Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital”

1. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” Chapter 1: The Argument • What is Pagano and Bowman’s central argument? Politics Matters • What does this mean? Why is this important? “Public economic development is the result of a purposive political decision and is undertaken selectively.”“Politics matters because those conscious and purposive development actions are choices of city leaders.”“Local officials pursue development as a means of reaching an ideal, reflecting an image they hold collectively of what their city ought to be.” In sum, the argument is that “a city seeks economic development for reasons that include its history, its place in the hierarchy of cities, and its aspirations to change…”

2. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 1: A Bit of Background • The concept of “City Limits” as espoused by Peterson • Regime Theory as espoused by Stone (and others) • Chapter 1: The Methods Behind the Argument • What was their sample population? • What numeric criteria did they use to test their ideas? Why are these criteria important to their study? • What other criteria factored into their final selection of cities? • Once the cities were chosen, what method(s) did Pagano and Bowman use to investigate their ideas? Big Methodological Point: When choosing comparison cities (for whatever you are doing) there are relatively easy methods available to you to go about selecting a good sample.

3. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 2: Public Capital, Systems of Cities, and Perceptual Orbits • What factors do most analysts conclude drive local governments to invest in large public projects? • 1) Tax-Services Equilibrium 2) City Aspirations

4. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 2: Public Capital, Systems of Cities, and Perceptual Orbits • What do the authors mean by the characterization of cities as 1) survivalist, 2) market, 3) expansionist, or 4) maintenance? (p. 27) • What is meant by the concept of “perceptual orbit”? What does this concept have to do with economic development? • Group ExerciseWhat are the perceptual orbits of the following cities: --Tallahassee --Orlando --Atlanta --Jacksonville --Your Home City • Chapter Conclusion“Perceptual orbits frequently define a different set of relevant cities than standard economic ones.”

5. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 3: Aspirations, Visions, and Images • How does “image” play a role in economic development? • 1) Influences choice of projects 2) Influences level of public participation in economic development 3) Others? • What are some of the images associated with the case study cities in Cityscapes and Capital? • Group ExerciseWhat are the local images/perceptions of the following cities: --Tallahassee --Orlando --Atlanta --Jacksonville --Your Home City

6. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 3: Aspirations, Visions, and Images • What other places have we discussed in this course in which “image” has played a significant role in the choice of public economic development policies and projects? • --Baltimore --Seattle --Detroit --Cleveland • Chapter Conclusion“Local economic development is commonly thought of in terms of job growth and changes in the tax base… it is at the same time something else. Image plays a central role in economic development. [It] is the backdrop against which economic development occurs, and image creation is frequently a goal of the economic development process.”

7. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 4: Cities and Economic Development • According to the authors, what forms does “market failure” take? • 1) Private sector market failure 2) Government market failure • What distinguishes each of these? • What does market failure have to do with economic development? • (Hint: Everything!) • When entering into the development arena to address issues of market failure, two approaches are generally available to the public sector. These are: 1) Financial tools 2) Organizational solutionsWhat are these approaches? Examples of each of these? • Chapter Conclusion“Market failure is not a satisfactory explanation for city development behavior.”

8. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 5: Measuring Successful Economic Development • For what reasons do cities undertake and invest in sizable redevelopment initiatives? • Why do the authors write that “success is seldom defined in terms of economic efficiency”? What other forms might “success” take? • In their empirical analysis of 1) perceived project success and 2) revenue generation, what did the authors find? What were their major conclusions? • 1) Perceived project success is largely a function of political risk 2) Revenue generation is largely a function of the economic conditions in the city and project complexity • What do these findings mean for economic developers? • Chapter Conclusion“…a project’s success in addressing a perceived market failure identified by public officials at the time the project was undertaken should become the benchmark by which success or failure is measured.”

9. Reviewing “Cityscapes and Capital” • Chapter 6: Urban Outcomes • What are three three development outcomes identified by the authors? • 1) Increasing capital investment and property values 2) Altering the physical appearance of the project area or city 3) Changing the class of user in the area • What are the specific, desired economic development results related to each of these? • What are some example projects from the book (or your own hometowns) that are aimed at the above urban outcomes? • Chapter Conclusion“City governments pursue development in the expectation that patterns of urban development will be altered in consonance with city officials’ mental pictures of the good society.”The choice of projects by the public sector often “has little to do with the city’s profitability from a project… rather, it refers to how well city official’s visions match reality.”

10. Case Study: Tallahassee’s Kleman Plaza • Kleman Plaza is a project that has been roughly twenty years in the making in downtown Tallahassee. • It includes:--Parking garage--League of Cities Building--MOAS--Challenger Learning Center--Two pads for development • Costs to the city have beenin the tens of millions ofdollars. • Even given the expectedreturn from the sale of lotson the Plaza, the city willnot make money on this deal.

11. Case Study: Tallahassee’s Kleman Plaza • For what reasons might the city of Tallahassee have invested millions of public funds into Kleman Plaza? • How might have Tallahassee’s “perceptual orbit” have factored into the city’s Kleman Plaza investments? • What is the primary “urban outcome” that has driven the redevelopment of this portion of downtown? • What do you think is the perceived success of Kleman Plaza to date?