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Does urban sprawl really make us fat?

January 27, 2012 – 12:50 am, by Alan Davies

% obese persons in Australia by age group: 1995 vs 2004–2005 (source: Preventative Health Taskforce)

A common view among politicians, the media, planners and health professionals is that urban sprawl is a key cause of the modern obesity epidemic. Higher population densities and more walkable neighbourhoods, many argue, are an essential strategy for fighting this scourge of the affluent lifestyle, e.g see here and here.

The trouble is both propositions are dubious. There are good reasons to pursue higher densities in Australia’s major cities, but addressing obesity isn’t one of them. It’s unlikely tightening the belt on sprawl will have much, if any, impact on the average BMI of Australians.

It’s not really surprising this view of sprawl is so entrenched. After all, there’s plenty of evidence showing suburbanites are generally fatter than inner city residents. But correlation is not causation, and households aren’t randomly distributed across cities.

An alternative explanation is suburbanites aren’t fatter because they live in the suburbs, but because people who are more likely to be fat self-select into the suburbs. Conversely, people who are likely to be thin self-select into denser neighbourhoods like the inner city. Changes in urban form will accordingly have little if any impact on obesity.

This fascinating study published in the leading Journal of Urban Economics, Fat city: questioning the relationship between urban sprawl and obesity, supports the alternative explanation. The research team, which included internationally prominent academics Henry Overman, Diego Puga and Mathew Turner, examined changes in the geographic location of 6,000 respondents in the US between 1978 and 1994.

They had access to a remarkable data base which, among other important variables, provided the precise street addresses, height and weight of respondents at intervals over a 16 year period. They were able to track changes in the location of individuals and construct measures of the neighbourhood density and walkability of each address.

As expected, the authors found residents of more sprawling neighbourhoods are indeed heavier on average than people who live in less sprawling neighbourhoods (although they found this applied to men but not women). However their results strongly suggest urban sprawl does not cause weight gain:

Rather, people who are more likely to be obese (e.g., because they do not like to walk) are also more likely to move to sprawling neighborhoods (e.g., because they can more easily move around by car). Of course the built environment may still place constraints on the type of exercise that people are able to take or the nature of the diet that they consume. The key point is that individuals who have a lower propensity to being obese will choose to avoid those kinds of neighborhoods. Overall, we find no evidence that neighborhood characteristics have any causal effect on weight.

Observers of Australian cities who argue that density and walkability affect obesity usually compare the inner city with the suburbs e.g see here. But the two populations are not the same. For example, compared to suburban populations, inner city residents are more likely to be young, single, have no dependants, have a higher level of education and enjoy a higher income.

It’s easier to be thin when you’re young (see exhibit!), haven’t had a baby, don’t have kids badgering you for fast food, are well informed about nutrition, can afford good food and have the time to cook. These sorts of factors are more likely to explain why on average inner city residents are thinner, not the fact they live at higher densities (I’ve expanded on this line of thinking before, here, here and here).

The authors of the article are aware their conclusions contradict the received wisdom on the connection between sprawl and obesity. However they point out their findings are consistent with other studies showing that sorting rather than causation is the primary mechanism that drives observed differences within cities on many socioeconomic variables. They conclude:

It follows immediately from our results that recent calls to redesign cities in order to combat the rise in obesity are misguided. Our results do not provide a basis for thinking that such redesigns will have the desired effect, and therefore suggest that resources devoted to this cause will be wasted. The public health battle against obesity is better fought on other fronts.

And equally, the battle for higher densities, improved public transport and shorter commutes is also better fought on other fronts. Of course this is a US study so the usual caution in extrapolating from another culture to Australia should be exercised – I’ve discussed the relationship between obesity and urban form and infrastructure in the Australian context on a number of occasions before (see links above and also here, here, here, and here).

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What is it with architects?

