily centralized in New York despite the migration of many jobs elsewhere.

    As it shifts emphasis more to media, the Bay Area’s tech sector increasingly threatens L.A.-oriented industries such as advertising and entertainment. Google and Yahoo already are ranked among the world’s largest media companies. (Yahoo refers to itself as a digital media company, rather than a technology company.) With the ubiquity of its iTunes platform, Apple exercises ever-greater control over consumer distribution of entertainment products like music and video; Netflix, Hulu and YouTube could become the movie and television studios of the future. This could shift global media decision-making from its familiar New York-Los Angeles axis to one centered on the Bay Area.

    In the future, our region may face powerful competition from Washington, D.C., which has all but stolen the aerospace crown from Southern California. Further down the road, we may also face a challenge from Washington state. Never before a serious competitor, Seattle, with a strong technology sector and name-brand retailers such as Costco, Starbucks and Nordstrom, is growing its global footprint as Southern California’s appears to be shrinking. Its twin ports, Tacoma and Seattle, could present a long-term challenge to the still-dominant ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles.

    What should be done to retain and improve Southern California’s global status? Does anyone still care? The entrepreneurs and promotors who built this region would probably support new infrastructure and regulatory reforms that might bolster the industrial, entertainment and trade sectors.

    Sadly, it is dubious that the city’s current leadership – focused on trying to build a faux New York or an Ecotopia amid economic decline – even understands the nature of the challenge.

    But adopting solutions from the 20th century will not be enough. Los Angeles’ greatest resource – its diverse, motivated population – has to be allowed to flourish as part of our globalization strategy. Our entrepreneurial ties to Vietnam, China, Mexico, the former Soviet Union and other places could prove critical to restoring our international status.

    Great global cities, we need to remember, are created by the people who live there. What we need to do, more than anything, is show that Southern Californians can play a part in reigniting the momentum that once made this region the emerging superstar on the global stage.

    This piece originally appeared at The Orange County Register.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and Distinguished Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University, and a member of the editorial board of the Orange County Register. His newest book, The New Class Conflict is now available at Amazon and Telos Press. He is author of The City: A Global History and The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050. His most recent study, The Rise of Postfamilialism, has been widely discussed and distributed internationally. He lives in Los Angeles, CA.

  • Why Modern Architecture Struggles to Inspire Catholics

    Inspired by a recent visit to a Le Corbusier-designed Dominican monastery near the French city of Lyon, I’ve been thinking a lot about the interaction between Catholicism and modernist aesthetics.   It has little to do with whether the Church affects what designers create beyond filling the program.   Instead, I’ve tried to examine how the architect’s religion influences the Church’s own self-image.  I’ve concluded that the Church, an institution that has been the guardian tradition and the patron artistic and architectural development in the West for almost two millennia, never could reconcile itself comfortably with Modernism.

    I was reminded of this when I shared with my brother news on the opening of a new convent and Visitor Center buried into the hill on which sits Le Corbusier’s famous Notre Dame-du-Haut Chapel at Ronchamp.  The convent was but the latest creation of the contemporary master Renzo Piano, featuring architect’s trademark manipulation of natural light, spatial simplicity, open views of nature and elegant detailing.  My brother seemed to shrug at these qualities, writing:

    Seems more like a fish tank with Ikea finishes than a cloister. I know natural light, rectangles, and windows are nice, but its openness and simplicity feel like some vapid unbearable lightness than a place of spiritual reflection. Zen monks might appreciate it more.

    I replied that he seemed to have a very narrow idea of what constitutes a proper place for spiritual reflection, and that lightness and simplicity had a place Catholic doctrine.  I referred to him to a series of pictures  I had taken of Le Corbusier’s monastery, wondering what he thought of his more ‘Brutal’ approach.  My brother elaborated:

    Ugh, these architects have no god. That thing (by Corbu) is hideous. Look, meditation takes place in the mind, but more in the soul. Christianity places the priority on man’s soul transcending his surroundings, not blending with it (a la Zen). Man is large, not small. Churches should be ornamented and highly symbolic, teeming with life, not stark and barren. It all has to do with Being not Nonbeing. The church is a foundation, it’s heavy, it imitates the eternal. It’s not some flimsy plates of glass and concrete garnished with random primary colors here and there.



