AN OPERATIONAL SEQUENCE FOR ESTABLISHING BALANCE BETWEEN CARS AND PEDESTRIANS

REBUILDING DOWNTOWN

THE GRADUAL TRANSFORMATION OF PUBLIC SPACE IN A CITY

A 15-Year Plan For The Transformation Of The Downtown Areas

By Christopher Alexander

Chairman, PatternLanguage.com

AN OPERATIONAL SEQUENCE FOR ESTABLISHING BALANCE BETWEEN CARS AND PEDESTRIANS



The modern city has lost its vibrancy, because the pedestrian world has been damaged; yet the modern city depends to a huge extent on cars and trucks. The two have still not been reconciled in a successful balance. In the ideal interactions of pedestrians and cars, cars are vibrant, pedestrians are vibrant, the two zones are separated but touch everywhere.

Rejuvenation of the city -- any city -- requires that this condition is attained.

There are at least five ways it can be done.

(1) Cars moving slowly -- people and cars mixed up

(2) Quiet place, good space for pedestrians, narrow slow space for cars

(3) Wide densely traveled pedestrian streets crossing densely traveled roads with cars and buses

(4) Pedestrian lanes, internal to the block

(5) Cars dominate, with access to beautiful and pure pedestrian space


Problem

Cities, if they are to be vibrant cultural and eocnomic centers must be pleasant places to be. People will want to spend time there. 21st century solutions of a more intimate human scale, a more intelligent approach to resources, and a more inspiring view of the modern city can be achieved. The city of the future should not be, as some may think, a fabric to be modernized by stripping out and enlargement of structure, and by destruction. Instead, careful observation, street by street, wall by wall, of the very subtle things which work now, and which make people deeply comfortable, can provide a new kind of solution more in keeping with the humanity of our new century, more in keeping with the promise of the 21st century as the century of biology -- that is, a century which may now be dominated by small scale intimacy, by complexity arrived at by working complexity created by sometimes tiny human structures cooperating to form more complex streets, and spaces, and foci, and opportunities for human life.

This is what can create a highly modern city of economic strength, where people of the region genuinely want to be, and to which they will come in search of their regional focus. The city of Thessaloniki is a prime example which may show a new wave of intelligent humanity, preserving the values of Greek civilization and daily life, and entirely different from the neotechnic and too-commercial fantasies of such places as Frankfurt, the suburbs of Paris, or Bilbao.

This true and human future of the city, is the path through which the city can achieve its regional leadership.

The following sequence of thirteen points represent a first sketch of a process intended to reach these ends in Thessaloniki. It is a proposal based on a request from the Ministry of Northern Greece. The same sequence, in broad outline, may be followed anywhere.

THE SHAPE OF PUBLIC URBAN SPACE
Urban spaces - streets and squares - are the living rooms of society.
Well being of people depends on the urban space.
Since arrival of the car, urban space of major cities has not functioned as a living room.
The most urgent problem, for the regeneration of the modern city, and for the city of Thessaloniki, is to create a comprehensive system of space in which human meeting, interaction, engagement, and above all true belonging, can occur.

The first step is in identifying existing and potential "living rooms" small and large throughout the city.

THE VITAL INTERPLAY OF PEDESTRIANS AND CARS
The crux is the interface of cars and pedestrians
Pedestrianization is now recognized and is being accomplished.
But urban life in modern times depends on the meeting of cars and pedestrians
New forms of interaction must be defined and implemented.

IDENTIFYING THE SMALL BLOCKS FORMING THE CENTRAL CITY
From Niki to Agiou Dimitriou, and from the White Tower to Vardari Square, this is the core of the city, and represents about 300 blocks, or 600 one-block street-segments.
Thus it contains about 600 distinct urban spaces.

Any city can be mapped out in this way.

The second step is creating this map.

FINANCING A PROGRAM OF REFORM AND RESHAPING STREET SEGMENTS BY COORDINATED PIECEMEAL ACTION
In the case of Thessaloniki the total cost would be about $100 million, financed by combination of public works, European funds and loans, and private investment.
The program would be to spend about $6 million per year for fifteen years
Each year about 25 blocks will have improvements made, completing the work of 400 blocks in about 15 years.

The third step is in securing adequate funding from multiple sources.

DIAGNOSIS OF URBAN STREET SPACE AND ITS LIVING QUALITY AS THE GUIDING TOOL FOR ACTION
Street segments can be judged according to the condition they are in today
Some are very good; some are adequate; some are poor.
Each block can be diagnosed in more detail, to identify what it is that makes it fall short of being good as urban space.

