On the LO Deck a great deal of effort and time is spent describing shopping and lifestyle choices, what might suit our personal tastes and our bodacious expectations for a visionary leadership that makes marvelous development happen.
Some turn their nose up at Aldi’s, others at the Dollar Tree.
Some believe a big box will reduce their real estate tax bite.
Some wish for the shimmering signs of upscale retail to send a signal about the accumulated wealth levels in the Wood?
We go on and on.
Yet I often wonder when Mr. O’Bryan and Mr. Juris exchange takes on retail how clear is our developing sense of the real political economy of the Wood.
Are we learning anything other than how differently we dream and desire?
How far from the free market would our dreams for the Wood land us?
Do our dreams and desires simply indicate that the Wood is not “good enough for now?â€Â
Are dreams and desires the points for arguments?
The desire for “the state of the art in middle-class amenities†is often cloaked in the high hopes of economic development for the city and reduced property taxes for homeowners.
It seems doubtful to me the free market will deliver “the state of the art in middle-class amenities†to the built environment of the Wood.
How much of a subsidy is required to obtain the “the state of the art in middle-class amenities,†shaking out the recalcitrant landlords and homeowners, assembling the requisite properties?
Do we truly understand our desires as shoppers and that the retail platforms to satisfy them are always moving, not easily located in the Wood?
The fact that Lakewood is called “the city of homes†is telling us that there is too little space to accommodate the dynamics of development in the register that speaks “state of the art in middle-class amenities.â€Â
Does this reality trouble our souls, causing us to dream feverishly of anchors and apples that will never drop here?
Do we know where we live in comparison to the sprawling geography of American Dreams?
Can find satisfaction within the limitations of the built environment?
Maybe not.
In “Modern life in Maricopa County,†Rob Horning captures a sense of the suburban life style in the desert that seems to reveal the driving forces of consumerism, retail chains and economic development that advance amenities and shopping experience not easily fitted to the built environment and in some cases the sensibilities of Wood.
Horning talks about antiquated traditions of NYC that pale against “the cutting edge suburban lifestyle†of Phoenix.
Lakewood, though not as old as NYC and certainly not as densely packed, does seem to possess some of the urban nuisances that run counter to “the state of the art in middle-class amenities†described neatly in the article.
That the Wood is denied “the state of the art in middle-class amenities,†the economic development gamble that comes from “manufacturing the cutting edge suburban lifestyle†seems to be a source of frustration for some people.
While the desire to consume along the “cutting edge†suburban trajectory is stifled, the rationale for imposing a retail platform to support this desire on the housing stock or built environment of the Wood is seen as generating more taxes and mitigating the sting of overhead.
Efforts to voice cautionary notes about an expansion plan for “state of the art in middle-class amenities†and retail shopping platforms generate aggravation.
Here’s Horning:
“….Phoenix is an ongoing project in manufacturing the cutting edge suburban lifestyle, in pursuing and distributing the state of the art in middle-class amenitiesâ€â€retail plazas with organic-food markets and parking lots with giant spacesâ€â€and New York City is an antiquated version of modern life, one that’s terminally threatened and holds on merely through the tenacity of tradition…... While everyday life in New York is a thicket of nuisances, dealing with crowds and lines and the ceaseless imperative to rush and put yourself first lest you never get what you’re trying to do done, the ease and convenience of the quotidian in Arizona is palpable, which to me seems a product of the redundancy of shopping centers. Also the expanse of open desert space (while it lasts) allows one to take scorched earth policy toward communitiesâ€â€when it ceases to be convenient, when it starts to feel encrusted with idiosyncratic necessities or complications, one can simply strike out for the latest development on the fringe and partake of the hottest enticementsâ€â€four-car garages, cathedral ceilings, etc. The driving forces of contemporary consumer capitalismâ€â€novelty, convenience, the desire to feel independent from the impact of other’s decisionsâ€â€seem to culminate in the dynamic system on display in Maricopa County. For me this plays out as a kind of vacation listlessness, some of which must be blamed on my lack of imagination. But since so much of the region seems devoted to convenient transportation and shopping, I feel like there is nothing to do but drive around and shop.
Sure, I could leave the valley altogether and go hiking or something but it seems easier to pivot from cable TV to shopping to dining to sleeping. Imagination itself is reconfigured as a nuisance; best to glide along without the trouble of it, finding fullfillment in the safe and predictable, in the pseudo-novelty of new franchises of chain stores and restaurants….
Phoenix suggests what all American cities would be like if they could instantaneously rebuild according to current consumer preferences. And perhaps the accessibility of the various successful retail strategies so many different chains at once accounts for my feeling of being intoxicated (if not incapacitated) by convenience. The corporate interests behind the chains induce us to accept values amenable to the corporations’ thriving because they offer us the least resistance and we as individuals are ultimately more flexible than corporations (which aren’t as flexible as market theory typically proposes). What we lose is any interest in local idiosyncracy, or the kind of complication that arises from tradition and history. Phoenix (appropriately named in this regard) allows us to believe that the community in which we live was invented to suit us personallyâ€â€it flatters our own vanity; the world, for meâ€â€because it so compellingly convinces us to reduce ourselves to the consumer desires it is optimized to service."
Source:
http://www.popmatters.com/pm/blogs/marginalutility/
Kenneth Warren
