In Chicago, former President Obama’s Presidential Library, has landed in historic Jackson Park: a 225 feet high flat-roofed and granite-clad concrete tower. It has a Sith-Lord-meets-conning-tower aesthetic. Largely bereft of windows and surrounded by lower blocks of precast concrete and glass curtain walls, it is described even by its own architects as “monolithic” and by its critics as “ugly”, “a jail”, “Soviet” and “brutalist”. Based on multiple studies of the types of places people tend to like and why, I can report confidently that it has none of the patterns, natural forms and sensitive handling of scale that most people find attractive and reassuring. It has all of the locational and symbolic sensitivity of the relentless black monolith in Stanley Kubrick’s film, 2001 A Space Odyssey.

Six hundred miles away in Washington, D.C., President Trump is planning to supersize Pierre Charles L’Enfant’s original Washington masterplan and out-French the French. To escape the need to host American state dinners in tents on the White House lawn, he has demolished the White House’s 1940s neoclassical East Wing and is replacing it with a $300 million ballroom by the skilled classical architect James McCrery. Three times as big as the original, the outside is replete with a balustrade, string courses, alternating pediments, a piano nobile and a Corinthian portico with all the trimmings. Inside, a double-height hall, with arched niches, fluted pilasters and a coffered ceiling, will adorn the largest classical room built for a century.

On nearby Memorial Circle, the President is planning a giant classical triumphal arch between the National Mall and the Arlington National Cemetery, topped with statues of eagles and a winged lady. At a White House dinner, Trump showed donors three models, informing them that he favored, you guessed, the largest option which, standing at 250 feet, would block symbolic views between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington Cemetery.

Palpably modeled on the French Arc de Triomphe, which was itself inspired by Rome’s Arch of Titus, the new Washington Arch, Trump has told supporters, must be bigger than Jean-François Chalgrin’s Parisian precedent. Predictably, the Washington Arch is already being called the “Arc de Trump”. If the remodeled Oval Office is anything to go by, it will be dripping with gilt swags and festooned with over-ripe fruit in luxuriant cornucopia, though for now, the renderings by Nicholas Charbonneau show welcome restraint.

Which will it be: classical bombast or placeless corporatism? Federal nostalgia or digital civic aesthetics? Nothing about Obama and Trump’s visions for the future of American cities is the same, other than their shared elephantiasis. But in this, both are within the American urban tradition.

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Why our cities should be sacred

By Nicholas Boys Smith

Once upon a time, the United States was an urban civilization and, briefly, the world’s most significant city-maker. The American model was megalomaniacal: consistently taking European technology and precedents, dialing them up from genteel to gigantic and re-exporting them around the world.

Thomas Walter’s gargantuan 1850s dome over Washington’s Capitol may have been inspired by European churches such as Paris’ Les Invalides. However, in turn, it spawned a shoal of European domed civic imitations: Brussels’s Palais de Justice, Budapest’s parliament, and Berlin’s Reichstag.

By the 1890s, American architects could create 200 lavish temporary Beaux Arts buildings out of mere plaster and artificial stone for the 1893 Chicago World Fair, which are better than almost anything subsequently built in the last 80 years. With perfect irony, the World Fair took place on the very site on which Obama’s watchtower library is now being erected. The historically resonant location, precisely where American architecture demonstrated so supremely its classical and city-planning expertise, merely rubs coarse salt into the wound Obama is inflicting upon Chicago.

Ultimately, American urban super-sizing got out of hand. During the long 20th century America de-urbanized as her cities became too big to be urban. Middle classes fled to the hugely expanding suburbs where long commutes and declining neighborly life undermined their residents’ prosperity, connectedness and happiness. Wider and wider freeways cut through city centers, often mysteriously physically segregating majority black neighborhoods. Downtowns were scooped out and offices and homes replaced with parking lots, as Jeff Speck has related. Subtle towns of Lego bricks became cruder towns of Duplo bricks. Humane walking architecture, rich with texture, decoration and patterns was eviscerated and replaced with driving architecture, featureless and faceless. Glories such as Chicago’s Garrick Theatre were demolished for lumpen multi-story car parks. Among the many unseamed downtown neighborhoods were Detroit’s Paradise Valley and Black Bottom, which were sliced up by wide freeways and whose largely black populations were decanted into heartless and over-sized “public housing projects”. All of these failed and have been in turn demolished — a savage flop of “sustainable development”.

