With the kind permission of Strelka Press, we publish an excerpt from Tactical Urbanism by Anthony Garcia and Mike Lydon.
Guerrilla signs
Anywhere you can walk on foot, it would be time.
Stephen Wright
The name of the project is "Walk [Your City]"
Launched 2012
Originating City of Raleigh (North Carolina)
Leaders Initiated by active city dweller Matt Tomasulo, joined by hikers, community organizers and city planners from a wide range of locations
Objective To encourage walking instead of using transport
Fact Although 41% of all travel in the United States is within a mile, less than 10% of travel is by foot or by bicycle
If the city of the XX century encouraged residents to travel any distance and for any reason, then the city of the XXI century is trying to return people to move on two legs. In The Walking City, Jeff Speck stated: "Provide the opportunity to walk, and a lot will work out by itself." Right. Economy, health of society, ecological situation - in everything there is a correlation with the desire of this or that region to support "foot transport". Only recently, after a 60-year hiatus, have we again undertaken to build neighborhoods and cities where this is possible. As shown in our book, America suffers from a lack of walkable streets and neighborhoods, and the demand for them is growing: a recent study found that among millennials, the ratio of walkable neighborhoods to indifferent neighborhoods is three to alone.
Pedestrianism is a short term for everything that makes the area attractive as a whole: the appearance of buildings, building density, human-centered street design, versatility, proximity to parks and convenient public spaces.
But what happens if all these factors are present in the area, but most residents do not have the habit of walking? How to change the culture itself so that people want to "walk with their feet" again? On a cold and rainy January night in 2012, 29-year-old University of North Carolina graduate Matt Tomasulo set out in search of answers.
In 2007, Tomasulo came to Raleigh, intending to write his thesis to receive a master's degree in two specialties - "landscape architecture" and "urban planning". He found himself in a fast-growing city, where the 425,000 people living mostly in the suburbs relied mainly on private cars. Because Tomasulo preferred to live in an area where driving was optional, he settled in Cameron Village (pedestrian rating 80) near campus. Shops were also within walking distance.
His first experience of tactical urbanism was his participation with other students in the Park (ing) a Day, which is also held in Raleigh: this is an annual event when people from different countries pay for parking spaces, but do not leave their car there, but thus create a miniature temporary the park. This intervention, albeit short-lived, encourages passers-by to ponder whether the streets can be used more diversely, to create new public spaces, and also reminds of the negative impact on society of excessive dependence on cars. At least, these are the stated goals of this movement.
However, Tomasulo found that Park (ing) a Day, conducted according to the scenario of his classmates, did not bring the desired result, since the key element was missing - passers-by.“I remember how I thought: Day park (ing) and even parquet floors will give nothing if there are so few people walking next to them or in them,” Tomasulo explained. Although Matt helped organize Park (ing) a Day, his personal experience at the event and what he saw walking around his neighborhood as a new resident made him wonder why so few people walk? Tomasulo conducted a survey among friends, colleagues, neighbors and completely strangers. The unanimous answer was: "Too far."
The young man did not want to accept such an explanation. When we asked him in turn about the average distance we were talking about, Tomasulo, usually very gentle, replied with sudden passion: “This is nonsense! I settled down halfway between the university and the city center, in a historic area that was actually intended for walking, and people refused to walk. They got into the car and even drove to dinner - a two-minute drive from home."
Tomasulo began to map the places that people most often mentioned in response to the question of where they need to go and how they want to get there. Is it really far away? He quickly became convinced that most of the respondents would have to walk a maximum of 15 minutes to their destination, and more often much less. And then he realized: the problem is not in the distance as such, but in the feeling of this distance.
Although Tomasulo realized that he could not change urban design, land use or infrastructure once and for all in one day, he still tried to change the misconceptions about distances by providing people with more information. What happens if the city government puts up signs with the names of the most popular places in the area, with arrows indicating the walking path, and signs how many minutes on average it takes to get there on foot? It would also be nice to place QR codes on the signs so that everyone can instantly receive all the necessary instructions.
Almost immediately, it became clear that the Raleigh City Hall had included in the long-term plan many measures to encourage walking, and that these measures were quite consistent with Tomasulo's wishes. However, something else immediately became clear: cooperation with the city authorities is expensive and takes too much time - to obtain a temporary permit for the placement of such signs, Tomasulo would have needed nine months of approvals, and it would have cost more than a thousand dollars along with liability insurance. Tomasulo had neither extra money nor extra time.
