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Tactical Urbanism Guide 2011

Tactical Urbanism Guide 2011
Type Resource Guide Format PDF Author Street Plans Collaborative Year 2011 Related Sectors Environment Topic Community Organizing

by Street Plans Collaborative and Next Generation of New Urbanists

Authors: MIKE LYDON, DAN BARTMAN, RONALD WOUDSTRA, AURASH KHAWARZAD

Excerpt

THE CHALLENGE

City planners and public leaders are frequently preoccupied with making large-scale, transformative change in the built environment. While stadiums, museums, large waterfront parks, and convention centers are all big-ticket items with measurable curb appeal—for some—such projects require a substantial investment of time, as well as political, social, and fiscal capital. Moreover, their long term economic or social benefit cannot be guaranteed.

In the pursuit of progress, citizens are typically invited to engage in a process that is fundamentally broken: rather than being asked to contribute to incremental change at the neighborhood or block level, residents are asked to react to proposals that are often conceived for interests disconnected from their own, and at a scale for which they have little control. In the pursuit of resilient neighborhoods, cities, and metropolitan regions, surmounting the challenges inherent to this “public” process continues to prove difficult. Fortunately, alternative tactics are available and ready for deployment.

TACTICAL URBANISM - Definition

Improving the livability of our towns and cities commonly starts at the street, block, or building scale. While larger scale efforts do have their place, incremental, small scale improvements are increasingly seen as a way to stage more substantial investments. This approach allows a host of local actors to test new concepts before making substantial political and financial commitments. Sometimes sanctioned, sometimes not, these actions are commonly referred to as “guerilla urbanism,” “popup urbanism,” “city repair,” or “D.I.Y. urbanism.” For the moment, we like “Tactical Urbanism,” which is an approach that features the following five characteristics:

• A deliberate, phased approach to instigating change;
• The offering of local solutions for local planning challenges;
• Short-term commitment and realistic expectations;
• Low-risks, with a possibly a high reward; and
• The development of social capital between citizens and the building of organizational capacity between public-private institutions, non-profits, and their constituents.

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