    Bedroom of Convent by Renzo Piano Workshop at Ronchamp, France

    Though there are indeed gaps in his argument that can be exploited, I think his overall opinion is respectable and shared by many of the Catholic faithful who possess a sophisticated understanding of their beliefs and how to translate them into sacred art.  Often such views completely contrast from many members of the clergy, who have more of an interest in revitalizing the church by embracing contemporary artistic trends than by responding to wishes of their flock.  The Dominican monastic order prizes scholasticism above all else, and finds it fully consistent to hire a leader at the forefront of architectural progress like Le Corbusier.  The nuns were probably thinking along the same lines, wondering less about how sacred life can transform architecture, but rather how architecture can transform sacred life.

    Outside a few rare examples such as Ronchamp,  I sense that Modernism has failed to deliver an architecture  that connects with most Catholics and other traditional Christians.  Much of this has to do with fact that Modernism as a cultural movement is inherently atheistic as it is based on a secular materialist philosophy.  Even Renzo Piano admits as much, describing his client from the convent: “She has a profound love of architecture, of landscape, of sacred space – and even of people without religion, like me.  She wanted a place of silence and prayer. I said: ‘I can’t help you with prayer, but perhaps I can help with silence and a little joy.”



    Chapel at Convent by Renzo Piano Workshop, Ronchamp, France

    And therein lies the crux of the problem: When one has done away with symbols, theology, and the act of worship, there’s little else to inspire a credible work of sacred art or architecture.  Piano, like any committed Modernist, is left with little more than a preference for abstraction, technology  and  some vague nostrums about nature and  space.  For a Modernist, the point of architecture is to convey an image of maximum clarity, in which all elements are related by function and little else.  As long as a space is adequately sheltered and functions for the use of its occupants, there is no need for decorative flourish.  Piano is reduced to checking off boxes for the client’s wish list, from the number of rooms, to furnishings, and to achieving a quality of ‘silence’.  There’s nothing all that particular about an architecture of silence–maybe  a dark room secluded from more socially active spaces.  Given the right palette of materials and details, any space can be turned into something contemplative.  But can this generic approach to design evoke much meaning beyond mere emotional states such as peace?

    Sacred spaces achieve much of its effect by emphasizing mystery. This is at the core of any religion, in which divine truth is revealed beyond any logical or rational framework.  As is often said, God is revealed in mysterious ways, and the purpose of any sacred space is to embody this reality.  It is inherent that a secular space is completely  counter to this and thus adopts an architectural language devoid of mystery or even ambiguity.   Secular spaces instead embrace the language of the engineer, someone who works outside the world of art, poetry, and indeed of mystery, by solving problems with the most rational tools of math and science.  There is a lot of work that goes into making successful settings for secular activities, much of it having to do with the science of building, such as lighting, acoustics, and visibility.  There is also a tendency for generating phenomenological effect through technology, such as making walls highly transparent or reflective, surfaces either smooth or deliberately rough.  To the Modernist who puts its faith in technological progress, the more an effect can exceed what can be done by the human hand, the better.



    La Tourette Monastery by Le Corbusier, Eveux, France

    Such attention to a material’s effects point to Modernism’s essentially materialist philosophy on architecture. In sacred architecture, the building and the spaces within serve  to connect users to a deeper reality that transcends its walls. They function as a gateway from the material world to a spiritual realm–the focus is on the eternal, not the object that portends to represent it.  In a secular context like Modernism, the object is the thing itself, and all meaning is tied directly to that object.   Walking into a exemplary Modernist space, one is supposed to marvel at its lightness, smoothness and simplicity, attributes that are commonly summarized as ‘machine-like’.  If one desires a more ‘humanist’ look and feel, the designer can instill a quality of ‘roughness’ by texturizing concrete, oxidizing steel,  and inserting warmth by using  natural materials such as wood and stone.  Industrialization gives us that much more control to generate a precise effect, and empowers the designers unlimited opportunities in experimenting.  At the same time, it diminishes the role of the craftsman, who throughout most of human history was the guardian in generating material effects, and in  many ways assumed the role of architectural detailing.  Machines take the human factor out of the art of making, thus producing something devoid of passion, feeling that imbues every man-made object.

