Social Participation in the Context of the Urban Public Space Renewal： The Case of Lagarteiro Neighborhood in Oporto

In 1980, Giancarlo de Carlo wrote in the Perspecta： Yale Journal, ＂An Architecture of the Participation＂. Carlo, proposed a sequence of procedures： the problem definition, the solution and the results evaluation, in all the three steps, the social communities should be integrated in as part of a share and dynamic process. This text corresponds to a new way of understanding the importance of the social communities in the architecture definition. From de Carlo＇s text, the main goal of this paper is to present the results of an intervention in public space renewal of the Lagarteiro neighborhood （in Oporto city） and the relation of this process with the participation of the resident population. The urban context of Lagarteiro＇s neighborhood presented before the intervention the typical and classic signs of disqualification of environmental and urban peripheral areas of resettlement. The term ＂disadvantaged areas＂ is associated with these areas in urban or peri-urban case, was framed in a specific Portuguese policy, called Initiative Critical Neighborhoods. Being a recent intervention, the renewal of the public space in Lagarteiro is a complete case study that allows comprehending the participation phenomenon in nowadays, at the same time that seduces a reflexion about technical and architectural solutions for ＂critical＂ neighborhood.     

‘Urban entrepreneurialism’ in the Post-socialist City: Government-led Urban Development Projects in Kazan,Russia

While the dominance of urban entrepreneurialism, governance and competitiveness in Western cities has been well documented, much less is known about the drivers and mechanisms of urban development in the Russian context. This article examines the role of the local state in urban development under the conditions of post-socialist transition in the Russian Federation. The article focuses on the Special Federal Programme for the Preservation and Development of the Kazan Historic Centre (2001–2005). The study challenges the assumption of a key role of partnership between the public and the private sector. Under conditions of post-socialism, the state may have sufficient economic resources and the capacity to govern which may make the role of public–private partnership less relevant. Other findings are as follows: (i) the local authorities play a leading role in entrepreneurialism; (ii) there is a mismatch between the entrepreneurial rhetoric and reality; (iii) while the authorities in Kazan engage in ‘entrepreneurial urbanism’, the similarities with Western cities are superficial or even deceptive, due to the underlying political and economic conditions of Russian cities.     

The ‘Silent’ Closure of Urban Public Space in Cape Town: 1975 to 2004

This study seeks to show that the closure of urban public space by residents in a South African context is not a recent phenomenon and that successful citizen-driven urban public space closures have been a feature of the urban landscape before the rise of gated communities and monitored urban public space. The primary objective of the study was to analyse and investigate spatio-temporal tendencies relating to the citizen-driven privatisation of urban public space in Cape Town. This objective would be driven by the creation of a comprehensive database of provincially gazetted urban land closures dating from 7 February 1975 to 17 December 2004 within one of the six municipal substructure regions of Cape Town. The secondary objective, but by no means less important, is an identification and analysis of the reasons forwarded, practices employed and techniques utilised by individual citizen-driven applications in two distinctly diverse residential suburbs within the study area.

From Product to Process: Building on Urban-Think Tank’s Approach to the Informal City

Adriana Navarro-Sertich interviews a pioneer of the informal in architecture, co-founder and co-director of Urban-Think Tank (U-TT) Alfredo Brillembourg . Brillembourg explains how U-TT's work seeks to connect informal settlements with the formal city, enabling inhabitants to access services and infrastructure. U-TT is now taking the lessons it has learnt in working in Latin American cities, such as Caracas and São Paulo, elsewhere in the world with the aim of ‘working globally and acting locally’. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Smart Cities: Towards a New Citizenship Regime? A Discourse Analysis of the British Smart City Standard

Growing practice interest in smart cities has led to calls for a less technology-oriented and more citizen-centric approach. In response, this article investigates the citizenship mode promulgated by the smart city standard of the British Standards Institution. The analysis uses the concept of citizenship regime and a mixture of quantitative and qualitative methods to discern key discursive frames defining the smart city and the particular citizenship dimensions brought into play. The results confirm an explicit citizenship rationale guiding the smart city (standard), although this displays some substantive shortcomings and contradictions. The article concludes with recommendations for both further theory and practice development.     

