Jay Valgora on Why Cities Are Our Greatest Invention

“Now, this is a question I think is wrong on its face,” says Jay Valgora, founder and principal of Studio V Architecture, when we asked him what cities can do to lure one-time urban dwellers back from the suburbs – where, perhaps, they fled during the pandemic. He rejects the perspective that the pandemic has fatally wounded urban centers. “I think that cities are the greatest invention of man,” says Valgora, who was raised in Buffalo, New York, and is now based in New York City. “It’s our greatest artifact. It’s our greatest collective work of art. But for me also, they are one of the greatest measures of our resiliency. There are many, many examples of [an imperiled] New York – from the Revolutionary War, when it was destroyed and occupied by the British, to the Civil War, when it was the site of race riots, to the 1970s, when Central Park was decimated. Always…