"Similar in spirit to Lewis Mumford's The City in History and Jane Jacobs' The Death and Life of Great American Cities . . . wonderful, funny, idiosyncratic." —Frederick R. Steiner, author of The Living LandscapeBig Plans: The Allure and Folly of Urban Design springs from the idea that human aspirations for the city tend to overstate the role of rationality in public life. Inspired by the architectural and urban criticism of such...

Big Plans: The Allure and Folly of Urban Design springs from the idea that human aspirations for the city tend to overstate the role of rationality in public life. Inspired by the architectural and urban criticism of such writers as Lewis Mumford, Jane Jacobs, and John Brinckerhoff Jackson, Kolson adopts a user's perspective on issues of urban design, an approach that highlights both the futility of social engineering and the resilience of the human spirit.