A recent trip to Pittsburgh illustrated something striking about the eating habits of two countries we’ve lived in: USA and the Netherlands.

In the USA the pattern for food portion size is ‘more is more.’ In the Netherlands it is ‘less is more.’ As someone who watches his weight, I have come to appreciate the Dutch approach.

In America, portion size is a market-driven phenomenon. There the market dictates that people should be presented with more food than they will ever need. Food in low-end restaurants — which we tend to frequent — is glossy, high in saturated fats and involves comically high calorie counts. We all know where this leads, and it isn’t pretty.

But as a tourist, this can be an attractive and entertaining proposal. “Let’s take another trip to the buffet, we’re on vacation!”

This is fun in the short-term but it does encourage obesity. It is a lead anchor wrapped around the ankle of the American public. It is death by a thousand cookies.

Clearly, open buffets are more a threat to the survival of the USA than are jihadists. “We have found the enemy and it is us.”

The Netherlands, in contrast, is a deeply Calvinist country where food is looked on a necessity for sustaining life rather than a cheap entertainment, or something that will being pleasure. You eat to live, you don’t live to eat. New visitors are sometimes taken aback by this, trained as they are to view the Dutch purely through the prism of soft drugs and prostitution.

I have been through many a Dutch office luncheon, which typical involves rolls with a single slice of cheese. They carefully count out the quantities required so if there are ten attendees there are exactly ten rolls.

When you first encounter this behavior you are taken aback, trained as we are to see an affluent society as one in which there is always more than enough to eat.

When the Dutch see food consumption become a pleasure they call this ‘Burgundian.’ This suggests a more Catholic, free and easy approach to food, as found in countries to the south such as Belgium and France. These countries are known for the quality of their food as well as a complete lack of Protestant guilt in consuming it.

However, as a way to run a country there is much to be said about limiting caloric intake and fostering guilt in consuming more than you need. It lengthens lives and increases the quality of life. This is why the Dutch are so tall and slender. They save money, look great, all the time honouring their forebears who survived hard times with a few potatoes and a stinky herring, eaten from a wooden bowl.

One thing about fatness is that the rich tend to be less fat than the poor. This is especially true in the USA. As Duchess of Windsor said: “You can never be too rich or too thin.” In Pittsburgh, obesity appears to be a problem. In Manhattan, much less so.

By this logic, the Dutch take the path of the trophy wife or the socialite, while many Americans the path of those less interested in the social value of their appearance — they depress their ‘market value’ by their discretionary, dietary behaviors. This is somewhat puzzling in a highly competitive, market-driven economy. In Europe it seems there is a socially acceptable ‘floor’ beneath which most prefer not to tread.

Of course you can have both a highly developed ‘Burgundian’ approach to food, as well as a tendency not to become huge. This is what you find in many countries, such as France, Belgium or Japan. These places seem like the best of both worlds. Obesity there is less of an issue, while excellent restaurants attract both fat and thin.

This is probably why so many Dutch vacation in the south of France.

The LRT (light rail transit, a scheme to use streetcars for public transit) seems like a smart idea — one that will encourage productivity and the generation of cultural and material wealth in this city. I believe it will encourage urban revitalization and help to create a critical mass of other good things happening.

First, a personal disclosure. If the LRT is built it will help us personally: the proposed LRT B-line is down at the end of our street. It will surely raise our property values. But since the B-line is many kilometers long, many in this city might be in a similar position.

There have been several articles in the last few weeks suggesting that the LRT concept doesn’t have much support from the current mayor and his city manager.

I believe that if this opportunity is not seized right now the momentum will be lost.

There is an argument that all-day GO train service is more important than LRT. Most LRT supporters would not pit these two issues at odds with one another. They are surely complementary: all-day GO train suggests that much money for Hamilton can be made in Toronto, while the LRT plan suggests that money might be made right here in town. Both ideas should be able to co-exist in perfect harmony.

