‘For the first time in recent US scholarship, Orum and Chen provide a deep and extended analysis of the importance of place in city development. Human beings value places as sacred sites with deep memories and legendary attachments, to be revisited even when catastrophes make this foolhardy. Dissatisfied with undemocratic development today, Orum and Chen provide a sage set of pro-active measures for creating much better urban places fostering human life and family.’ Joe Feagin, University of Florida