Why designing better cities means creating a better world.
This month, we invited our very own Sarah Barnes to share a little glimpse of how she plans to make the world a better place through design, sustainability, acceptance. Throw in a solid taco, and you’ve got yourself some fuel for future change.
Let us proceed, then, to the question of means, and with a seriousness in some degree befitting a question upon our dealing with which we know the misery or happiness of many million of our fellow beings will depend.
- F.L.Olmsted (the super cool dude who designed Central Park).
Cities around the world (and the people who inhabit them) have become the meccas of civilization over the course of human history. Cities are the financial centres of the world, hubs of innovation, education, and possibility. But most importantly, they’re the place people call home. 3.9 billion people were living in cities in 2014 and that number is only growing. 75% of the world’s population is said to be living in cities by 2050. Cities are more than just the roadways, potholes and sky-scrapers they’re known for.
For me, cities are where I learned to ride a bike, where I’ve danced the night away, where I’ve met my best friends, and where I ate the best taco of my life (pictured below).
As more people choose to immigrate to cities from their rural counterparts, they also choose to experience some of life’s most precious moments here, which means our cities need to live up to their value. If people are moving here to increase their quality of life, then our cities need to be financially within reach, have adequate access to just housing markets and transportation, welcome diversity, and recognize how that diversity makes society stronger.
More than just a mecca of innovation, cities are also where some of the most traumatic crisis occur: the Arab Spring brought people into the streets of Cairo and many other cities across the “Middle East*”. Terrorist attacks in cities from Beirut to San Bernardino to Orlando devastated the world this past year, and environmental disasters such as the forest fire in Fort McMurray saw over 100,000 people displaced from their homes.
Cities also have to confront societal injustices that marginalize people based on their gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, religion, and lifestyle choices. And lest we forget about the patriarchy, decolonization, and how all of these issues integrate themselves into an ongoing, global cycle of oppression.
In addition to all of the commotion already discussed, I think that urban areas are about to see more large societal shifts. From automation to climate change, the way that we live, work and play is about to alter drastically. We need to design cities so that when those changes come, our most marginalized communities are not left at the urban fringes, and our public spaces enable and promote human connection, a sense of belonging and community.
Designing better cities can’t be boiled down to a list of best practices or bullet points, but here’s how I would begin to take a whack at it. Each section could be the length of a book, but alas, this is Medium, and I’m pretty sure that’s frowned upon. Please excuse my brevity.
Design for people
I’ve always loved IDEO’s theories of change and practice, and truly believe that a little bit of human-centred design could take our cities a long way. One of the key principles of IDEO’s iconic mindset is to value the experience of the user as it is, and to take an anthropological point of view when studying human behaviour. Once you understand a user’s needs, you can design with them in mind. We need to be empathetic about the needs of citizens, of their struggles, and to acknowledge that their struggles are at often times systemic. Applying this theory to cities would allow for planners and designers to understand how people currently live, and begin to imagine how much better things could be.
Step 1: understand your city from the perspective of its citizens.
Step 2: design your city with their needs in mind. The process of how we design, is as important as the design itself.
To see this in action, I would recommend taking a glimpse through the portfolio of Gehl Studio, especially their project Love Letter to San Jose, which emphasized the importance of process and studying public life.
Switch it up
In one of my favourite TED Talks ever, James Howard Kunstler shares how our cities have become more monotoned, dull, and have lost their sense of place, particularly through suburbanization and societies’ affection for big-box stores. He emphasizes that in the name of efficiency, we’ve cluttered our cities with infrastructure (read: big block stores, wide roadways, vast parking lots) that is “not worth caring about”.
Beyond designing our cities at a human scale, designing accessible spaces worth lingering in is important. F.L. Olmsted, the designer of New York City’s Central Park and Boston’s Emerald Necklace, emphasized the need for these public spaces to bring about a sense of relaxation — a remedy for the craziness of urban life. Both of these parks see hundreds of millions of visitors every year, but you don’t see anybody relaxing their life away in a Walmart parking lot do you? There’s a reason for that. It’s called design.
Simple Sustainability
We need to reduce our impact now to mitigate the damages to come from climate change. Further we need to build resilience into our cities and their citizens now for prolonged mitigation. For me, sustainability can be broken down into two realms: better behaviours and better technology. But this is often times the chicken and egg. Which comes first? The behaviours or the infrastructure?
The saying goes “build it and they will come”. But personally, I tend to lean towards the idea that without the proper infrastructure people can’t be as sustainable as they’d wish. Urban infrastructure needs to aid, enforce or encourage sustainable behaviour, and be accessible so that people from every walk of life have the opportunity to lower their impact, without reducing their quality of life.
Waste reduction targets are more easily met when cities design an organic waste collection system, and cycling increases when protected bike lanes are built. The City of Calgary, one of Canada’s more conservative cities, just saw cycling shoot up 40% in downtown Calgary after a protected bike network was built. Furthermore, this project was done early and under budget. How does that happen? By being resourceful and smart, and learning from other cities. A little green paint, and fancy pylons can go a long way, and see a lot of results.
Of course, technology and infrastructure requires innovation, efficiency, and reduced energy usage. Science is currently working in our favour with this, and what will be most important is the adoption of more efficient technologies, such as solar energy, and better transportation systems into the daily lives of people.
This is a small reminder that small behaviours such as walking, cycling, taking the bus, growing your own veggies, eating less meat, consuming less water and bringing a to-go mug add up. You can do it!
Beyond Tolerance
This last point emphasizes the need for our cities to move beyond the ideals of tolerance with regards to diversity. Tolerance is a nod towards existence, but tolerance has its limits, and conditions. “I tolerate you up until a certain a extent, at which point, I no longer tolerate you.”
Acceptance is unconditional. It is the act of welcoming, understanding, and celebrating each other’s differences. If cities are going to house 75% of the Earth’s population in less than 30 years, then we need to move past the othering, discrimination, and violence that we currently find globally, whether within cities, or outside them.
I think that this lies in the hands of how we educate ourselves and future generations, as well as how the politicians we elect to represent us embrace the ideals of acceptance. Each and every person needs to confront their most subconscious understandings of the world. You don’t have to agree with every person, but you do have to accept them.
The first three bullet points come down to this: we need a better design process.
What we design needs to be more enticing and representative, and those designs can (and should) be built sustainably. The last point is that we need to treat one another with respect, full stop. There’s a heck of a lot more that can be done, but let’s start with this, and see where we get.
A world of better cities creates a better world in and of itself. Cities have the opportunity to lower their impact and be more resilient, to celebrate diversity, and to raise quality of life for billions of people.
I know that with an open mind and a dash of optimism, we can get there.
Sarah is the current Community & Events Coordinator at HiVE and we think she is the bee’s knees. At the end of August, she plans to hop across the pond to London, England where she’ll begin her Masters in City Design and Social Science at the London School of Economics. After that she hopes to design some kick-ass cities that are equitable, exciting and resilient.
Want to see what she’s been up to at HiVE? Follow us on Instagram.
*“To ask “Middle of what?” and “East of where?” is to draw attention to the privileges and powers that are written into these false distinctions.” Read more here about why the term Middle East is problematic.
