Analysis

Hindsight always sees things differently. Al Green’s clearly rode the cutting edge of post-war economic expansion and coasted downhill from around 1965 on. The post-war boom was also marked by the peak of the automobile's importance as a source of employment, a form of recreation, and an object of respect. Al Green’s was thus swept by the rising tide that lifted all drive-in boats. However, Al Green's rose above its peers for several reasons: its architectural flair, personal service, specialty food, free movies, and key location all helped it attain legendary status that lingers to this day. Location was also paramount: it was surrounded by a handful of manufacturing plants within a two mile radius, and also adjacent to two major roadways, one of them the main entry into Indianapolis from the East (US 40).

Explaining Al Green's decline is more difficult than its success. The early 1970s marked a turning point for the United States as a whole, forcing many businesses to adapt to changing market conditions. The Green siblings did not adapt particularly well to these changes, perhaps because they were phasing into retirement and no longer able to embark on something new and different. Perhaps they were financially secure and could do as they pleased. Rumors circulated that they were rich from their restaurant and land deals, but that is almost certainly exaggerated. In any case they could have adopted any number of strategies to cope: adding an indoor dining room, for example, or developing the land into a strip mall or office complex, or they could have sold outright. They chose to do nothing, preferring to let the restaurant fade into oblivion until finally selling to the car dealership in the 1990s.

We must consider that some of the reasons for Al Green's decline were external and beyond the Green's control. With the opening of I-70 around 1970, they no longer had a prime location. They might have chosen to cater to the new highway traffic, but fast, impersonal food wasn't their style. When local factories began closing in the early 70s and fuel prices spiked in 1973, it was clearly a sign of an ebbing tide that was sinking all drive-in boats. Only the strongest could survive and few did. As land prices shot up, drive-ins sold out in droves.

It's also clear that Al Green's success fed on some of the very weaknesses that were part and parcel to the suburban dilemma: the shortage of public spaces, village centers, public parks, and pedestrian traffic, for example. Nearly all social experience required automobiles and the drive-in was a perfect fit for that time and place.

A lot of effort is being made nowadays to understand the organic components of a desirable neighborhood. Many planners are interested in placing these components back into a suburbia where for a time they were deemed unnecessary: town squares, village centers, and pocket parks, for example. Sustainability, mass transit, walkability, and mixed use are some of the qualities people expect from their communities today. Gone are the days when vast housing tracts were zoned for a single use. Also gone are the massive high-density public housing projcts often designed for segregation. New trends favor human-scale development, meaningful destinations within a walkable distance, and transit choices.

Almost all cities have an older core that was designed for walking. Indianapolis, for example, has its "Mile Square," an area bound by East, West, North and South streets roughly forming a square mile. The Mile Square is a perfect example of old-style human-scale city planning where the entire commercial and business district was located within a short walk.

Another example of this older city structure is Alexandria, Virginia. Just across the Potomac from Washington DC, Alexandria has one of the largest preserved 18th-19th century residential areas in the United States. Residents enjoy the same urban fabric today as in the past, with plenty of sidewalks, proximity to transit and entertainment, and the original market square. Combined with many mid-rise offices and residential complexes nearby, Alexandria has a vibrancy that many American cities can only envy. Clearly, Alexandria's resiliency tells us something about city planning, a lesson that particularly applies to some of the nation's suburbs that are only a few decades old yet already starting to decay.

Another item of interest: Al Green's architecture has a natural human scale. Sitting beside the Parthenon of Athens, Al Green's is about equal in length if you include the car canopy. Architects tell us that great buildings usually "feel" right to people because they are correctly sized according to human function and scale. Al Green's is yet another proof.

For its small size, Athens has left a giant footprint on world culture. It's only about the size of Indianapolis's Mile Square, perfectly human scaled. Its marketplace was no bigger than a typical 1960s shopping mall yet it was one of the most vibrant public spaces in recorded history, as vital to political freedom as it was to commerce. Indeed, early democracy could not have existed without public spaces where people could meet and express ideas.

It also occurred to me that Athens was about the same size as the area I used to consider my "stomping grounds" as a teenager, a range of territory about four square miles that included Al Green's. Beyond that range lay the "barbarians," foreigners whose customs were a bit strange and inferior to mine, or so I thought as an immature adolescent. This demonstrates the human tendency to feel most comfortable within his or her territorial space. This territorial space is one in which buildings and places fit our natural form of locomotion, which for us were cars. Al Green's human scale was probably no small part of its success, as was it's adaptation to our mode of travel.

In the last analysys, young people of the late 40s through early 70s were often concerned with three things: Food, cars, and the opposite sex. Al Green's provided a form of social networking that linked to each of these three things. Today's social networking is quite differerent, but that's a topic for another website!