January 24, 2012 – 3:22 pm, by Alan Davies

IAC building, Manhattan, designed by Frank Gehry (click to look around)

The interesting looking building in the exhibit above was designed for Manhattan internet company IAC by celebrated architect Frank Gehry and completed in 2007. Frank Gehry is of course the designer of the magnificent Guggenheim at Bilbao and the proposed new Dr Chau Chak Wing building at the University of Technology Sydney.

The IAC building reminds me in one critical sense of the Empire State building. Grand entrances with soaring atriums have been a standard component in large buildings for many decades, but despite their imposing proportions and glorious appearance, both the IAC and Empire State buildings have puny entrances.

In the case of the IAC building that’s symptomatic of a serious deficiency. This building simply doesn’t relate well to its context. It offers absolutely nothing to the street at ground level but a solid wall, albeit perhaps an unusual and interesting one. Had the building been “activated” at ground level by (say) cafes, restaurants and shops that opened generously onto the street, it could’ve contributed positively to creating a vibrant street life in this part of Manhattan.

Click this link to wander around the outside of the building courtesy of Google Map’s Street View. I can’t help thinking it looks like a self-storage facility at ground level, albeit a tasty-looking one. Perhaps IAC isn’t entirely comfortable in public with its line of business, which includes the likes of Match.com and OKCupid.

This could’ve been a really good building but the ground level doesn’t work. And not just in contextual terms – to my eyes it looks like Gehry’s team didn’t know how to relate those fascinating shapes and that skin to the ground. It’s like they ran out of inspiration when confronted with the reality of the pavement.

41 Cooper Square, Manhattan, by Metamorphosis architects (click to look around)

Here’s another recent building in Manhattan that also does a poor job of relating to its surroundings. It’s 41 Cooper Square, part of Cooper Union, a privately-funded college in the East Village. It was designed by NY architects Metamorphosis who say this new academic building:

aspires to manifest the character, culture and vibrancy of both the 150 year-old institution and of the city in which it was founded…… Responding to its urban context, the sculpted facade establishes a distinctive identity for Cooper Square. The building’s corner entry lifts up to draw people into the lobby in a deferential gesture towards the institution’s historic Foundation Building. The facade registers the iconic, curving profile of the central atrium as a glazed figure that appears to be carved out of the Third Avenue facade, connecting the creative and social heart of the building to the street.

Oh dear. You can have a closer look with Google Street View via this link. The building is summed up neatly by Fred Kent from People for Public Spaces: “The Morphosis building in Cooper Square is a disaster at ground level and casts an angry gesture to an historic district recognized the world over as an exciting and unique destination…The East Village”.

Aesthetics is a very subjective topic and you might like the look of this building, but to me it’s as heavy as lead. It doesn’t have the sophistication of Gehry’s effort – it’s all “mum, look at me!” Trouble is, little Johnny looks like a gorilla in a tutu.

There are occasions when an outstanding building that’s visually out of kilter with its surroundings can be justified – for example, Manhattan’s Frank Lloyd Wright designed Solomon R Guggenheim Museum – but this isn’t one of them. Even in a more appropriate setting, 41 Cooper Square would be a building of little consequence.

Victoria Gardens, Richmond, Melbourne (click to look around)

The failure of buildings to give something back at street level isn’t confined to Manhattan. Consider the new Victoria Gardens shopping centre at Richmond in inner city Melbourne. This is a big mall with the standard quota of atriums, movie theatres and chain retailers.

Yet have a look at it from the street using this link, once again courtesy of Google Street View. Although it’s in the inner city and on a tram line, there’s little sense of “activation” at street level. Most of the opposite side of Burnley St has been developed since the Google camera car took these pictures, but the new neighbours mostly look into car park. The entrances for cars are appropriately obvious, but like the ICA building, there’s not much sense of an entrance for anyone on foot.

There are doubtless many examples in Australian cities of buildings that spurn the street. There’s a little chain link symbol in Google Street View that, when pressed, gives the URL of the current view. If anyone has an example of excruciatingly poor urban design, please provide the link in Comments.