After a century in which the United States first defined and then ditched the modern city, we are left with two different presidential visions for the American city: Fifties corporate modernism with a superficial high-tech sheen, or federal classicism on a growth drug.

The Obama Library is beyond redemption: so flawed in its location, conception and execution that it is hard to see it ever becoming a much-loved landmark. The architects, New York-based Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, have form in nominative antiphrasis: a folk art museum which is modernist, a pavilion which has precisely nothing of the form, nature or tone of a pavilion and, now, a Presidential library which is bereft of books. In what has coyly been described as “a break with tradition”, the Obama Library has no research library and will not house the former President’s archives. Jackson Park has been mashed up for an empty box.

There is a good functional case to be made for Trump’s ballroom, however. The world’s superpower should not be hosting state dinners in tents. Nor is the loss of the Forties East Wing quite as shocking as it first seems. The White House, like a Shinto shrine, is old in name only. It is really a modern building pretending to be antique. Though the many Democratic supporters of classical architecture are appalled by Trump’s ballroom — traditional architecture, it should be noted, is the preferred architecture of both Democratic and republican voters — the plans could, in fact, be redeemed, but not if Trump remains actively in charge. The former real estate developer is rumored to be personally deeply involved in the negotiations, planning, fundraising and design, delaying other meetings for development discussion, supposedly insisting on concrete not stone for the super-sized triumphal arch and always asking, “How can it be bigger?”

Trump’s contempt for historic fabric sits within a clear presidential tradition. Harry Truman had the entire White House gutted and rebuilt internally while his family moved next door for three years. Of the original building, only the exterior walls and some re-installed doors, chimney pieces and wood paneling remain. The recently demolished East Wing was a 1942 near-total replacement, by McKim, Mead and White, of the 1902 original. And many of its interiors had also been transformed several times. Trump’s derision for normal consultation and approval via the National Trust for Historic Preservation offends but is not illegal. The White House is exempt from the 1966 National Historic Preservation Act.

Meanwhile, Memorial Circle is a good place for a triumphal arch, even if the probable scale and decorative excess would be obscene to Thomas Jefferson’s and the Founding Fathers’ more reserved aesthetics. Federal classicism’s moderation revealed its underpinning confidence and civility. The new arch needs to calm down. It should be in communion with the history of Washington, D.C.,not with the more brittle dictator gargantuanism of Beijing’s 10,000-seater Great Hall of the People or Pyongyang’s never-completed 105-story “Ryugyong Hotel”.

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Trump’s monumentalist aesthetic

By Adam Ellwanger and John J. Waters

Despite the flawed directions being taken by both Presidents Obama and Trump, there is hope for American cities. Increasingly Americans are rejecting towns that could be anywhere and so are nowhere. As long ago as 1955, and haunted by memories of the small town Marceline, Missouri, in which he grew up, America’s most culturally iconic entrepreneur, Walt Disney created a place for Americans to enjoy which rejected all of the emerging traffic-modernist truths of post-war US cities. Main Street, Disneyland is not just pretty and nostalgic. It has no cars, and it is human-scale. That, Disney and his designers realized, was what made people happy.

Over the past generation, a growing number of American researchers, investors, developers and city mayors, from both Left and Right, have reached the same conclusion that Disney did 70 years ago. Many developers have created so-called “new urbanist” towns and urban extensions which ignore most of the development patterns of the last 80 years: Seaside, Celebration and Kentlands and dozens more. All are rewarded with more consumer demand and higher land values, typically between 15% to 100%, as analysis by Chris Leindbeger, me and others has shown. In fact, so successful are they that a consortium of investors is funding the first new American city, California Forever, to be built on walkable pre-modernist principles for over a century.

Make places better and people like it. Republican mayor Jim Brainard’s transformation of downtown Carmel in Indiana was so popular that he was re-elected seven times becoming one of the longest serving American mayors. Streets with higher “walkscores” tend to be worth more, revealing pent-up demand. The economic, social and political benefits are clear.

