neighbourhoods

Jane Jacobs, ‘The Death and Life of Great American Cities’:

Neighbourhood is a word that has come  to sound like a Valentine. As a sentimental concept, “neighbourhood” is harmful to city planning. It leads to attempts at warping city life into imitations of town or suburban life. Sentimentality plays with sweet intentions in place of good sense.

I’m only a third of the way through this book, but can’t help thinking there is already a lot in there to be learnt about what planning can (and shouldn’t) do in the  world of localism, localism, localism.