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Is Warne putting the right spin on cycling?

January 22, 2012 – 4:44 pm, by Alan Davies

Percent of total trips by bicycle (data from Pucher & Buehler, 2008)

The key issue highlighted by Shane Warne’s spat with a cyclist last week isn’t mandatory registration of bicycles or any need to crack-down on “lycra louts” running red lights. No, despite what the Spin King and many observers would have us believe, the key issue is who “owns” the roads.

Cycling offers environmental, energy and local amenity advantages over other forms of transport. It’s also cheap and provides the sort of on-demand, private and direct travel usually only available with a car. With increasing traffic congestion, journey times by bicycle can be competitive with other modes, especially in inner areas.

But if cycling is to become a major form of transport in Australian cities (as distinct from a recreational pursuit), cyclists will increasingly need to share the streets with cars, buses, trams and trucks. Completely segregated cycling infrastructure will be part of the solution, but it’s unrealistic to imagine a majority of cycling kilometres in cities like Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide would be on the bicycle equivalent of freeways.

Even if it were politically feasible to construct an extensive network of dedicated cycle paths by taking street space away from motorised vehicles, riders would still come in to frequent conflict with drivers, for example at intersections. Amsterdam and Copenhagen are as close as it gets to cycling nirvana, but even they only have around 400 km each of completely separate bike paths and lanes – most of the network is still shared with cars.

So drivers and cyclists in Australian cities will need to come to a satisfactory accommodation in order for cycling to grow as a major transport option.

A key reason our streets are dangerous for riders is that multiple generations of motorists have been brought up to believe streets are their exclusive territory. This wasn’t always the case – prior to the advent of motorised transport, streets were largely the province of pedestrians at large and children at play. Motorists effectively took over by force of arms as streets became too dangerous for foot traffic.

We’ve all been brought up with the implicit presumption that streets belong to drivers – even pedestrians are guests on the street, as exemplified by the curious offence of “jaywalking”. But at least motorists are pedestrians for some of the time. Unfortunately, very few are also cyclists (although most adult cyclists are also drivers) so they’re less likely to accept that bicycles have a legitimate right to be on the streets.

The inevitable consequence is the streets are less safe for riding than they would be if drivers adopted a more accepting and sympathetic attitude.

If cycling is to win a significantly larger share of the urban transport task, the conventional view about who owns the streets needs to change. That will probably take a generation or more, so now’s the time to start sending a new message.

The message is that cyclists have the same right to the streets as drivers. Moreover, because cyclists are infinitely more vulnerable, motorists need to extend them special care and consideration. There need to be highly visible changes in the law to emphasise drivers’ duty of care toward cyclists (even if amendment isn’t strictly necessary at law, the symbolism is important).

According to Rutgers University academics, John Pucher and Ralph Buehler, motorists in Dutch, Danish and German cities are assumed by law to be responsible for almost all crashes with cyclists, with special protection for children and elderly cyclists. This is supported by strict enforcement of cyclist rights by police and courts.

The idea that streets are shared spaces should be promoted vigorously by governments, for example in the driver licensing process, in schools and in the media. It’s also essential that adequate police resources are provided to enforce the law when drivers behave carelessly or aggressively toward cyclists.

Changing attitudes to who owns the streets is a necessary pre-condition for introducing on a large scale the sorts of tactical policies used in many European cities. These include 30 kmh speed limits in residential streets, traffic calming works and the re-allocation of street space from motorised vehicles to bicycles. These are unthinkable in a culture which implicitly assumes streets belong to motorists.

Registration of bicycles as suggested by Shane Warne might seem at first glance to be a way of increasing the “legitimacy” of cyclists on the streets, but there is a host of practical and political reasons why it’s a silly idea. In any event I doubt it would do much to change motorists’ attitudes.

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What were the most-read posts of 2011?

