The Remaking of Resilient Urban Space: a Case Study of West Hartford Center
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Urban Resilience – Evolution, Co-Creation, and the Remaking of Space: A Case Study of West Hartford Center 08 January 2016 Prepared by: Donald J. Poland Submitted for Degree of: PhD in Geography UCL Supervisors: Alan Latham, PhD Senior Lecturer in Geography And Andrew Harris, PhD Lecturer in Geography and Urban Studies University College London – Department of Geography I, Donald J. Poland confirm that the work presented in this thesis is my own. Where information has been derived from other sources, I confirm that this has been indicated in the thesis. ____________________________________________________________________________ _ Donald J. Poland 2 Urban Resilience – Evolution, Co-Creation, and the Remaking of Space: University College London – Department of Geography Table of Contents Chapter Title Page Chapter I. Introduction - The Remaking of Resilient Space: A Case Study of West Hartford Center 7 1.00 The Large Urban Bias 7 1.10 The Remaking of Urban Space 11 1.20 Small-City Urbanism and Suburbanization 13 1.30 West Hartford, Connecticut 14 1.40 The Case of West Hartford Center 19 Chapter II. Urban Theory: Exploring and Conceptualizing Urban Space and the Remaking of Space 22 2.00 Introduction 22 2.10 Small City Urbanism 22 2.20 Exploring the Urban 26 2.30 Exploring the Suburban 28 2.40 Exploring Gentrification 35 2.50 Gentrification or Suburbanization 41 2.60 Conclusion 48 Chapter III. Ecological Resilience: A Metaphorical and Theoretical Framework for Understanding the 51 Remaking of Urban Space 3.00 Introduction 51 3.10 Urban Ecology as a Metaphor 52 3.20 Ecological Resilience 59 3.30 Urban Ecological Resilience 61 3.40 Bridging the Urban Ecological Divide 69 3.50 Urban Governance and Ecosystem Management 81 3.60 Conclusion 85 Chapter IV. Methodology and Methods: A Case Study of West Hartford Center 87 4.00 Introduction 87 4.10 Why a Case Study Methodology? 90 4.20 Research Questions 93 4.30 Research Methods 94 4.40 Understanding Change 1980 – 2012 95 4.50 The Entrepreneurs and Restaurateurs 99 4.60 Government Intervention 100 4.70 The Consumers, Consumption, and the Production of Space 101 4.80 Secondary Methods 103 4.90 Conclusion 104 Chapter V. Exploring Urban Change: The Remaking of Space 105 5.00 Introduction 105 5.10 Understanding Change – West Hartford Center 1980 – 2012 105 5.20 Conclusion 119 Chapter VI. The Entrepreneurs and Restaurateurs: Emergence and Innovation 121 6.00 Introduction 121 6.10 Hospitality and the Remaking of Space 121 6.20 Entrepreneurial Emergence – Hospitality 1990 – 1999 125 6.30 Evolution and Hospitality 2000 – 2012 135 6.40 Gentrification and the Remaking of Resilient Space 151 6.50 Conclusion 157 Chapter VII. Government Intervention: ‘The West Hartford Way’ 160 7.00 Introduction 160 7.10 Managing Change – the Urban Growth Machine and Ecological Resilience 161 7.20 Removing Barriers to Parking 177 7.30 Experimenting with Outdoor Dining 180 7.40 Case Study: Blue Back Square, ‘The West Hartford Way’ 186 7.50 Conclusion 192 3 A Case Study of West Hartford Center University College London – Department of Geography Table of Contents (Continued) Chapter Title Page Chapter VIII. Consumption and the Production of Space: Consumers and the Co-Creation of Space 195 8.00 Introduction 195 8.10 The Consumers of West Hartford Center 195 8.20 The Consumption of Space – Experience, Community, and the Center 201 8.30 The Vocabularies of Space – West Hartford Center 207 8.40 The Geography of What Happens – Co-Option and Adaptation 214 8.50 Conclusion 225 Chapter IX. Conclusion: The Kind of Space that is West Hartford Center 226 9.00 Introduction 226 9.10 Exploring the Research Questions 228 9.20 Conclusion 237 Bibliography 241 References Cited 241 Interviews Cited 258 Appendix 260 Appendix I: Consumer Interview Questions and Demographic Sheet 260 Appendix II: Business Interview Questions 264 Appendix III: Coding for Interviews – Codes Paired with Research Questions 266 Appendix IV: West Hartford Center – Storefront Database Analysis 268 Appendix V: Storefront Database Maps (Mapping Change) 269 Appendix VI: Comparative Demographics 275 4 Urban Resilience – Evolution, Co-Creation, and the Remaking of Space: University College London – Department of Geography Figures, Maps, and Tables Title Page Map 1. Northeast United States 15 Map 2. Connecticut Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA) 15 Map 3. Hartford Suburban Streetcar Map 18 Figure 1. West Hartford Center Aerial View (2012) 19 Figure 2. The Adaptive Cycle 64 Figure 3. Panarchy: Nested Adaptive Cycles 66 Figure 4. Adaptive Cycle: Potential and Time 67 Figure 5. Front Half of the Adaptive Cycle 75 Figure 6. Back Half of the Adaptive Cycle 76 Figure 7. Farmington Avenue Across from LaSalle Road 1990 and 2011 96 Table 1. Demographic Profile – Users Interviewed 102 Map 4. West Hartford Center and Blue Back Square 106 Table 2. Change in Storefronts (1980 – 2012) 107 Chart 1. Storefront Change 