At Home in an Urban Paradise: Part I The Value of Social Capital

A Pearl District realty office provides services for "those who love city life" and desire an "urban paradise." There is truth in advertising. A “walker’s paradise” and projected to be a “bikers paradise,” it is a neighborhood “where people choose to come because of its unique mix of activities and its grit and contrasts,” the The Pearl District Development Plan states, “an urban place where daily life can be seen as much on the streets as in the buildings.” Since 1996, this document has guided efforts to to spur interaction and advance civility by harmonizing the built environment. There is no formula for this enterprise because good urbanism requires insight and an artist’s touch.

The art of place-making imbibes the Pearl District. Serving on its Planning and Transportation Committee, I am struck by the thorough analysis proposed projects undergo to ensure that they fit into the neighborhood’s urban milieu. Unity, harmony, and variety are the maxims of good design, and these words fill the committee’s discussions. First hand knowledge is also key. The Pearl District is a laboratory for urbanism, and the wisdom and stewardship that unites the committee is the product of daily study.

Good urbanism, like a good relationship, elicits affection, security, and attachment. In return, time and energy is invested in nurturing one’s surroundings. This investment has pay offs. In his insightful book, For the Love of Cities, Peter Kageyama, notes that communities with passionate and engaged citizens have higher levels of economic growth. The same traits also produce social capital, the connections among people that give rise to “norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness,” according to Harvard sociologist Robert Putnam. Putnam’s pioneering research revealed that social capital is a priceless commodity, as it is a prime indicator of life expectancy. (Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of the American Community)

Cities by their nature offer venues for the spontaneous, informal meetings that generate social capital. Such places are less prevalent in suburbs, and it is one of the reasons why social capital steadily depreciated once the United States invested its resources in building a suburban nation. The main culprit, according to Putnam, is automobile commuting: a ten-minute increase in travel time translates into a ten percent reduction in community involvement. At the same time, investing in pedestrian networks builds social capital. Jan Gehl, the Danish guru of urbanism, found that for every additional 14 square meters of car-free space, you gained another person participating in public life. This logic also fuels the Planning and Transportation Committee, as it seeks to procure a “well-designed urban neighborhood that operates as a network that increases social capital.” http://www.pearldistrict.org/about-the-pearl-district/

This effort is apparent in nearly every block. A crafted pedestrian realm and a mix of parks, plazas and greens orient streets and buildings to a scale suited for people to interact. In a high-density environment, the test is to blur the distinction between the public realm and private space. A seamless transition between parks, balconies, porches, planting strips, and sidewalks helps to both elicit face-to-face contact and cluster people into the smaller groups that form a social capital network. Taking an interest in common areas and enhancing adjoining private property not only fosters a sense of community; it creates the aesthetic and visual connections that unite a neighborhood. (Chapman and Lund, "Housing Density and Livability in Portland," in The Portland Edge)

Note the integration of public and private space

I have learned this first hand. Besides serving on the Planning and Transportation Committee, I volunteer with Friends of Tanner Springs. My singular skill is removing exotic thistles, but it allows me to join in the camaraderie and sense of accomplishment gained from our labors. I also collaborated with the North Park Blocks coalition, sharing my research on park users when conditions in the historic greens deteriorated last summer. The group sponsored several candidate forums that sparked tough questions on the conundrum of gentrification and homelessness. There were no easy answers, and everyone left realizing the challenge ahead.

Tanner Springs native planting project

Civic engagement fosters social capital. It instills a sense of belonging that softens the anonymity of urban life and, most important, it forges the bonds of virtue--the investment private citizens make for the public good--that Jefferson deemed essential for a republic to survive. Virtue is the "foundation of happiness," and "utility the test of virtue," he entoned, and since the heyday of classical Athens, a city in a republic is where happiness is attained and paradise approached. In the 21st century, Portland does not have a singular claim to virtue, but it utility--the pragmatic application of principle--is forging happiness on sustaining lines.