Jerusalem's Rova Mevo Ha'Ir: copying the wrong Parisian model

A couple of decades ago, give or take half a decade, I spent an academic year in Paris on an American study abroad program. After 10 months of thumbing my little red Plan de Paris par arrondissement (= old-school GPS) to a pulp, I found myself facing a summer short on cash -- but unwilling to retreat to the States before I could legitimately claim to have spent an entire calendar year in Europe.

Luckily Georges, the heroically non-judgmental and patient program director, was able to arrange temporary work permits for such underfunded students who insisted on remaining abroad.

 Which was how I found myself, over a period of several weeks, shuttling from picturesque central Paris to the futuristic La Défense business district at the city's western outskirts, where I had landed a job heating up frozen croissants and serving "instant" espresso to those employed in the surrounding skyscrapers.

La Défense -- Stairway to Heaven by
Dmitri A. Mottle, via Wikimedia Commons

By "shuttling" I of course mean a Métro ride, but a space-shuttle association would not be far off the mark. Going to La Défense was like rocketing or beaming up to the moon or some kind of space station carved into a forbidding alien landscape that, by dint of hard labor, had been made marginally habitable for humans, but not attractive to them. Considering that I had spent most of a year tirelessly criss-crossing the streets of traditional Paris, it says something that I never spent a moment in La Défense beyond what the timeclock dictated. The fact that I was working -- though technically in Paris! -- in a fast-food joint  à l'américaine, serving up bad imitation French cuisine to Frenchmen and Frenchwomen who, in any other setting, would surely have turned up their noses at such travesties, said it all.

So my question is, why would Jerusalem want to do this to itself?

The Israeli (and international) media have lately been abuzz (in English: here, here and here) over an "ambitious" plan to transform Jerusalem's western entrance area -- referred to in Hebrew as Rova Mevo Ha'Ir -- into a sleek and ultramodern business district, complete with the skyscrapers that are thought necessary to project a municipal image of exuberant money-making. "The city as economic engine."

The plans for Rova Mevo Ha'Ir have actually been in the works for several years (Mayor Nir Barkat, who assumed office in 2009, was the project's primary initiator). When the plans were first publicized, a similarity to Paris' La Défense district was proudly proclaimed. Apparently,  the mere hint of a resemblance to something European was thought sufficient to place the project in a positive light.

La Défense is not normally considered a success from the perspective of urban vitality. One author and lecturer in the urban planning sphere, Alex Marshall, calls the complex "stunningly dead." Charles Siegel , writing recently at Planetizen, points out that there are better models for smart growth than the "stale modernist model of La Défense." In fact, when the Rova Mevo Ha'Ir plans were first publicized in 2009, and hailed as Jerusalem's answer to La Défense, Siegel commented, again at Planetizen, "Virtually everyone agrees that La Défense blighted Paris' skyline and is an anti-urban design. Just what Jerusalem needs to destroy its historical character."

Unfortunately, those charged with planning Rova Mevo Ha'Ir seem unable to differentiate between design elements likely to foster vibrancy and ones liable to create deadness. Much lipservice is paid to designing with the pedestrian in mind, but the plans themselves paint a different picture.

The slideshow prepared by Farhi Zafrir, the architectural firm that won the Rova Mevo Ha'Ir competition, is a frustrating mish-mash of declared aspirations to walkable urbanism and simulation images that give such aspirations the lie.

Not the least annoying feature of the slideshow is its dubious referencing of traditional city design -- its deployment of photos of bustling European streets featuring human-scaled low- and mid-rise architecture -- in order to "prove" the value of the monolithic skyscraper project that it is actually trying to sell.

Farhi Zafrir first make a ploy for audience sympathy by describing, in Slide 2, the current sorry state of the Jerusalem entrance area. That part of town is certainly a mess -- as the architects put it, "sparse and dispersed construction," "separate and isolated compounds," "a roadway rather than a street." The pictures speak for themselves. Yes, almost anything would be better.

In Slide 3 the architects treat the viewer to a warm and fuzzy photo selection featuring narrow, Nathan Lewis-type streets, European version, full of fine-grained architectural detail and hip young city dwellers doing their thing en masse. "Priority to pedestrians" is the slogan here.

