Sharing the city as a commons can create stronger, inclusive communities

by Darren Sharp

The sharing economy is an exciting and disruptive set of developments turning old paradigms of production, consumption and exchange on their head. Major themes include access over ownership and unlocking the idling capacity of various assets including stuff, space and skills.¹ At its most sublime level the sharing economy brings peers together to match needs with haves, build social capital and neighbourly connectedness through tool libraries, community gardens, clothing swaps, skill shares and Repair Cafes.² Melbourne is home to many inspiring sharing programs like the Clothing Exchange³ that runs clothing swaps to promote sustainable fashion; 3000 acres⁴ which works with public and private sector asset owners to unlock vacant land for urban agriculture; and Brunswick Tool Library⁵ that pools equipment for hire to encourage sustainable consumption.

Brunswick Tool Library in Melbourne provides local members with shared access to tools and equipment. Image source: Assemble Papers, photographer: Fred Kroh

But the sharing economy is not without its drawbacks including the enclosing influence of platforms that monetise formally sacrosanct areas of private life. A ride to work, some help around the house, or a spare room for an out-of-town guest have become commodities to be bought and sold through a handful of on-demand platforms. The economic benefits of these services favours asset owners with a desirable car or home to share. Governments have been slow to respond to the shocks caused by Uber, Airbnb, and Deliveroo and their disruptions to transportation, the housing market and the freelance sector.⁶ These so called 'gig economy' platforms provide convenience to their users but also raise serious concerns as this seemingly 'inevitable march of progress' creates winners and losers, enriching start-up founders and investors while making it hard for gig workers, who are mostly independent contractors, to make a living.⁷

Commercial platforms have also skillfully leveraged the agglomeration benefits of proximity, density and amenity of public goods and shared resources that nobody owns but that we all benefit from - what we used to call the commons. These include everything from the tax-payer funded public roads which are quickly becoming congested by the presence of Uber and other rideshare operators,⁸ and the unique culture and quiet enjoyment of our cities and neighbourhoods which is being threatened by Airbnb as long-term rental stock is removed from the market and converted into short-term housing accommodation.⁹

As David Bollier reminds us the enclosure of the commons is a recurring threat and happens when private sector interests often working with the support of government, privatise or convert shared resources into private resources and treat them as tradeable commodities.¹⁰ Enclosure of the commons has been going on for centuries if we look back at the English enclosure movement where aristocracy stole the pastures, forests, water and grazing lands used by commoners and declared them private property.¹¹ Today we see a new enclosure movement as big tech companies with the support of governments, use proprietary platforms and network effects to commodify our data and take over critical city infrastructure under the rhetoric of disruptive innovation and the smart city. The failed plans for an Apple Store at Federation Square is just the thin edge of the wedge - a branding exercise that sought to extract the civic and cultural value of Melbourne and its citizens to further Apple's growth ambitions.¹² We must zoom out to see how tech giants have their eyes on the bigger prize - capturing our cities for the deployment of more tightly integrated data and service ecosystems on which government, business and citizens rely on for essential infrastructure but which undermines our technological sovereignty.¹³

Google is now in the city-building business as seen by Toronto waterfront re-development under its subsidiary Sidewalk Labs. The smart city plan involves "creating a neighbourhood from "the internet up", powered and severed by data; with sensors monitoring everything from air quality to pedestrian traffic, even the flushing of toilets."¹⁴ Quayside is the proposal's pilot community, a 12-acre area along the waterfront with an intention to expand the experiment to the remaining 800-acre site to Toronto.¹⁵ This is just one of a growing number of projects where tech giants with the support of governments are converting shared resources into private resources. Enclosure of the commons erodes community by turning citizens into consumers and creates vendor lock-in and walled gardens which undermines democracy by colonizing our public space with proprietary platforms that constantly monitor our behaviour and commodify our data in what academic Shoshana Zuboff has described as the pernicious rise of "surveillance capitalism."¹⁶

