The Death and Life of Great American Cities

In the introduction to The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs explains her goal of introducing new principles of city planning and rebuilding. She says that her ideas are very different and some even opposite from those taught and used today by everyone involved in city planning. However, Jacobs demonstrates just how difficult this may be with her story of North End. It was there that she witnessed the transformation of a run down slum to a flourishing community. Even though, North End made this remarkable transformation conventional wisdom was preventing people from seeing that change. Because North End didn’t change that way they thought it should people still viewed it as the slum that it once was. Jacobs’ friend who was a city planner knew that North End had become a beautiful community but he still couldn’t get the idea of it being a slum out of his head.