Many American cities face huge challenges of discord, infrastructure decay and housing affordability. But to these challenges, the vaulting scale of Obama and Trump’s architectural visions have no answer. So, the message for my American friends is this: if you want your towns and cities to prosper, if you want to help heal the fissures in society, then ignore Trump and Obama. Don’t supersize your towns any further, but reweave them. Help each neighborhood feel enclosed and intimate, with all the concomitant advantages of prosperity, community and public health that brings. Help them feel small again.

This, after all, is a place that promises a new Austin, one, its marketers say, that offers “serenity in the sky”. There’ll be restaurants, and retail, and a hotel complete with swimming pool and spa. Far from a repeat of The War of the Worlds, then, the Waterline speaks to another H.G. Wells fantasy, one the writer envisaged as “a great gallery” where people could meet and live in harmony. Nor is it alone. There are 13 similar high-rises coming right across Austin, as its population rises and GDP soars.

This emerging urban Austin, a place of towers and cocktail bars, is fundamentally different from the established centers of the East and Midwest. In beehives like Wall Street or The Loop, office workers historically came in to work, then retreated back to the suburbs each night. Downtown Austin, though, puts residents at its hearts, focusing less on offices and more on lifestyles. Yet if that means amenities galore, this tidy vision risks redefining American cities for the worse — even as the old problems of urban dysfunction always loom.

For decades, the Texan capital was synonymous with a single word: weird. Unlike the conservative countryside, or else oil towns like Dallas, the self-proclaimed People’s Republic of Austin was a place of lively bars and soul-filled clubs. There was Rainey Street, too, a charming Latino neighborhood filled with pretty tree-lined cottages. When I first came here, almost half a century ago, I was reminded of nothing less than Haight-Ashbury — the San Francisco neighborhood so beloved among artists and hippies.

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The Lone Star State is soaring

By Joel Kotkin

Now, though, this older, shabbier Austin is slipping away. Quite aside from landmark developments like the Waterline, that’s clear enough in the numbers. Since 2000, downtown’s population has tripled to 15,000. In large part, in fact, Kevin Burns argues the ultra-modern vibe can be understood by sheer demand, with the rising forest of towers appealing to young professionals tired of life in the suburbs. “The driver is quality of life,” says the bearded 47-year-old real-estate developer, sipping a coffee as the sound of construction echoes around us.

It’s not hard to see what he means. Life by the Colorado, still feverishly in the making, is pleasantly walkable. There are yew-scattered parklands, and bike lanes and creeks. It’s all surely a step up from the convention centers and stadiums that once got urban developers excited. There’s also plenty to do: dozens of bars and restaurants open in Austin every month, dovetailed by yoga studios and comedy clubs. Yet if the new Austin promises paradise for wealthy hipsters, the hippies of yore seem far less welcome. Downtown, after all, is expensive, hardly surprising when so many of the new arrivals are tech workers, “empty nesters” with far fewer children to feed than their peers elsewhere. An apartment in the sky here will set you back $170,000 more than other parts of Central Texas, doubtless explaining why so many new downtowners are white.

All this speaks to a younger, hipper crowd, especially compared to the vast suburbs of somewhere like Houston. Nor is demography the only way downtown is different. As Hannah Rangel says, this is fundamentally a place to live, not work, with the vice president of Austin Downtown Allies explaining that offices are smaller than elsewhere. Once again, that’s probably a function of the city’s tech boom: with startups needing little more than coders and their Macbooks, they need far less floorspace than their corporate competitors.

Factor in the remote work revolution and it’s little wonder places like the Waterline are so popular, with residential and mixed-use construction easily outstripping office builds right across town. Nor, of course, is this unique to Austin: even America’s classic urban cores are going the same way. New York has its own planting of residential towers, while the Rust Belt undergoes a similar transition.

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LA's dreams went up in flames

By Joel Kotkin

Reviving the grand architecture of the dead industrial past, downtown Milwaukee is one good example here. Another is Detroit, with its gaggle of neoclassical skyscrapers. Then there’s the Renaissance Center, all Seventies steel, abandoning offices for flats and entertainment. And where houses are coming, business is going. According to one recent report, residential conversion projects were set to double through 2024, even as demand for new office space tumbles.