View of Toronto waterfront. Image: Sandro Schuh on UnSplash.com

The sharing city is a new imaginary of urban transformation that offers hope through peer to peer collaboration, citizen participation and shared infrastructure to create greater social and economic inclusion.¹⁷ Sharing cities proponents tell a new story of the sharing economy grounded in grassroots innovation, municipal provisioning of shared infrastructure and diverse forms of sharing that engender social justice, economic democracy and ecological sustainability.¹⁸ The idea of the sharing city was pioneered by Shareable¹⁹, a nonprofit action hub and news site for the sharing economy that uses narratives of change and enabling tools like collaborative mapping to encourage urban experimentation that brings civil society, local government and alternative market actors together to create new forms of sharing for the common good. Shareable launched the Sharing Cities Network (SCN), a grassroots initiative "to mobilize, inspire and connect" sharing advocates around the world. To date over 50 cities have created SCN nodes, run MapJams and ShareFests to connect the dots and activate sharing within local communities using collaborative mapping to make shared resources more visible, convene local stakeholders and create new opportunities for partnerships to emerge.²⁰

The Share Yarra Map was the result of a community MapJam workshop at Fitzroy Town Hall in 2014. Image: author

The sharing cities movement has inspired local governments to formally declare themselves Sharing Cities and drive new institutional arrangements through policies and programs to make their city assets like public buildings, vacant land and open data more amenable to sharing. Seoul has made 800 of its buildings available to the community for use during idle hours, run as start-up school to support the next generation of sharing entrepreneurs and has invested millions of dollars through subsidies from taxes paid by citizens.²¹ Seoul designates sharing enterprises and organisations as part of their Sharing City program if they commit to solving urban problems through sharing via the economy, welfare, culture, environment and transportation sectors. Amsterdam became Europe's first Sharing City and convened the Ambassador Group with local representatives from the corporate, government and knowledge sectors to develop a program of activities to support the ecosystem and prototype sharing projects. The Amsterdam municipal government has also run a pilot program to make its meeting rooms available to organisations with a social impact mission.²²

The 'city as a commons' is another new urban imaginary that creates post-neoliberal pathways for local governments to play a key enabling role in making services, programs and staff available to the community to support urban transformation through new models of collaborative urban governance. One of the best examples can be found in the City of Bologna's 'Regulation of Collaboration Between Citizens and the City for the Care and Regeneration of Urban Commons' that supports active citizens to co-lead city interventions through collaboration agreements, an instrument that aligns deliberative processes and intent with a legal contract between citizens and the municipality.²³ Since the regulation passed in 2014 with the support of researchers from LabGov, over 280 citizen-led projects have signed collaboration agreements with the city under the regulation to co-govern shared resources. Bologna 'city as commons' projects include an association of Bologna women who turned an unused city-owned building into an 'ethical boutique' to support migrant women and Social Streets that helps neighbours get to know each other and strengthen community by building mutual aid networks at hyper-local level.

A Social Streets gathering in Bologna  - an example of the 'city as a commons' in action. Image: https://www.shareable.net/blog/how-to-start-a-social-street

Such experiments in collaborative governance through "public-private partnerships of people and communities" are underway across other cities in Italy with five types of actors including social innovators, public authorities, businesses, civil society organisations and knowledge institutions.²⁴ Following the success of Bologna, LabGov turned its attention to Centocelle's Archaeological Park in Rome which became the focus of urban commoning initiated by researchers and community stakeholders working on collaborative governance experiments. A co-design process was used which led to the creation of a community group dedicated to the regeneration of the park. This has resulted in a variety of site interventions including rubbish removal, tree planting and landscaping which has activated the park and created opportunities for collaboration between citizens and the local council.

Sharing cities and the 'city as a commons' movements demonstrate how alternative urban imaginaries, narratives of change and collaborative mapping create new structural contexts outside of neoliberal market and policy logics to support transformative modes of experimentation. These new imaginaries provide a guiding vision for urban actors to develop new economic practices through the social production of value and modes of collaborative governance like Seoul, Amsterdam and Bologna. Urban actors can share resources and use technology to strengthen community but resisting enclosure and maintaining technological sovereignty will be an ongoing challenge that will define our future cities.

