Pruitt-Igoe Sequence - "Trouble in Utopia" - Narrated by Robert Hughes [1981]

[knightschwartz]

I hate this artecture. Build buildings like they did in the 1890's.

[msalimon]

People take loads of sxxxt from priests, politicians and speculators but decide to be intolerant with the architects.

[litlgrey]

"Major structural alterations were called for." That's the most classic use of British understatement I have come across in years.

[sbal0909]

While it's hard to disregard the rampant apathy and crime that plagued these towers. It's also worth noting that when people have no personal incentive to maintain the upkeep of a place; the place eventually degrades. Ownership over anything stimulates long term concern and care.

[jessemedic]

Continued. People threw tv's and other things out the windows at police. Look at some footage from the 60's. The Pruitt Igoe project was known nationally as one of the worst places to live. I work in North St. Louis, and see the lot where the project was. It's now an overgrown jungle across from St. Louis Fire Department Headquarters. Interestingly enough, STLFD HQ is in the old Pruitt Igoe Carr medical clinic building.

[jessemedic]

Pruitt Igoe was originally supposed to be for middle income families, but middle income families did not want to live there. Also, the skip-stop elevators were not designed to increase socialization in the stair wells, they were designed for maximum efficiency, to get people on and off quicker. Someone said it wasn't as bad as people make it out to be... Yeah, it was. At most, they were only filled to 60% capacity. 95% of the windows were broken. Crime was out of control.

[MeredithBixby]

"Major Structural Alterations"? That's quite a dark sense of humor ~

[mikebrisebois]

Why did the trade centers fall exactly the same way this demolition did? Strange.

[Kuner1]

@mikebrisebois

gravity usually pulls downward.

the twin towers weren't static structures built of plastic that would retain their form when falling. when buildings fall, they usually collapse into themselves

[shockraid1]

@mikebrisebois Probably because they were designed by the same architect.

[Baflar]

Perhaps LeCorbusier was simply mad. (Perhaps Erno Goldfinger was simply madder...)

[mrlguitar]

imagine if Le Corbusier's plans to remodel Paris had gone through. Lesson: do not standardize humans we are not ants or bees, and our residences should not try to predict our functions.

[krakenwave]

"Every sort of amenity was designed..."

But many of which were not ever provided!

Due to last minute budget cuts (federal money withdrawn that the city could not make up), the features that were meant to offset the drawbacks (especially for families with young kids) living in high rises just never happened. On the day the first tenants moved in, many of the door locks and fixtures just fell apart in their hands...

[dtnytro2]

They look like a pack of textiles factories.

I find them to be absolutely ugly.

Ans many problems due to insuficient funding.

And where are the commerces? Security ? Not even a tree...

The layout is absolutely depressing.

[Capitanvolume]

@dtnytro2 this is modernism, it was made to be logical, not beautiful

[cReEp3r05]

@Capitanvolume the goal of modernism was to emphasize function, but in the end it became a celebration of form (over function).

[mischnix]

They did not even have basketball fields there, playing fields for the kids or a grocery to buy food. And it was very anynomous. No wonder the shit did not work. And I am not even speaking about the elevators, stopping only at flat 1, 4, 7 and 10. It was humiliating. The arcquitect wanted the elevators to only stop there to bring people into contact in the stairs. But you do not necessarily want to socialise in the stairs when you carry many shopping bags or need to pee.

[fly4vino]

A rather strange comment as so much of the country has two and three story walkup buildings constructed before handicap regulations were implemented. Tens of millions of people walk up one or two flights of stairs to their homes and offices every day.

Elevators are much more efficient where the number of stops are minimized. It was also a very common practice in parking garages. However, the users did not feel compelled to kill, rob and rape their co-users as they did at PI.

[jkrdsr]

Historical lesson: Don't build a palace to house the poor.

[jjjjjjjijjjjjjj]

There are historical lessons here; but they're quite a bit more nuanced and complicated than this one statement. I'm sure you'll agree.

[krakenwave]

@jkrdsr

Thank you for the analysis, Professor Lives-in-his-parents'-suburban­-McMansion.

[steelty]

@krakenwave Ad hominem

[Brambor97]

@jkrdsr

[juxtn]

@jkrdsr I think the problem was they built too large in the 1950s thinking the population of the city would keep growing and growing rather the people headed out of the city instead. The buildings remained largely unoccupied and it was planned that maintenance costs would be covered by rents. So i think a large part of the problem of the apartments were not the residents, but outside crime breaking into the buildings. The buildings were mostly inhabited by single mothers and children.

[TiberFoaming]

@jkrdsr

The buildings were finished in 1955. Well, pack them till the roof wit the poorest korean war refugees. Do you think the results would had been the same?

No one "nice" and "polite" will tell you this in public, depending on the circumstances maybe not even me, but that doesnt make it the least bit less true:

From London to Los Angeles, from Zimbabwe to Detroit. Wherever blacks are, every aspect of civilized life will be worse.

[Maxobillion]

When people do not own property, they will never respect it.

[jkrdsr]

@Maxobillion

I disagree.

It's only when people have the sense of property and community...

Look at public parks.