January 4, 2012 – 10:11 am, by Alan Davies

Click to compare pre- and post-tsunami imagery of Japan in Google Street View

Here are the ‘top twelve’ articles posted on The Melbourne Urbanist in 2011 i.e. those that got, in order, the most readers:

  1. What were they thinking?
  2. Will redevelopment of Fishermans Bend really be revolutionary?
  3. The distribution of wealth: perception vs reality
  4. Is this building offensive?
  5. Is this a real tram ‘network’?
  6. How many travellers use the trains?
  7. How can trams be made better?
  8. Are these really the most (and least) liveable suburbs in Melbourne?
  9. How liveable are our major cities?
  10. Melbourne ‘fantasy’ rail map
  11. What causes urban riots?
  12. What is the key challenge for cycling policy?

Note that this list refers only to articles posted in 2011 and naturally it favours articles written earlier in the year. The three most-read articles in 2011 were in fact posted in 2010 i.e. Is water priced to encourage conservation?, How big is Melbourne?, and Banging the high rise drum.

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What to read over the holiday season?

December 23, 2011 – 11:02 am, by Alan Davies

That violin's worth $3.5 million! He's playing some very complex Bach

When I started The Melbourne Urbanist I wasn’t sure what direction it would take. While primarily about planning and development issues, I imagined it might also have a major sideline in reading and literature.

Hence the Reading page in the sidebar. As things have turned out, there hasn’t been much interest in reading and books. For example, The Melbourne Urbanist had 25,000 visits in November but the Reading page only got 29 views, so next year I’ll probably move it elsewhere.

Clearly the readers of The Melbourne Urbanist don’t come here to talk literature. Fair enough, this is the age of specialisation and that’s one of the things the internet does well. However since it’s the holiday season, I have an excuse to talk books.

The thing newspapers love to do at this time of year is find out who’s reading what. Over the years I’ve found some good reads from seeing what politicians, novelists and others are reading (or say they’re reading). The Grattan Institute has put an interesting twist on this tradition – a suggested summer reading list for the Prime Minister. Here it is:

Fair share, Judith Brett, (Quarterly Essay 42, 2011)

Cities for people, Jan Gehl, (Island Press, 2010)

There goes the neighbourhood, Michael Wesley, (University of New South Wales, 2011)

Balancing the risks, benefits and costs of homeland security, John Mueller and Mark G. Stewart (article available at http://www.hsaj.org/?article=7.1.16)

The rational optimist, Matt Ridley, (Fourth Estate, 2010)

Cold light, Frank Moorhouse, (Random House Australia, 2011) 

Some interesting suggestions. Of these, I’ve only read The rational optimist and can’t recommend it highly enough (I quoted from it yesterday). It would be a great summer read. If you follow the link to the Grattan Institute, there’s an explanation of the thinking behind the list. Anything by Frank Moorhouse should be interesting and Cold light is about power, secrecy and, of all things, urban planning! So I’ll put that on my “to read” list.

Of the books I’ve read this year, I’d recommend Ryan Avent’s The gated city, He argues in a mere 100 pages that opposition to density is a key reason for American economic stagnation. This is an Amazon Kindle “Single” – it only costs $1.99 and if, like me, you don’t have a Kindle, you can read it on your computer or, in my case, on an iPhone (not so good for the beach, though). I’ve cited it before, here and here.

I’d also recommend Steven Pinker’s The better angels of our nature. He argues that violence at both social and personal levels is much lower than historically it’s ever been. Another fascinating book is Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking: fast and slow. Kahneman is a psychologist and Nobel laureate – lots of insight on why we think the way we do and, especially, why we so often get it wrong. Both of these books are long (and in the modern fashion look like they never had an editor), but they’re worth it.

The best novel I’ve read this year – in fact for a while – is The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson. It deals insightfully and wittily with some big issues. And it’s beautifully written – a deserving winner of the 2010 Booker. Read More »

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Does public transport offer enough privacy?

