Contributor Blog

"What is an ideology without a space to which it refers, a space which it describes, whose vocabulary and kinks it makes use of, and whose code it embodies?" 

            - Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space p. 44.

For more than ten years now I have been a librarian at the Institute of Urban Studies at the University of Winnipeg, managing a small library dedicated to planning, geography, urban design and environmental issues. I have been extremely fortunate to have had the freedom in this role to evolve a hybridized career involving research, librarianship, teaching, writing and editing.

We all remember that day: How we first heard, whom we were with, how we felt as we watched an iconic American cityscape transformed into a burning, toxic wreckage, knowing that  thousands were surely dead, many never to be found. We can all too easily recall how our disbelief quickly turned to horror, sadness and then fear – a fear that the world was now a fundamentally different place, and what that would mean for ourselves and our children.

On Monday, August 22nd, the leader of Canada’s New Democratic Party, Jack Layton, succumbed to cancer and passed away, mere months after leading his left-leaning party to unprecedented electoral success as the official opposition to Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservatives. Since then, the public expressions of loss, and the celebration of his life, have been extraordinary: impromptu memorials have sprung up in cities across Canada, especially in Toronto where he sat as a city councilor for almost 20 years before moving to federal politics.

The Fukushima reactors and their associated buildings have been exploding, melting and burning for not quite a week yet, but already the sense of déjà vu is inescapable.

In this lavishly produced, beautifully illustrated but somewhat self-edifying book, His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales argues that most of our global crises -- from climate change to poverty to our soulless built environments -- are owed to our disconnection from Nature (which he capitalizes).

With the passing in February 2010 of Canada's last surviving Great War veteran, we no longer have a living link to that conflict. Its infamous miseries, desolate battlefields, poison-gas attacks and industrial-scale slaughter are known to us now only through history.

While the veterans themselves are silent, Manitoba historian Jim Blanchard reminds us in his new book Winnipeg's Great War that the city of Winnipeg has its own story to tell about the First World War.

My hometown of Winnipeg is going through a particularly nasty battle over cycling infrastructure. Its current mayor, Sam Katz, while he may be reviled by rapid transit advocates for cancelling one BRT scheme and then muddling another (will it be a bus? A train? A streetcar?), has nonetheless managed to accomplish more for cyclists than his predecessors. In recent years we have seen new bikelanes, multiuse pathways and a cycling culture invigorated by such events as Winnipeg's Cyclovia.

As planners, we are accustomed to (and expect) some types of urban development proposals to attract controversy. Whether the opposition is to new roads, higher-density housing or undesirable land uses such as industries or prisons, such controversies are becoming far more common as environmental, economic and social issues become more pronounced and widely understood. In most cases, we generally assume that we can make use of a suite of engagement strategies to engage stakeholders and try to resolve typical development conflicts. 

 

Recently, a Briton armed with a metal detector uncovered a trove of more than 50,000 Roman coins, which archeologists believe was an ancient farming community's offering to the gods to ensure a bountiful harvest. Our own agricultural practices have moved past any pleas to the gods to incorporate instead an industrial-scale arsenal of petrochemical fertilizers, pesticides and genetic modification.

In a recent Planetizen post I argued that the unfolding oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico may be perhaps our last warning to move more aggressively on renewable energy and a less energy-dependent built environment. What follows is an effort to outline additional implications for planning, to gain an understanding of the scale of this emergency and how it may impact planning in the months and years to come. Ecologically, economically and socially this is going to be like nothing we’ve ever seen before. 

 

What began on April 20th as a tragic industrial accident that claimed 11 lives is turning into an unprecedented ecological disaster.

Crash Course: The American Automobile Industry's Road from Glory to Disaster
By Paul Ingrassia
Random House, 306 pages, $32

Carjacked: The Culture of the Automobile and its Effect on Our Lives
By Catherine Lutz and Anne Lutz Fernandez
Palgrave, 272 pages, $34

Automobiles dominate our economies, our cities and our popular culture. As these new titles make abundantly apparent, they also tend to imbue their makers and owners with either delusions or arrogance that can lead to dangerously misguided decision-making, both behind the wheel and in corporate boardrooms.

It is well-known in planning circles that Smart Growth has come under attack by (mostly libertarian) think tanks and pundits hostile to any form of urban planning that doesn’t leave land use decisions up to the “magic” of the free market. While their reports may get a lot of press, a close reading of most of their rhetoric reveals that it is largely based on a selective use of data, fallacious argumentation and hyperbole.

Yesterday, as a part of my university’s community outreach efforts, I delivered a lecture at a suburban retirement home on the theme of sustainable cities. I discussed Smart Growth, New Urbanism and the need for greater urban densities, all framed by the current events unfolding in Copenhagen at the United Nations Climate Change Conference.  

At the end of my talk, several elderly ladies came up to chat with me and thank me for the lecture. On her way out, one turned to me and said, “You take care of the world for us. We’re not going to be around much longer – it’s up to you young people.” 

The 2009 Canadian Institute of Planners conference in Niagara Falls ended on a remarkable note.  A talented speaker and unforeseen circumstance converged brilliantly to demonstrate both the nature of the crises we are facing, but also the resilience we will need to address them.

In her new book, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster, journalist and essayist Rebecca Solnit describes a phenomenon that is rarely mentioned in the context of disaster preparedness: the spirit of caring -- even joy -- that can emerge in the face of calamity.

All forms of public decision-making are subject to controversy and competing expectations. Many of these relate to the perceived utility gained -- or disutility incurred -- through public expenditures.

When we think of cities in antiquity, we don’t hesitate to think of them in association with their respective civilizations. After all, the words civic and civilization share the same root word in Latin, civitas. Similarly, we can now say that we live in a globalized civilization largely structured on what author Jeb Brugmann refers to in his new book Welcome to the Urban Revolution as the global City.

However, in our focus as planners on addressing concerns with current development projects and other local issues we might be forgiven for sometimes losing touch with this larger picture: that the city is still the focal point and driver for those processes we refer to as civilization.