THE PROCESS OF DIAGNOSIS IS TO BE PEOPLE-BASED, POSSIBLY USING THE INTERNET TO GAIN HELP AND OPINIONS OF THE PEOPLE LIVING THERE, AS ONE OF THE MAJOR TOOLS OF COMMUNICATION
Internet access is growing rapidly
Tools for making diagnosis can be simply explained
Evidence shows that people make coherent and roughly similar judgements of quality of public space
The Internet can - and will - involve people in a growing collective consciousness to supplement their intense individuality, but in an available modern form.
Internet methods will be supplemented by non-internet methods to provide opinions and involvement of all people regardless of computer access.

The fourth step is identifying an appropriate process for wide involvement by the people who live, and therefore know intimately, what will work or not work in their neighborhood.

A SYSTEM OF TRANSFORMATIONS TO IMPROVE STREETS.
For blocks whose space is not good, broad kinds of transformations may be applied: Examples of typically useful transformations include

  • methods which change pedestrian-car ratio,
  • which create pure pedestrian streets in some blocks
  • in some cases wider sidewalks,
  • more asymmetries between sidewalks and cars
  • which create crossing movement of pedestrians and cars
  • which create half blocks,
  • which create pedestrian streets in the middle flanked by automobile traffic
  • which create small streets where both pedestrians and cars are comfortable;
  • which create zones where cars and pedestrians freely mix without danger
  • which create small loops of car movement entering into pedestrian intense zones.
  • innovative use of small taxis, and small buses in new configurations.

All these examples exist as successful items in the present urban structure of the 600 blocks in Thessaloniki, but the good cases are vastly outweighed by the bad cases.
These ideal transformations need to be defined more carefully, in a way that is particular to the city and culture.

The fifth step is to identify the transformation most appropriate to the small block.

THE OVERALL WHOLE IS TO BE GENERATED NOT BY A SINGLE MASTER PLAN BUT BY SUCH A SYSTEM OF TRANSFORMATIONS APPLIED TO INDIVIDUAL BLOCKS ONE AT A TIME.
The primary form of decision about timing on different blocks, will be based on the diagnosis and on the urgency of action on the different streets.
Also the role played by each street, and the extent of its contribution to the whole, may be a major factor in deciding in what order actions are to be taken.
In certain cases large structures will be defined, that may guide the overall coherence of the small street-by-street actions, to encourage emergence of defined and necessary larger structures.
In some cases the action may occur, not only on one street at a time, but two or three streets, as necessary for instance, to create adequate and coherent focus on the ancient monuments of the city as major focal points.

The sixth step is to prioritize work and budgetary expenditure.

ADMINISTRATIVE COORDINATION OF THE ENTIRE PROCESS IS TO BE PROVIDED BY A JOINT EFFORT OF THE APPROPRIATE GOVERNMENT AGENCIES

PEOPLE, COOPERATING WITH AGENCIES (BUSINESS-PEOPLE, INDIVIDUALS, LOCAL PEOPLE, MEN, WOMEN AND CHILDREN) WILL BE INVITED TO HELP SHOW HOW AND WHAT SHOULD BE DONE ON THE BLOCK THAT IS "THEIRS".
Once again helped by tools given on the Internet, and supplied by public agencies of the city and local government, people can help to decide how these transformations may be applied best, to each block.
The quality of transformation done on different blocks, by discussion with people, will become part of the instrument used to decide priority and timing of the work on different streets.

THE SUCCESSFUL VISION AND INVOLVED COOPERATION OF PEOPLE, COUPLED WITH THE INTERNET-DISTRIBUTED SYSTEM OF TRANSFORMATIONS THAT ARE DEFINED BY THE PUBLIC AGENCIES OF THE CITY, IS TO CREATE THE WHOLE.
It is a major feature of this proposal that urban space is not only made better, not only made coherent and beautiful, and connected, but that it also contains the desires and will and thought of many, many individual people - so that people, together, feel and experience the ownership of the space which becomes and invitation to all people in the region.

THE END RESULT CAN BE A CITY, IN WHICH PUBLIC SPACE ONCE AGAIN BELONGS TO PEOPLE, IN WHICH PLEASANTNESS OF EVERYDAY LIFE IS THE GUIDING FEATURE, AND PEOPLE FEEL A TRUE OWNERSHIP OF THE CITY.
Deep pleasantness of the city has been identified by several economists as a major pre-requisite for success in the city's evolution as a regional center.
Under the program described and - we believe - only under this kind of program, the pleasantness that is activated will be sufficient to create sustained regional development for the region as a whole.