An Introduction to a zine I never finished
URBAN BIKE ADVENTURISM,
AND SUBVERTING THE BOURGEOIS STRANGLEHOLD ON URBAN SPACE
Are the two themes of this zine. Let me explain.
All content contained within these pages rests on the idea that the form and content of our cities should be determined by those that reside in it. That cities are not merely economic engines or investment opportunities, not cold collections of sociological statistics, not the playgrounds of yuppies or playthings of planners and politicians… but rather the site of incredible human potential and creativity, beauty and social bonds within the frequently cold confines of concrete and brick.
In capitalist America, our urban space is most frequently built and controlled by those with money and those who serve them. Charlotte is case in point, where developers and politicians, businessmen and bureaucrats, have and continue to throw to the wind concerns for the common good, environment, aesthetics, and community in the pursuit of profit. In celebration of their deeds are erected skyscrapers of steel and glass, towering over the city’s collective psyche and skyline. And I ain’t just complaining about sprawl here, y’all. Whether its throwing up single family home subdivisions on fringe farmlands, “revitalizing” old mills into ritzy yuppie shopping malls, or demolishing entire communities in the name of urban renewal, it comes down to POWER. Popular power to transform the bourgeois city built for profit, into the people’s city for the common good, is what we’re after. Getting control over the places we spend our lives at, both socially and physically, is what its about.
As we subvert the bourgeois stranglehold on urban space, however, we are confronted by a paradox, one that breathes life into an urban existence at its darkest moments filled with monotony, ugliness, shameful inequality, and alienation. The urban space shaped in the interests of capital cannot be controlled entirely by capital. As the people of the metropolis swarm about and around it, live in it and eat in it, acquire goods, travel, and work in it, we exert control over it. We find the beauty of place, any place, but specifically the place where we live. We become fascinated by the intricacies and idiosyncrasies of the neighborhoods, architecture, people, transport networks, and icons that weave together in always changing ways that define the city.
This zine, then, is also a tribute to my home. Much more than just criticizing current land use in Charlotte, this zine is about exploring the urban space we inhabit, from Myers Park to industrial parks, and bringing to light the adventure and history in every block. Interstates and highways, for example, have cut across Charlotte communities like razor blades, but in the wake of their devastation we find new urban forms, new possibilities for subverting the dominant order. I do not excuse the actions of the politician, the bureaucrat, the capitalist, the developer- they are my enemy, the creators and sustainers of poverty, inequality, injustice, environmental destruction, alienated consumerist culture. Yet in these pages I will bring to light the ever-changing urban landscape around us to explore, as much as mourning over how it was created.
SUBVERTING THE BOURGEOIS STRANGLEHOLD ON URBAN SPACE is the issue at hand. But how? First off, let me make clear that the grand schemes of urban planners a lá New Urbanism are not welcome in these pages. This is not a magazine for debating the merits of light rail, praising the redevelopment of South End, or contemplating the economic impact of a Johnson & Wales campus downtown. Not that I dismiss all such topics and ideas as without merit, but bureaucratic plans and schemes to make Charlotte a “world class city” do not belong amongst the subversives and grassroots agitators. Second, this is not a zine exclusively about sprawl and gentrification, the two bugaboos of many land use activists (although these critiques will come up). Third, this is not a forum for reprinting and debating articles from the Observer on local political and economic happenings. Although I support the efforts of all fighting against the corrupt and bloodless political economy of Charlotte, this zine is primarily about urban space.
Subversion!- we’re talking about grassroots initiatives against avaricious developers, community gardens sprouting up like mushrooms, squatter settlements, free bike libraries, graffiti, street parties, vernacular architecture, direct action against sprawl and roads, communities blocking another fucking Walmart being built, neighborhood assemblies, taking over big ass houses and handing them over to folks who’ve lived in nothing but tiny ass houses their whole lives, abandoned warehouses turned into social centers, urban permaculture, revolutionary murals, rent strikes, housing cooperatives. We’re talking the Paris Commune, we’re talking Barcelona, 1936, we’re talking the Berkeley People’s Park. We’re talking the sky’s the limit and damn it why can’t we get together with our neighbors and coworkers and family and friends and talk about what kind of world we’d like to live in, what kind of city we’d like to live, and get together and BUILD THAT CITY!
