Published July 5, 2010
by iris_author
Jan Gehl, renown architect and urban planner
Sometimes transformation can occur before you even realise it’s happening.
This was the primary message that I took out of legendary Jan Gehl’s presentation in Auckland tonight entitled "Cities for People", and one that I am very happy to have heard.
Jan Gehl, a Danish architect and urban planner with a vision towards restoring the planet’s cities for its inhabitants, has a simple message: “if you are sweet to people, they will be sweet to you”. He had the slides and images to back that claim up too.
After introducing the state of architecture when he himself emerged out of architecture school 50 short years ago – where buildings were grand and people were small, where the most important perspective – eye level – was completely forgotten, and where “bird sh** architects” dropped massive concrete buildings on cities like bomber pilots (all his expressions, not mine!), and in an era where Jane Jacobs fought successfully to keep her beloved Greenwich village from becoming ground zero for an expressway – some cities where already shifting towards a revolutionary style of city, one where people are its central focus, not cars.
Copenhagen is one such city, explains Gehl. Little by little, and with the direction of a visionary architect and city planner, Copenhagen began to systematically reduce the amount of available parking space by 2%. The amount was negligible (small enough for no one to really notice) and with it came the appearance of lovely human thoroughfares, with benches and cafes and places for people to sit and chat and walk if they wanted. Copenhagen never knew what hit it and in the space of 1 year the main street was completely pedestrianized.
When this plan was laid out in 1962 stores along the street balked. Surely there sales would drop! But – and City of Toronto mayoral candidates should listen up – not a peep was heard from them after its inception.
The truth of the matter is very simply, lay down more concrete and more cars will come, remove the concrete – or use it differently – and people will come (and with them their money). People are the life of any city; Gehl reminds us that it is in our nature to be around people. We enjoy watching them, talking with them, walking amongst them on a sunny summer’s day. When a street is deserted, it feels unsafe and bizarre.
Gehl boasts that his beloved Copenhagen, in its efforts to meet its stated goal of becoming “The world’s finest city for people” is aiming to get 50% of its population on bikes. Businessmen bike to work, grandmothers bike, pregnant women bike. The spaces afforded them are wide, safe and numerous. Compare this to Brisbane, Australia (as told by Gehl) – and I would also offer Auckland – where biking is considered an extreme sport only done by 25 to 35 year old men dressed in full “survival gear”. Biking can and should be a preferred way of transportation in a truly mixed-use city. In Copenhagen cars must cross sidewalks to turn, not people crossing streets. What a beautiful distinction!
Copenhagen bike lanes
And so it turns out, that Auckland has been studied by Gehl for a “public realm health check” in 2009. Its preliminary recommendations could be just as easily suited for Toronto:
• Celebrate your beautiful natural setting – from this emerges that it should go without saying that people should be able to easily and pleasantly access the waterfront on foot.
• Connect the oases of life (parks, attractions) throughout the city to encourage people to move around.
• And finally and obviously, take out the 150 cars per hectare parking spaces (compared to 23 per hectare in Copenhagen!), and bring back the bicycle.
To show that it can be done, Gehl concludes with some images of his work in New York City (of all places). Since 2008 NYC has been transforming itself. Separated bike paths have been introduced on its main arteries and car lanes reduced. Broadway Avenue is now permanently closed to motor vehicle traffic since February 2010 leaving what used to be permanent gridlock (as I remember it in 2006) to reinvent itself into a street wide open air café. And just to show how happy everyone is, business has gone up 75%.
This is astounding and a positive sign that when you are serious about changing you city, the city will gladly respond.
Now let’s just make sure to redirect this increase in spending power away from the toys and chocolate abundant in that part of New York and rather towards sustainable goodies and practices – photovoltaic suppliers and vermicomposter retailers pay attention, now you know where your next potential customer base might lie!
Parasols on Broadway Plaza
People, not cars, on Broadway
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