charter cities for addressing development challenges

There is a thought-provoking podcast from Paul Romer posted on TED.com last week, where he's talking about setting up city-scale administrative zones governed by a coalition of nations. This may not be an entirely new idea, but it is certainly a bold concept for addressing some of the challenges faced in developing countries.

His basic premise goes something like this. People need to be given choices if they are to have access to opportunities for advancement. The rules that are in place in any given country can help or hinder people in making their choices, and sometimes it could help to set up a place where an entirely new set of rules can be established. Places like North Korea and South Korea started with the same set of rules, but when they split up as countries, each established a set of rules that put them on divergent development trajectories. Countries with 'bad' rules might benefit from setting up special zones with a new set of rules, which could attract investors and could be jointly managed with a partnership of nations.

There are several examples where this has happened for more limited purposes, such as Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, the Dubai International Financial Centre and the Panama Canal zone. On a larger scale, Romer mentions Hong Kong as an example where two countries (Britain and China) agreed to a new set of rules , setting up a partnership with delegation of authority. (He sees his proposal as different from colonialism, on the grounds that colonialism was based on coercion and condescension.)

Rules often don't give service providers the means or incentive to provide choices that are suitable for the poorer residents of a country or city. But attempts to change rules often run into obstacles from vested interests. If a charter city were set up where people could choose to opt in, this could be a way to overcome objections.

He believes that cities are the right scale to provide choice and efficiency. Small towns don't provide the range of services or the scale necessary, and cities can also be denser, resulting in a smaller physical footprint than would be the case with settling the same number of people in smaller towns. I have read the view elsewhere (can't remember the reference now) that small settlements are actually better for accommodating growth in developing countries. The argument there was that small centres have governance models that are more easily able to accommodate growth effectively; but under Romer's model the charter city would have a new form of governance that should be able to address this issue.

energy in urban and regional planning

A new partnership between German and South African researchers aims to support decision-makers by integrating energy planning with climate protection within the context of economic growth.

Climate change modelling is a complex exercise that is being refined continuously based on the steady evolution of the science underpinning it. Each year there are hundreds, if not thousands, of individual research projects that look back in time to see better how climate varies, and to strengthen understanding of the linkages between cause and effect. Some scientists spend years studying more recent, better documented periods, and watching changes as they happen. Still others look ahead using global climate models (GCM) that use the results of all these studies to forecast what might happen in future.

And then there are those who take the results of the GCMs and try to make sense of them for local and regional planning purposes. This area of study is just as challenging, in part because the global models are too coarse to form the basis of detailed local-level forecasting. But this too is being taken forward as governments begin in earnest to plan for climate change; Bruce Hewitson is a key player in this field within Southern Africa, as I have written previously.

Each region needs to understand future conditions so that it can plan for adaptation, and it also needs to establish the most effective local strategies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. A project is currently underway in South Africa to assess the intersection of these two needs, with an economic energy model that initially will be used to analyse the entire energy system of Gauteng Province.The May 2009 newsletter of EnerKey, a partnership involving a number of local and international stakeholders, outlines the purpose of the TIMES model.

We will be able to provide policymakers with information which would lead to a least-cost expansion plan for the energy sector while meeting important political, environmenta, and social objectives. Uncertainties, such as energy prices and population, are addressed through a sensitivity analysis.

viva la difference

Taiwan's new solar-powered stadium

One of the things about green buildings, whether they are refurbishments or newly built from the ground up, is that it doesn't make sense to expect all of them to contribute in the same way to the improved sustainability performance of towns and cities. Context is key. Typical low-density suburbs have negative impacts for a number of reasons, but so do high-rise jungles.

For example, if an objective is to reduce dependence on private cars and to increase walking and the use of public transport, then we should work towards higher urban densities and mixed-use areas. But high-density urban cores will generally have to import their energy from other parts of the city or from surrounding areas, so they may not "pay their way" as far as fossil-fueled energy independence is concerned. (Although there is a Seattle proposal for downtown energy sources based on waste incineration.)