URBAN BICYCLE ADVENTURISM- where does that fit into this pipe dream? In the automobile-oriented, postindustrial city, bicycles are highly subversive. When we ride across the automobile-centered landscape, we recreate and leave in our wake the potential for a future human-scaled urban landscape not subservient to oil companies. Bicycles make us intimately learn hills and landscape, and feel the changing seasons, so that we connect with the terrain trapped beneath the pavement and the atmosphere we breathe. Bicycles force us to slow down and realize what is passing us by, the buildings, people, vegetation, and water. Bicycles undermine the dominant logic that building bigger roads and pushing further outward the bounds of the city is a wise course of development. Bicycles are more maneuverable than cars and faster than feet, making them ideal for mischief and fun in the unpredictable urban landscape. Bicycles are very cheap to maintain, do not emit pollution, and do not burn fossil fuels. Bicycles in large numbers can be used to block or slow traffic, in dire situations. Bicycles lead us to explore the back roads, seldom seen streets, and forgotten corners of the city, motivating always to make urban life an adventure.
In summary, this zine concerns URBAN BIKE ADVENTURISM, AND SUBVERTING THE BOURGEOIS STRANGLEHOLD ON URBAN SPACE. But I can’t do it alone, and I know that we are many, even in Charlotte. I want to see in this zine: features on Charlotte’s neighborhoods and architecture, train tracks and streets, rivers and woods; photographs of the city; accounts of bike rides and exploratory ventures; critiques of land use and ideas for changing it all around; utopian visions of the urban future; practical tips for subversion and survival in the capitalist city; anecdotes and stories of the urban experience; bike tips and tricks; articles on grassroots efforts to wrest back control over urban space. Write me.
I wrote this over a year ago, and this past year has seen a number of these perspectives changed, from personal experience, reflection, and delving into some radical urban theory (most notably that of the situationists.) So I regard these ideas now as immature, and not where I am now. Nevertheless, here they are for otherwise no one would ever see them packed away in a word file on the computer.
AND SUBVERTING THE BOURGEOIS STRANGLEHOLD ON URBAN SPACE
Are the two themes of this zine. Let me explain.
All content contained within these pages rests on the idea that the form and content of our cities should be determined by those that reside in it. That cities are not merely economic engines or investment opportunities, not cold collections of sociological statistics, not the playgrounds of yuppies or playthings of planners and politicians… but rather the site of incredible human potential and creativity, beauty and social bonds within the frequently cold confines of concrete and brick.
In capitalist America, our urban space is most frequently built and controlled by those with money and those who serve them. Charlotte is case in point, where developers and politicians, businessmen and bureaucrats, have and continue to throw to the wind concerns for the common good, environment, aesthetics, and community in the pursuit of profit. In celebration of their deeds are erected skyscrapers of steel and glass, towering over the city’s collective psyche and skyline. And I ain’t just complaining about sprawl here, y’all. Whether its throwing up single family home subdivisions on fringe farmlands, “revitalizing” old mills into ritzy yuppie shopping malls, or demolishing entire communities in the name of urban renewal, it comes down to POWER. Popular power to transform the bourgeois city built for profit, into the people’s city for the common good, is what we’re after. Getting control over the places we spend our lives at, both socially and physically, is what its about.
As we subvert the bourgeois stranglehold on urban space, however, we are confronted by a paradox, one that breathes life into an urban existence at its darkest moments filled with monotony, ugliness, shameful inequality, and alienation. The urban space shaped in the interests of capital cannot be controlled entirely by capital. As the people of the metropolis swarm about and around it, live in it and eat in it, acquire goods, travel, and work in it, we exert control over it. We find the beauty of place, any place, but specifically the place where we live. We become fascinated by the intricacies and idiosyncrasies of the neighborhoods, architecture, people, transport networks, and icons that weave together in always changing ways that define the city.