Having been thus buttered up, the viewer is then meant to be duly impressed by slides 4-11, which show us how Farhi Zafrir are going to rescue us from the dreaded stroad situation that currently exists, by building an architecturally monotonous, dedicated business, government-office and hotel district (the Israeli planning echelon's idea of "mixed-use development").

via Jerusalem Municipality

Yes, there is an emphasis on transit-oriented development here -- the project's much-touted connectivity to the Jerusalem light rail and the (future) high-speed Tel Aviv -Jerusalem train. Yet it is disturbing that all this accessibility is meant, ultimately, to keep people out of Jerusalem's historic downtown -- to artificially, and in a sense even dictatorially, concentrate certain activities -- and the people engaged in them -- in this one particular area.

For instance, the idea of transferring government ministry offices from their current locations in historic downtown buildings to the sterile office park of Rova Mevo Ha'Ir, and of turning the historic buildings into boutique hotels, may seem, at first glance, to have a certain poetic justice -- relegate the dry government paper-shufflers to dull modernist edifices! Save the pretty buildings for hunky and babalicious vacationers who can appreciate them! -- but it flies in the face of everything the New Urbanists have been telling us about real mixed-use development and the vibrancy it produces.

Deputy Mayor Kobi Kahlon has been quoted as saying, "Anyone who doesn't have to enter the city shouldn't do so. Leave the historic city to culture and tourism."  That is one of the most disturbing statements I've heard/read in a long time. Kahlon feels that by diverting jobs and government offices to the Jerusalem entrance, the "historic city" will be spared traffic congestion and "parking shortages." Unfortunately, it may also become depleted of anything resembling real life, and turn into a giant museum. I'm reminded of Alan Davies' (The Urbanist) recent description of Venice: 

In a physical sense Venice is pedestrian nirvana, but in my opinion it’s also a one dimensional city. The throngs of people along the canals are almost all tourists. The businesses only provide lodgings, food and fodder for tourists.

Is that what we want Jerusalem's historic downtown to become?

 My special bugbear: the Farhi Zafrir slideshow references La Défense (slide 12), in a manner that can only reflect ignorance or disingenuousness on the part of the designers.

I can't seem to copy the slides into the blog, but here is a La Défense plaza photo very similar to that used by Farhi Zafrir in slide 12 of their presentation:

David Monniaux via Wikipedia

The above photo (that is, its counterpart in slide 12 of the architects' presentation) is grouped together with a couple of photos of traditional European public squares, including an open-air market scene that looks something like this:

Street market at the bottom of  rue Mouffetard -- David Monniaux, via Wikimedia Commons

Farhi Zafrir's aim is to entice the viewer with street scenes that most people would be happy to see in their own city, and which the viewer is meant to understand that the architects are going deliver via their proposed Jerusalem entrance project. Yet one can see at a glance that the La Défense scene (the one that most closely resembles Farhi Zafrir's Rova Mevo Ha'Ir simulation) has little in common with a traditional street market scene.

In the La Défense photo, people scuttle like insects across an exceptionally uninviting, oversized plaza, dwarfed by brutal-looking buildings that do not work together as any sort of defined streetscape or provide the sense of enclosure that human beings generally require if they are to feel comfortable in a given built environment.

In the traditional-Paris street market photo, you've got it all: lovely and varied architecture on a human scale, enclosure, "intimate anonymity."

I humbly submit that this grouping of a photo of the La Défense plaza together with photos of traditional European public squares is a cheap ploy intended to persuade the public that a relatively isolated, limited-use high-rise complex can offer the pleasing urban ambience of a more traditionally-designed quarter. In my view, this reflects questionable ethics on the part of Farhi Zafrir.

It is too bad that the local planning echelon, and the architectural firm that it chose to design Rova Mevo Ha'Ir, couldn't have mustered up a bit more ambition, and devised a plan that would have increased Jerusalem's office-space supply in a style that respected the city's architectural traditions -- as in the Le Plessis-Robinson model described so compellingly by Charles Siegel. As Siegel points out, neo-traditional development can be "dense enough for smart growth" and can deliver its density "in a more attractive and livable environment than the typical modernist development."

