Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design Author: Charles Montgomery | Language: English | ISBN:
B009LRWHPY | Format: PDF
Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design Description
A globe-trotting, eye-opening exploration of how cities can—and do—make us happier people
Charles Montgomery’s Happy City will revolutionize the way we think about urban life.
After decades of unchecked sprawl, more people than ever are moving back to the city. Dense urban living has been prescribed as a panacea for the environmental and resource crises of our time. But is it better or worse for our happiness? Are subways, sidewalks, and tower dwelling an improvement on the car-dependence of sprawl?
The award-winning journalist Charles Montgomery finds answers to such questions at the intersection between urban design and the emerging science of happiness, and during an exhilarating journey through some of the world’s most dynamic
cities. He meets the visionary mayor who introduced a “sexy” lipstick-red bus to ease status anxiety in Bogotá; the architect who brought the lessons of medieval Tuscan hill towns to modern-day New York City; the activist who turned Paris’s urban freeways into beaches; and an army of American suburbanites who have transformed their lives by hacking the design of their streets and neighborhoods.
Full of rich historical detail and new insights from psychologists and Montgomery’s own urban experiments, Happy City is an essential tool for understanding and improving our own communities. The message is as surprising as it is hopeful: by retrofitting our cities for happiness, we can tackle the urgent challenges of our age. The happy city, the green city, and the low-carbon city are the same place, and we can all help build it.
- File Size: 4019 KB
- Print Length: 368 pages
- Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (November 12, 2013)
- Sold by: Macmillan
- Language: English
- ASIN: B009LRWHPY
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #51,063 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #3
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Business & Money > Economics > Urban & Regional - #3
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Public Affairs & Policy > Urban Planning & Development - #8
in Books > Business & Money > Economics > Urban & Regional
- #3
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Business & Money > Economics > Urban & Regional - #3
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Public Affairs & Policy > Urban Planning & Development - #8
in Books > Business & Money > Economics > Urban & Regional
As you might expect, the idea that people can be happy in a city doesn't come from the First World--at least today's. "The man who is tired of London is tired of life." --Samuel Johnson.
It comes from Enrique and Guillermo Penalosa from Bogota, Colombia. And the amazing thing is that Enrique Penalosa (past mayor of Bogota) is a career politician.
Find out what generally makes people happy in a city, then construct the city that way. What an idea. Again as you might expect, what makes people happy is generally NOT what said people think will make them happy. Think of the number of times that you thought a new thing--house, car, music player, large screen TV--would make you happy. And then things were pretty much the same within a couple of weeks of getting said thing.
What makes you happy is more likely to be a continuing series of experiences, and most likely experiences with other people. If the way your neighborhood is constructed and managed isolates you from people, you'll have fewer experiences and less happiness. But uncontrolled interaction might be just as bad as no interaction. Details matter.
This book is merely an introduction to the idea, but lots of us need the introduction, to learn another way of thinking about the subject. It's only about eleven bucks for your Kindle or Kindle app--buy it and read it.
By Larry D. Huffman
If you wonder why our communities produce folks who are overweight and depressed, This book will explain how we designed those communities. Good news, this book gives us insight in how we can change our environment/ community foe the better.
By D. Purdom
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