Utopian Visions in United States Urbanism
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 20146205 |
|---|---|
| Authors | James M Mccutcheon (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2005 |
| Volume | 42 (Number 164) |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 157-186 |
| Publication date | 2005-12-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Moreana (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0047-8105 • E-ISSN: 2398-4961 |
| Publisher | Edinburgh University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.3366/more.2005.42.4.12 |
| OpenAlex | W2529711108 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 16 |
America’s appeal to Utopian visionaries is best illustrated by the Oneida Community, and by Etienne Cabet’s experiment (Moreana 31/215 f and 43/71 f). A Messianic spirit was a determinant in the Puritans’ crossing the Atlantic. The Edenic appeal of the vast lands in a New World to migrants in a crowded Europe is obvious. This article documents the ambition of urbanists to preserve that rural quality after the mushrooming of towns: the largest proved exemplary in bringing the country into the city. New York’s Central Park was emulated by the open spaces on the grounds of the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893. The garden-cities surrounding London also provided inspiration, as did the avenues by which Georges Haussmann made Paris into a tourist mecca, and Pierre L’Enfant’s designs for the nation’s capital. The author concentrates on two growing cities of the twentieth century, Los Angeles and Honolulu. His detailed analysis shows politicians often slow to implement the bold and costly plans of designers whose ambition was to use the new technology in order to vie with the splendor of the natural sites and create the “City Beautiful.” Some titles in the bibliography show the hopes of those dreamers to have been tempered by fears of “supersize” or similar drawbacks
Ancient history · Appeal · Archaeology · Art history · Business · Capital (architecture) · Economic history · Order (exchange) · Political science · Recreation · Sociology · Urbanism · Vision · American Environmental and Regional History · Anthropology · Architecture · History · Law · Urban Planning and Landscape Design · Urbanization and City Planning
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |