Postmodern City

1
Postmodern City Space of Flows (2)

• Torontos and
• Montreals Examples

2
Outline

• Toronto from Modernization to Postmodernism
• Modernization and Anti-Moernism Regent Park as
  an example
• Postmodern Urbanism
• Renovation of Historical Building and the Retro
  Chic
• Urban Social Movements
• Social Geography of Toronto the Issue of
  Gentrification

3
Modernization and Anti-Modernism

• Modernization
• architecture geometric design universal
  structure committed to a unified organization of
  life. (Less is Beautiful More is Bore.)
• Urban design rationalized division of functions
  in life// zoning of a city

4
Anti-Modernism

• e.g. Mumford, Jane Jacobs,Venturi (p. 102)
• destroy the historic fabric and organic
  structure of traditional cities
• De-humanizing mechanical
• Ignore the practical functions of life (e.g.
  pedestrian walkway ? The City is not a Tree.)
• Hostility between the modern forms and the city
  dwellers (? Regent Park)

5
Modernist Housing Project

• Canada's oldest social housing project, having
  been built in the late 1940s.
• Location bounded by Gerrard Street to the north,
  River Street to the east, Shuter Street to the
  south, and Parliament Street to the west.
• A majority of families in Regent Park are
  classified as low-income, with 68 of the
  population living below the LICO (Canada's
  Low-Income Cut-Off Rate) in one of its census
  tracts and 76 in the other (compared to a
  Toronto-wide average of just over 20).
• Now being revitalized (source )

6
Regent Park Location
East
7
Regent Park Location
8
Regent Park Image
9
Postmodern Urban Design

• A mixture of styles consistent with nearby
  traditional forms. (p. 101 105 )
• a difference practice of Modernisms egalitarian
  objectives
• Dialogic, rather than monologic (107)
• Turns the utopian vision into something
  communicativecreated by the people, but not the
  designers alone.
• Examples
• Yonge Street
• BCE Place
• some malls in the suburban areas

10
Renovation and Preservation of Historical
Preservation

• Yonge Street, north from Adelaide, Toronto,
  Ontario, c. 1885.

11
Renovation and Preservation of Historical
Preservation

• Yonge Street, present

12
Historical Preservation Retro Chic
BCE More
Canada Trust
13
Historical Preservation Retro Chic
Façade of an old building
14
Mall Disney Like

• Erin Mills Town CentreMississauga, ON

Woodbine CentreEtobicoke, ON More . . .
15
Woodbine Centre Fantasy Land
Déju vu?
16
Urban Social Movements

• Local Social Movementsnot necessarily organized
  by class.
• Two different views
• In resistance to the global flows and flexible
  accumulation, urban social movements cannot avoid
  sliding into parochialism, myopia and
  self-referentiality.
• directed at specific circumstances, but not the
  general, more strategic objectives. ? failure to
  attach the real targets.
• e.g. Middle-class resettlement in Toronto (p.
  109-110) ????vs. ????????

17
Social Geography of Toronto General
Characteristics

• Gentrification
• Waterfront development
• Increasing demographic and functional diversity
  of suburbs. GTA polynucleated urban region.
• Deindustrialization of inner city
  deagriculturalization of some rural villages.

18
Social Geography of Toronto General
Characteristics (2)

• Development
• Mercantile (??) ? Commercial ? Industrial ?
  Corporate
• ? Differences from the American cities no utter
  abandonment of inner residential districts
  similarities Anglophone suburb
• ? How about Taipei?

19
References

• Virtual Tours Toronto http//www.toronto.com/feat
  ure/244/index.html
• Greater Toronto Area Places Streets
  http//www.dplib.com/epc_tor.htm
• Examples Regent Park http//encyclopedia.thefreed
  ictionary.com/Regent20Park
• ??????,????????? http//www.ncu.edu.tw/eng/csa/jo
  urnal/journal_park135.htm