the Edge is hosting a series of thought-leadership discussions on the future city of 2030-2040 in partnership with Taylor Wessing and UCEM
3. Clustering and Proximity
Is the ideal of the dense, social, mixed-use and walkable city still fit for the future?
Ideas of city clustering and walkable neighbourhoods, achieved through high densities and close physical proximity, have been prominent in urban planning discussions for many decades and have been widely applied. The downsides, especially to the poor and dispossessed, have long been considered manageable and a price worth paying for the benefits created.
How will this dominant urban planning approach develop in the face of environmental, social, economic and policy challenges in the next two decades?
Context
Cities have been rediscovered in recent years as desirable and creative places to live, work and party. Heritage and former industrial areas have been reinvented and new parts of cities created along similar lines, but with added high-rises and high-density housing. Associated impacts of overshadowing, overheating and overlooking have been accepted as worthwhile trade-offs for physical proximity to workplace, retail and leisure amenities.
Cities across the world have embraced the density mantra, especially as a means of coping with population pressures and the unremitting demand for growth.
The COVID-19 crisis has challenged this model, as:
space and distance have suddenly regained their value;
footfall in city centres and retail areas are projected to be far lower in both the immediate and the medium-term future as working from home continues;
local suburban neighbourhoods are proving more resilient than metropolitan centres;
long-term trends and changes towards social polarisation have been accelerated by the crisis;
housing space standards and outdoor amenity have come under renewed scrutiny with the rising awareness that living in close proximity carries public health consequences; and
the number of people moving around cities has reduced, with many local authorities taking the opportunity to introduce low traffic neighbourhoods and reclaim street space for pedestrians and cyclists.
Looking Ahead to 2040
Can the principles of density and clustering be reinvented for the post-Covid world?
Will the social and creative city thrive or be diminished; and
is the dense city still the answer to the net zero carbon question?
Chair: Patricia Brown, Central
Speakers:
Charles Landry, Comedia, Author - The Creative City
Jamie Ratcliff, Network Homes
Selina Mason, Director of Masterplanning, Lendlease
Ronald Nyakairu, Senior Manager, Local Data Company
Online: Zoom
Timing: Tuesday 1st December 2020, 16.00 – 17.30
Book tickets: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/city-2040-series-clustering-and-proximity-tickets-128063913613
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