This zine, then, is also a tribute to my home. Much more than just criticizing current land use in Charlotte, this zine is about exploring the urban space we inhabit, from Myers Park to industrial parks, and bringing to light the adventure and history in every block. Interstates and highways, for example, have cut across Charlotte communities like razor blades, but in the wake of their devastation we find new urban forms, new possibilities for subverting the dominant order. I do not excuse the actions of the politician, the bureaucrat, the capitalist, the developer- they are my enemy, the creators and sustainers of poverty, inequality, injustice, environmental destruction, alienated consumerist culture. Yet in these pages I will bring to light the ever-changing urban landscape around us to explore, as much as mourning over how it was created.
SUBVERTING THE BOURGEOIS STRANGLEHOLD ON URBAN SPACE is the issue at hand. But how? First off, let me make clear that the grand schemes of urban planners a lá New Urbanism are not welcome in these pages. This is not a magazine for debating the merits of light rail, praising the redevelopment of South End, or contemplating the economic impact of a Johnson & Wales campus downtown. Not that I dismiss all such topics and ideas as without merit, but bureaucratic plans and schemes to make Charlotte a “world class city” do not belong amongst the subversives and grassroots agitators. Second, this is not a zine exclusively about sprawl and gentrification, the two bugaboos of many land use activists (although these critiques will come up). Third, this is not a forum for reprinting and debating articles from the Observer on local political and economic happenings. Although I support the efforts of all fighting against the corrupt and bloodless political economy of Charlotte, this zine is primarily about urban space.
Subversion!- we’re talking about grassroots initiatives against avaricious developers, community gardens sprouting up like mushrooms, squatter settlements, free bike libraries, graffiti, street parties, vernacular architecture, direct action against sprawl and roads, communities blocking another fucking Walmart being built, neighborhood assemblies, taking over big ass houses and handing them over to folks who’ve lived in nothing but tiny ass houses their whole lives, abandoned warehouses turned into social centers, urban permaculture, revolutionary murals, rent strikes, housing cooperatives. We’re talking the Paris Commune, we’re talking Barcelona, 1936, we’re talking the Berkeley People’s Park. We’re talking the sky’s the limit and damn it why can’t we get together with our neighbors and coworkers and family and friends and talk about what kind of world we’d like to live in, what kind of city we’d like to live, and get together and BUILD THAT CITY!
URBAN BICYCLE ADVENTURISM- where does that fit into this pipe dream? In the automobile-oriented, postindustrial city, bicycles are highly subversive. When we ride across the automobile-centered landscape, we recreate and leave in our wake the potential for a future human-scaled urban landscape not subservient to oil companies. Bicycles make us intimately learn hills and landscape, and feel the changing seasons, so that we connect with the terrain trapped beneath the pavement and the atmosphere we breathe. Bicycles force us to slow down and realize what is passing us by, the buildings, people, vegetation, and water. Bicycles undermine the dominant logic that building bigger roads and pushing further outward the bounds of the city is a wise course of development. Bicycles are more maneuverable than cars and faster than feet, making them ideal for mischief and fun in the unpredictable urban landscape. Bicycles are very cheap to maintain, do not emit pollution, and do not burn fossil fuels. Bicycles in large numbers can be used to block or slow traffic, in dire situations. Bicycles lead us to explore the back roads, seldom seen streets, and forgotten corners of the city, motivating always to make urban life an adventure.
In summary, this zine concerns URBAN BIKE ADVENTURISM, AND SUBVERTING THE BOURGEOIS STRANGLEHOLD ON URBAN SPACE. But I can’t do it alone, and I know that we are many, even in Charlotte. I want to see in this zine: features on Charlotte’s neighborhoods and architecture, train tracks and streets, rivers and woods; photographs of the city; accounts of bike rides and exploratory ventures; critiques of land use and ideas for changing it all around; utopian visions of the urban future; practical tips for subversion and survival in the capitalist city; anecdotes and stories of the urban experience; bike tips and tricks; articles on grassroots efforts to wrest back control over urban space. Write me.
I wrote this over a year ago, and this past year has seen a number of these perspectives changed, from personal experience, reflection, and delving into some radical urban theory (most notably that of the situationists.) So I regard these ideas now as immature, and not where I am now. Nevertheless, here they are for otherwise no one would ever see them packed away in a word file on the computer.