Sustainability in the City...contemplating City Size, Green Spaces and Urban Attitudes

Tunnel of Green

 “Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair”

 Khalil Gibran

(i)                  This photograph was taken in Port of Spain, near to Serpentine Road. It’s a little way off the Queen’s Park Savannah, one of the major green spaces in Trinidad’s capital. However I chose this picture to start my entry on sustainability in the city simply because this tunnel of green in my opinion epitomizes all that is clean, surreal, pristine and natural about the city. Right in the heart of Port of Spain, amidst the noise and the chaos of the modern city is such a beautiful sight, an urban landscape on the brink of extinction, tucked away in the a tiny crevasse, adjacent to an every growing, ever sprawling city that waits ready and anxious to swallow it up.

Urban Green Spaces...
an unstoppable force meets an immovable object

(ii)                Sustainability and the city had been outlined in Hall and Barrett’s final chapter in their book Urban Geography. They talk of sustainability and sustainable development emerging slowly but surely out of the shadows into post-modern talks about the future. “The city has been identified as a key building block in the path toward a more sustainable world” (Hall and Barrett, 2012) as it has become clear to researchers that the city is an inevitable force that never ceasing to stop growing or affecting those around and within it. This includes the environment as the battle rages on between the immovable object that is nature and the unstoppable force that it urbanization.

Recently I attended the Caribbean Urban Forum 2013 in the Hilton Trinidad, and one of the key issues talked about in light of last year’s Rio +20 conference was the idea of sustainable development and the dire need for countries all around the world to adopt policies today that will preserve resources and the environment for the needs of future generations. Hall and Barrett recognize that sustainability when it comes to cities does not only entail protection of the environment but involves issues such as non-renewable resource depletion and toxic emissions. The difference between normal use and unsustainable use in this case lies in the crossing of the line that separates sparing and responsible usage and greedy use to the point of irreparable damage.

The debate between urban size and form and sustainability has been long-winded and significant in the creation of arguments for and against large and small cities. Below is a table I have made up outlining the arguments brought forward by Breheny (1995) as to why larger cities are indeed more sustainable:

LARGE CITIES

SMALL CITIES

1.       More compact cities means less commuting distance. 2.       Higher population densities leads to relatively low car usage 3.       Extensively developed and efficient mass transit systems. 4.       Higher level of political resources that can be mobilized to manage environmental problems 5.       Large cities act as ‘cradles of innovation and the development of technology’ that might enhance further sustainable development ventures.

Decentralization of cities actually means higher commuting distances to suburbs. Lower population densities: car usage is twice as high as in areas of highest population density. Less developed or inefficient mass transit systems because of the heavy reliance on personal cars.

Regardless of size one aspect of sustainable development that researchers agree on is that green spaces are essential in the city. This is referred to as ‘greening of the city’. Hunter and Haughton (1994) see plants as playing important roles in cities as moderators of human activities, for example absorbing emissions. Interestingly, Hough (1995) has made a distinction between two types of green spaces:

1.       Formally planned green spaces, referred to as manicured civic spaces and pedigreed landscapes such as gardens and boulevards.

2.       Unplanned green spaces, referred to as fortuitous, forgotten and neglected spaces.

Planned vs. Unplanned Green Space

While one would think the former description would be the most beneficial as they are more viewer friendly and ironically the more popular green spaces in cities, Hough notes that it is that latter ‘fortuitous landscapes’ that are actually more beneficial to the city. Among his reasons for this are: they aid in the development of diversity, they consume little external resources (no need for watering or maintenance), the plants reflect local ecology.

Also heard in talks concerning green spaces regard the size and distribution of these landscapes. Again, the green spaces that we see all around us, the large, homogenous, singular parks are seen to be not ideal by researchers. Haughton and Hunter (1994) outline that while large parks can offer some psychological benefits, socially and environmentally they are not sustainable. Large parks are found to break up traffic routes leading to increased congestion and higher levels or car usage, support narrow ecology, promote mass migration of animals to a few dispersed green spaces and encourage delinquent social activity such as drug-dealing, rapes and robberies. Rather than have few very large parks, researchers suggest that spreading smaller parks throughout the city and developing neighborhood or pocket parks may be more beneficial psychologically, socially, and environmentally for cities.

What can be said of Port of Spain's Green Spaces?? 
 
An article in the Trinidad Newsday: is this the best idea for green space in Trinidad? Who is it catering to? who has access to it? who is excluded? is it really green space?? http://www.newsday.co.tt/news/print,0,171898.html

Lastly, I just want to touch on urban attitudes and sustainability. Take a look at this picture I took in Port of Spain. Note that the sign is saying DO NOT LITTER…I find this absolutely appalling and sadly so representative of human nature. What can be the cause of this defiance? this lack of care for your own surroundings? this non-existent consideration for others, the city and the environment? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this photo..

CAPTION THIS!!
(p.s. look i'm there in the side mirror!!)

(iii)               Of course a few links to look at:

-          Guerilla Gardeners: one London gardener on a mission to make our green spaces brighter http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssz8AvCrqoM

-          This film gives details of the green-belt alliance and lets you know what you can do to help http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-45ZfKLamg

-          Stockholm is the very first city to be designated European Green Capital 2010 by the EU Commission http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuMuMnvcYvA

-          The city of Curitiba, capital of Parana State in south-east Brazil, opted for a sustainable development track as early as the 1970s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeAZsmpt7a8