Given the apparent enthusiasm for remote work among finance and professional services — the sectors that long kept downtowns afloat — it’s tempting to assume that the new Austin will soon become the new America. In truth, though, Wells’s “brilliant and entertaining agglomeration” isn’t a sure thing. One way of thinking about this is by digging into the numbers. Yes, the population growth along the Colorado is impressive, but roughly 98% of newcomers to Austin still settle in suburbs and exurbs. And why not? With WFH allowing employees to make money anywhere, many still prefer a yard and a picket fence over an apartment in the sky.

For those companies insisting on in-person attendance, meanwhile, America’s hinterland remains appealing. Once more, the statistics are telling, with jobs and homes across the sunbelt increasingly shifting to shiny new suburbs, with plenty of space for office parks, and where the overbuilt apartments are cheap. As far as Austin is concerned, certainly, outlying areas north of the city are wildly popular. The Domain, which lies just outside the city, is thriving, offering a car-oriented vision of suburban life. Though there’s some dense development, the surrounding area is covered by single family homes. Compared to downtown, it’s easy to park, and has fewer street-level hassles. It’s a similar story across the country, whether in Irvine, California, or New Albany near Columbus.

And while the denizens downtown are richer than average, the urban analyst Bill Fulton warns that their “niche life” remains at odds with the average high earner — most of whom still reside outside the urban core. One good example is Brian Niccol, the new CEO of Starbucks, who runs the coffee giant not from downtown Seattle, but rather from the warm weather and easy lifestyle of coastal Southern California.

In a sense, this is unsurprising. The American job market began spreading its tentacles into the suburbs as early as the Fifties. Prodded along by the automobile, and perhaps too by the enduring power of the traditional American Dream, a recent MIT study found that 80% of America’s metropolitan population now live in car-friendly suburbs, while just 8% live downtown. Nor are all suburbs created equal: though the sprawl is as popular as ever, the brownstone streets of Brooklyn or Georgetown, designed with mass transit in mind, are home to just 13% of people.

Simply put, then, the old urban model is dissolving, though what comes next remains unclear. As that last statistic implies, one issue is transport. Especially since the pandemic, networks across the US are struggling, with many short of money and plagued by crime and squalor. In 2023, some still operate between a third and two thirds below their pre-Covid levels, while in Austin barely 5% of people downtown make use of buses or the city’s light rail system.

It’s just as well, then, that Burns pins his hopes not on trains but Uber, or else the increasingly ubiquitous Waymos, which cart people about in driverless vehicles. “The Ubers are here now,” Burns says, “but the Waymo’s are going to change cities, and make places more attractive and connected.” Austin, with its tech-oriented elites, seems an ideal place to become, in the words of former mayor Steve Adler, “the Kitty Hawk of driverless cars.”

Yet if getting around in Austin may soon become a private-sector affair, Big Tech can’t hope to do everything. Indeed, Burns’s biggest worry is the proliferation of criminals and vagrants stalking inner-city streets. Stroll between downtown and the Capitol and you’ll see drug addicts and alcoholics sprawled by the gutter, albeit in far fewer numbers than other big cities. And, to be fair, some of these residual challenges do seem to be subsiding, especially with a new mayor who takes street-level disorder more seriously. Even so, Burns remains skeptical of Jose Garza, Austin’s radical DA, complaining that he “does not enforce the law” amid rising chaos on the streets. Given the grim decline of towns like Oakland and Chicago, these fears feel justified.

A more intractable problem with the new Austin — typified by the Waterline tagline that “work is rooted in wellness” — is that it has a limited market. Much of the original appeal of downtown’s earlier iteration was its funkiness, its scruffiness, when its dives and honky tonks were spots where anything, it felt, could happen. Good luck recreating that at Whole Goods. The offbeat charm of Rainey Street has vanished too, with just two of its bungalows remaining and its Latino residents priced out.

We probably shouldn’t mourn these shifts too much. Cities, after all, are always changing. Yet walk the streets of downtown Austin and this historic neighborhood, once so full of life, feels as sterile as Singapore. In that, it shares the fate of Spitalfields, or Hudson Yards, once the “great galleries” of Wellsian imagination, but now little more than vast amenity districts for a small and well-heeled elite. Better than dystopia — but hardly transformative for the mass of urban residents.