December 21, 2011 – 6:59 pm, by Alan Davies

Parallel parking - how to do it when space is tight

There are many ways to measure the immense improvement in standard of living enjoyed by western countries over the millennia (although most especially over the last two hundred years). I think an important indicator – with implications for city managers – is the greater demand for physical privacy that comes with rising incomes.

Much attention is given to how much better off we are today in terms of basics like food, clothing, energy and shelter than our ancestors were.  But there are many other measures. For example, in The rational optimist, Matt Ridley discusses the spectacular increase in the availability of time.

Part of the improvement came from dramatic reductions in the time taken – and hence the cost – of making things. Part also came from access to artificial light. He provides a fascinating example of how much the cost of manufacturing artificial light has fallen: this is how many lumen-hours (lm-hr) of artificial light could be obtained from an hour’s work at the average wage of the day:

1750BC: 24 lm-hr, sesame oil lamp

1800: 186 lm-hr, tallow lamp

1880: 4,400 lm-hr, kerosene lamp

1950: 531,000 lm-hr, incandescent light bulb

2008: 8,400,000 lm-hr, compact fluoro

If they haven’t already, LEDs will undoubtedly increase the amount of light an hour’s work buys by another order of magnitude. Modern lighting is also cleaner than the comparatively primitive methods widely used even a hundred years ago. It’s less of a fire hazard, doesn’t flicker and doesn’t create smoke within the premises (a leading cause of death in times past).

Although it isn’t discussed by Ridley, another aspect of the rise in living standards that should be of particular interest to anyone interested in cities is the increase in the demand for privacy and personal control.

With rising incomes, households who once shared a one-roomed hovel now have individual bedrooms. Twenty somethings who used to live in share houses a generation ago now live by themselves in studio or one bedroom apartments. Where once hotels and boarding houses had shared facilities, now even the most run-down motel offers a private bathroom and toilet. People who can afford it have babies or convalesce in private hospital rooms, not communal wards.

And look at transport. Around 90% of all travel in a city like Melbourne is by private car, much of it with only the driver present. Those who can afford it take taxis, fly in chartered or private jets or, if there’s no alternative to sharing, cocoon themselves in first class cabins on planes and ships.

Compared to a train, tram or bus, cars offer a lot of privacy and control: they’re available on-demand, go directly to the driver’s destination, are in most cases considerably faster, and are only shared by invitation. Car ownership usually costs more in terms of cash outlays than public transport, but people with a high standard of living are prepared to pay the price.

The increased demand for privacy and personal control might seem at odds with the growth of cities. People have been drawn to cities over the last 200 years on an unprecedented scale, so there’s no doubt they want to be closer to each other than ever. Indeed, a key reason why incomes have increased spectacularly is precisely because of the greater proximity of people.

But it’s clear they also want more privacy. Technology is one reason they’ve been able to live cheek-by-jowl and still increase their autonomy. Yet there are limits. Cars aren’t a very effective solution in dense environments. In response, cities have generally evolved by decentralising population, services and jobs at low densities, enabling residents to maintain their car-oriented lifestyle.

But cars have other downsides like pollution, carbon emissions, traffic accidents and noise. Moreover, a significant proportion of people now want to be close to key nodes, like the CBD and beaches – that requires density, the enemy of cars.

I think it’s very important that policy-makers, particularly those involved with public transport, understand and acknowledge the desire of contemporary travellers for privacy and personal control. Of course there’re many other improvements that need to be made to Melbourne’s public transport system, but this perspective suggests that, for example, safety, security and comfort are key values for existing and prospective public transport users. Read More »

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Do cities have a distinctive ethos?

December 20, 2011 – 6:32 pm, by Alan Davies

What are they laughing at? Some Xmas cheer - the Berlin Laughter Project

City managers love a catchy idea. Ten years ago it was “creative cities”; next it could be the idea that cities should discover their own “ethos” to protect them from the homogenisation of globalisation.