About the author.

Darren Sharp is the Director of Social Surplus and works with grassroots innovators and public sector partners to develop community empowerment strategies, collaborative governance experiments and facilitate capacity-building using strength-based and design-led approaches. Darren is also the Australian editor of Shareable, Melbourne coordinator of the Sharing Cities Network and co-authored the book Sharing Cities: Activating the Urban Commons which contains 137 case studies and policies that showcases how city residents around the world are using commons-based strategies to meet their needs in housing, food, transportation, work and energy. Darren helped established and run Livewell Yarra, an urban living lab in Melbourne and recently completed his PhD at Curtin University Sustainable Policy Institute where he undertook action research on transformative urban experimentation for sustainability transitions funded by the CRC for Low Carbon Living. His recent academic publications appear is Sustainability and Urban Policy and Research.

References:

¹ See: Botsman, R. and Rogers, R. (2010). What’s Mine is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption. New York, NY. HarperCollins; and Gansky, L. (2010). The Mesh: Why the Future of Business is Sharing. New York, NY. Penguin Group.

² https://www.shareable.net/blog/the-repair-caf%C3%A9-foundation-builds-community-by-fixing-things
³ https://www.events.clothingexchange.com.au/
⁴ https://3000acres.org/
^{5 https://brunswicktoollibrary.org}
6 https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jul/28/uber-lawlessness-sharing-economy-corporates-airbnb-google
⁷ https://www.businessinsider.com.au/australia-uber-drivers-make-less-than-minimum-wage-2018-3?r=US&IR=T
⁸ LeBlanc, S. (2018). Studies are increasingly clear: Uber, Lyft congest cities. Associated Press. Available from: https://www.apnews.com/e47ebfaa1b184130984e2f3501bd125d/Studies-are-increasingly-clear:-Uber,-Lyft-congest-cities
⁹ https://theconversation.com/australian-governments-are-treading-lightly-around-airbnb-76389
¹⁰ http://thinklikeacommoner.com/
¹¹ http://wealthofthecommons.org/essay/commons-%E2%80%93-historical-concept-property-rights
¹² https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/heritage-authority-refuses-fed-square-demolition-permit-for-apple-store-20190405-p51b97.html
¹³ https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/digitaliberties/digital-democracy-and-technological-sovereignty/
¹⁴ https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-05-31/concerns-over-google-city-in-toronto/9815446
¹⁵ https://sidewalktoronto.ca/
¹⁶ https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/feb/02/age-of-surveillance-capitalism-shoshana-zuboff-review
¹⁷ Shareable. (2018). Sharing Cities: Activating the Urban Commons. San Francisco, CA: Shareable. www.sharingcities.net
¹⁸ Sharp, D. (2018). Sharing Cities for Urban Transformation: Narrative, Policy and Practice. Urban Policy and Research, 36(4), 513-526. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08111146.2017.1421533
¹⁹ www.shareable.net
²⁰ Johnson, C. (2013). We gathered, we mapped, we shared: a #MapJam follow-up. Shareable.
Available from: http://www.shareable.net/blog/we-gathered-we-mapped-we-shared-a-mapjam-follow-up
²¹ https://www.shareable.net/blog/sharing-city-seoul-a-model-for-the-world
²² https://www.shareable.net/blog/amsterdam-to-launch-airbnb-style-rentals-of-municipal-buildings
²³ http://www.comune.bologna.it/media/files/bolognaregulation.pdf
²⁴ Iaione, C. (2016). The CO‐City: Sharing, Collaborating, Cooperating, and Commoning in the City. American Journal of Economics and Sociology, 75(2), 415-455.

The Rise of Open Streets

Introduccion by Ajith Kuruvilla

To all my friends that still believe that streets belong to car, watch this documentary. I remember when i first started cycling to school, uni, work over 15 years ago it was a world where there were no bicycle lanes, close shaves with a car on a daily basis and often abuse and spitting by many car users. I know how much has changed since then for bicyclist, but i also know, for car users their ownership of the road has decreased, the speed limits have decreased and the petrol price has gone from 75c to 1.60c.