A few recently publicised buildings illustrate the point.

designing cities for people

Truckloads of words have been written about how the modern lifestyle has alienated us from Earth and each other, leaving us "ungrounded". There are many interpretations of what it is about our lives that creates this disconnect, but technology features as a strong theme. I tend to think of technology not only as high-tech things like computers, cell phones and iPods, but as everything around us that is planned, designed and built.

As an engineer, I am at least partly responsible for shaping people's lives through design decisions that alter the built form. This influence can have a positive impact on quality of life, but I would hazard a guess that it is more often negative. The way a building is designed, where it is located in relation to other structures and spaces, how transport systems connect people with their destinations, what forms of energy are supplied - these all play an active role in determining the choices people have in going about their lives. There is nothing neutral about engineering, architecture or urban design; these disciplines come laden with the value systems of the people who apply them.

Trouble is, the application of design processes very rarely recognises the prejudices of their practitioners. If I don't understand the community that I am designing for, I can increase alienation, community dysfunction and poverty in its broadest sense. It's easy: as a professional, I know what's best for society as a whole. For one thing, we need more public transport and fewer cars - for a number of very good reasons. And we need more houses, because globally, there simply aren't enough. Oh yes, and we should have solar panels on the roof of every house, because distributed power systems are more effective and great for creating jobs.

ground zero for the climate change battle

It's been widely reported that right about now - certainly this decade - cities are overtaking rural areas as home to more than half the world's population. Statistics like this tend to reinforce the emphasis on cities as the source of most environmental problems, making them the focus of research and planning. Most researchers and planners, after all, live in cities.

It's worth remembering that there's still the other half out there. A paper issued last week by the International Institute for Environment and Development claims that cities are often unfairly blamed for producing 75 to 80 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. If you look at where products and services are consumed, rather than where they are produced, cities are only responsible for 40% of emissions, according to the paper - and the consumer should rightly take responsibility. This is not to demonise people in rural areas; the point is that there are a lot of efficiencies and potential improvements in efficiencies that can be made in cities, but not so much in rural areas. Compact cities, for example, can make better use of resources, can have greater synergies between different land uses, and can have people driving less.

In general, wealthy people outside cities are responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than those in cities as they have larger homes that need to be heated or cooled, more automobiles per household and greater automobile use.

It's not clear, from the summary of the paper, whether the global allocation of emissions to urban and rural areas holds true in developing countries, where there is a particular balance between rich and poor in urban and rural areas that differs from the mix found developed countries. The use of energy by poor people could swing emissions either way: rural poverty often results in less efficient use of energy, such as burning wood for cooking - and likewise, the smog hanging over urban slums might produce beautiful sunsets, but it sure doesn't help the environment.

The paper's author, David Satterthwaite, blames the rich for producing the bulk of emissions, and sees the easiest solutions in urban areas. Both conclusions might be true, but a sustainable solution absolutely must address poverty, wherever it exists, and address it in a way that does not replicate a middle class that consumes resources with abandon. I don't see the point in keeping the battle within city boundaries. Spatial planning, and design of the built form, need to be attuned to environmental preservation on farms, in towns and in the physical and functional relationships between settlements of all sizes.

In a separate editorial in the October 2008 edition of the journal Environment and Urbanisation, Satterthwaite acknowledges the importance of addressing poverty, but keeps the focus on urbanisation and seems not to recognise urban-rural relationships. He notes that efforts by poor communities to gain control over their economic situation can be more easily repressed, and their energy diffused, by municipalities that choose not to (or cannot) address urban inequalities. "In addition, physical proximity is no advantage for urban poor groups when city authorities view them or their settlements as constraints on the city’s development and capacity to attract new investment." Which leads me to think that some strategies to address human settlement challenges could in fact be more effective in rural areas or small towns. And where social and housing needs can be addressed with conscious planning, there must be a parallel opportunity to deal with resource consumption and GHG emissions.

Interestingly for South Africans, the same edition of the journal also includes a paper by Debra Roberts on how Durban has institutionalised a climate change strategy.

