Cities and Streets

In his article "His Majesty the Pickaxe" in this book, the esteemed architectural historian Spiro Kostof says:

"...To ignore the loss of the great or small structures of the past means not to have a social consciousness that transcends our immediate needs and desires. To feel this loss, to resist losing it, means to remember the times when we left our destiny to the hands of higher designs as if we had no will of our own, and to refuse to let the same thing happen again. To kill is not to heal. To destroy is never a wise way to nurture love." Sharing this thought, architectural historians also proceed from the idea that the unique qualities of any street are a complex combination of social, political, technical, and artistic forces that shape a city, and they examine the streets of nine different cities: the new boulevards of 19th-century Athens, the triumphal processions that paraded through the streets of ancient Rome, the Hawkaypata square in Cuzco, where Inca rituals took place; the three-pronged streets forming Piazza di Ponte in Renaissance Rome, designed for military reasons; the levee built in 19th-century New Orleans in the water-surrounded space that was supposed to be the city's traditional resting place; the main street that created an imperial environment in the unique topography of 2nd-century BC Ephesus; Soğukçeşme Street in Istanbul, rebuilt with an Orientalist mindset; Gorky Street in Moscow, re-arranged with socialist realist thought; the redesign of Castle Square in Tripoli by Mussolini for fascist propaganda... Each article is an adventure that those interested in urban processes will enjoy reading.