Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Like Wendell Berry, Bollier sees commons-thinking as a push-back against “inevitability,” and as an invitation to hold fast to our ability, as human beings, to imagine an alternative to simple acceptance when we see, as he said in Salina, something “rooted in an ecosystem is redefined as a market commodity.”
Climate challenges do not affect all people equally. House by house, block by block, there are huge differences in vulnerability based on geography, health status, income level and other factors. Such differences are not always visible to decision-makers. F
For us a Playable City is specifically a human-led response to challenges for cities that are using technology in a way that connects people to each other.
My advice for young adults everywhere is this: pick an issue you’re passionate about and volunteer. You’ll meet people who care about the same things, and more importantly, you’ll be DOING SOMETHING to make the world a better place.
The library’s yard was dubbed the Reading Park, and a clear vision for the space soon came into focus — it would be where the library could reach out to Buffalo’s underserved communities, with expanded programming covering everything from literacy to nutrition.
Resilience is a result of connections between people, not a physical feature of a place. So, as we adapt to a changing climate, public spaces are the key to strengthening the community ties that help us bounce back from disaster.
Coming to terms with the historic displacement of communities in Chattanooga, particularly of Black and Native American populations, has meant finding new ways to talk about its public spaces.
It was a fenced-off World War II bomb site that had rewilded, and a team of London artists decided it was the perfect place to grow a medicine garden. The site is in the middle of a social housing complex in the Bethnal Green neighborhood of Tower Hamlets, a London borough that has become the U.K.’s second most densely populated local authority, the basic unit of local government.
We live where we do, and we become what we are through that lived environment, organically. If there is a consequence to it, it might be best, at the very least, that it not be one already determined by a planning board, because however well-meaning, their logic is likely not to be wholly their own.
Subway systems, trams, Bus-Rapid-Transit, high-speed trains, cars – these can all play useful roles in well-designed transportation systems. But we must not forget what still is and what should remain the world’s most important transportation method: walking. That is one of the key messages of Beyond Mobility: Planning Cities for People and Places, a survey of urban planning successes and failures around the world.
While there is no one park or town square that can accommodate 22.5 million people, which is the global refugee population according to recent UN estimates, public spaces can still play a key role in addressing today’s global refugee crisis.
A handful of cultural associations obtained concessions to use garden lots, opening them to the public. These associations, federated within the “Fédération des Murs à Pêches,” organize a cultural festival every year as a strategic effort to build a strong network of citizens who are ready to oppose future urbanization of the site.
