Skip to Content
Streetsblog New York City home
Log In
Streetsblog

Aerotropolis: A New Model for Cities?

11:17 AM EDT on October 3, 2011

Imagine a city where the airport is not located at the urban periphery but in the center of the city. All other facets of commerce and life flow from that central point, the city’s economic nucleus.

That is John Kasarda’s vision, known by the catchy appellation “Aerotropolis.” Kasarda’s futuristic airport city is premised on the notion that in a globalized economy, access to world markets is paramount. Since airports provide the fastest mode of shipping, he posits, they should be the figurative and literal city center, with businesses, cultural amenities and even homes organized around them.

That vision is attracting adherents in the Middle East and Asia, and the U.S. as well, most notably the city of St. Louis, which has been looking at the model as a potential avenue for economic and urban revitalization.

Is the Aerotropolis the city of the future? Aaron Renn at the Urbanophile has read Greg Lindsay’s new book “Aerotropolis: The Way We’ll Live Next.” The book raises important points about the nature of cities in a era when location can be reduced to a figure on a balance sheet. But ultimately, Renn is not convinced:

I think this is a great summation of perhaps how we got to where we are with globalization. Globalization is often portrayed as an inevitable, inexorable process that sort of came about as an emergent property of advances in transportation and communications technology. But as the aerotropolis – a master-planned environment conceived and dictated from the top down – illustrates, globalization is in fact a man-made creation, one willfully brought into existence by the efforts of various parties.

As for Kasarda, the impression I get from the book and various articles I’ve read about him is less of a man interested in getting rich than of someone who is looking for someone to implement his new vision of the aerotropolis city. In the video above, Kasarda quotes Le Corbusier in the title slide. Corbu famously proposed demolishing much of historic Paris in order to build a city of freestanding modernist towers. He was more than willing to sweep away the entire urban order in order to remake the city in accordance with what he thought was a better vision – his vision naturally.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the aerotropolis. Even where the nominal ingredients were in place (including authoritarian government), there seem to be precious few places where the aerotropolis has been pulled off successfully. In fact, the book probably relates as many failed as successful ones, and at no point did I read a case study and come away going, “Wow – that’s it.”

The aerotroplis, inhumane as it may seem at times, has its merits as an abstract idea, but the reality is likely rarely to match up to Kasarda’s expectations. As Dietrich Dörner put it in his classic The Logic of Failure, “Because planning involves only imagining our actions, we are essentially free from the irksome conditions of reality, and nothing prevents us from simply ignoring the conditions necessary to carry out an operation.” Indeed.

Elsewhere on the Network today: Matt Yglesias comments on Occupy Wall Street’s Brooklyn Bridge protest and the intersection of civil disobedience and public infrastructure. Straight Outta Suburbia says the 2009 Household Mobility Survey by U.S. DOT tells a different story about cycling and walking than the latest American Community Survey. And Bike Delaware puts pressure on its state DOT to do a better job sweeping street shoulders.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog New York City

Opinion: Bring Back ‘Give Respect/Get Respect’ Campaign

If cyclists don't throw their own bad apples under the bus, we won't get safer streets, argues this West Side advocate.

September 27, 2023

Pols: Congress Must Bolster Sustainable Commutes to Reduce Carbon and Congestion

The feds should bolster sustainable commuting modes and transportation demand management strategies.

September 27, 2023

Tuesday’s Headlines: Don’t Look Up Edition

It's hard to believe that it's going to rain again today, plus other more important news.

September 26, 2023

Another Flip-Flop: City Hall Allegedly Pauses Almost-Done Underhill Ave. Bike Boulevard

City Hall is intervening in yet another street redesign project, and supporters fear it could be the start of dismantling other improvements.

September 26, 2023
See all posts