Topic: Urban Renewal
Urban renewal, the West End Project, the North Station Project, the Government Center Project, City Hall, renewal projects in other cities
Victor Gruen was the Austrian-born architect whom Jerome Rappaport, Sr. hired to design Charles River Park, the development that replaced the demolished West End in the 1960s. But Gruen’s work also had national significance as “the father of the shopping mall.”
Herbert Gans lived in the West End for eight months prior to the start of its demolition, conducting sociological research on the culture and lifestyles of the Italian-American residents of the neighborhood. His findings in “The Urban Villagers” presented a significant criticism of Boston’s urban renewal process as inhumane, and Gans notably concluded that planners were incorrect to define the West End, a vibrant community despite widespread poverty, as a slum.
Jules Aarons’ candid photographs of the old West End are a special window into the social life of the neighborhood. His son, Philip, and grandson, Zach, have carried on the legacy of these pictures in creative ways.
Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann created modern Paris through ambitious urban renewal projects over almost 20 years (1853-1871), but he displaced thousands of working-class Parisians through demolition and slum clearance.