Avner De-Shallit and Daniel A Bell have just published a new book, The spirit of cities: why the identity of a city matters in a global age, which they say revives the classical idea that a city expresses its own distinctive ethos separate from its national affiliation. They take their definition of ethos from the Oxford dictionary: “Ethos is defined as the characteristic spirit, the prevalent tone of sentiment, of a people or community”.

The authors look at nine cities which, they argue, each have a dominant ethos. The cities are Jerusalem (religion), Montreal (language), Singapore (nation building), Hong Kong (materialism), Beijing (political power), Oxford (learning), Berlin (tolerance and intolerance), Paris (romance), and New York (ambition). According to the publisher’s blurb:

Bell and De-Shalit draw upon the richly varied histories of each city, as well as novels, poems, biographies, tourist guides, architectural landmarks, and the authors’ own personal reflections and insights. They show how the ethos of each city is expressed in political, cultural, and economic life, and also how pride in a city’s ethos can oppose the homogenizing tendencies of globalization and curb the excesses of nationalism.

You can get a sense of what the whole idea is about from this transcript of a public seminar on The Spirit of Cities the Grattan Institute conducted with Professor Bell on 4 October 2011. You can also read the first chapter of the book, titled Civicism, and some of the chapter on Jerusalem, at Amazon (use the ‘look inside’ option). Chapter one is instructive because it sets out the rationale, theory and methodology, with subsequent chapters discussing each city in turn.

It’s an interesting idea, but I remain to be convinced. For starters, separating national from city-level characteristics is a minefield. As if to reinforce this difficulty, De-Shallit and Bell mess it up from the outset. They select Singapore as one of their examples even though it’s a city-state. Arguably, Hong Kong was too up until relatively recently.

And what, in practical terms, do we settle on as a city’s intrinsic ethos? I don’t find the discovery that Jerusalem is a city of religion, or that diminutive Oxford (population 165,000) is a city of education, provides any greater insight into these places than the discovery Karratha is a mining town. All that tells me is these are their dominant industries – that’s not telling me about the spirit of the place.

And if Bejing’s ethos is political power, that’s also true of most of the many other places that specialise in government, like Washington DC and Canberra (and there are many of them – for example, 33 capital cities in the US are not the most populous city in their State. Olympia, the capital of Washington State, has a population of just 50,000). Perhaps the hand of politics feels heavier to the outside observer in Beijing, but if so, that could be because of a national-level characteristic – it’s a communist state – rather than a city-level one.

It’s also very hard to separate out what’s city branding/marketing and what is the characteristic spirit of a place, or the collective aspirations and beliefs of its residents. New York is certainly a world power in finance and media and has marketed itself accordingly. But does “ambition” permeate the lives of all those New Yorkers – the great bulk of the city’s population – who aren’t “Masters of the Universe” e.g. the teachers, doctors, suburbanites, shop assistants, retirees, truck drivers, stay-at-home parents, people living in “the projects”? I don’t think so.

Similarly, does “romance” permeate all walks of life of Parisians or is it something projected onto the place by visitors (and maybe helped along with some savvy Gallic marketing)? Read More »

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Do great buildings make great cities?

December 19, 2011 – 5:18 pm, by Alan Davies

Utzon's competition-winning entry for the Sydney Opera House - fortunately, he liked oranges! (from SMH 30 Jan 1957)

I wish I could’ve been in Sydney on the 17th to attend UTS’s 10th Anniversary Special Zunz Lecture on the rather silly proposition that ‘Great buildings make great cities’. It would’ve been a giggle to see Nick Greiner, Elizabeth Farrelly, Graeme Jahn and Stuart White taking this pompous idea ever so seriously.

It’s true there are some great buildings in great cities. But there are some cities that have great buildings but aren’t themselves great. There are great cities that don’t have great buildings. Some great buildings aren’t even in cities. In fact some great buildings – like Mies’ Barcelona Pavilion and Rossi’s Teatro del Mondo – weren’t even intended to be permanent! And even in those cities with one or more great buildings, the best that could be said about most of the other 99.99% is they aren’t great.

