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IFLA-UNESCO: Safer Cities and Towns
IFLA-UNESCO Student Design Competition
Safer Cities and Towns
Topic
The topic that the competition entries must respond to is Safer Cities and Towns.
UN-Habitat has set up a special Safer Cities Programme and is seeking IFLAs assistance with this subject. Therefore Safer Cities and Towns is the topic for this years IFLA/UNESCO student competition. It is hoped that the prize-winning designs can be part of IFLAs representation to UN-Habitat and will inspire others with ideas about how landscape design can make towns and cities safer.
Laura Petrella, director of the Safer Cities Programme has provided the following stimulating brief:
A cycle of decay is typical of urban environments when fear of crime takes root. Spontaneous reactions by the population, the moving out of investments and business, as well as difficulties for service delivery can all contribute to large parts of cities losing vitality, to ghettoisation and associated stigmatisation, and the decay of public space.
This cycle of decay is difficult to counteract without a determined effort tackling the various factors at play. Landscape design and management have key roles to play to show us approaches and tools to address insecurity and promote safety and peace in public space, be it park, public square, a cultural complex or other forms of public space. Sometimes solutions for some are a problem for many, and public space is the first victim of fear of crime and of the spontaneous responses it commands.
In our vision of a Safer City, public space is accessible, lively and safe; residents and visitors feel encouraged to deploy activities and different types of user find it possible to have access and make use of public space without undue restrictions and barriers. In a Safer City, conflicting uses and cultural or behavioural patterns are managed and integrated by careful design and planning, and by meticulous management and maintenance mechanisms.
(For additional information and resources on the concept of Safer Cities please refer to http://www.unhabitat.org/programmes/safercities/ where linkages to other resources can be found.)
Cities can be made safer in direct ways by diminishing dangers arising from traffic, by pedestrianisation, by safe routes for children and cyclists, by the creation of a spatial structure for people. At the same time the human joy of risk taking needs to be recognised avoiding the trend towards repressive health and safety measures which can end up with the nanny city. Provision is needed for those who are disabled and also for the able bodied to exercise their full rights.
Safety can be interpreted as safety from crime, safety from injury by vehicles of all sorts, safe playgrounds and places for all ages to relax and play. Providing for safety can also mean creating places of challenge where young people can test their capacity to face danger and learn how to jump, balance or hang in the sky without endangering others or unduly putting themselves at risk.
Students are asked to submit projects which interpret the meaning of Safer Cities and Towns from any angle which stimulates their imagination. Think for instance about Ralph Waldo Emersons dictum: In skating over thin ice, our safety is in our speed. (Essay on Prudence 1841), or British King George VIs words in his Christmas broadcast in December 1939, Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown. Shakespeare wrote the words for Henry IV: Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety; can you propose landscape designs which will make towns and cities safer places?
Find more: UK Institute of Landscape Architects - http://www.l-i.org.uk/ifla/competition/
Safer Cities and Towns
Topic
The topic that the competition entries must respond to is Safer Cities and Towns.
UN-Habitat has set up a special Safer Cities Programme and is seeking IFLAs assistance with this subject. Therefore Safer Cities and Towns is the topic for this years IFLA/UNESCO student competition. It is hoped that the prize-winning designs can be part of IFLAs representation to UN-Habitat and will inspire others with ideas about how landscape design can make towns and cities safer.
Laura Petrella, director of the Safer Cities Programme has provided the following stimulating brief:
A cycle of decay is typical of urban environments when fear of crime takes root. Spontaneous reactions by the population, the moving out of investments and business, as well as difficulties for service delivery can all contribute to large parts of cities losing vitality, to ghettoisation and associated stigmatisation, and the decay of public space.
This cycle of decay is difficult to counteract without a determined effort tackling the various factors at play. Landscape design and management have key roles to play to show us approaches and tools to address insecurity and promote safety and peace in public space, be it park, public square, a cultural complex or other forms of public space. Sometimes solutions for some are a problem for many, and public space is the first victim of fear of crime and of the spontaneous responses it commands.
In our vision of a Safer City, public space is accessible, lively and safe; residents and visitors feel encouraged to deploy activities and different types of user find it possible to have access and make use of public space without undue restrictions and barriers. In a Safer City, conflicting uses and cultural or behavioural patterns are managed and integrated by careful design and planning, and by meticulous management and maintenance mechanisms.
(For additional information and resources on the concept of Safer Cities please refer to http://www.unhabitat.org/programmes/safercities/ where linkages to other resources can be found.)
Cities can be made safer in direct ways by diminishing dangers arising from traffic, by pedestrianisation, by safe routes for children and cyclists, by the creation of a spatial structure for people. At the same time the human joy of risk taking needs to be recognised avoiding the trend towards repressive health and safety measures which can end up with the nanny city. Provision is needed for those who are disabled and also for the able bodied to exercise their full rights.
Safety can be interpreted as safety from crime, safety from injury by vehicles of all sorts, safe playgrounds and places for all ages to relax and play. Providing for safety can also mean creating places of challenge where young people can test their capacity to face danger and learn how to jump, balance or hang in the sky without endangering others or unduly putting themselves at risk.
Students are asked to submit projects which interpret the meaning of Safer Cities and Towns from any angle which stimulates their imagination. Think for instance about Ralph Waldo Emersons dictum: In skating over thin ice, our safety is in our speed. (Essay on Prudence 1841), or British King George VIs words in his Christmas broadcast in December 1939, Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown. Shakespeare wrote the words for Henry IV: Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety; can you propose landscape designs which will make towns and cities safer places?
Find more: UK Institute of Landscape Architects - http://www.l-i.org.uk/ifla/competition/
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