Recognized it instantly. But I’ve read a fair bit of urban planning. Could it have been in something by Jane Jacobs?
If I say the words "Pruitt-Igoe" to you with no context provided, do you know what I'm referring to?
Never heard of it. I am 63. I have heard of Cabrini Green, as well as when the mayor moved in there, but I don’t expect anyone outside the Midwest to recognize C-G.
John Landecker did a parody of “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” about C-G.
Regards,
Shodan
Interesting. I answered no (30-54) and asked the peanut gallery for comments, and got “yeah it’s some Philip Glass piece; I have that album”, with no knowledge of the housing thing. I’d never heard of the music or film either.
None of this is familiar to me. I haven’t seen any of the movies mentioned, and never heard of the developments. I have lived in the midwest, also California and Texas. I do pay some attention to the world despite not knowing these things! 
I’m 73. I also think “failed public housing project” is redundant; are there any that didn’t fail? Serious question.
The film shows the demolition of Pruitt-Igoe (and other buildings); I recall looking up the name to get the backstory, since I thought it was unusual. One could maybe guess that it was some failed housing project, but it’s an art film; it doesn’t exactly explain itself. So, not a surprise that one might only know it as the name of a piece (especially if encountered in a Glass collection instead of the full movie soundtrack).
I’m 42 and I don’t know what either of these are.
I saw *Koyaanisqatsi *first run (in the early 80s), so I must have seen the demolition of P-I, but the film didn’t identify it (did it?) so I had no idea what the name of the project was. I have heard of Cabrini-Greene…to me, it’s a more easily remembered name. I don’t even know how to pronounce the Igoe part of Pruitt-Igoe.
Just like it looks without the “e.”
EYE-go
I’m 51 and never heard of either. And I’ve lived in St. Louis (county)!
First read about it in an essay by the late Tom Wolfe about architecture, about 10 years ago. Am currently 33.
No, but whenever I read St. Louis, I stop reading.
I’m 55 or older. I first think of the troubled housing project when I hear the words, and then of the Philip Glass composition.
I’m 48 and selected “yes,” BUT it’s only because one of those names is also a name in my family. I think I discovered Pruitt-Igoe shortly after I started using internet searches; around the mid-to-late 90s.
Also, I already knew about Cabrini-Green because I went to Cabrini College (now Cabrini University). No connection. Someone once asked me about Cabrini-Green upon hearing where I was going to college, and that’s how I learned about it.
I mostly know about it from hearing it spoken about in the same breath as Detroit’s local version, Brewster-Douglass.
I’ve heard of Soylent Green
I would assume you were referring to “Pruit Igoe” and “Prophecies,” as used in the soundtrack to Watchmen (2009). And on further investigation, I’ve learned that those are actually two Phillip Glass songs, combined in part for the soundtrack, and the first of them was actually part of the soundtrack for the Soviet film a few people have mentioned, which featured scenes of Pruitt-Igoe.
Why Glass dropped the hyphen and the second t is anyone’s guess. Maybe it made more sense in translation?
Koyaanisqatsi is not a Soviet film.
The track name is just a misspelling. It was corrected in the 2009 re-release of the soundtrack. *Watchmen *must have just copied the original misspelling.
Also, it’s Philip Glass, not Phillip Glass :).
No, but I’m English, so you wouldn’t expect me to have heard of it. I voted thinking it might be some political scandal or similar. The votes of other non-Americans might skew the results a little.
I’m sure I added the extra ‘l’ intentionally as a sort of meta commentary on Glass dropping the second ‘t’ from Pruitt-Igoe. Yeah, that’s it! I was being meta! 
As to how I got the idea it was a Soviet film… shrug Mandela Effect, maybe? Alternate universes?
30-54. Yes, I’ve heard of it. I first learned about it from Koyaanisqatsi and became interested enough to learn the full story.