Transparency of decision-making

One of the benefits of democracy is that decisions are made in an open manner. If a bad idea is about to be axed then it is clear from the public record why this occurred. If an idea is good and it gathers support from many sectors of the population then you expect it to do well.

The enemy of democracy is the idea that the real decision-making takes place behind closed doors.

The reason that doors are usually closed in what is purportedly a democratic process is that the people making the decision to be not want to be held accountable for their own decisions. They want the power to make the decisions but not suffer the consequences if these decisions turn south.

This latest LRT decision seems to fail the transparency test. It is not clear why this LRT idea — given the broad base of support which it has gained — was so abruptly de-prioritized. Is there something here that the ordinary citizen is missing?

Post-industrial malaise and beyond

One thing that really defines current-day Hamilton is the concern about what it wants to become when, and if, all its factories close. In the past, people made money and found employment from industrial production. In the future much less money will likely be made this way.

Hamilton puts itself on the ‘psycho-analytical couch’ perhaps more frequently than other places I lived because it really is puzzling what Hamilton should do for itself in future. I think the LRT debate involves such considerations.

What is clear is that new industries will need to spring up to fill the employment gaps created by the closure of hundreds of Hamilton’s former factories. The nature of these new industries is the source of much debate and anxiety.

This might be like the Pittsburgh experience, but one that is taking much, much longer.

In Pittsburgh it seems like the possibility of a reinvented industrialism was erased almost immediately by the unseemly and quick evacuation of almost all industrial production. If that city was to do well, then people saw that it must go ‘post-industrial.’

The sudden loss of employment in Pittsburgh was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because air quality improved overnight, but a curse because many hundreds of thousand of residents found they had to move from Pittsburgh in order to survive.

At least what this dramatic de-industrialization did was to focus the minds of its civic leaders.

However, in In Hamilton there still might be possibilities of investment and employment in heavy industry.

Therefore, there is significant ambiguity here about whether a post-industrial future might be able to co-exist within a continuing industrial city. There is much to recommend such an idea. Hamilton needs all the money it can get. It is in no position to discourage future industrialization, despite how unattractive this might seem to those who prefer their Hamilton to be grit free.

Therefore, Hamilton may or may not be in the middle of a post-industrial malaise. Yet it may be generations before Hamilton is truly post-industrial. It is quite likely that to become truly ‘post-industrial’ is not even an appropriate goal for Hamilton.

A knowledge economy is certainly attractive in many ways, but what seems most appropriate for Hamilton is a mixed knowledge/industrial economy.

If Hamilton’s economy remains mixed this makes the job of planning for future development trickier. Hamilton must acknowledge the important role that ‘dirty jobs’ play in this city while at the same time encourage — in a forceful way — the influx of people who have no interest in dirty jobs.

LRT and post-industrialization

How then does this involve the LRT debate?

I believe that the issue of whether Hamilton is to have a knowledge-based future or an industrial one is related to the acceptance of the LRT.

LRT seems more aligned to a post-industrial future, while ‘no LRT’ seems best suited to an industrial status quo political position. [I would be interested to know if there is any sociological support for this idea].

In the LRT debate not only the appeal of various technical solutions are at issue but it is also a visioning exercise that involves the psyche of the whole city. What does Hamilton want to become?

In Hamilton there is often the hint of what kinds of pleasures are appropriate for an industrial city of its station. A familiar trope found in the civic discourse is ‘failures that originate in hubris.’ Perhaps the desire for an LRT system — like what you find in the well-heeled cities of Europe — is excessive and unseemly.

LRT opponents suggest that LRT is an inappropriate goal for Hamilton; that it is too fancy, costs too much money and that the public transit status quo is acceptable. LRT supporters counter that the LRT is not only an appropriate and sensible goal but actually the most financially rationally solution.

In the event that Hamilton fails to find its inner Pittsburgh and does not become completely post-industrial in short order, then is LRT still an appropriate solution to public transit and city-building? Many, including myself, believe yes.

