Two items stood out for me from the December 10th meeting: (1) a discussion of a sign for a downtown restaurant, and (2) a request of an owner to rent a first floor apartment in the back of the old Hallmark store location.
I’ve mentioned before that while one’s opinions should not change from forum to forum, one’s manner and presentation should fit the forum. I write polemically (that’s perhaps an understatement), but what’s possible on the page way not be effective in person. Anger plays poorly in person, and on television. Sometimes I’ll use an italic font to emphasize a word in print, but I might not emphasize the word when speaking. Different forum, different manner: same point.
At the same time, the world’s a messy place, and sometimes people will get angry, make faces, etc. That may be, by turns, ridiculous or frustrating. There is something satisfying and reassuring about a person who stays calm while those nearby lose their cool.
Restaurant Sign. A local restaurant in our downtown wanted a sign for its window. The plans for the sign were in black-and-white, and did not specify colors. Planning Commission member Rick Gilpatrick asked this question, “Wouldn’t the city have interest in having a record of what the colors are?”
It’s a rational question, and one typical of planning meetings in all sort of places. It’s certainly a conventional request and a conventional outlook.
It doesn’t have to be this way, though. What if we lived in a society where a restaurant owner could display a sign without filing a colored drawing with the city? If a shopkeeper decided one day that teal would be more suitable on the sign than navy, must a municipality know (and approve)? My question is not about conventional practice — it’s about the possible, about what could be.
I do not believe that this level of planning and municipal oversight is necessary for a town to function, let alone function well. This isn’t planning to compete, it’s not even reasonable planning for aesthetics (an often dubious concept, to my mind), it’s just planning. If the restaurant owner said that she thought orange and gold would make a good sign, what would one say? Orange, but not — absolutely not — tangerine orange?
I know full well planning commissions often ask questions about color, etc. My question is why it’s necessary of the city to inquire. Refraining from inquiry wouldn’t mean disaster; it would be an improvement. It’s not planning for order, but planning merely necessary to permit a spontaneous order, that we should favor. The true advantage of more spontaneity is not a calculated efficiency or cost savings; it’s liberty and the creative, unpredictable, amazing possibilities that liberty affords us. At the end of the day, I am convinced that a less-structured, less-inquisitive municipality is a better one, for moral and prudential reasons. It’s not that the current system is all bad; it’s that a less inquisitive system would be better.
I believe in a community where ordinary judgments about beauty are left to individual homeowners and businesses. Neither my neighbor nor my community’s elected representatives should, for example, restrain or restrict my ability to paint a house or sign a given color. (That hasn’t happened to me, by the way; my point is general.) I favor a world with the freedom to choose the shade I want, without filing a document, or asking permission of a committee. Left on their own, people will typically choose wisely, and its patronizing to think otherwise. If they don’t, then I’ll not trouble myself about the result. Most choices will be as good, or better, than managed choices. That these choices will have been made without intrusion or oversight makes them even better.
We should be strong enough to accept the free aesthetic choices of others.