So for my friends who still want to complain about the cyclists and the hippies and continue to elect pro automotive governments ahead of greater levels of public transport and people friendly streets, just think where the world will be in another 15 years time considering major cities like LA, NYC, Bogota, Mexico City have already moved in people ahead of cars direction.

The Rise of Open Streets

(Source: https://vimeo.com/78886448)


The Rise of Open Streets from Streetfilms on Vimeo.
Streetfilms has been documenting the ciclovia/open streets movement for over seven years, beginning with our landmark film in 2007 on Bogota's Ciclovia, currently our most popular film of all time.

Not soon after that film's debut Mike Lydon of The Street Plans Collaborative decided to get one going in Miami in 2008 which led to his research for The Open Streets Project, a joint project with the Alliance for Biking & Walking.

In 2008, there were new events in over a dozen cities including San Francisco, Portland and NYC. Since 2006, open streets events have increased 10 fold.

Since Streetfilms has ample footage of nearly a dozen such events, we decided this was an opportune time to interview some of the most important people in the movement, including former City Transportation Commissioners Janette Sadik-Khan (NYC) and Gabe Klein (Chicago), as well as former Bogota Parks Commissioner Gil Penalosa and Enrique Jacoby, from the Pan American Health Organization.

"The Rise of Open Streets" looks at myriad angles of the Open Streets movement. From its little known origins to the joy it brings to participants. From the sundry types of programming to the health benefits it brings citizenry. From the inspiration it gives people to further change the balance of our streets to giving city residents a few hours of peace from the normal tumult of loud city traffic. And it not only looks at big cities like Los Angeles, but smaller ones like Fargo, Berkeley, and Lexington.

We were proud to partner with The Street Plans Collaborative and the Alliance for Biking & Walking to produce this film, which we hope will give municipalities another tool and encourage even more events throughout the world. Funding for "The Rise of Open Streets" was graciously provided by the Fund for the Environment & Urban Life.

More cyclists? That depends on where you live

By Alexis Zander, University of New South Wales and Chris Rissel, University of Sydney

If you have heard comments from friends or colleagues that there seem to be a lot more cyclists these days, chances are that you live or work in the inner city of an Australian capital city.

A new report released by the Prevention Research Collaboration of the University of Sydney examined journey to work data for Sydney from the 2001, 2006 and 2011 Census.

It shows that while the proportion of people cycling to work in inner Sydney has increased markedly since 2006, the proportion cycling to work in outer Greater Sydney has gone down consistently since 2001.

Overall, cycling to work has increased marginally but remains low at around 1% of all journeys to work.

What’s in a choice?

More people commuting by bicycle means cleaner, less congested cities, less stress on public transport systems and a more active, healthier population. In light of Australia’s commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and ever increasing rate of obesity, normalising cycling to work has multiple benefits for cities, government and individuals. But participation needs to be far greater than its current levels for any of these benefits to be felt on a population level.

Read more »

Metro of Santiago: more than mere public transport

The Metro of Santiago has recently being conferred two international awards, the best Metro in America (North and South) and the International Achievement Award IAA for the roof design of 4 of its newest stations. Already in 2010 the Metro of Santiago had been ranked 4^th in the world by CoMET (international railway benchmarking).

Image source: Chilean Ministry of Economy and Tourism:  https://www.sepchile.cl/   

Read more »

Wide Open Road: how did Australia plan pedestrians, cyclists and transit out of its cities?

Author: Peter Newman

Professor of Sustainability at Curtin University

Before the motorcar “owned” the road, cyclists weren’t seen as space-taking nuisance.

The ABC documentary Wide Open Road is a totally fascinating history of the car in Australia.

The characters who pioneered the car in the Australian bush 100 years ago are remarkable. The images of Australian cities as the first cars arrived on the scene are wonderful, with their carts and trams winding through huge flows of pedestrians and cyclists.