Parking Garage on 6th Street, Pittsburgh

Our family spent the US Thanksgiving weekend in Pittsburgh. We booked a hotel on priceline.com (highly recommended) and managed to get a very reasonable deal. Luckily, the hotel–the Renaissance Pittsburgh–turned out to be stunning as well as affordable. It was by far the best hotel we have every stayed in–or ever expect to stay in. The boys were ecstatic when they saw the sumptuousness of the lobby and the fluffiness of the pillows on our king-size bed. This hotel had been recently restored and had an impressive glass dome in its lobby and marble balconies worthy of the palace of Versailles. We couldn’t afford to eat any food in its restaurants or, as it turned out, to use its telephones even for local calls but overall the value was impressive. We suspect that something must be deeply wrong with the new world order when people like us can stay so comfortably in such a fine American hotel for so little money.

Our hotel was in an ideal, downtown location along the Allegheny River waterfront called the ‘Golden Triangle.’ It was the first time we had ever stayed in downtown Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh has an unusual urban configuration in that its central business district–the Golden Triangle–is relatively isolated from the rest of the city. The Triangle is where the two rivers meet to form the mighty Ohio. As we told the boys, this is where in the old days people drifted lazily down the river–Huck Finn style–all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. Even though Pittsburgh is a northern city, this access to the Mississippi River basin does add some romance to the city’s narrative. At one time, Pittsburgh was the ‘Gateway to the Continent.’ It held a similar role to that of Buffalo–as a trans-shipment hub for a nation bent on Manifest Destiny.

What is striking about Pittsburgh, which you tend to forget when you’ve been away from it, is its stunning topography. Pittsburgh is extremely hilly outside of its downtown core. You soon get into the rhythm of driving through valleys, around hills, along ridges and on top of cliffs. Houses in some neighbourhoods are perched precariously on hillsides, which gives them aspects similar to the Amalfi Coast in Italy or those Greek monasteries built on cliffs. At first this topography is disorienting, then you get used to it. When I look at online maps of Pittsburgh I forget how the neighbourhoods I knew are interrelated, but when I am driving around in them, I can remember where routes lead based on muscle memory.

Pittsburgh has the policy of fixing up its downtown core to make it the most attractive part of the city. This policy seems to have worked out well. Fortunately, there were many splendid, historic buildings in the core to fix up. Pittsburgh has re-branded part of its downtown as the ‘Cultural District.’ There, they have renovated several old movie and vaudeville houses to become venues for live theater and music.  The Cultural District holds Pittsburgh’s major cultural attractions such as Heinz Hall–home of the Pittsburgh Symphony, the Benedum Center, Byham Theater and the O’Reilly Theater. These venues happened to be a block from our hotel.

Heinz Hall Staircase

In downtown Pittsburgh there are many instances of interesting civic sculpture and the quality of new and renovated architecture is generally very high. In addition to restored buildings, there are also other civic improvements such as sculpture parks, river walkways, and new state-of-the-art sports stadiums along the Allegheny river. Overall, Pittsburgh has done a very good job of fixing up their downtown and I would say that the quality of design and execution is superior to most things you see in Toronto or Hamilton. Pittsburgh can be a very classy place, which is something that many outsiders might not realize.

In Pittsburgh’s Golden Triangle, the remnants from previous eras when Pittsburgh was incredibly prosperous, are everywhere to be seen.  Some buildings have splendid cast bronze sculpture, or intricately carved stonework in the Gothic style. Others are clad in cream-coloured terracotta–an extraordinarily elegant and long-lasting building material. These buildings were obviously built to communicate a level of cultural sophistication on the part of their builders. They are as impressive as buildings you might find in New York, Boston or Vienna.