    Piano singles himself better than most of his contemporaries by his ability to reinsert the human touch in his design process. His architectural details are truly works of art and are usually the result of a distinct craftsman-like approach in generating them.  The name of his firm, The Renzo Piano Workshop, harkens back to the time when architecture was realized by stone masons, who would accumulate specialized design knowledge in the development of style details and templates.  Where Piano departs is the end result of his craftsman-like approach: highly refined, ultra-precise, machine-polished building systems and parts.  The structural connections in his projects are beautiful  and poetic pieces of engineering, much like Apple products, but like most industrial artifacts, they cannot express the ancient, primordial aspects of our humanity.  Is that necessary to fully immerse oneself the Catholic experience?

    I believe so.  A fundamental assumption in Catholicism is that history is linear and that God was incarnated in the human form of Jesus Christ at a precise point in history to the point that the period before and after this event are neatly divided (BC vs. AD).  Its doctrines and liturgy are part of an evolutionary process that have taken place in the world for two thousand years, and followers actively partake in this history by participating in the mass.  For most Catholics, weekly mass is the only time that they are reminded that they are tied to humanity in throughout the ages, both in the past and the future.  This goes against ‘modernity’, or the idea that the times are so new and different that prior truths or solutions are irrelevant.  In Christianity, Truth is eternal, and the problems that afflict humanity are no different during the time of Christ than they do now. There is no ‘new and improved’. Rather, the ideal was was established two-thousand years ago (the life of Christ) and no amount of social or technological advance (or regression) can change this. 



    View of Crypt inside the La Tourette Monastery by Le Corbusier

    In addition, Christianity relies on communicating its ideas through allegories conveyed verbally in the Bible, musically in its music and visually illustrated in its art and architecture.  These are designed to make the message accessible to all people, as opposed to keeping revelations close to a self-selected elite.  The message has to be clear, the context must be provided and the characters believable.  Visually, this requires the use of lines and recognizable figures placed in a narrative relationship. These demands don’t lend themselves well to abstraction, the modus operandi of the Modernist.   Abstraction is by nature open to individual interpretation; Christian revelation is not.  Abstraction is deliberately exercised by an individual, driven by their own desire to create original content; Christian subjects and themes are the content, with the artist sharing his visceral imaginings of truths he does not question (like most European art before the 19th Century).

    This probably explains why many Catholics feel a certain frustration with the role played by modern music, art and design in today’s church.  The music uses irregular folk beats, vulgar melodies and harmonies, and seem composed to bring attention to the songs themselves rather than acquainting singers to a more transcendent reality.  In contemporary Christian art, Christ is portrayed as a non-descript figure, and often times and rendered in an abstracted archaic style that is flat and lacks feeling.  The cross is abstracted to emphasize its iconic nature as a symbol, detached from any literal representation of what actually happened on the cross.  In most modern churches, seating is arranged as a theater in the round, focusing the parishioners’ attention to the the priest, or the choir, rather than to God as manifested in an elaborately decorated apse wall or a ceiling pointed to heaven. This was vividly brought to my attention when watching the broadcast of Christmas mass from the Vatican–most of the camera shots showed details of the sanctuary’s glorious interior and symbolic art, with the occasional view of the Pope.  Catholic worship is not about the mere men (priests) who help conduct its rituals but is instead is about how God is revealed in them by means of humanity’s most outward expression of what lies within its soul: Art. When there is nothing meaningful or moving to look at, one is resigned to paying attention to a charismatic individual standing on a stage, transcendent beauty is loss, and the Christian message takes on a banal delivery.



    Chapelle Notre Dame du Haut by Le Corbusier, Ronchamp, France

    Architects, a growing number of whom fall into agnosticism and atheism, often seem to forget this when visiting sacred yet Modern masterpieces.  Just because Le Corbusier’s Ronchamp chapel makes some of my colleagues cry doesn’t mean it fulfills its ecclesiastical responsibilities particularly well.  They are likely overwhelmed by the chapel’s poetic mastery of form and light and how it provokes a profound yet undefinable emotional response.  I succumbed to this response myself when I went to Ronchamp as well when I toured  Le Corbusier’s monastery of La Tourette.  I was taken aback by his buildings’ abstract forms, its play with light, its vivid use of color, its sophisticated relationship to its site.  In the end, I didn’t develop a more profound appreciation of Christian revelation, but a greater respect for mathematical proportion, abstract formal metaphors, primary colors and geometries–transcendent things nonetheless, but a bit too esoteric for most people.  La Tourette was clearly a more regulated composition compared to Ronchamp, which is probably why is probably why the latter provokes a more emotional response.  In  a sense, the chapel is Le Corbusier at his least ‘modern’ and more archaic, while his monastery is likely intended to feel more academicized due to that typology’s tradition of being repositories for knowledge. Ronchamp’s form sweeps up to heaven, its dark sanctuary enclosed in thick walls reminds one of a cave evocative of early Christianity, while its rounded towers mimick Mary in her veil, sheltering the church below. Though these moves aren’t literal, there is just enough reference to the symbols and ideas of Catholic church that make this more approachable to average followers.



