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The Future of Public Space III: Alderman Walker
- 1. Future of Public Spaces III: Who owns the space? Alderman Belinda Walker 8thJune 2016
- 6. Stand up for Crossroads
- 10. Do we trust ourselves and our young people enough to create a city for them that we cannot control? (Edgar Pieterse, Cape Town 2025Conference)
- 11. Space Rich – Cash Poor From providing spaces To Facilitating activity
- 12. Rationalise • Surplus POS in Mitchell’s Plain (700 spaces – 300 needed as parks)
- 13. Public spaces – the basics 13 Safety And Security Accessibility Multi- functional Community needs driven Safety And Security Accessibility Multi- functional Community Needs Driven Realistic Varying Sizes
- 14. Theft and Vandalism Cost of replacement/repair R5.5million (general) + R4million (protest action) Cost of Security: Hardening Facilities 14Go to Insert > Header & Footer > Enter presentation name into footer field 10% of Capital budget: R15million 3x synthetic soccer fields 3x spray parks Cost of Security Personnel R80million
- 15. City Surgery: Top down planning Community Action Plans: Developmental Approach Change planning approach
- 16. Lack of Creativity: Need for collaboration vs
- 17. 17 Where are we now?
- 18. Added 2011-2016 18Go to Insert > Header & Footer > Enter presentation name into footer field
- 19. 10 000 ha open space What spaces exist Nature Reserves [40%] Parks [20%] Ball Sports [20%] Non Ball Sports [4%] What people want 19Go to Insert > Header & Footer > Enter presentation name into footer field Active Recreation Arts and Crafts/ Indoor activities Dance and Music Formal Sport [7%] + Table Mountain National Park and the Coastline
- 20. Smart Parks
- 21. Valhalla Park Family Recreation Centre Active Recreation
- 22. Spray Parks, Skate Parks and Artificial Turfs
- 23. The Power of 10
- 24. Internal Challenges That’s not my job Spread too thin
- 25. Who should manage public spaces? The City = the owner? The public = the users? Public groups = activity specialists City + Public + Groups = Partnership External Challenges
- 26. How do you provide public spaces in an informal settlement? What are the new building blocks?
- 27. Working with small spaces 27Go to Insert > Header & Footer > Enter presentation name into footer field
- 28. Communication Breakdown: Public-Private Collaborations Short Term & Long Term view Ideas & Risk Common Sense & Compliance
- 29. You need • Information on existing opportunities • A variety of attractive opportunities • Un-complicated processes We need • Long Term Partnerships: – Enhancement and Activation of public space Dialogue Knowledge Opportunities Next Generation Urban Environments Facilitating contributions
- 30. Cultures & Climates differ all over the world, but people are the same. They’ll gather in public if you give them a good place to do it (Jan Gehl) 30
Editor's Notes
- In the early days, Cape Town’s tidy grid pattern hid the rather messy reality that people often lived, worked and spent their leisure time in the same spaces. Town planning began to define what should happen where – where you could live, where you could work and where you could play. This became the zoning scheme, or in Cape Town’s case the multiple zoning schemes, prescribed by 20th century planners and generally obeyed by the citizens. Generally although not entirely. But I am getting ahead of myself.
- We also had to contend with a number of “big ideas” in spatial planning from Europe and the United States particularly in the first quarter of the last century. There was Ebenezer Howard’s Garden City – Pinelands. There was le Corbusier’s Radiant City which required us to “abolish the suburbs and bring nature inside cities” and, very importantly, to separate functions in an orderly, planned and logical way. This reflects in the swathe of inappropriate apartment block zonings across the City Bowl, home to what is probably South Africa’s most significant collection of heritage sites and properties. Then there was Frank Lloyd Wright’s Broadacre City which took the city into the countryside with a vision of car-based suburbia. Just look around you to see this. The planners might well have felt rather like this. It is interesting that Wright predicted the rise of home entertainment with movies, concerts and lectures enjoyed better at home than in cinemas and concert halls.
- At this stage there was very little focus on people and a great deal of focus on rules. The result was often a sterile environment, something that Jane Jacobs took issue with and famously described as “having all the attributes of a well-kept, dignified cemetery”.
- Then as the world emerged from the Second World War and started to get back to normal South Africa took a giant step backwards. Apartheid demanded tha And if what was on the ground didn’t fit the plan it had to change – whether people liked it or not. t spaces were not only defined by function. They were defined primarily by race.