They were built by names such as Carnegie, Frick, Mellon, and Heinz. These are the people who in old cartoons dress in top hats, wear cashmere overcoats and smoke fat cigars. They made incredible amounts of money when Pittsburgh was the centre of steel production for a rapidly-expanding continent. At the time they may have been ‘new money’ but now they seem as old as the Medici. They built some splendid buildings for their city and therefore gave back to the city in a physically-enduring way. This is somewhat of a different practice than what is done by today’s obscenely wealthy, for which these forms of architectural philanthropy are less common. As an architect I enjoy visiting such buildings despite misgivings about the economics and labour relations of Gilded Age capitalism.

If you live in Pittsburgh and don’t work downtown then you probably will not spend much time downtown, even if you have interest in the urban attractions that the downtown has to offer. The suburbs of Pittsburgh spread for miles and this is where most people live. In general, these suburbs are similar to those in any other American city and have little in common with the hard-core urbanity of the Golden Triangle. The people who tend to frequent the downtown seem to be well-off people who work in corporate offices and drive Audi’s, poorer black people who also work downtown and who take the bus, and those who attend cultural and sporting events such as football games, plays, and concerts. This gives the tourist a slightly skewed demographic impression of the city.

Pittsburgh’s downtown is busy during the work week but it tends to empty of people when the work week ends. Very few people appear to live in the Golden Triangle itself. It lacks the high density pedestrian traffic or residential amenities you might find in Toronto or New York. There is some evidence of higher-end residential development for those who work in corporate towers and wish to live adjacent to their work, but this is a tiny portion of the population. The Golden Triangle seems to lack some basic services for residents. For instance, it does not appear to have many (or any) grocery stores.

6th Street, Pittsburgh

Despite the overall attractiveness of the Golden Triangle, it is unclear whether it will ever become a compelling place to live. One reason is that Pittsburgh has many residential neighbourhoods that are attractive, inexpensive and full of residential-type services such as shops, schools and synagogues. Pittsburgh prides itself on the warmth and sociability of its neighbourhoods. The Golden Triangle may be stunning from an architectural perspective but seems to lack this home-town warmth and practicality. Since the border between adjacent neighbourhoods and the downtown is so distinct in Pittsburgh, to live downtown people have to be hard-core urban homesteaders to make that jump. In fact, we know no one who lives or has ever lived in the Golden Triangle. This is why staying there briefly, in a fancy hotel, was such a novelty for us. It is an experience that many Pittsburghers have also never had.

Pittsburgh is now a largely post-industrial city with little evidence of heavy industry in its city core. It is unclear what the city makes it money doing these days beyond the usual sources such as universities, hospitals and financial services and whether Pittsburgh is still running on old money or whether new fortunes are being made.

Despite the fact that its downtown is very attractive and they have managed to convert the Smoky City’s downtown into a show place that rivals midtown Manhattan, Pittsburgh is not always an optimistic city. It has the typical rust-bucket maladies of declining population, pockets of extreme poverty, racial segregation and flat employment growth. I sense that the attractiveness of the Golden Triangle may not be indicative of the health of the rest of the city.

Travelling to the USA from Canada is interesting because it is so different from what we are used to. This feeling of difference occurs the minute we cross the USA-Canada border. On one side of this border is one set of rules and expectations and on the other is another. America gives the impression of promises of great wealth and comfort for those who succeed, but also great pain and degradation for those who fail. The wealthier seem wealthier but the poor seem poorer than in Canada. Not being too clear about which of these two categories we fit into, makes us hesitate to move back to Pittsburgh.

One does get the impression that in parts of the USA during this current recession some of the working population is in absolute crisis–more so than in Canada. The USA has never been known for having much of a safety net and this recession seems to be more severe than previous ones. There is greater fear this time that not only is the American economy in rough shape, but also that the position and status that the USA has enjoyed up until now is in some jeopardy.

Pittsburgh derives part of its power simply from being situated in the USA. Pittsburgh has direct access to American markets and to American economies of scale. The USA does have a population and an economy that dwarfs that of Canada. As we often thought when we lived in Pittsburgh, the USA may not be better than Canada but it sure seems bigger.