But very likely there are no templates for neo-traditional design in the software used by Farhi Zafrir -- so they settled for a stark modernist office park, hoping to pass it off as successful urbanism.

A Memorial to Bad Urbanism on Derech Beit Lechem

Derech Beit Lechem, or Bethlehem Road, is a long street that runs through Jerusalem's Baka and Talpiot neighborhoods, parallel to the thunderous traffic artery of Derech Hevron. Derech Beit Lechem, though itself a busy thoroughfare in parts, would not normally be called "thunderous" (a car word) but rather "bustling" (a people word). When one talks about Derech Beit Lechem one tends to draw on a lexicon of chicness and boutiques, cafes and gentrification.

This vocabulary mainly describes the section of Derech Beit Lechem that extends between Rivka Street (near "Tsomet HaBankim") and Yiftah Street. There is considerable urbanist consciousness in that part of town; Baka activists have garnered media attention by protesting planned changes in traffic patterns that would, in the words of architect and Baka resident David Guggenheim, "have destroyed the delicate urban fabric" of Derech Beit Lechem.

There is, however, another Derech Beit Lechem -- one whose urban fabric is not so delicate: the Talpiot Industrial Area end of the street, between HaTenufa and Derech Baram. On this stretch of Derech Beit Lechem, one side of the street features old industrial buildings ...

... flanking a forlorn, vacant lot where the infamous Versailles wedding hall disaster occurred eleven years ago yesterday, on May 24, 2001. No one, apparently, wants to build something new here:

Site where the Versailles wedding hall once stood, now offering a direct view of the ubiquitous Holyland project.



The opposite side of the street, on this stretch of Derech Beit Lechem, houses some of Jerusalem's poorer residents, in a compound of decrepit shikun buildings (1950s-era mass housing for immigrants) currently slated for urban renewal:



And it is on this side of the street, directly across from the now-desolate space where the Versailles disaster occurred, that a "memorial garden" has been created in honor of the disaster's victims:

Is it just me, or does this "garden" seem wholly inappropriate, whether as a memorial to the casualties of a collapsed dance floor, or as a feature of a street where, after all, human beings continue to live and go about their business? Well, I guess if I thought it was just me, I wouldn't be writing this post, would I?

Here's what I think is wrong with the Versailles memorial site:

1) It has a distinctly military-cemetery feel, as though the designer (architect David Guggenheim -- the Baka activist mentioned above) thought the site was meant to commemorate a battle where heroic warriors fell, rather than a civil disaster. Those tall, straight-arrow cypress trees standing at attention under the brutal midday Mediterranean sun, surrounded by a stark grey concrete wall bearing the names of the fallen ... This military ambience is all wrong, given the civil nature of the incident.

2) The site is unsuited to an area where, as I noted above, people live, play, work, and pursue everyday activities. Basically, a large chunk of public space was hijacked and turned into something that no one can use. This isn't a cemetery, it's a street. Would David Guggenheim want something like this on his end of Derech Beit Lechem?

To be more specific about why the memorial is unsuited to an area where people live and "do stuff" (as opposed to a military cemetery or some kind of national battlefield park):

-- The "garden" is shadeless, meaning that no one can spend time there during normal daytime hours. Wouldn't it have been more meaningful, a more fitting remembrance of the departed, to have planted some shade trees, and arranged them in an inviting way, with some benches under them, creating what we refer to in Hebrew as a pinat hemed -- a "cosy corner" that would have elicited gratitude from local residents and passersby, and, perhaps, have stimulated actual contemplation of the names of the disaster victims -- rather than concealing them?

-- The overall layout is such that one can't be in the site; one is forced to
walk around it. As I said: a hijacking of public space. One can speculate that Guggenheim intended something deep by this: perhaps the set-up of trees-mounted-on-a-platform, upon which we gaze as outside observers, was meant to evoke the moment just before the dance floor collapsed beneath the wedding revellers -- a moment that was captured for posterity on video, and viewed by many thousands of people.