107 Table 3. Population Change 109 Chart 2. Shifting Storefront Regimes 109 Chart 3. Changes in the Hospitality Regime 113 Table 4. Fine Dining Establishments by Year 115 Table 5. Change in Outdoor Dining (1980 – 2012) 118 Chart 4. Outdoor Dining Establishments 118 Figure 8. Max Oyster Bar 124 Figure 9. Restaurant Bricco 128 Figure 10. Arugula 129 Figure 11. The Elbow Room 130 Figure 12. Barcelona and BarTaco Building Renovations 139 Figure 13. Rizzuto’s Restaurant 141 Figure 14. Reuben’s Deli 142 Figure 15. Chains, Francizes, and Fast Casual Dining 145 Figure 16. Moe’s Southwest Grill 147 Figure 17. Max Burger 150 Figure 18. Public Space and Community Events 165 Figure 19. Ornamenting the Public Realm 175 Figure 20. Outdoor Dining 1990 181 Figure 21. West Hartford Center Model 187 Figure 22. Blue Back Square 189 Figure 23. Hospitality 198 Table 6. Three Words – Consumer Vocabularies of West Hartford Center 212 5 A Case Study of West Hartford Center University College London – Department of Geography Abstract Dissatisfied with the large urban bias—the overreliance on large cities, spectacular space, and paradigmatic cases—and equally dissatisfied with our urban vocabularies and understandings of suburbanization and gentrification, I seek to explore how urban theory informs us about change in smaller cities and smaller suburban spaces. I argue that much of our urban understandings juxtapose the city as one kind of space and the suburban as another kind of space even though the distinction has become blurred. As a result, I argue that our understandings suburbanization and gentrification fall short of conceptualizing and understanding the remaking of smaller (sub)urban spaces such as West Hartford Center. Utilizing a case study approach, I explore the space of West Hartford Center and how the Center changed—was remade from a suburban town center to a regional center of middle-class hospitality and sociality—from 1980 to 2012. To accomplish this, I introduce ecological resilience as a metaphor and theoretical framework for thinking about and working though our understandings of urban space, the processes of urban change—suburbanization and gentrification—and how and why (sub)urban space is remade. Through the metaphorical and theoretical lens of ecological resilience, I explore West Hartford Center as a complex adaptive system that has been resilient—having the capacity to absorb shock and disturbance while maintaining its function and structure. In doing so, I explore how the actors and their actions—the business owners, government officials, and consumers—coalesce into a dynamic process of re-creating urban space. Through this approach and my findings, I argue for more contextual geographies of place and geographies what happens; including the need for more and better studies of small city urbanism. Key words: Small City Urbanism, Suburbanization, Gentrification, Post-Suburban, Urban Ecology, Ecological Resilience. 6 Urban Resilience – Evolution, Co-Creation, and the Remaking of Space: University College London – Department of Geography Chapter I. The Remaking of Resilient Urban Space: A Case Study of West Hartford Center 1.00 The Large Urban Bias As of 2010, approximately 249 million Americans lived in urbanized areas (Census, 2010). Of the 249 million persons living in urbanized areas, only 81 million live in the 10 largest metropolitan regions. The majority, 168 million persons or 67% of the United States’ metropolitan population, live in smaller (4,500,000 persons or less) metropolitan regions. For example, only nine U.S. metropolitan areas have over 5 million persons, only 14 metropolitan areas have over 4 million persons, and only 17 metropolitan areas have over 3 million persons. The 50th largest metropolitan area has 1,054,323 persons. Not only do most American urban dwellers live in smaller urban areas— metropolitan and nonmetropolitan (Ori-Amoah, 2007)—, the majority live in suburban places outside the central city (Lang, et al., 2008; Lang, et al., 2009; Frey, et al., 2004; Keil, 2013). According to Wendell Cox (2006), approximately 36% of the population in the 10 largest metropolitan areas live in the central city while 64% live in urbanized areas outside the central city (Cox, www.demographia.com). Gallagher explains (2013: 8-9): Looking at the broadly defined ‘metropolitan’ regions of our country, which is where more than 80 percent of Americans live, the percentage of us living in the suburbs is higher, 61 percent … Over the past half century, the portion of people living in the suburbs has steadily grown, from 31 percent in 1960 to 51 percent in 2010... Viewing the American urban experience as both a smaller urban and suburban experience raises questions about urban research, urban theory, our understanding of urban places and the contemporary American urban experience. Can urban theory based mostly on the form, function, and individual site and situation of large urban places (i.e. Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York) help us to understand smaller urban places (i.e.