Beyond the Scarcities of Affluence: An ‘Alternative Hedonist’ Approach

Kate Soper describes how at a time when the gap between the rich and poor has grown wider, scarcity has become a product of affluence in a double sense. Not only is consumption using up material and energy resources for everyone, for the wealthiest section of the world's population the pleasures of consumption are also being paid for by the dearth of life's other qualities, such as sufficient leisure time, good health and an environment free of pollution and congestion.     

Impact of “We Media” on Public Participation in Urban Planning:A Case Study on the Urban Design of Xuanwu Avenue in Nanjing

From a stakeholder perspective, this paper discusses the positive and negative impacts of “We Media” on public participation in urban planning based on a case study on the public event related to the Urban Design of Xuanwu Avenue in Nanjing. This research draws the following conclusions. Firstly,“We Media” helps to reduce the cost of the bottom-up feedback in the public participation process as it expands information dissemination approaches, and the comprehensiveness and objectiveness of the in...     

On the Question of Using the Concept ‘Slum Tourism’ for Urban Tourism in Stigmatised Neighbourhoods in Inner City Johannesburg

Since 2012, there has been a significant growth in tourism in inner city Johannesburg. Some of this tourism materialises as walking tours in disadvantaged and relatively poor inner city neighbourhoods, some of which were until recently considered no-go areas. In a paper published in Urban Forum in 2014 (Frenzel 2014), I have analysed this new phenomenon in the context of slum tourism. I define slum tourism as such forms of tourism where poverty and associated signifiers become central themes and (part of the) attraction of the visited destination. Following a broad empirical research project, Hoogendoorn and Giddy (2017) have questioned whether the concept slum tourism should be used when discussing tourism in inner city Johannesburg. This paper forms a response to the paper of Hoogendoorn and Giddy (2017).     

“Not a Lot of People Read the Stuff”: Australian Urban Research in Planning Practice

At the 2013 State of Australian Cities (SOAC) Conference, a dedicated plenary session examined the blunt prospect of “Who cares about Australian Urban Research?” One group apparently not reading, or not making extensive use of, urban research is Australian urban planners. Drawing on interviews and focus groups undertaken for a recent research project, in this paper we examine the nature of the research-practice Relationship in an Australian urban planning context. We explore the limited extent to which practitioners engage with research outputs; and the entrenched barriers to research to practice information exchange. While our interviews indicate planners are concerned about the lack of a solid research base with which to underpin many policies, assumptions and decisions; we find that time-poor professionals largely rely on popular media, industry publications and practice networks to inform decision making. Further, the political and reactive environment of planning practice means the role for evidence in consensus-driven decision-making is fraught and far from clearly defined. Ultimately the project highlights the extent to which the resources required to digest research, interpret its local significance, and apply it to practice can be underestimated.     

Examining Open Data at the Urban Level: An Exploration of “Wellbeing Toronto”

This paper examines how Wellbeing Toronto (WT)—a free, open data, GIS tool that allows users to map information—has evolved into an extensive data repository with robust data analysis capabilities. Explored is the progress of open data scholarship in relation to municipal government and civic participation. Based on this, the authors note the following: (1) as open data becomes increasingly prevalent, a more varied understanding of the organization and structure of municipal government may emerge. (2) There is a need for measures of civic engagement to move beyond data co-production towards an organization-based interactive approach.     

Queering Mobility in Urban Gauteng: Transgender Internal Migrants and Their Experiences of “Transition” in Johannesburg and Pretoria

Migration studies in post-Apartheid South Africa have maintained a strong focus on cross-border mobility while often narrowing health-related research to HIV/AIDS concerns and framing gender in woman-oriented approach with a gradually emerging area of research on migrant sex workers. This article offers to bridge certain gaps in migration research on health, internal mobility, and gender. It revolves around experiences of black unprivileged transgender internal migrants accessing medical services in the public health sector in urban Gauteng, in particular, Johannesburg and Pretoria. The article explores their experiences of migration focusing on analysis of their “transition”—both “gendered transition” (different medical interventions that alter/modify gender-related attributes of the body) and “spatial transition” (diverse mobility patters, relocation, renegotiation of place of living and belonging)—and ways they negotiate belonging. The analysis outlines challenges that transgender individuals face in the public health sector and affects these challenges have on mobility of transgender South Africans. Further, the article delves into exploration of transgender internal migrants’ experiences and understanding of “migration” that arises from sense of (non)belonging and ways to negotiate dynamic subjective sense of being (or not) part of physical (and sometimes imaginary) social groups and places, such as family/home, local (“host”) community, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community, and religion/spirituality.     