    Church on the Water by Tadao Ando, Tomamu, Japan

    This isn’t to suggest that modern architecture can’t achieve successful spaces for spriritual contemplation. Tadao Ando’s Church by the Water is especially powerful, manipulating natural light and framing views that heightens the senses and fuses nature into the act of worship. The church is stripped of traditional Christian decoration, illustrations of bibical stories or saints, or any other reference to the history of the church. It works for those who wish to understand God through nature’s primal elements and how they change through the passage of time. There is a sense of ignoring the human presence altogether, as it invites one to blend into the natural surrounding (as my brother’s comment on zen indicates), which may work in more minimalist strains of Christianity and even Catholicism, but will leave many believers hungering for a place rich in narrative objects and a more fully enclosed communal response among people.   There is no altar to focus on, only a highly abstracted cross standing in a reflecting pond, which could have all sorts of meanings, but not one that concentrates the mind of the believer on Christ and his passion.

    A truly inspiring space that uses a modern architectural language for catholic worship is extremely difficult to find.  While many architects simply choose to employ a historicist style for even newest churches, it is possible to address the particular characteristics of a catholic church while maintaining a modernist sensibility.  I submit a Cistercian chapel located not far from where I live in Irving outside of Dallas designed by Gary Cunningham. Long an admired designer in the area, Cunningham’s work can be characterized as simple, straight-forward, and sensitive to materials. His award-winning residences follow a rather conventional contemporary style but he also is very accomplished in the art of adaptive reuse, in which he repurposes an existing building by carefully juxtaposing old and new elements.  This consciousness of how time plays a role in the way a building expresses itself is strongly manifested in the Cistercian chapel.  The space is enclosed in rough quaried limestone, cut in massive blocks and stacked in traditional running bond, which instantly strikes any visitor as reminiscent of the Catholic church’s earliest Romanesque sanctuaries with their thick walls and small windows. Its wood roof floating above the nave takes the shape of a traditional ceilings found in these churches, while also resembling the underside of a ship (which is where the word ‘nave’ comes from). Spans are short, further emphasizing the weight of the stone, even as they maintain familiar rhythm suggestive of the old ambulatory aisles with the repetitive row of vertical windows.  It follows more of a classic basilica typology than the popular theatre-in-the round, which indicates a desire to focus on the liturgy as opposed to the priest. But more than merely echoing the churches of the past, this chapel appears as a direct architectural metaphor for the creation of the church itself: “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church…(Matthew 16:18)”  While obviously an abstract design, Cunningham manages to endow the chapel with an important phrase from the Gospel and thus Christian revelation.  Sleek details and delicate connections between the roof and walls betray its contemporary origins, but the way it highlights the split-faced texture of the rock wed the chapel to the church’s long institutional history, and the countless number of people who dedicated their lives in building structures fitting to God’s glory.



    Cistercian Chapel by Gary Cunningham, Irving, Texas

    And that, to me, is what is necessary for a compelling Catholic worship space–a connection not only with the divine, but just as importantly with an institution comprised of people throughout the ages. Its walls should reveal human intent, either through a man-made texture or through an ornament that is the work of genuine human input. Machine-smooth de-personalizes this experience. As any human institution that is an essential part of catholic identity, it carries a rich artistic and architectural heritage that brings with it a kind of unassailable authority not found in Protestantism, which devalues the human institution in favor of interpreting directly from the Bible. The result of of relying on scripture, however justifiable from a theological standpoint, seems to lead towards a breaking down of a rich visual language and an embrace for abstraction. A small cultural vacuum subsequently takes root, which grows to consume what’s left of symbols, music, and eventually the walls. The ultimate result is either a television studio black-box with no windows preferred by evangelicals or a zen-like meditation space with no walls and a subtle symbolic indication that it’s even Christian (such as Ando’s church).