Read more »

Driven to despair in Australia’s outer suburbs

Author: Peter Newman
Professor of Sustainability at Curtin University of Technology

In cities all over the industrial world, people are driving less. Changes to society and the structures of our cities have made jumping in the car less popular. But what does this mean for people who have no choice but to drive?

Getting out of the car: easy for some. Hunter Desportes/Flickr

Read more »

It's not about roads

Mary Newsom at the Charlotte Observer has been thinking about roads. The word 'roads'. Too often discussion about transportation in a city is expressed in debate about 'roads', conjuring up images of asphalt and cars. This is quite different to the word 'street' which carries some sense of urban design with it - a street has other things going on, whereas a road doesn't. Even better is 'transportation':

“Transportation” means auto and foot traffic, bicycles, planes, trucks, trains, buses and streetcars. Call it “transportation,” and you're already thinking more broadly.

Charlotte Observer August 29th

Reducing transportation

The New York Times reports that moves are afoot to radically reduce carbon emissions from transportation. Cars and trucks currently contribute 28% of the States total emissions, increasing fast.

The report was released by federal agencies in partnership with environmental groups and industry. The NYT reports that,

transportation emissions could be reduced 24 percent by 2050 by acting to change travel behavior and land-use patterns. The emissions reduction hit 47 percent by adding road pricing techniques, ranging from pay-as-you-go insurance to charging Americans for every mile driven.

NYT 28.07.09
via Planetizen

Melbourne CBD, its close neighbours and its greater rest: a question about public transport, equity and urban quality

The following notes were written for the presentation delivered at the Sustainable Living Festival, under the title of Sustainable Transport – Visions for Victoria in 2010. It contains all what I didn’t say and some bits of what I actually spoke about. Public transport is an ongoing issue for cities in Australia and it is one that we hope will drive all the professions of the built environment to jointly address it as a critical urban issue. I would appreciate comments or questions that could assist to further develop these ideas.

Melbourne CBD, its close neighbours and its greater rest: a question about public transport, equity and urban quality

Beatriz C. Maturana
Architects for Peace

Melbourne is a city fractioned not only spatially but also in our perception of what Melbourne involves. Think for a moment about the dichotomy between the notions of ‘city’ and suburbs as opposed to city and its centre—the first referring to what the city is and the suburbs are not, with the latter referring to an entire city with a centre. This fractioned notion of Melbourne coincides—whether by mere chance or design—with the delimitations defined the extent of its public transport. Quality public transport means a transport service that offers at least two reliable transport modes (underground, buses, perhaps although less efficient for a large metropolis, trains and trams), frequent, direct, affordable, available day and night (including weekends) and accessible by a five minutes walk.

When we think of Melbourne, we tend to think of the CBD (central business district), and areas such as Richmond, Prahran, Fitzroy, Brunswick…. What all these areas have in common is that they display the best in urban qualities. There is an energy due to the multiplicity of activities, (universities, work, commerce, markets, services, schools and child care centres, proximity to hospitals, amenities, entertainment)—all relatively close by, and accessible by a variety of means: bicycle, tram, buses, train, walking. Most would agree that these conditions are optimal—the property market agrees too, tagging properties in these areas the highest. So, do the above mentioned areas represent Melbourne, or is this idea a misconception? Perhaps these areas represent only half of Melbourne or a third of Melbourne—and that would be serious, because the rest is not like what I have just described. Are these areas just one tenth of the real Melbourne? No, unfortunately Melbourne’s CBD, Richmond, Prahran, Fitzroy, Brunswick…. represent only one 20th of Melbourne—let’s say one 15th for good measure. The rest—the large majority of suburbs—in different degrees, do not enjoy closeness to amenities and services, multiplicity of activities, diversity of people and culture. Nor do these suburbs of Melbourne enjoy public transport choices, often no public transport at all.

