Other writers on the list include Farley Mowat, Wayne Johnston, M.G. Vassanji, Pierre Berton and Margaret MacMillan. Two of Vancouver writer John Vaillant’s books have been nominated: The Golden Spruce and The Tiger.

Over the past few weeks, avid readers have suggested titles online at CBC Books. Readers must now shorten the list to 10 books, with online voting open until midnight on Oct. 30. Then, the participating celebrity panelists will choose books from the list that most appeal to them for discussion during Canada Reads: True Stories. The upcoming edition is the first time Canada Reads has considered Canadian non-fiction books.

While there are a lot of worthwhile and important books on the list, my fingers are crossed that Jacobs’s book ends up winning.  It is an important book for everybody living in a city to read (and over 85% of Canadian now live in urban areas. But perhaps most importantly, honoring this book would be a fitting celebration of the 50th anniversary of its publication this year as well as the 5th anniversary of Jane’s passing next spring.

You can check out the otehr 39 books under consideration and vote for your top ten on the CBC website.

Related articles

• CBC’s Canada Reads turns to non-fiction (cbc.ca)
• Rereading: The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs (guardian.co.uk)

I recently learned that there is a new audio edition of Jane’s Jacobs’ The Death and Life of Great American Cities. So if you are more a listener than a reader, you now have no excuse not to absorb Jacobs’ wisdom.

Personally, I think it would be cool to listen to the book with strolling through my neighborhood. That way I could make my own observations while listening to Jane’s.

From Planetizen:

Epstein found a number of folks who lived in a black community up on West 99th Street that was cleared by Moses’ Manhattantown project:

“In 2007, Epstein started digging through the archives and interviewing residents to learn more about the neighborhood that had vanished. From this work, he created a 7-minute documentary portrait of the old community…”

Cross-posted on Yurbanism.

Here are a few passages from his article:

Rereading: The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs

Jacobs, who died in 2006, never published any fiction herself, but she certainly had a novelist’s sensitivity to human relations. She argues in Death and Life, for instance, that one of the paradoxical advantages of urban existence is privacy. In contrast to the suburbs, a dense neighbourhood has lots of convenient places to stop and chat, so you can be on friendly terms with dozens of people who live or work near your home without ever feeling the slightest obligation to invite any of them inside for tea:

“Under this system, it is possible in a city-street neighbourhood to know all kinds of people without unwelcome entanglements, without boredom, necessity for excuses, explanations, fears of giving offence, embarrassments respecting impositions or commitments, and all such paraphernalia of obligations which can accompany less limited relationships.”

If these things had truly been lost to New York, we would never have got Seinfeld, but the point still stands. How many professional city planners have considered everyday life so carefully that they’ve remembered to take all the nanophysics of social awkwardness into account?

[...]

Plenty of the requirements Jacobs sets out for building a healthy and diverse urban community can be applied with real success to building a vivid and plausible fictional community. Death and Life, in other words, is a sort of accidental creative writing textbook – perhaps appropriately so, because Jacobs’s beloved West Village was itself full of writers. Early on, Jacobs says:

“Under the seeming disorder of the old city, wherever the old city is working successfully, is a marvellous order for maintaining the safety of the streets and the freedom of the city. It is a complex order. Its essence is intricacy of pavement use, bringing with it a constant succession of eyes. This order is all composed of movement and change, and although it is life, not art, we may fancifully call it the art form of the city and liken it to the dance.”

But the art form of the city is not really dance. The art form of the city, described so well in that passage, is the novel.

Jane’s Walk, a Project of Tides Canada Initiatives (TCI), celebrates the ideas and legacy of urbanist Jane Jacobs by getting people out exploring their neighbourhoods and understanding how their communities and cities work.

Its signature event – free walking tours held on the first weekend of May each year – gives locals a platform to tell stories of their neighbourhoods, encourages conversations about who plans and builds them and the experience of those who live there, and in the process, inspires people to come together to make them more walkable and liveable.