    I’m sure that Piano’s and Le Corbusier’s clerical clients were pleased with the result, and fans of high-design with no opinion on proper Catholic aesthetics are moved by their examples, too. But I wonder if these exercises in abstraction, lightness, and trying to stay relevant in fast-changing contemporary culture win much in the way of converts. People who seek the church want their souls nourished by the church’s message in as many forms as possible. When many of these forms are abstracted or simplified to an incomprehensible level, it leaves such people feeling unfulfilled, and causes many of them to leave the church for a place that offer a richer, more visually arresting environment of the older historic sanctuaries.  At least these modern ecclesiastical masterpieces continue to open their arms to the perennial pilgrimage of people most interested in them: architecture students.

    Julien Meyrat is an architect living in the Dallas area.

    Lead photo La Tourette Monastery by Le Corbusier in Eveux, France.

  • Urbanist Goals Will Mean Fewer Children, more Seniors Needing Government Help

    America’s cognitive elites and many media pundits believe high-density development will dominate the country’s future.

    That could be so, but, if it is the case, also expect far fewer Americans — and far more rapid aging of the population.

    This is a pattern seen throughout the world. In every major metropolitan area in the high-income world for which we found data — Tokyo, Seoul, London, Paris, Toronto, New York, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay area — inner-core total fertility rates are much lower than those in outer areas.

    For example, inner London, notes demographer Wendell Cox, has a fertility rate of 1.6 children per female, which is well below the replacement rate of 2.1.

    The total fertility rate is the average number of children born to women between 15 and 44 years old. In the outer reaches of London, this rate hits 2.0, one-fourth higher.

    In Sydney, Australia, where increasing population density is a sworn goal of planners, the inner city now has a fertility rate of 0.76, compared to 2.0 or more in the outer suburbs.

    Nowhere is the confluence of high density and high prices more evident than East Asia. This region is now home to some of the lowest fertility rates on Earth.

    Take Seoul, South Korea, a paragon of high-density development where high-rise buildings dominate even on the periphery.

    Seoul’s fertility rate is about 1.2, similar to rates found in Tokyo, Singapore and Hong Kong. This is the kind of place urban planners often cite as a role model.

    A recent glowing report in Smithsonian Magazine heralded Seoul as “the city of the future.” Architects, naturally, join the chorus. In 2010, the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design named Seoul the “world design capital.”

    Yet the real frontier of ultra-low fertility may now be coastal China. Both Shanghai and Beijing have fertility rates of roughly 0.7, almost one-third of the replacement rate. Overall, China’s cities have a fertility rate under 0.9.

    Gavin Jones, a leading demographer of Asia, suggests that despite recent easing of China’s one-child policy, the world’s second leading economic power is experiencing a dramatic slowdown in its birthrate.

    In places such as Taiwan, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Singapore, more than one-quarter of women will never marry and even more will never have children.

    The result, Jones suggests, will be a society made up increasingly of single people, one-child families and very old people.

    In less than four decades, according to United Nations projections, Japan will have more people over 80 than under 15.

    This may present more of a challenge to Japan in the future, one professor suggests, than the rise of China. Indeed, over time, notes Jones, the same process will be seen across East Asia, as well as parts of Europe, as the anti-marriage and post-familial trends accelerate.

    “This won’t get better in the future,” he suggests. “The decline is just starting and it’s expanding to other areas, and the process seems inexorable.”

    For now, America, with a fertility rate of 1.89, stands in somewhat less distress, but that could be changed by increasing urban density — the very policy widely adopted by pundits and planners and broadly endorsed by urban developers.

    As Cox has shown, localities with higher densities and higher prices — the two are often coincident — have considerably lower birth rates than areas with lower prices.

    This becomes even more evident when one considers the segment of the population between 5 and 14 years old, when children enter school.

    In 2012, urban areas with the highest percentage of children are predominately lower density and lower cost, including Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, Riverside-San Bernardino, Atlanta, and Phoenix.

    Urban areas with the lowest percentage of people in these age groups were also the New Urbanist exemplars, such as Boston, San Francisco, New York, and Seattle.

    The geographical nature of low fertility becomes even more clear in maps developed by demographer Ali Modarres.

    These maps show the percentage of households without children present. In regions such as New York, San Francisco, Seattle, D.C. and Chicago, the message is clear: much lower fertility rates in the denser urban cores.

    Maps Source: Demographer Ali Modarres, chair of urban studies at the University of Washington at Tacoma, using data from U.S. Census American Community Survey 2010

    In virtually every case, family size expands the closer one gets to the periphery; in contrast, some of the inner rings show fertility rates that approximate those seen in the hyper-dense Asian regions.

