America's First Medal at the Nazi Olympics Was for Town Planning

http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/americas-first-medal-at-the-nazi-olympics-was-fortown-planning

by samclemens • 10 years ago

70 33 10 years ago

atlasobscura.com

zatkin• 10 years ago

By America, you mean Chicago, right? That's the only well planned city I can think of off the top of my head.

gxs• 10 years ago

Agree whole heartedly.

When I visit Chicago, I get the distinct sense that things were done deliberately, with beautiful architecture to boot.

I suspect it has to do with the fact that the city burned down and they got a redo - twice.

pessimizer• 10 years ago

First plan, 40 years before the fire:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Thompson_Chicago_pla...

Brennan's street numbering and naming reform:

https://www.wbez.org/shows/wbez-news/the-unsung-hero-of-urba...

The Burnham Plan:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnham_Plan_of_Chicago

The U of C "community area" divisions:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_areas_in_Chicago

edit: I generally think of other cities as places where people put their garbage in the street and streets turn back on themselves.

hexane360• 10 years ago

I don't have much knowledge of many cities, but Milwaukee always seems well designed to me.

macintux• 10 years ago

Indianapolis was designed from scratch, similar mold to Washington.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Ralston

Retric2• 10 years ago

DC is a horribly laid out city. Indianapolis adds 2 diagonals which is tolerable, but DC is a mess.

Top 10 worst traffic for X years running, which is sadly an improvement it used to contend for #1. It does not even have an interesting pattern with roads at seemingly random angles. http://www.apco2015.org/hotel-travel/shuttles-and-parking/

leviathant• 10 years ago

Philadelphia was built as a grid in the 17th century, with five public squares, four of which are now parks, the fifth is city hall, in the center of the city. It's old enough to have respectable (for an American city) transit infrastructure - electric trains, subways, trolleys, buses, an active ferry to Camden, and more. Fairmount park is one of the largest urban parks in the world, although getting a straight answer about acreage can be a little tricky.

hbosch• 10 years ago

I think Savannah, GA is the most beautiful laid out city in the country. The perfect grid, symmetry, and plentiful squares and architecture are second to none.

Spooky233• 10 years ago

Someone needs to re-read the Robert Moses biography. In that era, Moses was in the process of finishing the construction of the entire state park system, and was building thousands of parks in NYC.

kchoudhu• 10 years ago

And also destroying and redlining minority communities in NYC for decades to come.

The man's legacy is decidedly mixed.

sjm-lbm• 10 years ago

True, but this doesn't change the fact that the statement in the article is factually untrue.

Moses preferred roads over all other transport mechanisms, and was shockingly effective in his ability to basically make everyone do what he wanted (even if it involved clearly terrible ideas). He was, though, responsible for many New York state and city parks, and really got into road building as a method to get people out to the new parks he was creating.

Now, his definition of "park" as a very developed area with landscaping, sports facilities, playgrounds, etc. with all previous plant life getting killed with a bulldozer is another matter that hasn't really held up over time, but I'm digressing at this point. The Power Broker really is a fascinating read.

JBReefer• 10 years ago

He's still very, very hated here. He really fucked this city up.

Spooky233• 10 years ago

Perhaps. But he didn't screw up the parks, NYC has aworld class park system in many respects.

kazinator2• 10 years ago

Yes, from 1928 until 1948, town planning was an actual Olympic sport.

I suddenly feel a discomfort that could be my mind changing about synchronized swimming and golf.

slyall• 10 years ago

Chess has been pushing to be in the Olympics for years. This mostly seems to be a dream of a few of the top people while everybody else thinks it is a waste of time. It also means that Chess players are subject to doping regulations.

http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1827716,00...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/chess/11677916/Chess-at-t...

sverige2• 10 years ago

Table tennis is right after synchronized swimming on my list.

prawn• 10 years ago

Table tennis ahead of dressage/equestrian!?

kazinator2• 10 years ago

Oh, I got one: ice dancing.

alex-• 10 years ago

I wanted to understand why the arts were dropped from the Olympics.

"In 1949, a report was presented at the IOC meeting in Rome which concluded that practically all contestants in the art competitions were professionals, and that the competitions should therefore be abolished and replaced with an exhibition without awards or medals"

"At a 1951 meeting, the IOC decided to reinstate the competitions for the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki"

"The issue continued to be debated within the Olympic Movement, and at the 49th IOC Session in Athens, 1954, the IOC members voted to replace the art contests with an exhibition for future Olympics"

"The IOC officially began allowing professional athletes to compete in the Olypmic Games in 1988, basically leaving it up to the individual sporting federations to decide if they would permit it"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_competitions_at_the_Summer... http://sports.stackexchange.com/questions/14378/why-are-prof...

ultraforce• 10 years ago

It would be interesting to see what would occur in terms of the interest in being employed in professions that would be associated with the arts if they were to be reintroduced into the Olympics, perhaps it would change people"s perspective of stuff such as architecture. At the same time if they were to reintroduce all of the past art competitions in the summer Olympics the music category could be extremely controversial depending on what styles of music are allowed.

cloudjacker• 10 years ago

I was wondering if there were any other government regimes to host the olympics that are now considered unfavorable, from a US perspective

America's First Medal at the Nazi Olympics Was for Town Planning

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