Are there any allies for alleys?
Why is it that alleys always suck? The word alley has become globally synonymous with terms like “dingey”, “sketchy”, and “dull”, and deservingly so. Most alleys in the United States and around the world have been neglected and mistreated, left to be locations for discarding waste or for quick, undignified smoke breaks; the abused alley across the street from my house is no exception. With litter and graffiti being the primary form of décor, and asphalt rubble being the street’s defining feature, this alley is not the ideal place to be in any instance. Seeing this alley every day has quickly made it one of my least favorite features of our neighborhood, and I suspect that those who live on and use it each day share the same level of animosity. From the large pieces of trash strewn about to the horrendous car-scraping road conditions, I knew that this was a public space that would suit this study nicely.
Alleys are community spaces where private life meets the public, forcing neighbors to interact in one way or another. Living backed up to the alley in question, you are faced with the concerns of safety, sharing the space with your neighbors, and the overall road condition. After walking the site, observing and interviewing residents, and putting myself in the shoes of someone who lives with and uses the alley every day, I’ve attempted to learn more about the alley, and understand if my initial impressions were as severe as I had made them out to be.
It is important to break the alley down into its different dimensions and component parts when addressing how well it performs its role as a public good. When looking at its vitality, the alley is average at best. While it does accommodate the bare minimum functions that being an alley requires, it could be significantly more graceful and user-friendly than it is. First, the road conditions are abysmal. From massive potholes, poor patchwork, and completely uneven road surfaces, the alley’s road is as dangerous to walk on as it is to drive through. I have seen several cars drive over it, and any car with a clearance of less than about five inches is guaranteed to scrape its underside somewhere along the road. I have personally had the misfortune of taking both my car and my moped down this road, scraping the front skid plates of my car, and almost flying over the handlebars of my moped when I hit a rather deceiving pothole. Luckily, the weather conditions were suitable, because the combination of rain and the littered bits of gravel that sporadically blanket the road does not make for safe travels for any two-wheeled mode of transportation. Adding to the road conditions themselves, the surroundings are almost just as bad. Bushes and trees are unkept, and large pieces of litter and overturned trash cans often make their way into the path of drivers. Just on my brief walk today, I saw (and managed to get a picture of) a utility van hitting the limbs of a tree as it pulled into the alley from the main road, poetically summarizing the experience of the average user of this alley.
There is a clear sense that the alley can be easily perceived and differentiated from its surroundings, however, this is more so due to the nature of alleys in general. In my opinion, alleys would better serve the community if they could not be differentiated from their surroundings, blending onto the back porches and driveways of the residences that surround them, allowing for more cohesion between neighbors and utilities. Alleys as we know them, however, are very distinguishable and typically not by design, but due to circumstance. The crumbling asphalt lets you know that you are not on your back porch anymore, and the dumpsters, overfilled with waste and smothered by spray paint, add an ugly exclamation point to that message.
While I have many negative things to say, it might not be so bad. The fact that it is a quintessential poorly kept alley may help it fit its role in the community. Sometimes you do not need it to be the nicest place in the world, and you have somewhere to deposit your refuse free of guilt. The large pieces of furniture and trash that spill out of the dumpsters highlight the way the residents treat the alley, not necessarily how the alley treats the people. This represents a “by-any-means-necessary” approach taken by the residents backed up to the alley, disposing of their waste under constraints of time and space, not worried about how they affect the aesthetic of the alley since it has already been so brutalized for so long. This individual level of control has contributed to the fact that the alley overall has no sense of communal control. There is no sense of oversight or accountability due to the neighborhood being made up by many separate private entities, allowing people to do as they please, by any means necessary. There are beer cans everywhere, graffiti covering the dumpsters and facades, yet, surprisingly, the people living here seem relatively unaffected by this. It does a great job of displaying through a macro-level lens the attitude of many Americans; the “It’s not my problem” mentality, where because there is no requirement for accountability, there is none.
Obviously, I would recommend that the City of Austin repave the alley’s road as its first form of improvement, improving the alley’s access and vitality immediately. After this, however, it is hard to decide exactly what the next step for improvement is since the will of the people has ultimately led to this outcome. If the entire strip was to be purchased and turned into one large private residence, then a larger entity could control the alley and prevent any further degradation than what has already occurred. If the city came through after repaving the road and installed new dumpsters, removed the graffiti, and increased policing to stop the littering and illegal dumping, then we could see the alley in better condition, however, this would likely conflict with the interests of the residents. Additionally, the increase in dumpsters may make it more inviting to throw away trash, leading to even more overfilled dumpsters than before. In conclusion, this study has opened my eyes to the rabbit hole of the alley dilemma, and has made it much more clear to me that the solution to this problem is a blurry one at best.