Durban is unusual among cities worldwide in having a municipal government that has developed a locally rooted climate change adaptation strategy. The paper highlights the need for climate change issues to be rooted in local realities that centre on avoiding or limiting impacts from, for instance, heat waves, heavy rainfall and storm surges, and sea-level rise, and also the ecological changes and water supply constraints brought about by climate change. The paper also notes how little attention international agencies have paid to adaptation, as the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (mitigation) has been prioritized. This paper also stresses the importance of building local knowledge and capacity about climate change risks and adaptive responses. Without this, decision makers will continue seeing environmental issues as constraints on development rather than as essential underpinnings of and contributors to development.

having my cake and eating it too

We can't all have big private garderns and still expect walkable communities. This should be obvious, but one reason it isn't is demonstrated by the comments on this post from Eschaton [via kottke.org]: People give examples of how they have big plots of land and can still walk to the shops or schools or work. I could also point out that I walk to a train service that takes me to work every day, and I live in a low-density suburb. But that doesn't mean everyone else can walk and travel on safe, convenient public transport. I chose my house because it is near a station, but if everyone did that, then the prices of houses near stations would skyrocket, and eventually market forces would increase residential densities around stations.

So I consider myself fortunate in being able to make what I consider environmentally responsible travel choices; but if I am honest, I have to admit that while I am limiting my direct contribution to vehicle emissions, I am contributing to a city shape that forces others to drive. Something's got to give.

growth of a monster

For many environmentalists, Walmart is the epitome of how a retailer can take low-density sprawl, accelerate it, and cause havoc by magnifying the trend towards increasingly car-dependent cities. Just for fun, here's a visual representation of how Walmart took over America between 1961 and 2007.

UK eco-towns raising hackles

With the UK government planning a series of eco-towns to act as models for zero-carbon urban development, there are a few objections. The Campaign to Protect Rural England says that the towns shouldn't be on greenfield sites. They could rather be "eco-extenstions", or other forms of development that are potentially less damaging to the environment by avoiding sprawl and improving existing urban areas. The CPRE suggests a number of tests by which the eco-towns should be judged before their plans are finalised.

Urban planner Nicholas Falk adds that some of the eco-towns are on sites that were previously rejected as locations for new towns on other grounds, suggesting that criteria for sustainability aren't being applied properly. The objections don't seem to be over the concept of eco-towns, but over appropriate locations for development.

But a DCLG spokeswoman said the policy would encourage “well planned sustainable growth” on brownfield and greenfield land.

“The statutory planning process will ensure that areas will be protected from inappropriate development,” she added. “These settlements will be designed to the highest standards, make the most efficient use of land, and be designed sustainably and to zero-carbon objectives.”

EcoEdge for sustainability

For anyone interested in current discourse around developing green cities, last month's EcoEdge 2 Conference in Australia provided wide-ranging debate on a number of related topics. Part of the motivation for this event was to generate ideas from academics, architects, planners and others facing the challenge of planning and building sustainable cities, under the four main themes of urbanism, government, buildings and housing. There were also workshops to deliver practical approaches to improving urban sustainability performance.

Presenters attended from China, India, USA, Holland, Denmark, Colombia and other countries, and their presentations are available on the CityEdge web site. A number deal with the challenges of slums and other concerns in developing countries.

making do with less

Eskom has tried several tactics to force big electricity users to reduce demand, in a last-ditch attempt to minimize the need for load shedding. Some industries have had an understanding for some time that they would be called upon to partially shut down their operations; more recently the mines were forced to drastically scale back; and the latest strategy - a step too far, in the ANC's view - has been to refuse to issue permits for large new developments for a few months. Without the permits, the developments can't proceed.

The ANC is outraged, no doubt, because they see this as applying the brakes to economic growth. The government may be right - but only because it hasn't bothered to develop a strategy to encourage developers who could (with a little nudge) make do with reduced dependence on the national electricity grid.

I find it curious that the backlash from government has been more vociferous in the case of the permit delay tactic than in the case of shutting down mine operations. Given time and carefully applied political pressure, the mines could probably find alternative power sources to supplement their main supply, but in the short term there is little they can do but comply with restrictions, and this clearly has an economic impact. New developments, on the other hand, could be configured to have greater flexibility in their mix of power supplies from the start. Government and Eskom should be working together with developers to find ways to encourage a new wave of thinking - particularly with new developments. In industries where the market calls for it, this is already being done. The planned expansion of the Cape Town International Convention Centre is a good example.