Book Review: "Cities for People"

source: islandpress.org

Jan Gehl, Cities for People. Washington: Island Press, 2010. xii + 269 pp.

Jan Gehl of Denmark, best known as a leading planner of transformed Copenhagen, published this gem of a book nearly 10 years ago. I only caught up with it this week, and am here to reassure you that if you also have missed out on it until now, it's not too late. Generously illustrated with photographs from around the world, the book makes his case crisply yet with lyrical prose. Principal recommendations are catalogued in a "toolbox" at the end.

Gehl writes a lot about the importance of cities being walkable, and how to help them become so. There are various reasons why this is important, but the ones he stresses are the connections between physical design and individual well-being. For this reason I'd classify him as an "L" urbanist, though the other dimensions appear as well. For theme he compares to The Happy City by Charles Montgomery (Farrar Straus Giroux, 2013) and The End of the Suburbs by Leigh Gallagher (Portfolio/Penguin, 2013); he also relates to handbook-style works of city design like Walkable City by Jeff Speck (Farrar Straus Giroux, 2012), who cites him energetically throughout the his book, and City Comforts by David Sucher (2003).

Fast traffic and parking lots make for poor walkability

Gehl begins at a familiar starting points for urbanist critiques of contemporary cities: the mid-20th shift to designing places to maximize the movement and parking of motor vehicles, along with modernist architecture's individual spectacular buildings. As a result, "[T]he traditional function of city space as a meeting place and social forum for city dwellers has been reduced, threatened or phased out" (p. 3). We might get to our destinations faster--or we might not, as anyone caught in congested traffic can attest--but we lose something fundamentally human: contact of many varieties with many varieties of people.

Even from their cradles babies strain to see as much as possible, and later they crawl all over their homes to follow the action. Older children bring their toys into the living room or kitchen to be where the action is. Outside play takes place not necessarily on playgrounds or in traffic-free areas, but more often on the street, in parking lots or in front of entrance doors, where the grown-ups are. Young people hang out by entrances and on street corners to follow along with--and perhaps join in--events....

Throughout life we have a constant need for new information about people, about life as it unfolds and about the surrounding society. New information is gathered wherever people are and therefore very much in common city space. (pp. 23, 25)

 "Good cities for walking," then, do more than provide opportunities for pleasant exercise or an alternative means of short trips. They are good cities for life.

Red's and Blue Strawberry are part of one of the best blocks in CR's downtown

One of the most important ideas in the book, both for designers and citizens, is the need to restore human scale to cities. In chapter 2, he presents a few data that serve as the basis for the design ideas later in the book: "man is evolved to move slowly and on foot" at about 3 mph, so we can notice details when moving at that speed. Sight, hearing and touch operate at short distances. At car speed and skyscraper height, we're limited in what we can absorb, so streets designed for cars must be at a pretty basic level, and whatever features might adorn skyscrapers are lost except for aerial photography. So cities must restore the small scale: Cities must provide good conditions for people to walk, stand, sit, watch, listen and talk (p. 118). This means providing enough space, easy street crossings, interesting sights, soft "edges" and places to sit, while minimizing obstacles like signs and "interruptions" like driveways.

The lawn at New Bo City Market is a multi-use space providing plenty of cause for staying

Another interesting feature of his argument is the amount of stress he puts on "staying," as opposed to walking or bicycling, by which he means "sitting down and spending time in the city" (p. 147). Staying activities can often be used as a measuring stick for the quality of the city as well as of its space.... In a city like Rome, it is the large number of people standing or sitting in squares rather than walking that is conspicuous. And it's not due to necessity but rather that the city quality is so inviting. It is hard to keep moving in city space with so many temptations to stay. In contrast are many new quarters and complexes that many people walk through but rarely stop or stay in (pp. 134-135). Data he collected in the 1980s show "staying activities last an average of nine times longer and therefore contribute 89% of life in the streets" (p. 72). Attractive places to sit, pleasantly soft edges and cafes are essential to the street life we--at least many of us--crave.

People walk to this grocery store, but it's a battle

Throughout the book, Gehl argues getting the design right is fundamental to making cities for people. Early in the book, in a section entitled "First we shape the cities--then they shape us," he asserts "urban structures and planning influence human behavior and they ways in which cities operate" (p. 9); in particular, the effort to accommodate driving led to more driving but also less city life. Citing studies from Copenhagen and Melbourne, as well as examples from other cities, he concludes The conclusion that if better city space is provided, use will increase is apparently valid in large city public spaces, and individual city spaces and all the way down to the single bench or chair.... Whether people are enticed to walk around and stay in city space is very much a question of working carefully with the human dimension and issuing a tempting invitation (p. 17).

Garages make for a hard edge to the street

My only quibble with Gehl's book is it spends so much time on (in?) the city center. Its lessons need to be carried to the surrounding neighborhoods as well. If people aren't walking and/or cycling in their own neighborhoods, they will inevitably be driving to work, school and downtown, which starts the vicious cycle. Even if they break those habits to walk around the city center, their cars will need the gobs of accommodation that makes walkability so difficult to attain. I don't imagine that Gehl disagrees with this point at all, and totally understand his emphasis on the city center, but would have liked to have seen the point addressed that "cities for people" means the whole city.

CR Municipal Band performs in Bever Park. This magnificent park is one of the few attractions within a mile of my otherwise-walkable neighborhood.

SEE ALSO: Allison Arieff, "Let's Reconnect with Our Streets," New York Times, 3 July 2018