Get The Battle For Gotham: New York In The Shadow Of Robert Moses And Jane Jacobs Created By Roberta Brandes Gratz Version

much not to like about this book, It was written so poorly, I wondered about the editor, Points were made and not supported, but then she would come back to them later, She just bounced around making the whole thing lacking in cogency, But worse was Gratz's egocentrism, She starts the book with her own bio and never stops reminding us of her presence at events and diligence in writing about them.
We get it it's all about you,

The conceit that she is somehow enlightening us to the evils of Robert Moses and his legacy is ridiculous, He's already reviled and understood as someone who did terrible damage to NYC,

I managed to read most of it only because of some interesting stories of NY and the changes it's gone through.
But the focus on the Village is a drag, I never spent that much time there until recently and would've liked to hear about other parts of the city that were impacted by Moses.
A really frustrating book. A good summary of the start of Jane JAcobs and her impact on urban planning, I learned a lot. This book consists of three intertwined strands, none of which I found very satisfying, The first is criticism of Robert Moses that is largely cribbed from Caros monumental biography it didnt seem that the author has any original research on this point.
The second is excerpts from the authors conversations with or reflections on Jane Jacobs in some cases, she publishes almost entire conversations without editing.
While Im interested in Jane Jacobs, I dont think reading whole paragraphs of her unedited thoughts is the best strategy for conveying more about her life and philosophy.
The third strand, and the best, is the authors own memoirs about her life in New York and her experiences around various urban renewal and preservation questions.
Still, its not enough to make this a fully fleshed out narrative, The book proceeds slowly and in fits and starts, and its never clear where its heading, Robert Moses was the towering figure of public works in the New York of my youth, I swam at his Jones Beach with its gorgeous bathhouses and boardwalk that felt like a stroll on the deck of a luxury liner.
It seems Moses shaped the entire waterfront including the crests of the waves, I was driven on his parkways Belt to see grandma, Meadowbrook to get to Jones Beach, He shaped theWorld's Fair a money loser and eventually gained control of a halfdozen public agencies, The Moses name seemed to loom on every construction sign and cast a long shadow over even the egomaniac Governor Rockefeller, Moses' own megalomania was documented in Robert Caro's tragic biography "The Power Broker," a Shakespearian tale of genius gone wrong in which Moses is blamed for just about everything that went wrong with American cities and suburbs after WW IImisbegotten public housing, decaying public transit, numbing sprawl, traffic jams, you name it.


Jane Jacobs was his foilan autodidactic Greenwich Village "housewife" who became a writer for Architectural Record and ultimately of "The Death and Life of American Cities," a polemic in defense of the small, spontaneous and neighborly, rather than the planned megaproject.
Jacobs' book remains a classicyears later while Moses despite some efforts to rehab his reputation is largely reviled as the devil of topdown, arrogant, urban soulsucking planning.
Like Godzilla vs. Mothra, the two titans faced off in Greenwich Village in the earlys, The forces of Jacobs triumphed over a Moses highway scheme and today we have an intact SoHo to show for it,

Roberta Brandes Gratz grew up in a Greenwich Village neighborhood that was ripped down for urban renewal, Her family artappreciating owners of a dry cleaning operation moved to Weston, Connecticut, a rural idyll that Gratz saw overrun by cookiecutter suburbia.
She found her way back to Manhattan by way of NYU, went to work on the New York Post with Pete Hamill and Jack Newfield, discovered architecture, and later became a celebrated writer on architecture and planning.
Gratz takes a personal view of the Moses vs, Jacobs debate, having lived through it at close personal range,


This is not really an urban planning book but a charming memoir of growing up in New York and its suburbs and of a young Jewish intellectual woman coming of age during an era of powerful women who really did change the worldJacobs, Rachel Carson and Betty Friedan among them.

As I read on I deducted, The book becomes a repetitive recap ofs planning battlesstories told with more verve elsewhere, The towering personalities of both foils are curiously missing, Still I love Gratz's memoir of New York and its suburbs,


The Battle for Gotham is an immersive, firsthand account of the highs and lows of city planning in the second half of the twentieth century.
Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs, though only overlapping for a few years, are two of the most influential voices in terms of how the city is laid out the way it is today, and yet they were of completely opposing viewpoints.

I started reading this one as research on something Im writing about historical landmark status, but it was really a fascinating account of NYC for anyone whos from here or lives here.
Like the proposed restructuring of Washington Square Park s to serve traffic rather than pedestrians and would feed into the thankfully unrealized Lower Manhattan Expressway.
Or the proposed demolition of SoHo that inadvertently led to the influx of artists lofts and galleries it became known for in thes.
Or how Moses purposefully built the bridges and tunnels leading from the city to Jones Beach too low so that public buses would be unable to travel through them, thus discouraging those who couldnt afford their own cars from coming.
Or the continued drama surrounding the Atlantic Yards Project now known as Pacific Park, Highly recommend this for anyone interested in learning more about city planning or just wanting to learn a little more about NYC, As someone born and raised in NYC, especially nice to read this one today!
Over more than a year, I made it through maybepages of this book.
I still remember how painful it was making it all the way through her first book, The Living City, more thanyears ago.
This book was no different, I tried reading it immediately after Anthony Flint's far more readable "Wrestling with Moses", on the same subjectJane Jacobs titanic community planning battle with Robert Moses in midcentury NYC.
But Gratz has a way of adding aside atop aside atop aside, until you need a road map to try to recall what her point was in the first place.
She has amazing knowledge. She just has no idea how to tell an engaging story, Tied with her first book for the most boring written work I've ever reador at least attemped to, Not worth the effort. Disappointing. I didn't make it past the first chapter, which was shaping up as primarily autobiographical rather than an investigation of Moses or Jacobs.
While I can appreciate the author's justification for thisthat her own story was representative

of the city'sit wasn't what I was hoping for when I picked this up.
A prolix mishmash. Im not sure Ive ever rated a book belowstars,

And Im not sure Id ever try and write a book in the shadow or Robert Caro, thats a risky plan.


If this had been more focused on the authors personal journey it likely would have better reviews,

Im not sure how I came to read this book, but in the future perhaps Ill pay more attention to reviews in advance.
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