Whereas wealth and heritage assist some suburbs to foster an urban character of their own (for example Malvern, Surrey Hills or Heidelberg), the ‘rest’, is defined by what is left when major road connectors, freeways and ‘one mile’ warehouse shopping strips (with their equally large street level carparks) are accommodated. Add some pieces of bushland reserves and this is the real Melbourne where most people live. The city’s centre, the CBD and surrounding suburbs, makes Melbourne a quality city, but metropolitan Melbourne involves places as far as St Albans, Laverton, -Cranbourne and Craigieburn. The lack of connectivity between periphery and centre or around its periphery, casts a question regarding Melbourne’s equity in the distribution of services and amenity. The following example illustrates how access to public transport affects people in different urban areas: a household in inner Melbourne, or the City of Yarra, will undertake and average of 5.4 walk trips per day. However, a household in Wyndham or Melton will undertake an average of 1.9 walk trips per day. For those not familiar with Melbourne suburbs, Melton and Wyndham are further away form Melbourne CBD.[1]

The role that public transport has in reducing or increasing the social exclusion is well documented, not least by Dr Jane Stanley who presented at Architects for Peace 2007 forum, Transported.[2] The following statement shows that the government is also well aware of the social inequity resulting from this situation.
Limited public transport services have the most impact on communities that are experiencing a range of other disadvantages, such as higher unemployment and reliance on social services. Lack of transport services can exacerbate isolation and limit access to opportunities.[3] At a risk of repeating what you may already know, walking patterns have health, economic, social and urban consequences. Car dependency makes people walk less, makes the viability of corner shops almost impossible (for example try to find a corner shop in new developments such as Caroline Springs where people drive to the supermarket, drive children to schools etc). It makes the streets more deserted, so the perception of danger increases. Suburbs not serviced by quality public transport, no matter how neat and manicured they may be (or how many awards the developers may accumulate for their landscaping), are no longer the pedestrian domains but the domain of the car. Subsequently, houses begin to turn their backs toward the roads. In roads with heavier traffic, large warehouse style businesses settle in. We have the McDonalds in one corner and KFC in the other—repeating regularly across Melbourne’s suburbs—perhaps this is the real Melbourne. Is this the fault of these businesses, the housing industry, or is this a problem with our government, at all levels?

Somewhere in Melbourne's periphery, the landscaped desolated streets.

There is no doubt that increase density justifies and assists the delivery of transport services, but what comes first? Housing—naturally, organically and as experience demonstrates—congregates and increase in density close to where good transport services are provided. It is therefore misleading to place the responsibility of opting for denser housing options and use of public transport services on people. People cannot opt for an underdeveloped transport service, nor can they (us) be expected to opt for density, if this does not deliver the advantages those denser areas around the CBD enjoy—human urban scale, comparatively good public transport, multiplicity of services and amenities. I suggest that it is time to cease shifting the responsibility on individual citizens and to lobby the government (or work with the government), to implement changes that will radically transform our underdeveloped public transport—only governments can do this. Half measures are domed to fail. The public will not opt for public transport when they become more educated on the ecological advantages of it, but when in practice it proves useful. For decades the public in Stockholm, Santiago in Chile, Vancouver, Barcelona and many other cities, has not failed to recognise the advantage offered by their public transport, and this has not been due to their knowledge on sustainable options—although this of course can augment the interest.

On the outskirts of Stockholm, bus and metro services.

These days some councils in the outskirts of Melbourne are also embarking on large and ambitious urban projects, some do better than others, but the challenge is how to build ‘city’ rather than a series of disconnected urban events. Building city relies on overlapping and interaction, movement and connectivity in a manner that is ecologically and socially responsible. Transport in this sense must allow multiple options, multiple ways of living and different living aspirations. For example, access to public transport in the outskirts of Melbourne should provide everyone, including the teenager and the elderly citizen with the options to come and go to anywhere in the city anytime, any day with a maximum waiting time of five minutes, with a maximum walking distance to transport services of 5 minutes walking, and at an affordable cost. Most cities within rich nations have this, why can’t Melbourne have this? Why can each city and town in Victoria be connected by a bus service every 5, 10 or 15 minutes? Barcelona has this, Santiago, Berlin, why doesn’t our government see public transport as a priority? Note that all the cities I have mentioned have an element that makes all excuses as to why Melbourne cannot enjoy a quality public transport meaningless. Some of these cities have a similar population (Barcelona, Santiago), some smaller populations (Stockholm), similar density (Vancouver), some are located in poorer countries some in wealthier countries—what all have in common is that they enjoy a cheaper and efficient public transport that involves at least buses, and underground, in some cases also trams, and with waiting times that vary from 90 sec average for the underground to 5 minutes for buses. There are no outdated level crossings, no prescribed times and variable weekdays service.