[Maxobillion]

@jkrdsr You don't live in a park. A park does not remind you of the fact that you are low income. Parks hardly have anything to destroy. Park benches always have graffiti or carvings on them.

[jkrdsr]

@Maxobillion

I'm guessing you are from a big city. Probably the city gave you a neighborhood park with the bare minimum, so there is nothing to destroy...

Compare your neighborhood park to a park like the Highlines or Central Park.

Parks can get neglected, and there are a lot of preventative strategies in keeping parks clean, beautiful and safe.

[Capitanvolume]

@Maxobillion Public housing worked in Warsaw pact nation the poor build was at fault here.

[thunderstruck665]

The fact that the honor award was still there as the complex was being destroyed is an absolute riot!

[Nanniof1]

They told us the buildings were being imploded in order to make way for improved living conditions for us. We cheered when the buildings came down. We didn't realize it was the beginning of the end.

[jayceexx]

Flooding came from busted pipes in most of the bedroom areas..all the frost in front of the buildings that you see is a testiment of the results in the heart of the winter season....cheap insulated pipes..people on the outside tend to blame the tenants for the destruction of pruitt-Igoe rather then blaming the designers that used cheap material..Elevators was designed to stop on the 1st floor .4th floor 7th floor and 10th floor..now wasn't that crazy...

[jayceexx]

n2life2 is right on point..I was a resident there..as a child..we did everything any other neighborhood children would do..Play football, baseball..go to the neighborhood center..Desoto Center..the problem was 33 buildings...poor sanitation system,,poor maintenance lack of security...it was just a matter of time before it all would come tumbling down..there were steam pipes inside the apartment bedrooms..that malfunctioned.

When you see pictures of frozen windows they came from frozen pipes.

[jayceexx]

Squatters.......no way..I was there...the possibility of people caught in the explosion is total nonsense..matter fact I lived there...

[Zarathustra799]

hehe. shoulda kept it segregated! maybe then the igoe section would've survived. ;)

[SQUIZZLER24]

i, personally, are a fan of 60s architecture, i cant pinpoint it, but theres something about the sharp lines and boxy shape that is pleasing to the eye...

[KidRandomm]

I was googling twin towers which led me to wiki article about yamasaki and there was a bit about pruitt igoe where it said that after 20 yrs it was demolished. For some reason I find abandoned/decaying/destroyed architecture fascinating.

[kuhataparunks]

i love it aswell!

[nfongster]

urban exploration is the concept

[onomatoh]

@KidRandomm  met too, absolutely.

[ChillesofFlanders]

@KidRandomm

I share your fascination. That's why I find a lot of buildings in Pyongyang (capital of North-Korea) very interesting.

[a01087483]

@ChillesofFlanders Wait what o.o

You serious? :U... i have a couple of problems with that o.o... one.. how the hell did you get in and then managed to visit "abandoned buildings"

"second".... well...how do you even know about it? o.o

[ChillesofFlanders]

@a01087483

I never claimed I've been to North-Korea. Still there are a lot of journalists who've actually been there, so I can imagine how things look there.

Even on youtube you can find some very interesting vids.

[a01087483]

@ChillesofFlanders I know but i find it hard to believe any journalist would be allowed to film an empty building in decay P:

Tho yeah i am aware of journalists going in there, I think aljazeera did a fantastic job when it went there :3

[jrjinsa]

Kinda cool looking place at first glance but imagine looking out your window and seeing nothing but bricks and windows...everywhere?!? I'd go insane and tear the place up too!

[boja56]

where was shot this sequence?

[Muad420]

St. Louis, Missouri, USA.

[boja56]

thanks a lot

[n2life2]

Pruitt Igoe was not as bad as people (who are only repeating what they've heard) try to make it out to be.

[PJPak721]

sad

[hosweetim89]

good riddance. the architecture looks so plain and mundane it makes the area feel like a place of oppression.

[Alternatevil]

It never won any awards!

[hellgas0]

The 1951 Architectural Forum praised Yamasaki's original proposal as "the best high apartment" of the year.

[DeanAMacd]

A magazine calling it the best of the year is not a real award. The o.p. is correct that it never won any awards

[RonaldoMexicano]

i wonder how many squaaters died?

[Nonoyawns]

RolandoMexicano- I lol'd!

[klastrol]

krakenwave, pruitt-igoe got in turn to be a segregated housing project, then exclusively down-and-outs and druggies were housed by the authorities there. except those circumstances it was all peace and quiet there.

[krakenwave]

I thought it started out segregated from the get-go (hence the 'double' name) - it was built in 51 in Missouri...?

But how did it get so bad so fast - and ended up fast down into rubble in 72, when places like - for eg - Robert Taylor Homes (Chicago) - lasted another 25 years?

[krakenwave]

Thanks for posting this - ever since Koyaanisqatsi I have been intrigued by this place. Must have been really bad that it was pulled down so quick, when so many other projects lasted for years...

[richiebear1969]

Me to, I learned and never knew about this place until recently when I first saw Koyannisqatsi, I thought it was the South Bronx only to find out it was St Louis. I'm pretty sure that when they blew the buildings up, the city demoliton workers inserted the TNT knowing there were squatters inside with little or no remorse.