Zoned Out in Gopher City

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a conference on “Building the Urban Utopia: A Blueprint for the Competitive Global City.” The featured speakers were part of a contingent from Gopher City, MN:  Phillip Space, internationally renowned architect and author of “Den$ity for Dummies,” Gopher City Council Member Malcolm “Mal” Feasants, and city planner Uriah Heep IV.

MAL FEASANTS: I’m delighted to be invited to speak on the wonders of the high-density urban neighborhoods we’re rebuilding in Gopher City. The first step in this process is clearing old buildings, old people, bellyaching minorities, and the financially disadvantaged out of these neighborhoods to make way for new mixed-use commercial buildings and high density housing. It’s easy to do--We just ignore or crush any obstacle that gets in our way, like zoning ordinances or small-area plans. If a developer needs a variance or a zoning change for a new project, we just do it. That’s the beauty of being the government. As chair of the Gopher City Zoning and Planning Committee, I control what goes down and what goes up. The voters gave us a mandate, and we’re doing what’s good for them--even if some of them don’t appreciate it.

URIAH HEEP IV [M.A.,Ph.D. Stalinist Planning and Architecture]: The Gopher City Planning Department is proud to be part of the private-public partnership. We are pleased to assist any and all new development by providing the rationale needed to argue for bypassing regulations. We’re the go-to agency for developers. Who knows the city and its buildings better than we do? Who knows better how to spin the rhetoric, using all the buzzwords: “green”, “transportation nodes”, “bike-friendly”, “affordable”, and so forth? 

 The Chinese know how to do high-density development. Complete government control, planner paradise.“Harmonious Society! Long Live the People!”

PHILLIP SPACE [A.I.A., S.O.B.] May I take a moment to brag about a new project I’m designing, a six-story hotel that developer Hy Density has proposed for Gopher City’s Ro-dense Zone? It’s cheap, it’s right on the bus line, it’s easily accessible to downtown. Who cares if the current zoning doesn’t allow a hotel next to two-story-family housing? Who cares if it doesn’t suit the Ro-dense Zone small-area plan? Who cares if building it requires a conditional use permit and a floor area ratio variance? it’s what the City needs, and Mal, here, knows how to get past these pesky ordinances and get the thing built. We’ll put a bike rack for guests by the lobby entrance. No need for parking spaces. Cars are so 20th-century.

 MAL FEASANTS: One important undertaking we GC CM’s are working on is eliminating every way that citizens can comment on projects. We’re cutting out citizen review boards that allow residents free rein to bitch about what the City is doing or not doing. We still have tiresome hearings which can’t be scrapped--yet. BOR-ING. I would go out of my mind if I didn’t have my smart phone in my lap so I can tweet and look at Facebook posts while these old NIMBYs are cranking away. When they won’t shut up, I just cut the mic. The new Gopher City, love it or leave it. 

Gopher City Council Members at public hearing.

It's essential that we rid our cities of these old knee-jerk jerks who don't appreciate the Brave New World we're fashioning in the old neighborhoods. The time of these superannuated losers has passed and so should they. The new neighborhood belongs to the developers and the young and hip. If someone isn't fit enough to ride a bike or walk to a bus stop, they should be harassed into going somewhere else to die. 

PHILLIP SPACE: Hear, hear, Mal. That reminds me. I must tell you about a brilliant scheme my firm has developed to deal with both senile senior undesirables and our supporters who can't afford the rents in the new buildings. Let me announce the latest in minimalist urban pads: Troll Holes. These young male internet trolls don't have jobs, don't have friends, and don't have lives, so they don't need all the amenities required of hipsterdom. They live online. So we've designed small, windowless one-room underground units with high-speed internet access, so they can spend all their time launching anonymous attacks on the recalcitrant NIMBYs who are such a thorn in the side of the City and developers. The City can subsidize  rents in these Holes, for these young wits are providing an important service to local government. 

We've already cleared the neighborhood of annoying minorities who are always protesting for some lame reason or the other. In the big scheme of building the great metropolis, their lives certainly don't matter. And the poor? They're already on the streets or out in suburban ghettoes. Everyone else can pay up or move out.

 A-hole online in a Troll Hole

URIAH HEEP IV: Great plan, Phil! Now, I’d like to congratulate Minneapolis on the fine job the government has done in converting antiquated cow-town Uptown into a wonder of urban planning. Uptown is very much like our awesomely hip Ro-dense Zone. Thirty years ago we threw out all the bozo small businesses there.  We used tax increment financing and got subsidies by selling the Feds on how the area was blighted. Man, what suckers! It’s taken 30 years, but now we have exactly what we wanted: a place for hipsters, yuppies, bros and suburbanites to party till they puke.

PHILLIP SPACE: Well, friends, it's been fun, but we gotta run. I need to check out several building sites to be bulldozed, and I trust that Mal and Uriah here will keep up the good work running interference for us architects and our developer employers. [Applause]  And remember, as a famous German once said, "The victor will never be asked if he told the truth."

                 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
                                             Praise be to Nero's Neptune.
                                             The Titanic sails at dawn.
                                              Everybody's shouting,
                                              'Which side are you on?'
                                                      --Bob Dylan, "Desolation Row"  1965

                                                   
                             With a tip of the hat to Harry Sinclair Lewis of Gopher Prairie, MN.                                                   

--T.B.