Melbourne's underdeveloped public transport says much about the will, ideology and priorities of our governments, as about the professionals of the built environment. A few years ago, Donald Schön, discussing the crisis faced by the professions, suggested that professionals pay much attention to problem solving and little attention to understand and identify the nature of the problem.[4] To follow on his example, the problem may not be how to resolve the cost of the freeway, or its look, or whether the level crossing has been nicely landscaped and the handrails comply with the regulations. The question might be whether these ‘solutions’ are providing the answer to our current transport needs or just reinforcing a pattern of obsolete ideas about transport—and it is in this area in which the professionals of the built environment have been complacent.

Governments (at all levels) and professional experts allow important sites within and around the city to be use as carparks—not for public housing, not for clinics or schools, but for carparks. And in the suburbs experts allows the creation of large street level carparks, in other words, large deserts of bitumen and steel. How socially, or environmentally sustainable are these practices? However, we continue to allow financial resources to support these ‘solutions’.

I suggest that we have done well in providing answers to detailed problems set in an already prescribed agenda, but is this agenda addressing the real problem? And what is exactly the nature of the problem? Shouldn’t the urban professions, in the fulfilment of their pledge to the public interest be more pro-active in demanding investment in a real public transport? A public transport that could solve more than a need to get between A and B but that would also assist to diminish our embarrassingly high contribution to greenhouse gases per capita, while adding urban vitality between A and B.

In sum, the professions of the built environment can and should be directly and actively involved on issues that affect the city. Transport is key aspect that defines the quality and health of our urban space.

Cities are complex and rich systems and solutions cannot be approached in an isolated manner. It is essential to understand that public transport play a crucial role in the urban quality of the city, and this responsibility and implications go beyond the realm of what one discipline can do, in this case beyond the realm of traffic engineers. It is essential for the professions of the built environment to work in collaboration. It is also essential for these professions to play an active role and together with the politicians, develop an agenda that is inclusive of all the issues involved. What we would like to see:

Transport is not a traffic issue, it is an urban issue. A collective transport solution that is an integral part of the city, its social, urban and environmental fabric. The quality of the city (the entire city) cannot be separated from the quality of its transport. Good quality urban spaces are not isolated events. They work in connection with its surrounding neighbourhoods and municipalities—together they form the city.

Transport must connect the entire city, be time efficient and affordable. It must run frequently and be available anytime, any day. In a city like Melbourne, transport should not determine the way in which people live, but rather offer people real choices. The public deserves a good collective transport system and the environment cannot afford any less.

We need to find an inclusive a holistic and a collaborative way to address the quality of our cities and with this its transport. Quality depends on approaches that are encompassing of human and non-human beasts, buildings, roads, traffic, vegetations, commerce (of all scales), and services. We hope that government (at all levels) begin to trust the professions and the community, not as recipients of set agendas, but as partners. This requires openness to criticism, openness to question the premises. It requires trust in collaborative processes.

-----------------

References:

[1] While this data was obtained in 1999 and things may have changed since, what can be inferred from the information is the correlation between access to public transport and propensity to walk. Refer to Victorian Activity and Travel Survey, “Trip Rates per Household on the Average Weekday by LGA”, RMIT University, 1999. In article by David Sykes, "Vats Has the Facts," Local Connections March 2004.
[2] Refer for example to: John Stanley and Janet Stanley, "Public Transport and Social Exclusion: An Operator's Perspective," No Way to Go 1, no. 1 (2007).
[3] Integrated Transport in Department of Infrastructure. "Melbourne 2030: Planning for Sustainable Growth - October 2002." (Place Published: Victorian Government Department of Sustainability and Environment Melbourne, 2003), http://www.dse.vic.gov.au/melbourne2030online/downloads/2030_complete.pdf.
[4] See Donald A. Schön, The Design Studio : An Exploration of Its Traditions and Potentials, Architecture and the Higher Learning. (London: RIBA Publications for RIBA Building Industry Trust, 1985).