Developmental Urbanism,City Image Branding and the “Right to the City” in Transitional China

From the 1980s, urban-led economic pursuits, city image building, and residency control of rural migrants have been three key elements which are complementary yet conflicting in China’s development path. Whilst the two former are pro-growth oriented, the “low-image” and “potential risk to slum formation” of rural migrants are found by the state to be incompatible with the modernist urbanism sought after. Under the state’s ambitious city branding and intensive-cum-high value operations, the paper revisits Henri Lefebvre and David Harvey’s notions on the “right to the city”. It highlights the social injustice issue of differentiated citizenship in terms of inequity of access to services and inequality between urban and rural origins. City-branding efforts have indeed contributed towards economic efficiency and land use rationalization but are characterized by an asymmetrical power and spatial redistribution process filled with inequalities against migrant workers and deprivation of rights. Recent developments have shown that the state has compromised and become more people-oriented and inclusive in its approach towards rural migrants.     

Smart Grid in China: a promising solution to China’s energy and environmental issues

Smart Grid presages an advanced power grid that revolutionizes the century-old traditional power grid and the way mankind uses energy. In China, the pressure on the current grid exerted by growing demand, environmental issues and the unbalanced energy use structure makes the transition to a ‘smarter’ and ‘cleaner’ grid inevitable. This paper firstly contrasts the concepts and research priorities of Smart Grid of China and other developed countries; then turns to the situation of Chinese energy and power use. China has the largest generating capacity, 79% of which is coal-fired plants. And China is also the largest carbon emitter in the world. Despite the challenges, China is also the most promising market for Smart Grid. The components of Smart Grid, especially the development of renewable energy, electric vehicles and smart substation are reinforced in the Chinese 12th Five-Year Plan (2011–2015). The paper examines also efforts by government, power utilities and research institutes. The paper concludes that developing Smart Grid will be beneficial both to China and the world.     

From “Three Olds” Reconstruction to Urban Renewal:Reflections on Establishment of Urban Renewal Bureau in Guangzhou

With the establishment of Guangzhou Urban Renewal Bureau,the first of its kind in China,as the background and the starting point,the paper reviews relevant experiences in the UK,Singapore,and Hong Kong,summarizes the features,responsibilities,and rights of such institutions.Through analyzing three statuses of redevelopment,which are increased,reduced,and retained construction,the paper points out that urban renewal is a process orienting at promoting the comprehensive capacity of the built-up environment.Then the paper summarizes the strength and weakness of the "three olds" reconstruction policy making and implementation in Guangzhou,holding that the strength lies in the effective land consolidation and socially collaboration experiences,while the weakness includes the unclear rights and responsibilities,unsystematic target,and imbalanced interests distribution.It concludes that the goal of urban renewal is to improve the existing built-up environment without damaging the benefits of original stakeholders,to emphasize both fairness and efficiency,and to seek for sustainable city redevelopment with optimized comprehensive capacity.Moreover,the paper clarifies that the primary responsibility of urban renewal is to well maintain the built-up environment and the extended responsibility is to properly coordinate the city redevelopment.Considering that urban renewal is a kind of public administration with distinctive social and processing features,urban renewal should be empowered the necessary implementation priority and administrative permission power via local legislation measures.In addition,an effective social collaboration platform should be established to actively support the urban renewal and to reflect the "new normal" of city redevelopment.     

(W)Escaping the Challenges of the City: a Critique of Cape Town’s Proposed Satellite Town

Much of the current planning discourse has come to reject master planned ‘new cities’ as both unrealistic and undesirable. However, with growing urbanisation challenges in the Global South, master planned cities, suburbs and communities have come back on the agenda driven by both public and private interests. This paper explores the WesCape Development (WD), a proposed satellite suburb to be located north-west of Cape Town, South Africa. Situating the WD in a longer lineage of utopian and new city planning approaches, I argue that the proposal is deeply flawed. Rather than being the solution to the urban ills facing Cape Town, it is an ‘anti-urban’ strategy which supports suburbanisation and assumes a particular and problematic urban growth scenario. It relies on ‘environmentally deterministic’ assumptions and depoliticised and deinstitutionalised designs. Ultimately, it tries to escape, rather than confront, the operational, political and social challenges of the city leading to the devaluation of planning instruments and citizenship engagement. The WD highlights the importance and power of radical and utopian thinking as well as the necessity of grounding and situating these impulses in the specificities and complexities of the city.     

