measuring success

In each of these reading selections, the calculation of the best possible organization of stores and the resulting monetary intake, gains precedence over the stores’ individual characteristics. Is the measure of a successful project based solely on the developer’s financial success? Obviously not, but this seems to be part of the focus in these readings. Gruen and Smith meticulously describe all of the conditions that influence the success of a development, while Longstreth discusses the pros, cons, and evolution of the configuration of the types in Los Angeles. Both of them focus on the methods of the developer and architects who design these shopping centers, with distinct attention paid to the automobile’s effects on that design.

In Gruen and Smith’s prologue, they do touch on the well-being of the community and the relationship between good planning and community growth. However, this is not measured or really accounted for in the proceeding chapters, where they discuss the aspects of development that have different levels of importance in the calculation of desirability. They lay out very specifically the best conditions for the development of a shopping facility, which perhaps accounts for the generic quality of most shopping experiences, namely the smaller developments, like strip malls and town centers. I’m curious to know if their designs ever had the program that supported the positive civic activity (not just commercial activity), which architects generally crave and which they attribute to ‘good planning’.

On the flip side, perhaps these constructs are successful because they allow us, carried by our cars, to reach the product efficiently. If the layout, location, stores, and all the other conditions of shopping centers are successful financially for the developer, then the consumer has also benefited from this well-organized construct. The purpose of the shopping center is served if shopping is primary. Dreams of some kind of contemporary replacement for the public piazza, agora, or the medieval city square, will probably continue as dreams because of the individualism and swift dispersal provided by the automobile.