    What this suggests is that a continued focus on forcing Americans to abandon their suburban lifestyles will have a profound impact on the nation’s future competitiveness.

    An aging America will lose much of its current advantage in terms of vitality of our markets and labor force, and will be forced, like many East Asian and European countries, to invest ever more resources to take care of an aging population.

    Yet don’t expect this to affect the planners, environmentalists and their allies in real estate development, who hope to harvest windfall profits by urging and even forcing people to embrace high-density living.

    Their gain will not be to America’s advantage and will consign future generations to persistent slow growth, greater debt and a kind of societal malaise as the family fades in the face of ever greater emphasis on individualism.

    At the same time, an expanded state will be needed to keep the old folks alive in the absence of traditional networks of children and relatives.

    This piece originally appeared at The Washington Examiner.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and Distinguished Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University, and a member of the editorial board of the Orange County Register. His newest book, The New Class Conflict is now available for pre-order at Amazon and Telos Press. He is author of The City: A Global History and The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050. His most recent study, The Rise of Postfamilialism, has been widely discussed and distributed internationally. He lives in Los Angeles, CA.

    Crossing the street photo by Bigstock.

  • Ranking America’s Top Young Labor Forces: A Rust Belt Rising?

    This is a new report brief from the Center for Population Dynamics at Cleveland State University, download the pdf version here. The report was authored by Richey Piiparinen, Charlie Post, and Jim Russell

    Greater Cleveland ranks 8th nationally in the percentage of 25- to 34-year-olds in the labor force with a graduate or professional degree, ahead of such “brain hubs” as Chicago, Seattle, and Austin. The analysis speculates as to whether or not this is a leading indicator to broader economic growth. Comparisons are made with Boston and Pittsburgh—two metros further along in the economic restructuring process.

    Ranking America’s Young Adult Labor Forces

    A region’s economic prospects are tied to its levels of human capital. The most common proxy for human capital is the educational attainment rate, or the percent of a population that has completed a bachelor’s degree or higher. Figure 1 shows the nation’s largest 40 metros ranked by the percent of residents 18 and over who have completed at least a bachelor’s degree. The Rust Belt metros of Pittsburgh and Cleveland rank 23rd and 31st, respectively.

    But there are issues with measuring educational attainment this way. Metros such as Cleveland and Pittsburgh have larger aging populations due to their settlement histories, and this significantly affects regional educational attainment rates. Why does this matter? Notes Pittsburgh economist Chris Briem1: “I argue all the time that such a metric says little about how well we are doing in recent decades at either educating the population, or on how we are doing at both attracting and retaining folks with higher education.”

    A better way to analyze human capital is through age cohort. Measuring the educational attainment of a region’s 25- to 34-year-olds is a leading indicator when it comes to understanding where a region’s economy is headed. Figure 2 shows the educational attainment rates for the 25- to 34-year-old age cohort. Greater Pittsburgh ranks 7th, moving up 16 spots. Greater Cleveland moves up 6 spots to rank 25th.

    An additional method of examining a region’s skill level is to look at the educational attainment within the labor force, as opposed to population. The rationale for doing so is simple. Regions with proportionally large student populations, like Columbus, Ohio, can have exaggerated talent pools, at least in terms of economic productivity. That is, a college student may live in a region to consume knowledge but not necessarily be employed to produce output.

    To calculate educational attainment in the labor force, data were analyzed for the 25- to 34-year-old cohort from 2013 Current Population Survey2. Figure 3 details the results of this analysis. Pittsburgh ranks 4th, whereas Greater Cleveland moves up to rank 21st. Conversely, Columbus, Ohio drops 13 spots to rank 27th, perhaps suggesting that the region’s large college enrollment isn’t effectively translating into the regional labor market.

    A final analysis examines the percentage of a region’s young adult labor force that is highly skilled, or those with a graduate or professional degree. Slicing the labor force data this way is important in that a region’s highest-skilled workers are drivers of economic growth. Specifically, a metro’s top talent—think engineers, scientists, and doctors—are key agents of knowledge production and transference3, which— when translated into the marketplace—mean new firms and the evolution of existing firms. Those metros that have a high concentration of highly-skilled young adult workers have a head start in the race toward the “next” new economy.

