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Title:
New City Spaces [ALBUM: Reviving Urban Open Space (Review)]
Journal Issue:
Places, 14(2)
Author:
Bressi, Todd W
Publication Date:
2001
Publication Info:
Places, College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley
Permalink:
http://escholarship.org/uc/item/28c2s585
Acknowledgements:
This article was originally produced in Places Journal. To subscribe, visit www.places-journal.org.
For reprint information, contact places@berkeley.edu.
Keywords:
places, placemaking, architecture, environment, landscape, urban design, public realm, planning,
design, album, reviving, Todd Bressi
4 PLACES14:2
never developed a tradition of pedestrian life)—a meeting place and thoroughfare that are posited
differentiation that is sometimes easy to overlook. at the outset. There is no analysis (as opposed to
It is these latter cities, of course, that have the description) of how any of the spaces are actually
most difficulty in sustaining urban public spaces. used, which is particularly ironic in that Gehl’s
Finally, the book demonstrates convincingly first book, Life Between Buildings, published con-
that there are many cities in the world that, as a temporarily with William H. Whyte’s studies of
matter of will and public policy, have refused to New York City spaces, underscored the impor-
give up on public space. It profiles nine cities tance of understanding human perception and
which, it argues, have had more or less systematic use of space. Even for designers working on the
policies of cultivating public space, and provides increasing number of small urban spaces being
an album of thirty-nine significant public spaces reclaimed from parking or traffic circulation,
built in those cities and elsewhere in recent years. there is a dearth of useful information about
Yet New City Spaces has significant weaknesses. the construction, management and ownership
The case studies are wildly uneven. Portland (the of the spaces.
only U.S. city among the nine profiled), admired Nevertheless, New City Spaces offers numerous
by planners for many reasons, has added only a pleasures. One of them is the exuberance, inven-
handful of significant public spaces (Pioneer tiveness and appropriateness of so many of the
Courthouse Square, riverfront parks) in the last design details. The light standards in Plaça del
quarter century; its greater success has been in Sol (Barcelona), the variable lighting schemes for
maintaining a consistently walkable scale of Rathausplatz (St. Pölten, Austria) and the effec-
streets downtown. A more convincing case could tive combination of tree plantings, surfacing and
be made for San Francisco and the remarkable public art in Bismarckplatz (Heidelberg) are
transformation of its Embarcadero; Chicago worth keeping in mind.
and its ambitious riverfront, schoolyard and park The graphics, which present plans of the cities
initiatives; or even New York’s renewal of so and public spaces at the same scale throughout the
many parks. book, make for easy comparisons. Such attention
More fundamentally, the spaces profiled com- to the legibility of graphic information is still, sur-
prise a remarkable lack of diversity. Virtually no prisingly, rare in books like this.
waterfront spaces, no parks and no streets are pro- New City Spaces renews our confidence in the
filed (save streets that have been converted to potential for public space, reminds us of the spirit
pedestrian use). In demonstrating that traditional with which they can be designed and built, and
squares and plazas are still being built (the Danish suggests the pleasure they can offer. It reinforces
title is New City Rooms), Gehl and Gemzøe miss important, fundamental principles about transit,
the opportunity to explore the exapnding range of pedestrian life and public space. But the book
public spaces that cities are creating. In particular, offers few concrete lessons about the art of
their survey offers designers and planners in designing new spaces or providing for them as an
“abandoned cities” little to learn about. act of public policy, either in cities where tradi-
The write-ups on the thirty-nine spaces are tional urbanism is still alive, or in the problematic
generally perfunctory. Disappointingly, the crite- places where such urbanism has never had a
ria for selecting or evaluating the spaces in the chance to take hold.
book are not made evident; there is not even a
reflection on characteristics of market place, — Todd W. Bressi
PLACES14:2 5