Feeling pandemic burnout on the future of cities? You’re not alone.

This is the first in a two-part series on how urbanism, transit, and housing advocates, and other city lovers have experienced the past two years. You can read the second article here.

Cities had a rough go in the last two years — or at least we’re often led to believe. During the pandemic, it’s been hard to not get down on the future of urban places, transit, housing, and the like, with many speculating that, “cities are over.”

For me, cities have felt like an abstract concept during the pandemic. Working from home, my world became much smaller, and I barely left my neighborhood for months in 2020.

Despite living in the District, DC started to feel like an old friend I don’t get to see very often anymore. Public gathering places seemed dangerous. Amenities were shuttered. We had a transit system with potential for greatness, but we got stuck with 20-minute headways on Metrorail, and bus drivers struggling to stay healthy. Looking for refuge, many people looked to places closer to nature, oftentimes buying cars and abandoning cities altogether. And it’s hard to blame them.

With the barrage of negative media surrounding cities, I often have questioned whether the urban lifestyles we knew before 2020 — let alone the more livable, equitable, and affordable ones we strive for — are possible in the US moving forward. And in talking to other advocates for urban living, it’s evident I’m not the only one who has been feeling burnt out.

“A year of almosts”

Canaan Merchant, a longtime GGWash contributor, aptly described the frustrations of 2021 in particular as a “year of almosts”:

We’ve almost got the silver line

We’ve almost got the purple line

We’ve almost lost the purple line as well

We’ve almost got construction on the Bennington road extension

We’ve almost got a new highway battle lost

We’ve almost got a breakthrough on what seems like a ton of bus and bike projects.

We’ve almost gotten to a better reckoning on zoning not just in the commercial areas.

To me, all these ‘almosts’ have felt like adding insult to injury — after all the turbulence of 2020, 2021 was a year where we needed a win. That said, we might be selling short the progress we have made.

The big picture

Urban thinker Jane Jacobs often alluded to cities as living ecosystems. And history has shown us that those ecosystems are remarkably resilient.

Cities in the US have had a lot thrown their way - redlining, underinvestment, suburbanization, and more. In the mid-20th Century, residents had to fight highway planners to not bulldoze their neighborhoods; now more and more policymakers are looking to undo the scars of building freeways through communities.

And yet, cities are still here. Though promoting sustainable and equitable urban life has always felt like an uphill battle, it’s easy to forget how far we’ve come.

“One day this will all seem really small. I promise,” said Dan Reed, a Montgomery County housing advocate (and GGWash edit board member), offering advice to those looking to put this phase of urban advocacy in perspective. “You’re going to look back and be pleasantly surprised at how much things have changed for the better since you started.”

Where do we go from here?

I believe cities are, to a certain extent, an inevitability —without encouraging dense growth and boosting transit use, we won’t be able to tackle climate change.

But as we push through this seemingly endless pandemic era, it’s important to remember: it will end, and when it does, cities will still be here.

“My husband and I set a goal: to go to Paris,” said Alison Gillespie, who advocates for open streets in Montgomery County. “I see that on the other end of the tightrope and it motivates me. It gives me something to dream about and focus on and keeps me balanced. After that, I want to travel as much as I possibly can. I wanna see how all of these cities took the pandemic and transformed themselves, especially. I wanna ride a bike thru Berlin and London. Cities.”

“I’m pretty optimistic about the future of transportation in DC,” said Mao Hu, a DC resident who has been taking, and enjoying, Metrobus more in the last year. “It’s neat how just a little bit of change in the prioritization of street space (bus lanes, bump outs, pedestrian refuges, etc.) can really make the neighborhood way more enjoyable to move around and live in.”

Maybe that’s one of the most helpful things to hear right now: hopeful words from a fellow city lover that things are okay.