* Note that the public transport in Santiago has undergone an extremely difficult period under the new TranSantiago. Much remain to be said about this bold move, but this belong to another discussion...perhaps somewhere under the role of the 'experts'.

sustainable-living-festival: transport

,sustainablelivingfestival

Presents: Sustainable Transport–Visions for Victoria in 2010
Sun 17th Feb. 10:00am-12:00pm, Fed. Square, The Edge, Melbourne


Following up on our 2007 Transported Forum, Architects for Peace, along with a range of sustainable transport organisations, will take part in the Sustainable Living Festival. The aim is to present a vision on where Victoria could be in 2010. This two hour event is part of the 2008 Sustainable Living Festival. The organisations and speakers include:

• Australasian Centre for the Governance And Management of Urban Transport (Gamut) - John Stone
• Architects for Peace - Beatriz C. Maturana
• Blind Citizens Australia - Jessica Zammit
• Department of Infrastructure - Jim Betts
• Metropolitan Transport Forum - Jackie Fristacky
• Planning Institute of Australia - Jason Black
• Public Transport Users Association (Victoria) - Kerryn Wilmot
• Tourism & Transport Forum - Stewart Prins
• Victorian Local Governance Association - Greg Thomas
  

Find more: http://www.slf.org.au/festival/program/talks/1361

We hope to see you all there. Architects for Peace will have an information table and we would welcome your assistance.

(image by: sustainablelivingfestival)

Transported 2007arch-peace forum

Transported

2007 Architects for Peace Forum
A collaborative partnership between Architects for Peace, VicHealth, RMIT Public Art, Village Well and UNESCO Observatory

Date: Saturday September 1, 2007 (11am-7:30pm)
Venue: RMIT University, Building 94, 23-27 Cardigan Street, Carlton
Everyone welcome
Find more or click on your tickets to register your attendance: http://transported.wordpress.com/

Architects for Peace Annual Forum is an opportunity to focus on a particular area of the built environment to create debate and to inform our members, professionals of the built environment and the general public.

In 2007 the topic is collective transport and sustainable cities. We hope to use this forum to create discussion and to inform a position paper for the Melbourne Futures.

We aim to open the debate of possible alternatives the a car dependent city and develop an information exchange of the ideas presented at the forum via our website.

Please register your attendance on line:
http://transported.wordpress.com/program/registration/


Cost: $5 students, $10 member, $15 non-member


This event is sponsored by VicHealth

Transported: 2007 arch-peace forum

TRANSPORTED...

Transported (Sat. September 1, 2007), will be a one-day forum that will discuss the issue of collective modes of transportation in relation to climate change and responsible urban development. The purpose of this forum is to bring together academics and community perspectives for a dialogue that reveals the magnitude and ramifications that transport has in our environment and every day life.

This forum involves the participation of academics, transport lobbyists, politicians, and socio-physical exclusion experts. A main aspect of this forum will be the invitation of secondary school students from Melbourne's periphery, who will have the opportunity to participate in the forum and workshop.

Possible outcomes from the forum:

• Promotion of a cross-disciplinary approach to tackle urban issues
• Future directions - model
• Lobbying
• Awareness and education

Topics so far:

• City, Health and Education
• Technology + Transport
• Learning from other cities: focus on overseas initiatives
• Implications: social, economical, political and environmental
• Art Projects
• Workshop (tailored to secondary students)

At this stage we are working in a collaborative partnership with Unesco Observatory, RMIT Public Art and the participation of Prof Nicholas Low, director of Gamut (Australasian Centre for the Governance and Management of Urban Transport).

If you would like to be involved in this exciting forum, please contact us here and become part of our Transported multidisciplinary team.