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What is the role of the plaza in Europe? Why don’t Americans put a value on that?

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What is the role of the plaza in Europe? Why don’t Americans put a value on that?

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It has to do with history. European cities were created to survive. They surrounded themselves by walls to protect themselves. Inside the walls was dense development, outside farmland. Before we could transport food over large distances, equilibrium had to exist between the city and its surrounding agricultural land that fed people in the city. This created an ongoing incentive to keep the city dense and homes small because sprawl would diminish food supply. Breaking the city-land equilibrium would have instant results: hunger, disease, etc. Density, by itself, is not pleasant. So plazas and parks are necessary amenities where much of social life can occur. Many early-American cities were organized around the commons. Then, with the advent of cars, things changed. People and goods traveled increasingly long distances, and parking lots (plazas for cars) replaced plazas. This trend reached its peak in the later part of the 20th century with suburban developments and shopping malls and sw

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