unofficial blog for course ARCH210

Lehigh University
Art Architecture and Design
113 Research Drive
Building C
Bethlehem, PA 18015

Seth

Robert Moses

The clips demonstrated a side of architectural planning that disregards the way of life in neighborhoods. There’s no doubt that Robert Moses was a true visionary but how far would he take his vision? Moses wanted to add a road going right through the park but that would have eliminated the center of life and activity in the park. The park already had an amazing design and adding a road would only take away the residential relation to it. Then Moses wanted to build the Cross Bronx Expressway. This was a direct disregard for neighborhood life. Clip 3 states, “The decision to drive the interstates right through the cities and through neighborhoods because of value that the elites wanted to reclaim.” Urban planners did not care for the people in the neighborhoods but cared about the architectural future of the city as a whole. The expressways tore through vital neighborhoods, causing people to relocate. I don’t get how architects call it “urban planning” but make the people in the urban neighborhoods relocate. If urban planners completed the lower Manhattan expressway, then Soho wouldn’t have existed. These urban planning projects seem almost contradicting.

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