Drains take up precious but inaccessible open space in our cities. Converting these to living streams running through the suburbs could make for healthier places in multiple ways.
With cities becoming more dense and housing more crowded, people rely more than ever on well-designed public spaces, so why hasn’t the furniture changed with the times?
By putting the users of buildings – people – at the centre of the process of designing buildings and infrastructure, we can create healthier, more human-centred spaces.
Melbourne is a product of British colonial planning policies to control public access and movement in Australian cities. This legacy still influences the use of public spaces today.
A host of spaces that were once immune to commercial intrusion – from parks to our friendships – are now being infiltrated by advertisers. Are we being enslaved by a ‘merciless master’?
In contrast to perceptions of other homeless people sleeping rough, Darwin’s “long-grassers” are applying a long cultural tradition to deal with the situation in which they find themselves.
Redesigning spaces of conflict starts with creating life on the edges. Geelong offers contrasting examples of city centre spaces: one with problems inherent in its design and a nearby one that works.
Desley Vine, Queensland University of Technology and Laurie Buys, Queensland University of Technology
Several key aspects of public open space can encourage older people to get out and about. And badly designed and maintained facilities have the opposite effect and can harm their wellbeing.
In many ways, the conflict we see on our beaches may be a small price to pay for the free and open access to our beaches, which Australians have long fought to preserve.
The increasing global focus on essential services and public space as a key combination for successful city-making is relevant to fast-growing Australian cities too.
Big ideas and big dollars have been invested in making ‘memorable’ places. Paradoxically, as similar solutions are adapted in diverse settings worldwide, this can lead to an uneasy new placelessness.
This Friday is the 11th PARKing Day, when people pay a parking meter, then turn the space into a pop-up parklet. It’s a day that invites citizens to rethink the city and their place in it.