Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e Quality of urban public spaces and services as paths towards upraising deprived neighbourhoods and promoting sustainable and competitive cities Edited by: Liliana Padovani lead export of URBACT II WG Sha.ke Baseline study March 2010 1 Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e 2 Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e Table of contents Chapter 1. The topic, the approach proposed, main references to current debate and EU challenges Chapter 2. Fighting social and spatial exclusion and addressing problems of deprived urban neighbourhoods. National reports Policy approach and facts in: Austria, Germany, Greece, Italy, Poland and in Spain Chapter 3 Local overviews and case studies 1 - Iuav University of Venice (lead partner) “Innovative practices in the production of public spaces and services and urban regeneration”. Case studies: Venice, Padua and Verona, Veneto Region 2 – Vienna University of Technology “Fostering social integration through the renovation of public spaces in deprived urban neighbourhoods and through the promotion of area-based, integrated urban regeneration policies”. Case study Vienna City 3 – Hafen City University of Hamburg “Public space in different planning concepts”. Case studies: Altona Altstadt and Hafen City, Hamburg 4 – University of the Aegean “The role of public space renovation in the Urban Growth Poles strategy”. Case studies: The cities of Alexandroupolis, Komotini and Mytilene. 5 - Wroclaw Municipality Case study: “A Regeneration programme for Nadodrze District: focus on restoration of traditional commercial routes” 6 - Mytilene Municipality “Integrated urban intervention in an island city”. Case study: Mytilene City. 7 – Apulia Region case studies: a) regional programme PIR b) implementation of the programme in five cities: Bari, Manfredonia, Putignano, Cisternino, Torremaggiore. 8 - Generalitat de Catalunya Case studies: a) regional programme of urban sustainable regeneration Lei de Barrio b) implementation of the programme in two cities: Badalona and Manlleu Chapter 4 Summary and synthesis Findings from intake visits, kick-off and final meeting of the partners and development phase Conclusions and implication for the future work 3 Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e 4 Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e Chapter 1 The topic, the approach proposed, main references to current debate and EU challenges. Methods and structure of the baseline study Topic, and approach P. Bruegel image emphasises the density and the freedom in the use of a public space by different groups of inhabitants: elders, young, merchants, artisans, gamblers . The aim of these introductory notes is to explain: a. why public spaces and services can play an important role in process of deprived neighbourhood regeneration and more generally in the revitalization of cities b. why the focus of Sha.ke WG activities is on the relationships between three different angles to look and consider public spaces: the optics and procedural practices of the public administrations, that of the different associations involved, and that of everyday life. a. The role of public spaces and services in regenerating deprived neighbourhoods European cities have experienced a variety of innovative actions and programmes aiming at improving the quality of life in deprived neighbourhoods, fighting process of spatial and social exclusion, as well as addressing the problems of revitalising those parts of the city that have been affected in the last decades by problems of decline, de- industrialisation, abandonment A common feature which characterises these different orders of programmes is the strategic centrality assigned by them to the quality of public space and services (public and private) as a lever toward sustainable processes of improvement. Years of action to revitalise deprived neighbourhoods that have considered the improvement of services and of public spaces at the core of their initiatives allow to 5 Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e develop some considerations as far as the main issues identified, approaches followed, difficulties met and results. Some of these seem of particular interest for Sha.ke WG. Among the new problems to face: - the new features acquired by public spaces and services in the city of today The increased citizens mobility (Tarrius 1) within and between cities, their multiple belonging to places (Frug 2), the heterogeneity of the social, cultural, ethnical profile of the groups of population using public spaces, has deeply changed, functions, meaning and attractiveness of public spaces - in public spaces coexist local users (from the stable concept of ‘community’ to a more recent one of ‘proximity’) and non local users. How to make their coexistence a resource in terms of openness to the whole city, a tool to avoid marginalisation, a richness in the quality of services and not a potential arena for conflicts - how to deal with new feeling of safety and security in public spaces. - how to improve the capacity of living together, of sharing spaces. This is a field to effectively experiment forms of declination of the concept (at present still undetermined of social mix) which is at the centre of urban policies both at the EU level and of European governments. - b. An approach involving all the relevant actors as a promising way of action Urban public spaces through the process of industrialisation and then the shift towards the knowledge society, have gained in safety, capacity to represent society organisation, order, but have lost their original capacity to host a variety of forms of social interactions and being vitalised and determined in their social, functional, cultural and political terms by these activities. Urban planning, health rules, a new sense of urban décor, the interests of urban promoters and other important urban actors have progressively specialised and diversified the use of these spaces devolving the definition of their meanings and ways of use from citizens to technical apparatus. Not all the cities and not all the parts of cities underwent this process, some of them because of their structural and social texture were able to resist, preserving in the good and the bad theirs nets of interactions between urban public spaces and city inhabitants and users (see cities lake Naples and Moscow, Benjamin 3, the concept of the city in Amin Thrift 4; the Mediterranean city, etc). The problem is particularly evident in the new residential peripheries built during the growth years of the 50-80s. Large arena-shaped squares, porches evoking the democratic concepts of agora, of meeting and walking, lay, still conserving traces of their original architectural beauty, in a state of neglect in many public estates whose settings had been conceived and drown by valuable architects (Aimonino and Rossi at Quartiere Gallaratese in Milan). In other les fortunate contexts empty spaces 1 Tarrius A. (1994) “Territoires ciculatoires et espaces urbains”, Annales de la recherche urbaine , n.59- 60. 2 Frug, G. E. (1999), City Making, Princeton Univ. Press, Princeton and Oxford 3 Benjamin W. (2007) Immagini di città , Einaudi 4 Amin a:, Thrift N.(2002) Cities, reimagining the urban, Cambridge Polity Press 6 Sha.ke - Sha ring Urban knowledg e characterise areas classified as services and public spaces by the land-use plan. Thus contributing at the negative image and the low quality of life in these neighbourhoods. The dominance of a technical approach, nevertheless required to guide urban growth, has contributed to empty public spaces by a multiplicity of uses and functions and made them prone to neglect, vandalism, or appropriation by specific social groups (legal or illegal) at the expenses of other groups or of the whole community. Quoting Jane Jacobs: "Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.". This to explain why the approach proposed by the Sha.ke WG to address the issue of the role of public spaces (and services) in upgrading deprived neighbourhoods, stresses the interactions between three different areas of practices: - ‘Institutional practices’ (i.e., roughly, practices of production of public spaces developed by institutions within urban policies) - Urban practices somehow linked to ‘social innovation’ which consider the needs and socio-political organisation of excluded groups at the core of local development strategies (Moulaert, 2000 5) - Urban practices linked to people everyday life (Bang 1999 6). These different fields of practices, which are frequently considered separately in urban policies, are tightly interconnected in the process of providing services and public spaces, and their intertwining has an important place in determining the ‘quality’ of public spaces and services. Particularly if quality is confronted with local needs and expectations. The social innovation concept involves an alternative view of urban development. This is focused on satisfaction of human needs trhough innovation in community governance. Both needs and socio-political organisation of excluded groups are at the core of local development strategies. Main references to current debate and EU challenges During the last two decades the issues of deprived urban areas have played an important role in the EU policy agenda. Cities and urban regions have been acknowledged to be the motors of EU economic growth, and essential for Europe’s competitiveness in the global economy. Their key role as centers