Jane Jacobs was one of the country's top urban thinkers and activists. She fought to preserve neighborhoods from the onslaught of many urban planners who saw the top-down approach to development as a way to revitalize downtown businesses and communities. Jacobs was opposed to the development of expressways and believed in public transportation over cars. She advocated for a more pedestrian friendly environment where people would spend time interacting with each other, on bench filled sidewalks, in parks, and in neighborhood where the homes were built with front porches. Jacobs spent her life working for the people, and city planners, in preserving the neighborhoods where people live, work and play.
Having a community business district combined with residential living, "mixed use buildings", she contended, "with eyes on the streets", would make for safer neighborhoods and create more accessable and humane cities. She believed that Communities with differences in incomes, ethnic and racial groups, should and could live in "close proximity" to each other.
Jacobs was instrumental in helping to keep cities more vibrant by focusing on the people's needs and not the big corporate power base who were more interested in large scale projects, e.g., shopping malls, versus neighborhood corner stores. Her non-stop activism helped to give people the strength to fight against the "urban bulldozer" and in working together to save their cities. Jacobs once said, "cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, whey are created by everybody".
Jane Jacobs has inspired so many people to commit themselves to helping communities across the country by, in part, creating the "Jane Jacobs Homepage". These people are students who are devoted to working toward the ideal of "healthy communities -- communities that are economically, socially, politically, and environmental vibrant". Their major areas of study include Philosophy, Government, Urban Planning, Latin American Studies, Architecture, Sociology and Environmental Studies. In creating this homepage, these students hope to bring about a better understanding and awareness to the many contributions Jane Jacobs has made in the field of urban planning. Please take a minute to read about these students and their commitment to the "Power of Jane Jacobs". I'm sure that these students, touched by the works of Jacobs, will continue their quest to contribute to the growth of "healthy communities". http://bss.sfsu.edu/pamuk/urban/
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