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06 May 08

In praise of the lost art of strolling, by Christopher Hume (Toronto Star)

Last (so far) in what almost amounts to a series of articles on the importance to a true urban fabric of sidewalks and pedestrians. Hume adds some interesting speculation around Modernism's aversion to mingling/ chance encounters.

www.thestar.com/420945 - Preview

thestar christopher_hume pedestrians flaneur toronto

It was the French who first grasped the cultural significance of walking.
The French even devised new words to describe these denizens of the expanding city. They were boulevardiers and flaneurs. The former were sophisticated and worldly, urban and urbane. The flâneur, on the other hand, was the man-about-town, idle but intellectually curious and aware.
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- As much as anything, he realized, walking defines us. It is one of the things that make us what we are. Unlike running, marching, crawling, hopping, skipping, jogging, walking is essential; left foot, right foot, left foot ...
- And so it is a measure of how far removed we have grown from ourselves that many of us now see walking as extraneous. It is viewed as a kind of hobby, a pastime, a luxury, certainly not essential, and definitely not a means of transportation.
  Indeed, we have reached a point where we classify ourselves according to whether we walk or drive. Thus we are either drivers or pedestrians. Because walking is not considered necessary, we give precedence to those who travel in cars and trucks. From their perspective, people who walk are obstacles, in the way.
- walking
- is a mode of being, a way of relating, of existing in the world. The mere act of going out onto the street opens up a whole set of possibilities that lie at the heart of urban life.
- Though the early Modernists were deathly afraid of the chance encounter, human or otherwise, most welcome them. Sad to say, however, the Modernists were hugely influential; their vision of a neat, clean and tidy streamlined world devoid of the messy chaos of the big city lies at the heart of innumerable suburban developments.
  - - I had always linked this to car-centrism, to suburbanization, and also to a horror of density (equated with "urban slums" and "blight"); but it's interesting to think that Modernism might, among other things, have been an aesthetic response specifically designed to "clean up" one's aesthetic space (which of course includes the urban environment). - on 2008-05-06
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- "A house is a machine for living in," Le Corbusier famously declared. By extension, a city should be a machine for many to live in.
- Congestion for pedestrians, if not drivers, can be a pleasure. It is another word for richness and diversity.
- Behind the wheel of a car, isolated, protected and feeling invulnerable, we are forever in a hurry. The rest of the world is reduced to nothing more than a series of obstacles.
- On foot, sharing the landscape with countless others, we have no choice but to slow down and enjoy. We become a member of a community, connected and part of something larger.
- Not only that, but walking speed allows us to absorb what's going on around us and react. Looking in a shop window, we can decide whether to stop or not. We have time to engage in the city, not simply move through it.
- In fact, among the curses of our age is the tendency to think strictly in terms of destination; convenience consists of reducing any act to its most basic elements and performing them as fast and efficiently as possible – a sidewalk becomes a road becomes a highway becomes an expressway.
- Though we can't turn back the clock, the only way to ensure urban health is to plan cities with walking in mind. If nothing else, this necessitates a human scale. There's no better measure of that than walking. Not to say that everyone will walk everywhere, but that we should be able to, it should be an option. No, it must be an option.

A flaneur's lament for the sidewalk, by Christopher Hume (Toronto Star)

Together with 2 other articles (Apr.26 and May 3), a nice trilogy in praise of walking and pedestrian rights.

www.thestar.com/418560 - Preview

thestar flaneur pedestrians infrastructure christopher_hume toronto

If only people were cars, maybe then we could get the city to take our sidewalks seriously.
In addition to the decayed state of city sidewalks, many are too narrow to begin with. And given the city's love of widening roads whenever possible, that makes for a dangerous combination.
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- Have we forgotten the importance of sidewalks? Did we ever know?
- They are an essential element of the public realm, not, as we have come to believe, simply a way of getting from A to B. Indeed, they are an irreducible part of the urban fabric.
- Sidewalks are stage sets, backdrops and seating areas all in one. They are the very place where urban life occurs. Without them, a city can't be a city.
- That's why so much more than broken ankles is at stake when they are allowed to deteriorate. Urbanity depends on sidewalks.
- Fleet St., Lake Shore Blvd. and around the Rogers Centre. These islands of condos separated by six-lane highways are hostile, even dangerous, for walkers. Pedestrians are definitely not welcome here; they get in the way of drivers, who are always in a hurry.
  This is not how to build a city. This is how to destroy a city.
- "Having adequate space and lots of sunshine means a lot psychologically," Brown insists. "But what we're getting is suburban dimensions infiltrating the city. Traffic lanes in an urban condition need be no more than 3.1 metres, that's about 10 feet. On a highway where you have greater speed, lane widths have to increase. But engineers are used to working on an average, a standard. You need to approach things more finely, taking what you can find here and there."
  - - this idea that road engineers use the same rule in urban & suburban settings for arterials, secondaries, etc., reminds me of Andres Duany's critique, and how the transect should be used to contextualize what's needed. - on 2008-05-06
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