I think it should be obvious Rome wasn’t a great city because of the Pantheon, but because it was a key centre of trade and political power over many centuries. Likewise London. But they’re European cities with millennia of history to draw on. New-world cities are a better reference for Sydney.

Few would argue that New York is one of the world’s great cities. It has some great structures too e.g. its rail stations, the Chrysler building, the Empire State building, the Brooklyn Bridge, and more lately the Highline.

But even the briefest glance at the magnificent book by Edwin Burrows and Mike Wallace, Gotham: a history of New York city to 1898, shows the overwhelming importance of complex social and economic forces in making Gotham one of the world’s great cities. With reputedly half of everything that ever entered the USA, including people, passing through New York, it would be a ridiculous conceit to argue the city is great because of its buildings.

It’s far more plausible that any line of causation runs the other way – New York has some great buildings because the city is great. Athens has the Parthenon because it was a great city, not the other way around. Bilbao doubtless has many virtues, but I haven’t heard it described too often as one of the world’s great cities just because its got a Guggenheim.

Sydneysiders suffer from Opera House Syndrome (OHS), so it’s no wonder they default to “starchitecture”. This unfortunate condition, which is characterised by blind hope and delusions of grandeur-on-the-cheap, is a direct consequence of the extraordinary good fortune of having not one but two internationally iconic structures – the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. Like cargo cultists, they think they can make Sydney even greater through more starchitecture.

OHS is a terrible and merciless condition. Sufferers think their cherished international emblems are the reward for their city’s intrinsic qualities, like the vision, risk-taking and marketing savvy of its residents.  The reality is that, like much in life, international icons are almost entirely the result of good luck – in fact extraordinary good luck.

We should all know by now that the Sydney Opera House was created in spite of Sydneysiders, not because of them. If it hadn’t been for Finnish architect, Eero Saarinen, it wouldn’t even have got a start.

The odds of a new-world city like Sydney having even one internationally iconic structure are astonishingly long (just ask Melbourne), but two is stratospheric. The odds of having more than two……and the likelihood Sydney could create yet another by intent…..well, we’re in the realm of metaphysics now.

I like to think that in Melbourne a debate like the Zunz lecture would be couched in different terms. At the very least, the proposition might be something like “great urban design makes great cities” or, preferably, “great urban design makes a better city”. They both recognise that it’s not individual buildings that make a difference but the overall feel of the city. The latter also acknowledges that the physical environment is only one factor that contributes to making a city great. Read More »

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What's Melbourne good at?

December 17, 2011 – 2:35 pm, by Alan Davies

What's the answer?

It’s natural in discussions of planning and development issues to focus limited energy on the areas where Melbourne could do better. But it’s easy to forget our blessings – the areas where Melbourne is doing well. That’s not to say that things couldn’t be better, but it acknowledges there are some areas where things could be much worse. It’s conceivable there are even areas where Melbourne punches well above its weight.

It’s the season of goodwill, so I thought it timely to look at the positives. Hopefully readers will have some suggestions too.

One of Melbourne’s great blessings is its extensive rail system. Please, while your first reaction might be disbelief, many cities elsewhere – in the US for example – don’t have anything even remotely as good as our network. And our tram system is reputedly the largest in the world. Again, many cities elsewhere are scrambling to retro-fit light rail and streetcar systems. We have rolling stock that’s getting friendlier for wheel chairs and successive governments have (belatedly) ordered new trains and trams.

In many places if you change modes you have to pay again. Not in Melbourne – there’s unlimited travel on a single ticket within a time window no matter how many times you transfer. While it’s had teething problems and isn’t out of the woods just yet, we have a smartcard system too. And two high frequency bus services now orbit the suburbs from the deep south to the west and from (relatively) early till late. Heck, I even heard there’s an extra NightRider service next weekend.

