“Move it, football head!”
There is a common thread in some of the more beloved television shows from my childhood. The shows Sesame Street, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, Reading Rainbow, Static Shock, and Hey Arnold! did not talk down to its audience of children nor did they invalidate life’s everyday struggles and disappointments. It can be tough to see how much Detroit has improved and how much farther it has to go. Downtown has way more things to do, and commercial corridors in the neighborhoods are busy again. However, too many local business owners struggle to stay open because there are not enough residents nearby. Modern problems require modern solutions.
Let’s have a lesson in urbanism with the help of a football-headed boy named Arnold.
Hey Arnold! represents a vibrant neighborhood better than most television shows to this day. Many shows in the ‘90s were set in a suburban environment, such as Step by Step, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Boy Meets World. Home Improvement was set in Livonia, and even Tia and Tamera Mowry’s characters lived in an area of metro Detroit in Sister, Sister. The creator Craig Bartlett set his show Hey Arnold! in Hillwood, a fictional city that felt real because it was a mix of Seattle, WA; Portland, OR; NYC’s Brooklyn borough; and Chicago, IL.
Urban cities were struggling with common issues during the latter decades of the twentieth century. Hey Arnold! deviated from the sentiment urban areas are scary and places to avoid. Arnold Shortman and his friends demonstrate that a city is also a place of endless possibilities, stories, and characters. Hey Arnold! mirrored the reality of children growing up in urban areas and challenged the idea of the perfect American life. Hillwood was a place that felt rough, loud, and crowded, and yet it was the most welcoming city on television.
As members of Strong Towns Detroit, we sometimes hear about “human scale development”. It is an approach to development based on fulfilling basic human needs – creating spaces that are the appropriate layout for a person to be comfortable in the built environment. More colloquially, it is a contrast to newer auto-centric design of towns and cities in the U.S.A. Neighborhoods built with people in mind, keep destinations close enough to walk to or, to a greater extent, make public transportation a viable option. Hillwood is the standard bearer for human scale development. Sure, there are plenty of cars, but the kids are able to ride a bus, walk, skateboard, or ride bicycles to where they want to go. Craig Bartlett designed Hillwood to feel like a place where people actually live.
To understand why Hillwood works so well as a vibrant, urban environment, we can look at key ideas from the late journalist and theorist Jane Jacobs. In her book The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs argued that cities are not just buildings but are ecosystems. She distilled four conditions for vibrant blocks in cities.
A city neighborhood must have multiple functions, e.g. a laundromat, multi-family housing, a convenience store; it will never be totally empty. Arnold lives in a multi-family boarding house located near parks, and down the street from his school. People are meandering at all times of the day, making the area safer and more lively.
Secondly, the blocks should not be too long to encourage more dynamic neighborhood experiences. Arnold and his friends regularly take shortcuts through alleys or simply walk a few blocks to find everyone. Their neighborhood of Hillwood feels closely connected, making it easy for even a nine year-old to navigate their pocket of the world without a car.
Thirdly, there must be a mix of old and new buildings. Arnold lives in an old boarding house called “Sunset Arms” with his eccentric yet loveable grandparents. Remember his bedroom? It is an old attic with modern elements. Arnold’s bed was raised, and he had recessed shelves in the wall. He had one remote that controlled his lights, speaker system, and the couch that folded out from a wall. Jane Jacobs argued that urban neighborhoods need old buildings so that small businesses and residents of different incomes can afford to stay there. If we don’t preserve old structures and instead tear them down to construct sterile looking high rises, the neighborhood’s soul often disappears.
And fourth, there must be population density to support a variety of businesses with customers, foster diverse social interactions, and have “eyes on the street” for public safety. You don’t even need high density like in New York City or Chicago. Moderately dense cities such as Pittsburgh, PA, and Milwaukee, WI, have “eyes on the street.” Jane Jacobs believed a higher population density causes there to be visibility and thus an increased feeling of safety. Arnold Shortman has a safety net of adults in Vitello the florist or the Sunset Arms boarder residents.
The very first episode of the series, “Downtown as Fruits”, sets the stage for the series by invoking many of these themes. Arnold and Gerald take a bus downtown, end up shopping at a 24 hour clothing store “Roscoe’s Funky Rags Emporium”, get food at 23 hour shop “Gino’s Souvlaki Shack”, shoot pool at “Ernie’s Pool Hall”, before cutting through a few alleys and ending up at a garden level business, “Zamboni Jones’ Psychic Palace”. Before catching a cab back to PS 118, Arnold and Gerald experience the world within a few hours, thanks to density, small businesses, and a 24 hour economy.
Many of Detroit’s neighborhoods resembled Hillwood. You’ve heard stories from family members and friends about how people would walk to a local store to get groceries or let their kid ride their bike a few blocks away to play with their cousins and other kids in the neighborhood. Some people still enjoy that environment, but plenty of others are deprived of it. If we want to continue building a stronger Detroit, we should start by looking at lessons from the urbanism of Hey Arnold!
The design of Hey Arnold!’s Hillwood is a lesson in building communities that work for everyone, especially children. Hillwood is a place where a kid can be independent. It is a place where neighbors take care of each other. We should strive to have neighborhoods where the streets are for people, where the buildings have so many stories that its walls could talk, and where a kid can walk to get a chocolate shake without crossing a six-lane highway like Telegraph or Gratiot.
P.S. If you are feeling nostalgic like me, listen to this podcast episode from Nick Animation. The show episode is an interview with Hey Arnold!’s creator Craig Bartlett, in which he discusses his real-world inspirations and the urban legend feel of the city of Hillwood.
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