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DENSITY: SHOULD WE FAVOR IT? IF SO, TO WHAT EXTENT?
Jérémy Giglione
Edward Glaeser, of Harvard University, has presented
an interesting figure. He provided evidence that
the average American commuter’s journey takes 48
minutes by public transport but only 24 minutes by car.
This illustration may well be at the “crossroads” of the
issue of population density. Firstly, Americans are more
likely to live in suburbs if cars are faster than public
transportation. Secondly there is no way dense cities
are likely to entice people if no good means of
transportation are provided.
In
people’s collective consciousness, dense cities often
mean congested streets, no trees and worn-out
facilities. It might be true to some extent. It seems
less likely that an area’s natural resources can support
a densely occupied environment.
Yet reasonable density turns out to be one of the smart
growth movement’s ambitions. Dense cities mean less gas
emissions. They make it possible for a mixing of people,
styles and cultures. As Richard Florida coined it,
cities are a natural home
for the “creative class”, such as artists, designers or
others. Only in such an urban lifestyle can you apply
the third place theory – i.e. one place for work, one
for house and one for leisure and community life.
The widespread trend in favor of dense cities is not yet
apparent. Of course, global warming will probably lead
people to congregate in cities or more compact suburban
areas. Land is finite. Yet sprawl has “good days” ahead.
The USA has space. It loves its car culture. And
moreover technological changes enable people to shop,
work, or get a cultural fix through the internet. That
is why Atlanta’s overall metropolitan area expanded by
39% while central Atlanta grew only by 6%.
So
the issue is more about how to favor reasonable density
and how to make it smart. The key answer lies obviously
in the quality of infrastructures. The heart of the
issue remains public transportation. It will entice
people and ensure that density is not synonymous with
congestion. A good answer could be to introduce road
charges to enter the city, as London, Oslo or Singapore
have implemented. Another way could be to apply
Brazil’s
Curitiba example. The capital of Paranà state has
pedestrianized the center of the city. It has created
broad lanes leading to the center of the city in which
fast commuting buses are moving on both sides,
unencumbered. The center of the roads are reserved to
local traffic. The attractive set-up motivates people to
move into town, and public transportation flows
smoothly. This is a smart growth victory. There is more
density and yet less congestion.
PART TWO
TRANSPORTATION
So
much of smart growth and degrowth theory centers around
transportation because so much of our world’s pollution
comes from cars, trucks and planes, and so much of our
time is spent in these vehicles, in some way taking
advantage of them and in other ways, much too dependent
on them, too much for our own health, the health of
others, and the health of the earth.
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