This view of Manhattanville Houses, which consolidated four city blocks, highlights the dramatic contrast in approach between tenement rows and freestanding slabs. The pinwheel formation of the slabs gave every apartment ample outdoor exposure and sunlight. The tower-in-the-park approach, at least in New York, did not typically change population density, but it greatly reduced the land coverage.
By the 1970s, the view of superblocks was completely reversed: the tower in the park was seen as isolating and destructive, the superblock was scorned as deadening and antiurban. Streets were resurgent.