Streetfronts

Le Corbusier's 1929 vision for the modern city was that of bright housing set into green open space. Following Le Corbusier, houses need to withdraw from the streetfront. Jane Jacobs (1961) instead pointed to the importance of "eyes on the street" in making streets safe. For Jacobs, houses need to align with the streetfront. Today developers around the world overwhelmingly appear to pursue the Corbusian vision. This paper provides an economic rationale for, and a welfare assessment of, the discontiguous streetfront that results. Daylight has become internal to large developers' designs. This is why their houses are bright. Yet "eyes on the street" remain external even to large developers' designs. This is why these developers' streetfronts are blind. We argue for redressing the balance between "daylight externality" and "streetfront externality", and suggest supporting institutions. Ultimately contemporary architecture should align better with the street.