Whatever visual metaphor Guggenheim had in mind, it does not, in my view, justify the removal of a public space from public use. The local residents didn't cause the disaster. Why should they not have the use of their street in its entirety, and in aesthetically pleasing form?

And if the site of the catastrophe itself -- directly across the street from where the memorial "garden" was installed -- has lain desolate for the past decade, wouldn't that have been the logical venue for a monument of some kind?

-- Also, what's with the grey, blank wall on the outside of the memorial? 

Not that it was necessary or desirable to have this grey starkness on the interior walls, either -- but how can one justify putting a blank wall directly across from what is, essentially, a nice, modest, pleasantly dense and human-scaled stretch of multifamily dwellings:

The Versailles disaster, in which 23 people perished and 350 or more were injured due to "quick and dirty" construction methods and owner negligence, demonstrated one kind of price that society pays when the needs of actual human beings are treated with cavalier disregard by those responsible for our built environment.

The Versailles disaster "memorial garden" demonstrates another cost that we incur, as a society, when those responsible for our built environment disregard the needs of actual human beings. No, no deaths are likely to be directly caused by an ugly and unusable memorial garden. But I would argue that negative urban features such as these have a cumulative effect. They make it seem okay to do inappropriate things with the street; to design and build inappropriately. They alienate us from the street, with devastating effects on our quality of life and long-term health. Twenty-three fatalities in one shot is indeed a terrible tragedy. But when, as a society, we adhere to a lifestyle in which the street is a place to be avoided, we suffer health consequences that, though more insidious, reach much farther.

Walls and values

My basic assumption is that architecture and neighborhood design reflect values.

What values are embodied in the buildings pictured at left -- a residential project in one of Jerusalem's newer, peripheral neighborhoods?

More precisely, what prominent feature of the project reflects values that are skewed -- from an urbanist point of view, at least?

Imagine that the wall surrounding the project weren't there. I'm not a real estate marketer, so I don't have simulation software handy. But let's try to envision what the project -- or rather, the semi-public area fronting the project -- would look like in the absence of that wall.

What you would end up with is something not too dissimilar to this older building in Jerusalem's prestigious Katamon area:

Both buildings, the one in the newer neighborhood and the older Katamon one, have parking at ground level. But in Katamon a passerby can see the cars. This may not be an attractive sight in and of itself; however, that is not the whole picture. The area in front of the Katamon building is open; one has an unobstructed view of the building entrance, as well as of human traffic into and out of the building. (Of course I don't mean this in a voyeuristic sense, but rather in the sense of a passerby's peripheral awareness -- at once reassuring and stimulating -- of human activity in and around the building.) An ambience of sociability prevails; the building communicates with the street. This sense of human activity goes a long way toward mitigating the aesthetic "blemish" of the cars parked under and around the building.

Moreover, the communication is two-way: anyone exiting the building (whether to get into their car or to continue on foot) will have an immediate view of the street scene before them. They can greet neighbors, assess the weather and the overall mood of the street; they will be influenced, in the most natural way, by the street atmosphere as they encounter it on their emergence from the building. Perhaps a group of laughing schoolchildren will raise a smile on their lips; maybe they'll see someone trip over a section of broken pavement and make a mental note to call the municipality about it. Whatever they see or hear, they will have interacted in some way with the street.

By contrast, the wall fronting the project in the newer neighborhood simply hides all signs of life, both from passersby and from the building residents. What could be more depressing than to walk out of one's building and be confronted by a sterile stone wall? And what could be more alienating to a passerby on the sidewalk, than a wall such as the one pictured at right?

The buildings in this project are by no means unattractive. When we leave the external wall out of the equation, they even compare favorably with the one in Katamon pictured above. What a pity that the project designers felt the need to deface their own handiwork with this nonsensical wall -- a wall that serves no structural purpose, whose sole raison d'etre is to ensure that the building residents see as little as possible of their neighbors, and vice versa.

