Visionaries and Planners: The Garden City Movement and the Modern Community [Hardcover]

Stanley Buder (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0195061748 | ISBN-13: 978-0195061741 | Publication Date: July 26, 1990

For nearly a century the Garden City movement has represented one end of a continuum in an ongoing debate about the future of the modern city. In 1898 Ebenezer Howard envisioned an experimental community as the alternative to huge, teeming cities. Small, planned "garden cities" girdled by greenbelts were to serve in time as the "master key" to a higher, more cooperative stage of civilization based on ecologically balanced communities. Howard soon founded an international planning movement which ever since has represented a remarkable blend of accommodation to and protest against urban changes and the rise of the suburbs. In this interconnected history of the Garden City movement in the United States and Britain, Buder examines its influence, strengths and limitations. Howard's garden city, he shows, joined together two very different types of late-nineteenth-century experimental communities, creating a tension never fully resolved. One approach, utopian and radical in nature, challenged conventional values; the other, the model industrial towns of "enlightened" capitalists, reinforceed them. Buder traces this tension through planning history from the nineteenth-century world of visionaries, philanthropy, and self help into our own with its reliance on the expert, bureaucracy, and governmental policy, shedding light on the complex changes in the way we have thought in the twentieth century about community, urban design, and indeed the process of change. His final chapters examine the world-wide enthusiasm for "New Towns" between 1945-1975 and recent political and social trends which challenge many fundamental assumptions of modern planning.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Carefully researched, cogently argued, and gracefully written....Buder argues compellingly for a humanistic reorientation in planning. This book chalenges planners to understand their past as an essential step in redefining and revitalizing their profession."--American Planning Association Journal

"Buder's most significant contribution...is his analysis of how, in the building of Letchworth, other well-intentioned men subverted Howard's utopian ideal."--Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians

"Visionaries and Planners ably presents Howard's sources of inspiration and the intellectual influences of the late nineteenth century contributing to the garden city idea."--Reviews in American History

"This is one of the landmark books in urban studies to appear in recent years and will surely take its place among the best books of 20th-century planning history. As such, it deserves a place in academic libraries at every level, and a readership ranging from undergraduates to veteran scholars."--Choice

About the Author

Stanley Buder is at City University of New York.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (July 26, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195061748
• ISBN-13: 978-0195061741
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,544,494 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, insightful, and readable, February 23, 2009

By 

N. Rowan - See all my reviews

This review is from: Visionaries and Planners: The Garden City Movement and the Modern Community (Hardcover)

The author offers an interesting and insightful account, both scholarly and readable, of the origins and evolution of an important international planning movement. I was particularly intrigued by the way various nineteenth century reform strands, including several looked upon as the fervent pursuits of crackpots and cranks, fed into Ebenezer Howard's synthesis of an ideal community combining the best aspects of rural and urban life. Many who aspire today to a "simple life" that treads lightly on the environment would do well to visit Howard's ideas as examined here. I appreciated Dr. Buder's even-handed assessment of the contributions of some of the so-called fringe element to what has become the modern field of urban and regional planning, providing a timely reminder that the synergy of many diverse points of view often results in workable and innovative solutions.