Then he tried to find a way to implement his project so that it would correspond to the course of the city authorities, but without their official consent. After researching various sites, he discovered many ways to design guerrilla signs using cheap and lightweight materials. The entire work would have cost four times the cost of an authorized project - less than $ 300. Tomasulo opted for Coroplast all-weather signs that can be attached with plastic ties to lamp and telephone poles. Matt sketched quickly on his laptop. Signs were supposed to notify pedestrians and drivers how many minutes it would take them to get to a particular destination on foot. Tomasulo printed 27 signs and, with the help of his girlfriend (now his wife) and a guest from California, went out on a rainy January night to hang his signs. He called this project "Walking the Raleigh".
“I knew exactly what I was doing,” says Tomasulo. - I was extremely careful, avoiding the slightest damage to municipal property. I carefully studied other projects on the Web and knew that you cannot use glue, you need to leave the opportunity to easily remove and remove these signs so as not to cause the slightest damage. " Citing the equally illegal property listings that can be seen everywhere in the city, on lawns and on poles, Tomasulo adds: “These ads are not for the public good at all, and nevertheless hang for months. Walking the Raleigh is at least a civic initiative consistent with the goals of the city government. I believed that the long-term development plan of the city speaks in our favor and that such markings have already become a desirable element for the city."
Tomasulo also took into account the need to popularize his project and its objectives: "I knew what role the Internet can play in expanding the audience of the project." Before going out to post signs, Matt acquired the domain name [walkraleigh.org] and set up a platform to discuss the project on Facebook and Twitter. Tomasulo knew that QR codes would help track the number of people who paid attention to the signs. He also figured out how to illustrate the project with well-chosen high-resolution photographs - these photographs went around the world, they are used in the pages of our book. “Illustrations help to convey the story, and there is hope to stimulate people to change. Although, to tell the truth, then we did not foresee what would come of all this."
The next day, the Facebook page was filled with hundreds of likes and information began to spread in the urban blogosphere. Matt's efforts piqued the interest of Emily Badger, a journalist at Atlantic Cities (now City Lab). She named the project Role's Guerrilla Paths and included it in her work on tactical urbanism in general as one of the best examples. The journalist noted that “this focus has already attracted the attention of city officials who are considering making such signs permanent. This is the highest manifestation of tactical urbanism: a night outing of enterprising citizens, which can ultimately lead to real improvements in urban infrastructure."
Of course, since then, we have realized that the "night out" was not a "trick" at all, but a deliberate and carefully documented intervention, precisely calculated to induce citizens to make a long-term restructuring of their lifestyles, and the city authorities to change their appearance. cities. "Walking Raleigh" - guerrilla sortie. It is also an amateur project. But the most important thing is the act of tactics.
The Atlantic Cities article sparked the interest of other national and international media outlets, including the BBC, which produced a report on "How to Make America Walk." Mitchell Silver, who served as President of the American Planners Association and Director of Urban Planning for Raleigh, played an important role in this material. To secure his participation, Tomasulo, who had never met Silver before, contacted him directly on Twitter. Silver responded almost immediately and, according to rumors, even changed the travel schedule in order to stay in the city and meet with journalists (later the head of the Planners Association admitted that if Tomasulo had written him by mail, he would not have received this letter on time, and so would never have had time to answer it).
Silver's presence in the BBC story and the implied, albeit unspoken approval of Tomasulo's (formally illegal) act made the story a favorite case for pedestrian city supporters. This is a good example of how amateur actions for the benefit of the city, even initially unauthorized ones, often quickly find patrons among people in power, and then the possibility of long-term change opens up. Emily Badger, in a detailed article in Atlantic Cities, describes Silver's proactive response in the words of the official himself: “Sometimes something happens that forces you to reconsider priorities. This is one of those cases when we got alarmed: “What's going on?” It's not about PR as such. Yes, you need to get permission for this kind of action. But this is the first time in my life that I've seen such a level of citizen involvement."
When reporters heard that the city authorities did not authorize the installation of signs, of course, the question was asked: "So why are the signs still in place?" Formally, such an issue is viewed as a complaint, and this forced the authorities to remove the signs. However, here the residents of Raleigh protested - they liked the pointers. Sensing growing voter dissatisfaction, the city government hastened to find a way to launch a similar program. Silver told Tomasulo that his action would be a "pilot project" for the city's overarching development plan. Tomasulo encouraged himself to organize support from below to persuade the city council to make appropriate decisions quickly. He again used the Internet as his main weapon and, with the help of [signon.org], launched the Revive Pedestrian Raleigh campaign. It was confirmed that a significant part of the population is in favor of the return of signs.
Three days later, 1,255 people signed up for the petition for the return of the signs, helped by Tomasulo's active Facebook campaigning. By the time the city council met, the case had already been decided. Tomasulo was asked to provide the city with signs for a three-month mayor-supported project. The authorities have officially recognized the project's compliance with the goals outlined in the city's long-term development plan: to increase the non-car mobility of citizens, develop a network of bicycle and pedestrian paths, and even install more signs indicating direction and distance.
