Pedestrians
The pedestrian is the most numerous and least considered user of the street: everyone walks some part of every trip, yet space, signage and priority were designed for a century around the car. Reclaiming the street for people on foot is the cheapest and most contested urban reform.
Pavement width, kerb height, signal timing or the distance between crossings are decisions somebody made. Jan Gehl showed that street life is measured by counting pedestrians and what they do; Pontevedra or central Copenhagen showed that removing cars multiplies retail rather than sinking it.
Videos on this term (33)
- Public space
Why Walking Makes Cities Livelier and Safer: Jan Gehl's Evidence
Walking is the basis of public life and safety. What Jan Gehl measured in Cities for People, his twelve quality…
Jan Gehl 3 min read - Urban economy
Jane Jacobs: How Life on the Streets Builds Safe and Vibrant Cities
Jane Jacobs argued that mixed uses, small blocks, old buildings and density keep streets alive and safe through…
Jane Jacobs 3 min read - Urban AI
William J. Mitchell: The Future City, Information and Connection
William J. Mitchell anticipated in City of Bits, e-topia and Me++ the hybrid city of matter and information: the…
William J. Mitchell 3 min read - Shrinking cities
Who Deserves Space in the City? Peñalosa and the Fair Street
Enrique Peñalosa turned the distribution of urban space into a policy of equality: pavements, cycle paths,…
3 min read - Urban economy
Closed Shutters Close Businesses and Communities: The Ground Floor
Why a street full of homes can feel empty: Jacobs's eyes on the street, Klinenberg's Chicago heatwave, thousands of…
3 min read - Mobility
Traffic and Fear Kept Our Children Confined at Home
From eight in ten children walking to school alone to one in ten: how the car expelled children from the street,…
3 min read - Public space
The Participatory Theatre That Deceives Us
When you are invited to participate, are you given power or asked to legitimise? Arnstein's ladder, Spain's Auken…
3 min read - Public space
Insurgent Citizenship: James Holston and the Peripheries of São Paulo
James Holston's insurgent citizenship explains how the residents who self-built São Paulo's peripheries won rights…
James Holston 3 min read - Urban psychology
Juhani Pallasmaa: The Eyes of the Skin and the senses
A summary of Juhani Pallasmaa's The Eyes of the Skin: why modern architecture privileges sight, and what touch,…
Juhani Pallasmaa 2 min read - Urban psychology
Kevin Lynch's The Image of the City: How We Perceive Cities
The Image of the City (1960) by Kevin Lynch explains how we perceive cities through five elements: paths, edges,…
Kevin Lynch 3 min read - Public space
Marc Augé: what non-places are
What non-places are according to Marc Augé: airports, motorways and shopping malls without history or identity,…
Marc Augé 2 min read - Urban psychology
Happy City by Charles Montgomery: Urban Design and Happiness
Happy City (2013) by Charles Montgomery gathers the evidence on which urban design makes us happier: shorter…
2 min read - Public space
Lefebvre: urban space as a field of struggle
In The Production of Space, Lefebvre separates perceived, conceived and lived space, and shows where capital and…
Henri Lefebvre 2 min read - Urban form
Jaime Lerner: the urban acupuncture of Curitiba
Lerner argues that one small, well-placed intervention transforms a whole neighbourhood. He proved it as mayor of…
Jaime Lerner 2 min read - Public space
Great Streets by Allan Jacobs: What Makes a Street Great
Great Streets (1993) by Allan Jacobs compares the world's best streets at the same scale and draws eight…
Allan Jacobs 3 min read - Public space
John Friedmann: Transactive Planning and Community Participation
John Friedmann proposed transactive planning: a dialogue between technical and community knowledge.
John Friedmann 3 min read - Public space
Nicholas Blomley: Property, Space and Spatial Justice in the City
Nicholas Blomley shows that property is a spatial practice deciding who may be where. Unsettling the City, Rights…
Nicholas Blomley 3 min read - Urban form
Peter Calthorpe and The Next American Metropolis: The Origin of TOD
The Next American Metropolis (1993) by Peter Calthorpe formulated transit-oriented development against the…
Peter Calthorpe 2 min read - Public space
Sharon Sutton: Social Inclusion and Participation in Urban Planning
Sharon Sutton, a pioneering African American architect, argues for designing with marginalised communities and…
Sharon Sutton 3 min read - Public space
Susan Fainstein's Just City: Equity, Diversity and Democracy
The Just City (2010) by Susan Fainstein proposes judging urban policy by its equity, diversity and democracy.
Susan Fainstein 3 min read - Public space
Interstitial Spaces: Resistance and Creativity in the City's Gaps
Interstitial spaces, vacant lots, warehouses and motorway undersides, are where the city reinvents itself.
3 min read - Urban psychology
Urban Design and Mental Health: Lessons from Whyte and Gehl
Urban mental health depends on how streets, plazas and parks are designed. What William H. Whyte and Jan Gehl…
2 min read - Public space
Social urbanism: Peñalosa and Gehl on inclusive cities
What social urbanism means for Enrique Peñalosa and Jan Gehl: quality public space, pedestrians before cars, and…
2 min read - Public space
Jane Jacobs: the street as the engine of the city
Jane Jacobs showed in 1961 that mixed uses, density and active streets keep a neighbourhood safe better than any…
Jane Jacobs 2 min read - Mobility
Electric Mobility in the City: Benefits, Limits and What to Electrify
Electric mobility cuts emissions and noise but does not solve congestion or space. What Peter Newman and Donald…
3 min read - Public space
Insurgent Citizenship: James Holston and the City from Below
James Holston's insurgent citizenship explains how São Paulo's peripheries won rights by building their…
James Holston 3 min read - Public space
Pedestrianization: Definition and Benefits from Gehl and Appleyard
Pedestrianization gives the street back to people. What it is, how Jan Gehl and Donald Appleyard justify it and…
3 min read - Mobility
Mobility as a Service (MaaS): Whim's Promise, Failure and What Works
Mobility as a Service integrates public transport, bikes and taxis in one app. What Whim promised in Helsinki, why…
3 min read - Public space
Feminist Urbanism: What It Is, Principles and City Examples
Feminist urbanism designs cities for daily life and care work, not for the man with a car. What Jane Darke and…
3 min read - Public space
Doreen Massey: space has a gender too
Massey showed that moving through the city does not cost everyone the same, and called that geographical inequality…
Doreen Massey 2 min read - Mobility
Women's Mobility and Urban Transport: The Mobility of Care
Women travel differently and transport was planned as if they did not. What Susan Hanson and Inés Sánchez de…
3 min read - Public space
Judith Butler and the City: Gender Performativity in Urban Space
Judith Butler's gender performativity explains how urban space produces and polices gender. Her key ideas,…
3 min read - Urban AI
Industry 4.0 and Cities: How It Transforms Urban Mobility
Industry 4.0 brings sensors, artificial intelligence and electromobility to the city. What changes in transport,…
3 min read
