This has been a brilliant month for those of us interested in the sociology of planning and urban development. Sounds dull, but it can be pretty dramatic in reality, certainly if you’re interested in instinct and human behaviour. Or the fact that the railings outside Camden Town tube have all come down recently.
On BBC Radio 4, we had Thinking Streets, a documentary about the theory of shared space. In a gross simplification, this is the theory that if people and motorists think for themselves around roads and public spaces, the result, rather than chaos will be harmony.
So take down traffic lights and railings, and people cross where they like, when they like… and motorists have to act like real people rather than keeping their feet permanently on the accelerator until instructed by a machine to slam the breaks on.
It was all pioneered by a Dutch planner called Hans Monderman, who was fond of testing out his theories by walking backwards into the traffic with his arms folded.
I was looking back over the Camden New Journal’s coverage of the railings removal in Camden Town. This is ‘naked streets’, a small step towards shared space. ‘Shared space’ in Camden Town would no doubt also include taking down the multitude of lights and levelling the pavements with the roads.
But it was interesting to see in Tom Foot’s piece that Camden council had evidently stressed that they wouldn’t be expanding the zero-railings policy to outside schools. For in the Radio 4 documentary, they talk about when Monderman came up with the controversial idea of invoking shared space at a village primary school in Holland.
And this wasn’t just outside the school gate. Motorists were driving through the playground to access the village. Kids were playing on the main road. There were chalk marks and skipping ropes. And apparently it worked a treat, not just for that road, but for the whole village.
And those of us who have been to the countryside know that it’s a complete myth that roads are safer there anyway. But can you imagine the Daily Mail outrage if Camden did such a thing?
Of course, there are other issues about access to primary school playgrounds. It’s quite possible that in Holland they don’t have enclosed playgrounds, and so there would be no added paedophile risk from such a move.
But even if a British local authority tried to take down railings outside the school gates, I think it would be very hard to pull off. Lots of emotion.
In other news on this subject, Anna Minton has a new edition of her seminal work Ground Control: Fear and Happiness in the Twenty-First Century City out this month. My copy arrived yesterday. I reviewed it when it first came out, and interviewed her about the shocking issues it raises. Now there’s a new chapter on the ‘true olympic legacy’ and the policies of the Tory-led government.
I should be reviewing this before long. But keep an eye out, follow her on Twitter and take an interest in this fascinating area.
