These are a set of diagrams taken from a recent WSJ article talking about how, "the pandemic changed where Americans live." I know that this is a topic that gets a lot of air time (both here on the blog and elsewhere), but these diagrams do a good job of showing the flow of people, as well as how things may have changed/accelerated since 2018.

These diagrams also remind me of the work of Charles Joseph Minard. A French civil engineer, Minard is best known for his contributions to the field of information graphics, and in particular his flow maps. His most famous piece of work -- which I happen to have hanging at home -- is his depiction of Napoleon's losses during the Russian campaign of 1812.

The map itself is from 1869 and is packed full of information. It shows the number of Napoleonic troops as they left for Moscow, the distance they traveled, the outside temperature (the French weren't properly prepared for the cold), latitude and longitude, the direction of travel, and the location of the troops relative to specific dates.

The point of the diagram was really to show how disastrous this campaign was for Napoleon. The thick beige band on the left is showing over 400,000 troops setting out. But by the time they reached Moscow -- which, by the way, had been abandoned before their arrival -- only about 100,000 troops were left.

The thin black bar on the bottom is showing how many troops ultimately remained and returned at the end of the campaign -- the number was only about 10,000. So the vast majority of Napoleon's troops perished. Supposedly over half either starved or froze to death.

Some 150 years later, and we are still using flow charts to clearly depict the movement of people and things.

If you’re into cities, then you’re likely familiar with the Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann.

He was Napoleon III’s urban planner and the man responsible for the Paris we all know and love today. Those broad avenues radiating from the Arc de Triomphe are his doing. His plans transformed Paris from a medieval city into what was considered to be, at the end of the 19th century, one of the most modern cities in the world.

What spurred this post is an exhibition currently on display at the National Gallery of Art in Washington. It’s on the photography of Charles Marville, who was, interestingly enough, initially commissioned to document Paris before Napoleon and Haussmann “destroyed” it.

In reading NPR’s summary, I was amazed to learn about the meticulous detail that went into the redesign of the city, which went all the way down to the gas street lamps that were rolled out following the “Haussmannization”of Paris. In fact, so much thought went into the appearance of these street lamps that their heights were actually modulated to match changes in street elevation; the effect being that as you looked down an avenue, the street lamps always appeared even and harmonious despite any ups-and-downs in the road.

But beyond street lamps, the exhibition also got me thinking about urban renewal as a broader concept. Today, I suspect that most people would consider Haussmann’s interventions to have been a positive thing for Paris. Before these changes, Paris was a cramped and crumbling medieval city.

However, while in retrospect these changes might seem positive, Parisians at the time hated what was happening to their city. The entire place was under construction. And if you’re a fan of Impressionism, you’ll know that many artists at the time began lamenting about the regularization of Paris. They yearned for the visual variety that once characterized the city.

But as any developer will tell you, change is not something most communities tend to embrace. In fact, it’s human nature for us to down play positives and play up negatives when faced with uncertainty (see Prospect Theory). 

And sometimes it’s merited. Fast forward to 1925 and you have yet another audacious Frenchman trying to destroy and rebuild Paris: Le Corbusier. Come to think of it, I wonder if he thought of himself as the next Haussmann. He certainly thought of himself as the man responsible for ushering in the next wave of modernity.

But while he didn’t execute on his Plan Voisin in Paris, he certainly left his mark on cities all across the world. The plan he intended for Paris, was more or less what we used to clear slums in a lot of cities. However it turned out to be a complete failure.

So I guess the moral of the story is that some change is good and some change is bad. But most of the time it’ll seem bad at first, making it hard to tell which is which.