    Figure 4 ranks the metros by the percentage of 25- to 34-year-olds in the labor force with a graduate or professional degree. Pittsburgh ranks 3rd nationally, whereas Greater Cleveland moves up 13 spots to rank 8th, ahead of Chicago, Seattle, and Austin. The implications of these findings are discussed below.

    A Rust Belt Rising?

    Economic restructuring from a labor- to a knowledge-based economy is no easy endeavor. Perhaps no other metro has made this transformation as successfully as Boston. What has driven the region’s evolution from a “dying factory town to a thriving information city”4 has been its gains in human capital. As shown in Figure 5, Boston ranks as an elite metro when it comes to educational attainment rates in both its population and labor force.

    What metro is the “next Boston”? Pittsburgh is a likely candidate. The “Steel City” region is increasingly marrying its legacies of manufacturing and knowledge production, with the evolution of new industries and products to show for it5. Enabling Pittsburgh’s ascent is a highly-skilled young adult workforce that’s rivaling Boston in terms of concentration of human capital (See Figure 5 below).

    here does that leave Cleveland? While the region is far from being the “next Boston”, one can make the case it is trending to be the “next Pittsburgh”. Specifically, a line of emerging thought—and one that will be developed by the Center for Population Dynamics in the coming months in two working papers—is that Cleveland’s 8th-placed ranking in its concentration of young workers with an advanced degree is a harbinger of broader economic growth. While this supposition is exactly that, there are several mechanisms by which this can occur.

    First, it is important to note that there is an industry demand for workers with advanced degrees in Greater Cleveland, else its 8th-place ranking wouldn’t occur. Termed a “magnet city”6, Cleveland’s knowledge economy is forming world-class clusters of expertise that are attracting top talent in key industry sectors, particularly life sciences and advanced manufacturing. In other words, if you want to act, you go to Hollywood. If you want to practice cardiac care or make medical devices you come to Cleveland. The next step for the region is to scale up its emerging economies so that the amassing of knowledge and investment becomes multiplied into the creation of a “thicker, stickier” regional economy.

    Part of this scaling up process relates to the effect that Cleveland’s concentration of highly-skilled workers can have on the local economic ecosystem. To wit, those with advanced degrees are most likely to migrate across state or international lines7. For instance, 29% of newly-arriving immigrants into Cleveland’s Cuyahoga County had a graduate or professional degree8. This means Cleveland’s burgeoning new economy demand is commonly fueled from outside the market. Why does this matter? For a historically insular region like Cleveland, this out-of-the-market knowledge migration brings a deepening of a region’s idea bank, as well as increasing global connectivity. The ability of a region to cross-pollinate ideas and get connected with global markets is crucial in the creation of new firms and emerging industries9.

    Now, what does, for example, a new biotech firm in Cleveland’s Health Tech Corridor mean for the local mechanic, bartender, lawyer, or accountant? A lot actually. Specifically, economist Enrico Moretti found that for every high-skilled job created, an additional 5 jobs are created in the professional or service sector10. What’s more, the job creation goes beyond the local services and taps into semi-skilled professions in emerging industries. For example, a recent Brookings study found that the Cleveland metro ranked 20th out of the nation’s largest 100 metros in the number of workers without bachelor’s degrees employed in pre-baccalaureate health care occupations11.

    Summary

    Perhaps Cleveland is the next Pittsburgh, and Pittsburgh the next Boston. Clarifying this entails analyzing how human capital development and economic restructuring takes place. Simply, is Cleveland’s talent profile today similar to Pittsburgh’s a decade ago, and to Boston’s twenty years prior? Moreover, what policies have been proven effective in translating knowledge production to regional economic growth?

    The Center for Population Dynamics is in the process of answering these questions. The information intends to help Cleveland speed up how quickly tomorrow gets here.

    This is a new report brief from the Center for Population Dynamics at Cleveland State University, download the pdf version here.

    Creative Commons photo “Cleveland Skyline from the Flats” by Flickr.com user Erik Drost.

    ———–

    2 The Current Population Survey (CPS) is a monthly survey of households conducted by the Bureau of Census for the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The monthly workforce educational attainment rate estimates were aggregated for a 2013 annual estimate.

    3 Waters, R. and Smith, H. 2013. High-technology local economies: Geographical mobility of the highly-skilled. In
    Networking Regionalised Innovative Labour Markets; Eds. Hilpert, U and Smith. H. Routledge: New York.