- And by the 1970s reality could no longer be ignored. Inward migration to cities and towns began in earnest and shack settlements sprang up wherever land was available.
- How do we reverse apartheid planning? How do we densify? How do we navigate growing, crowded cities? How do we enjoy them? Where are the recreational spaces?
- How much should we control? We sit with a young city – how do we build a city for young people and children?
- Safe = well used, oversight, well lit, fences & gates, CCTV, guards Accessible = close to school/home, no need to cross main roads or gang turf Varying sizes = make do with what is available Multi-functional = active & passive, all ages, M/F Community needs driven but also innovative Realistic e.g. paving Safety – people Security – space, drugs, costs
- In addition, many facilities are being progressively hardened and re-enforced with security infrastructure that includes stronger gates, burglar bars, alarm systems and where possible, CCTV camera installation. Last financial year, the City’s Sport, Recreation and Amenities Department prioritized R4,6 million to implement over 120 security interventions, including the installation of fencing and alarms at sports complexes and community halls. This hardening of facilities is helping to address the particularly problematic facilities that are classed as targeted hotspots for these relentless criminals.
- Top down planning: where the planner holds all the knowledge and makes incisions and moves things around accrording to what they think is best – the city is a lifeless, helpless thing in front of them. We’ve realised this approach doesn’t work well especially in the more informal areas of the city – it assumes that we understand how communities work – what they need and what their challenges are
- Smart parks each differ to meet community needs in a very specific way. If we want people to enjoy our public spaces, these spaces have to appeal to them. We don’t want to produce the same park 100 times across the city. There is huge diversity evident in CT’s neighbourhoods, so the roll out of a one-size-fits-all park is not an option. Public spaces gain infinitely more value if they reflect something of the public around them. Thibault park is a great example of a park designed with a certain user in mind. Here play equipment is especially designed for children with disabilities, with the park being conveniently located adjacent to a school for disabled children.
- For too long have ideas on exercise and recreation been dominated by sports like cricket, soccer and rugby. Not everyone wants to spend their free time trying to get a ball past a line or into a goal. The popularity of the spaces like the Valhalla park rec hub show that large swathes of society, both young and old, want to enjoy recreational time in a different way – something a little less structured: whether its running in between jets of water at the spray park or skating up and down a half pipe. The benefit of providing a collection of recreational spaces and not solely a 100m by 70m patch of grass is that the whole family can enjoy themselves in one space. The City of Cape Town launched their first Family Recreational Centre worth R33m in Valhalla Park on Monday 9 December 2013. The Valhalla Park Family Recreational Centre is the first of its kind and boasts a wide variety of sports and recreation spaces that offer activities for the whole family. It includes a full-size synthetic soccer pitch, a clubhouse and community facility, a network of pathways and landscaped areas through the park, a BMX track built as part of a detention pond, playground areas, outdoor gym areas, a spray park, a change room and ablution facilities, a flatlet for a caretaker, outdoor ‘reading rooms’ for community interaction with library activities, two mini-soccer pitches, two multi-purpose courts and a multitude of landscape architecture features. The facility is designed to appeal to people of all ages – from infants to teenagers to the elderly there really is something for everyone on offer. The Sport, Recreation and Amenities (SRA) and City Parks departments will manage the centre as an integrated facility, as a pilot project by the Community Services Directorate. SRA partnered with the Spatial Planning and Urban Design Department to design, manage and implement the concept for this recreational hub. The facility will be bordered by a new housing development and there is an existing school which borders onto it. The school kids have direct access to the full size synthetic pitch for sport. There is also an existing library on site and the recreation centre provides spaces where children can read outdoors.
- The Gardens Skate Park project is about turning a neglected space into a place for public interaction and creativity. It is a good example of going against the thinking of ‘build it and they will come’ – it reflects an understanding of the target market – where they come from, what they look for in a recreational space. The first six spray parks developed this year are each unique, with a variety of different play features. The components of a spray park are limited only by the imagination, with endless options for water-based fun. Spray parks are designed to appeal to the senses and stimulate children’s imaginations and provide an element of surprise.
- Great public spaces should offer at least 10 reasons to be there. These spaces should provide an alternative for anti-social behaviour not a space where it happens. Positive use of public spaces is the best deterrent for anti-social behaviour.