The Regional Rail Link has gotten the green light and design work is continuing on Melbourne Metro. It’s not good enough for most people I know, but we have a 24/7 airport public transport service operating at 10 minute frequencies for the great bulk of the day.

Fortunately, large parts of our freeway system are tolled. There are significant barriers to getting a drivers licence in terms of time and out-of-pocket costs. And just this week the Government had the good sense to bang up registration charges.

Successive governments and councils have promoted high density residential growth in the city centre. New inner city brownfields sites such as Fishermans Bend have been earmarked for development. There are large tracts of historic housing in areas like Fitzroy Nth and Carlton Nth that are largely intact. And we have inner city parks and the glorious Yarra River park system that other cities would die for.

One of Melbourne’s great assets is it has capacity for growth in the west, still within a reasonable distance of the CBD. Average lot sizes in all the growth areas are smaller than the older middle ring suburbs and getting smaller.

Perhaps the jewel in the crown is the wonderful and vibrant city centre. Its laneways and public spaces are rightly the envy of other cities who think (mistakenly) that they can replicate Melbourne’s success. I believe (admittedly without much hard evidence) that within ten years or less, inner Melbourne will be widely acknowledged as one of the world’s coolest cities (that’s a prediction!). Many major trip generators like the MCG are located in the centre, where peak crowds can best be served by public transport (unlike, say, Brisbane’s entertainment centre at Boondall).

We have Fed Square and the free Ian Potter Gallery. We have a culture that’s interested in the public realm, including planning and development issues, for its own sake (maybe I’m overdoing that one…)

That’s a start. I’ve focussed mainly on infrastructure, but there are also institutions and people who give Melbourne a positive outlook. For example, I reckon the Lord Mayor, to the surprise of many, is a real asset. I’d like to think there are some areas of social and cultural policy where we do well too.

Anyone else got any ideas on what Melbourne does well?

P.S. More on that statistics question.

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Links for urbanists No. 6

December 15, 2011 – 7:54 pm, by Alan Davies

Correlation is not causation

Assorted links to some of the useful, the informative, the interesting, and sometimes even the slightly weird sources I stumble across from time-to-time:

  1. There are only one and a half days to go to win a copy of Jarrett Walkers new book, Human Transit. Follow this link (this competition closed 17 Dec 2011)
  2. Motoring helmets for car drivers – “Ultimately, motoring helmets will be commonplace”
  3. Ted Baillieu’s favourite Melbourne buildings. He’s not likely to annoy anyone – the most recent is Alkira House, built in 1937
  4. How to increase capacity on SkyBus? – use “double deckers”
  5. Evolution of the London Underground map
  6. 16 global cities to watch in the future, according to Edward Glaeser and Saskia Sassen – but where’s Melbourne?
  7. Naughty and nice in transport advertising – Waking up in Geelong
  8. Correlation or causation. Need to prove something you already believe? Statistics are easy: all you need are two sets of data and a leading question (H/T Human Transit)
  9. The importance of place – scientists who are geographically close do better work (especially those within 10 metres of each other)
  10. Should speed limits be higher? No, the social costs of speed limit increases are three to ten times larger than the social benefits
  11. What does it cost to run a car? RACV’s guide to what it costs to run new cars of all sizes and shapes
  12. Barbarians on the Thames – hindsight analysis of the British riots by Theodore Dalrymple
  13. Sir Rod Eddington interviewed by Professor Peter Newman – they’re old colleagues!
  14. The death and life of great architecture criticism
  15. Slowing motorists down is the best way to increase safety for cyclists according to Britain’s Department for Transport
  16. Commuting cost analysis: bus vs bicycle vs car
  17. All you need to know about Birrarung Marr
  18. There was a time when the great political worry was that we’d leave no coal for future generations
  19. A review of Steven Pinker’s new book, The better angels of our nature, by Peter Singer
  20. A joke about a snail
  21. Imagining life in 2076
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