The difference of ‘being diverse’: City branding and multiculturalism in the ‘Leicester Model’

This city profile on Leicester focuses on the representation of ethnical diversity in city branding. Through a historical approach, the paper discusses how the local authorities have taken advantage of the arrival of different migration flows into the city, in order to redefine its post-industrial identity in terms of multiculturalism, tolerance and inclusivity. In so doing, the paper emphasises the combination of deliberate marketing communicative activities, the provision of services for attracting and retaining foreign businesses and the creation of an open urban milieu where various ethnic groups are free to express and celebrate their own cultures through festivals and events. The paper identifies the alignment between place communication and place ‘offerings’ development as the crucial element underpinning Leicester's model for multicultural cooperation and critically assesses the recent challenges that are being posed to the sustainment of a multicultural city image.     

From urban beautification to a holistic approach: the discourses of ‘landscape’ in the Arab Middle East

The English word and Western idea of landscape was introduced during the colonial restructuring of Arab cities in the early decades of the twentieth century. Thereafter, landscape came to be understood predominantly in the context of urban modernity, associated with the Western picturesque tradition adopted in landscaping municipal parks and public urban spaces. The formal conception that prevails today precludes a broader appreciation of landscape as a source of livelihood, the fabric of lived-in experiences and collective identities, just as it reduces the scope of landscape architecture, an emerging profession in the Arab Middle East, to urban beautification. Inspired by the integrative and community-centred conception advanced by the European Landscape Convention, this paper argues for a holistic landscape approach that contributes to development while responding to regional environmental and ecological constraints. The methodology of ecological landscape design is applied to secure a holistic reading of people and place and to engender integrative solutions that address socio-economic, environmental and heritage concerns. A selection of projects are cited to demonstrate the potential of a holistic approach in changing current limited perceptions of landscape and in expanding the discourse of landscape in the region beyond the current focus on appearance and beautification.     

Perspectives in planning history: planning and the dream of a better city in a global world – reflections on Helen Meller’s ‘Imagining Culture and the City in Planning History’

In the last decade of the nineteenth century, Bombay City was rocked by a series of events that undermined the systems of rule patched together over the course of the preceding century and triggered a crisis of the colonial ‘information order’ on which these were based. Saliently, these developments led to significant changes in the modes of colonial urban governance, in which a new planning agency played a key role. Integral to this shift was a reappraisal, on the part of the colonial state, of its mechanisms of information gathering and the growing recognition of the need for more knowledge about the swiftly expanding city and its rapidly diversifying population. The census of 1901 reflected, to a large extent, these new imperatives of colonial governance.     

Urban qualities and residents’ strategies in compact global south cities: the case of Havana

Research and policy argue for more compact cities to respond to sustainable development challenges. However, what actually needs to be made more compact and how, is under examined, particularly in global South cities where north notions of urban qualities are adopted without being questioned. Informed by a qualitative study in informal and compact neighborhoods in Havana, this paper explores which qualities are important to deliver more just cities, and what strategies are developed by residents to strengthen beneficial qualities and address detrimental qualities in contexts of informal urbanization and compactness. It shows how the street, human capital, neighborhood, housing affordability, citizenship and vibrancy are significant compact city qualities neglected in the literature. Finally, the paper shows how diverse strategies are developed by residents to draw upon these qualities, such as self-help urbanism, learning and innovation, economic entrepreneurship, networks of solidarity, economies of reciprocity, local imaginaries and active citizenship.

     

‘Model for a short-lived future’? Early tribulations of the Barbican redevelopment in the City of London, 1940–1982

This article recounts the chequered history of the Barbican redevelopment in the City of London, exploring its origins, planning, and implementation, together with its changing reputation. The Barbican is an interesting example of a modernist housing scheme, comprising multi-storey flats and social facilities set within a pedestrian precinct, something relatively unusual in the British context. The scheme was originally conceived in the 1950s as a publicly funded alternative to the rapid expansion of private office development and was pushed through in the 1960s by the City Corporation acting as its own developer. Subsequently, the whole project became mired in controversy and technical difficulties, and, as a result, on completion, few viewed it favourably. However, with urban regeneration again on the political agenda since the 1990s, the Barbican's image has improved, and it is increasingly recognized as one of the more notable achievements of British post-war modernism.