Superfluous walls are a recurring motif in this newer Jerusalem neighborhood. The neighborhood's name has the Hebrew word for "wall" in it, and one feels as though the metaphor has been taken to an insane extreme. In my last post I described the crypt-like atmosphere of a playground surrounded by a wall (where a simple metal railing ought to have sufficed). There are many other examples. Here, for instance, one finds a wall placed directly in front of a building entrance, for no apparent purpose other than that of concealing the entrance from passersby:



This is the view from behind the wall (the mailboxes could, obviously, have been placed elsewhere, e.g., next to the building door):

Apparently, the project architect felt that only the building residents should be entitled to see the tiny patch of shrubbery near the entrance. Should a passerby on the sidewalk happen to catch a glimpse of it, that would be tantamount to an invasion of the residents' privacy.

The architect also seems to have felt that the building residents would prefer to see a wall as they exit the building, rather than the sidewalk, as in most normal Jerusalem architecture of the previous century.

This architectural style constitutes a clear departure from the past -- aesthetically and morally.

Why this fear of seeing one's neighbors? Of being seen? Why the obsession with privacy, at the expense of any normal, natural concern for the public sphere? From where did we get the idea that it is okay to dishonor the street?

I get it that Israelis want more luxurious living conditions than those offered by the typical apartment building of 30 or 40 years ago. The exposure to Western standards -- to the glimpses of suburban home decor that abound on American television -- has likely changed everyone's outlook, and driven demand for larger apartments and for a "mifrat techni ashir" -- the "high-caliber" specifications that are always being touted by new residential projects and which are supposed to make buyers feel that they are getting something exceptional.

I can understand that Israelis want a reprieve from the tiny apartments and modest conditions of past decades. But I fail to understand why one's privacy and quality of life are "hurt" when a passerby gets to see the outside of one's building. Why do we have to feel that our standard of living in the private sphere can be ensured only by showing contempt for the public sphere, or by doing away with it entirely?

Gerard Heumann articles on architecture and urban planning

Gerard Heumann is a welcome exception among English-language commenters on the local urban scene.  I don't know Mr. Heumann personally, nor am I familiar with his actual work as an architect/town planner. But the articles that he occasionally publishes in the Jerusalem Post and Haaretz are both articulate and accurate in their representation of current planning problems and challenges.

Of course, these articles (so far as I know) are not the work of a professional journalist on his regular architecture beat. They are op-ed pieces by a non-journalist.

Regular, in-depth architecture criticism would be a welcome addition to the Israeli newspapers that I am most familiar with (the Jerusalem Post and Makor Rishon). These papers have columns devoted to interior design ("Homes" in the Jerusalem Post's Friday magazine section; interviews with women designers in Makor Rishon's "Nashim" supplement). However, the exterior sphere is almost uniformly neglected, and that is unfortunate.

Until these newspapers begin to take architecture and urban planning seriously, I'll content myself with following Gerard Heumann's occasional pieces.

Enjoy these links:

Recent Heumann articles in Haaretz

Global Architecture in Israel (Jerusalem Post, 2 April 2013)
While hiring star-architects is not necessarily harmful, serious problems arise when foreign architects are ignorant of, or oblivious to, the history, the physical environmental context, the contingencies of climate and the special qualities of local light, imposing their personal style – advertisements to themselves – on surroundings of which they have little understanding.

Where Beit Shemesh Went Wrong (Haaretz, 6 April 2012)
Today, the minister of housing - Ariel Attias, whose ministry initiates large new neighborhood plans; the interior minister - Eli Yishai, whose ministry controls all national and district planning and building committees; and the Haredi mayor of Beit Shemesh - Moshe Abutbul, all belong to the Shas party. One needs little political acumen to understand that Shas has Beit Shemesh locked up. They already have their eyes set on the enormous swath of invaluable state-owned land north of the Ha'ela Valley, to the city's south, for the development of tens of thousands of new residential units. If they succeed in this mission, it will be a clear sign for others, including the founding families of the original Beit Shemesh, to simply pick up and move elsewhere. Such a scenario should be prevented at all costs.

A Home-Grown Delicate Balance (Haaretz, 24 February 2012)
The low-rise, high-density housing alternative can offer real hope for restoring the delicate balance between tradition and modernity so very desperately needed in Israel today. Strangely, in spite of its being superbly appropriate to our climate and social context, almost no courtyard housing on an urban scale has been built in Israel for many years. Developers need to be convinced that this building typology can be built economically and will be well-accepted by the public, and easy to market. For courtyard housing to flourish here, the political, social and economic climate, must of course, be supportive.