On the first Jane’s Walk weekend in May 2007, 1,000 people took part in 27 walks in Toronto. Since then, the event has inspired walkers everywhere, and the Toronto-based initiative has seen explosive growth in activity during the annual weekend.

During the fifth anniversary Jane’s Walk weekend in May 2011, 20,000 people strolled in 500+ free, volunteer-led walks in 75 cities across 15 countries worldwide, including in Berlin, Dublin, Goa, Guadalajara, Los Angeles, Madrid, Manhattan, Montreal, New Orleans, Tel Aviv, Whitehorse, La Paloma, Uruguay and Wuhan, China! [and Phoenix too!]

Job Description

Jane’s Walk seeks a visionary and entrepreneurial individual to provide strategic and operational leadership as Director. This person will be interested in guiding the initiative through its next stage of evolution, and will be excited by the challenge of establishing its long-term financial sustainability.

This is an extraordinary time in the evolution of Jane’s Walk. As local participation and global interest are at all-time highs Jane’s Walk faces the core challenge of developing a long-term financially sustainable model for delivering the initiative. The Director has an exceptional opportunity to turn a strong and promising initiative into a truly sustainable, global phenomenon.

The Director works closely with, and is answerable to, an Advisory Committee of committed volunteer members and to Tides Canada Initiatives (TCI), which acts as financial and legal trustee.

Position Responsibilities

• Collaboratively lead Jane’s Walk stakeholders to develop short, medium and long-term strategies for the organization
• Ensure the successful delivery of the 2012 Jane’s Walk in Toronto, and support the delivery of the 2012 Jane’s Walks across Canada and worldwide
• Develop and implement initiatives that contribute to long-term financial sustainability, including sponsorships, global licensing models, government grants, foundation grants and earned revenue
• Assume overall leadership, with the support of the Advisory Committee, to position Jane’s Walk on a long-term path of growth and success
• Represent the initiative and related advocacy issues and programming with an array of stakeholders including the Advisory Committee, sponsors, media, governments, volunteers and a broader public audience
• Be responsible for the complete financial, statistical, accounting and HR records of the Project, and ensure the accuracy, integrity and timeliness of all activity, financial, and other reporting to TCI and other stakeholders; lead the preparation of the annual budget for Advisory Committee and TCI approval and prepare regular budget updates
• Ensure that Jane’s Walk activities comply with the Project’s description and all policies and procedures of TCI
• Supervise all Project staff, volunteers and contractors; report vacation liability to TCI HR; ensure performance evaluations carried out for Project staff; advise TCI HR of any personnel issues

Position Requirements

• Experience leading substantial projects and/or organizations
• Strong entrepreneurial bent with experience and interest in revenue-generating strategies for non-profits
• A proven fundraising track record
• Experience preparing grant proposals and regular activity reports
• Exceptional communication skills (writing, speaking, presenting) and ability to convey ideas and stories in both traditional and social media
• An excellent networker and facilitator with experience managing volunteers and working collaboratively
• Familiarity with, and passion for, a broad range of issues related to vibrant cities, urban planning, design, and literacy, civic engagement, and walkability
• Ability to manage a small office in a cost-efficient manner, providing or supporting operational requirements at all levels (IT, communications, etc.)
• Familiarity with preparing and monitoring budgets and reviewing financial statements

The annual compensation range is $65,000 to $80,000 commensurate with experience. A term contract will be negotiated and will be renewable based on funding and upon agreement by both parties.

Individuals with the requisite experience are invited to apply with a covering letter and resume (in ONE PDF or Word document) in confidence to chair@janeswalk.net by October 24, 2011.

Only those candidates who are being considered for interviews will be contacted.

For more information about Jane’s Walk and Tides Canada Initiatives, please visit:
http://www.janeswalk.net/ ; http://tidescanada.org/projects/ 

As Jane’s Walk is a Project of Tides Canada Initiatives Society (TCI), the selected candidate will be a contractor to, or an employee of, TCI.

[via JanesWalk.net]