In Dense NYC, What Does ‘Human Scale’ Mean?

In an op-ed in Next City, Lynn Ellsworth, author of Wonder City: How to Reclaim Human-Scale Urban Life, argues that the New Yorkers who fight high-rise developments are not the “narrow-minded, greedy homeowners obsessively trying to raise and protect their property values” they are sometimes made out to be, but rather everyday residents who “want their city to support the thriving of ordinary residents” through “human-scaled, incremental build-out.”

Ellsworth draws on her own experience as a New Yorker involved in preservation battles. Ellsworth and her fellow human-scale advocates “favor incremental projects on small sites rather than massive rebuilding on huge sites. They want to stop the endless displacement of anyone who is not rich. They want an end to the misguided “luxury city” policy that New York’s politicians formally adopted when Michael Bloomberg became mayor in 2002.”

These advocates want to see an end to the privatization of parks, sidewalks, schools, and other public spaces. “They understand that thriving depends on the presence of a great public realm of schools and parks and swimming pools and a great subway system. Their vision includes places that support children, small businesses, plants, and animals. It is the very opposite of the towerized hyper-dense proposals of the real estate industry.”