Waiting in Vain (Haaretz, 3 February 2012)
Clearly, the most central and primary goal of public transportation, that of serving the public, is not being met. People are right in demanding to reach their destinations in the most direct way possible. While obviously the option of changing the tramway's route won't be considered, revising bus lines, while ensuring the continuity of the system and relocating bus stations so as to ease the necessary additional transfers - can and must happen. Bus frequencies must be increased, and bus and tram schedules coordinated. The traveling public of Jerusalem is on the platform - waiting anxiously for these revisions.

Toward Kinder, Gentler Housing (Haaretz)(updated September 2011)
By providing a full range of housing types and workplaces within close proximity to each other, age and class distinctions are reduced and the bonds of authentic communities formed. A variety of street types would serve pedestrians, not just vehicles. A community spirit is born in well-defined squares and parks. Well-placed civic buildings can serve as symbols of community identity.

Buses Trump Trams Any Day (Haaretz)(updated July 2011)The absurdity is apparent. Jerusalem's entire transport system has forcibly been reconstructed to support a single line for a luxurious and fashionable but entirely inappropriate transport technology, while commuters' real needs and concerns have been totally ignored. After years of planning and a full decade of construction, it's mainly tourists and those who don't own cars - captives of the new system - who will be served by the light-rail line.

Saving Safra Square (Haaretz)(updated May 2011)Public places need meaning beyond their mere existence. Plazas are successful when life goes on around them as well as within, when they invite participation and are well-proportioned, when they offer a variety of uses and activities. A place where people meet informally, talk, stroll, make music together.
Planning for the Haredi Community (Jerusalem Post) (updated March 2011)The low-rise, high-density alternative, sometimes referred to as courtyard housing, oriented toward families with children – never properly tested here – appears to be the most appropriate.
Crime Deterrence through Urban Design (Jerusalem Post)
"Deterring crime without having to wall off projects can be achieved by a variety of means. Clearly articulating the transition points between public, semipublic and private areas is essential. In place of anonymity, project a strong identity. Architects can position dwelling units, openings and entries, and set paths of movement and areas of activity – signs of life – so as to provide inhabitants with continuous natural surveillance of bordering streets and project grounds. The street comes under surveillance from the building entries and lobbies. "
Lessons from Holyland (Haaretz)
“The Holyland reminds us that our natural and built environment is deteriorating rapidly and that the public must develop a new and deeper understanding of urban planning. What, for example, constitutes good or bad design? How is it possible for construction to satisfy the needs of the collective as well as the individual? How can community values be translated into architecture, urban design and planning? How does design affect interpersonal and social relations? To be able to answer these questions, along with many others, education, of course, is the key.”
Israeli Architecture: an Ethical Crisis (Jerusalem Post)
“A substantial part of the environment is shaped by people who have little or no visual training and who are simply unaware of the aesthetic and social consequences of their decisions – including mayors, lawyers, real-estate men and developers, businessmen and engineers. The public at large has little understanding of design, not to mention many people who do not differentiate between an architect and a contractor.”
The Growing Gap between Architecture and Urban Planning (Jerusalem Post)
“Every architectural concept has an equivalent urbanistic one. Spaces exterior with respect to buildings are interior with respect to the city. The real life of any city takes place on the ground plane, at the level of the street, the plaza and the park.”
Who Designs Jerusalem? (Jerusalem Post)
“At Malha, a shopping center, sports stadium, technology park and residential neighborhood were designed as if each existed on separate planets. Not a single building in the technology park bounds adjacent roads, not even opposite the shopping center, where a golden opportunity existed for the design of valuable commercial space at ground level.”
Billion Dollar Baby (Jerusalem Post)
“The long-awaited inauguration of the Jerusalem Light Rail line, the first of its type in the country, is scheduled, barring further delays, for April. Already five years behind schedule due to bureaucratic bungling, a total lack of experience with this mode of transportation and horrendous project management, construction has wreaked havoc in the life of the city over most of the last decade.”