Ecological Urbanism Category
World Cities Summit: leveraging the science of cities
Posted on September 2, 2021 Leave a Comment
As an architect & urban planner my principal concern is to make cities work for people. This means understanding how their streets connect to either encourage low carbon transport such as walking and public transport. Or, if they’re disconnected, do they lock in car dependence and its carbon impacts?
What will cities look like 30 years from now?
Posted on May 6, 2020 1 Comment
I joined a carbon reduction event yesterday where, by way of introducing ourselves, we were each asked to predict the future: what did we think we would see more of in 2050 – in terms of objects, experiences and services. A neat little ice-breaker if ever there was one. Here are my top-of-the-head responses: 1. […]
Sustainable cities of the future – sketch
Posted on February 9, 2016 Leave a Comment
Notes for keynote at UK Green Building Council Annual City Summit, Birmingham. 1. Spatial planning & human behaviour implications of sustainability – reduction of transport carbon through shift towards walking, cycling & public transport 2. A massive shift needed in transport + land use planning, urban + landscape design, architecture. Professional inertia. Turning the supertanker. […]
The Garden Street – the essential, unspoken element of the Garden City
Posted on January 28, 2015 2 Comments
Too often the Garden City is visualised as a place of huge green spaces enfolding small pockets of grey streets. The green and the grey. But why should streets be grey? What about avenues? Boulevards? Rows of trees? Grass verges? Street planting at various scales. And don’t those huge green parks just separate the urbanism? […]
AoU Landscape Urbanism notes & questions
Posted on December 15, 2011 2 Comments
These notes accompany a PowerPoint presentation Fragmented urbanism: the rise of Landscape Urbanism & the threat it poses to the continuously connected city TS intro This is a crucial moment for urbanism. In the UK, The Portas Review, highlighting the UK’s threatened high streets. Around the world, cities are growing faster than ever. But cities […]
Landscape Urbanism & New Urbanism: it shouldn’t be so divisive
Posted on November 10, 2010 8 Comments
Summary Despite the efforts of each party to highlight its differences, there is a significant overlap between Landscape Urbanism and New Urbanism, both positive and negative. Positive: a concern about urban harmony. Negative: a tendency to fragment (call it sprawl). Urbanists of both colours would do better to recognise this common ground and realise that […]
The power of the network 