Assessing the publicness of public places: towards a new model

The research undertaken in this thesis represents an inquiry into the nature of public space. Its scope is threefold, first, to propose a new way of conceptualising the publicness of public space, defined as the sum of characteristics that make a public space public; second, to create a new methodology for practically assessing public places and third, to test this on several new public place case studies. The entire thesis is based on a new understanding of publicness as having a dual nature: it can be grasped simultaneously as a cultural reality and as a historical reality. Publicness as a cultural reality means that all public places, created at a certain point in time and in a particular socio-cultural setting, can be understood as reflection of a common held view of what the ideal public space is. In order to grasp this ideal and use it as a standard to measure the publicness of new public places, the researcher gathered and filtered the different conceptions and definitions in the field. It was found out that five key meta-themes determine, through their interaction, the publicness of a public place today, in the western world: ownership, physical configuration, animation, control and civility. These have been gathered into the theoretical Star Model of Publicness which was then translated into a practical tool for measuring public places. However, a public place can be grasped not only as a cultural artefact, it is also as the product of a historical process of placemaking. Its publicness results from the interactions, negotiations and decisions made during its development process. It is in other words, a historical reality. As a result, it was considered that assessing the publicness of a public place comprises two things: first, a measurement of the site as a snapshot against the existent standard of publicness and second, an explanation of that measurement though exploring its development process. This was applied in practice, on three new public places created on the regenerated waterfront of the Clyde, in Glasgow and conclusions were drawn regarding the robustness and usefulness of this approach. This is a pilot project undertaken with limited resources and by a single researcher in one location/city and is thus not meant to be ‘an ultimate truth’, a unique formula for assessing publicness. Instead, it represents only the beginning step towards a more objective and inclusive way of analysing the publicness of public places

Development networks and urban growth in small cities

Real estate development is an intensely social process dependent on rich networks of relations between public and private sector actors. Previous work has explored how far such relations are formalised in large cities through shared coalitions of interest intended to promote urban growth. Relatively little attention has been given to networks in smaller cities, which is the concern of this paper. Drawing on detailed research in a small Scottish city, the paper explores how its local network was characterised by strong reliance on network construction and reproduction through trust and reputation. Significantly, within such local networks, competition and collaboration can exist side by side, without subsuming normal tensions into consistent agendas or formally defined ‘partnerships’. Controlling land for urban expansion provides a particular focus for these tensions, since it can allow certain interests to gain network dominance. These findings raise important concerns around whether small cities should rely on informal networks to promote growth instead of constructing formal coalitions that may attract more externally based actors. Such choices have profound implications for the capacity and transparency of development networks, and thus for the accountability of the urban development process

Measuring Public Space: The Star Model

In the rapidly expanding public space debate of the past few years, a recurring theme is the ‘loss of publicness’ of contemporary urban public places. This book takes up the challenge to find an objective way to prove or disprove this phenomenon. By taking the reader through a systematic and multi-disciplinary literature review it asks the deceptively simple question: ‘What is publicness?’ It answers this by first developing a new theoretical approach - ‘The dual nature of public space’, and secondly a new analytical tool for measuring it - ‘The Star Model of Publicness’. This pragmatic approach to analysing public space is tested then on three new public places recently created on the post-industrial waterfront of the River Clyde, in the city of Glasgow, UK. By seeing where and why certain public places fail, direct and informed interventions can be made to improve them and through this contribute to the building of more attractive and sustainable cities.<p></p> By adopting a multi-disciplinary approach to shed light on this ‘slippery’ concept, this book shows how urban design can complement other disciplines when tackling the complex task of understanding and improving the built environment’s public realm. It also bridges the gap between theory and practice as it draws from empirical research to suggest more quantitative approaches towards auditing and improving public places

Measuring Public Space: The Star Model

In the rapidly expanding public space debate of the past few years, a recurring theme is the ‘loss of publicness’ of contemporary urban public places. This book takes up the challenge to find an objective way to prove or disprove this phenomenon. By taking the reader through a systematic and multi-disciplinary literature review it asks the deceptively simple question: ‘What is publicness?’ It answers this by first developing a new theoretical approach - ‘The dual nature of public space’, and secondly a new analytical tool for measuring it - ‘The Star Model of Publicness’. This pragmatic approach to analysing public space is tested then on three new public places recently created on the post-industrial waterfront of the River Clyde, in the city of Glasgow, UK. By seeing where and why certain public places fail, direct and informed interventions can be made to improve them and through this contribute to the building of more attractive and sustainable cities.<p></p> By adopting a multi-disciplinary approach to shed light on this ‘slippery’ concept, this book shows how urban design can complement other disciplines when tackling the complex task of understanding and improving the built environment’s public realm. It also bridges the gap between theory and practice as it draws from empirical research to suggest more quantitative approaches towards auditing and improving public places

The political economy of and practical policies for inclusive growth—a case study of Scotland

The concept of ‘inclusive growth’ (IG) is discussed in a political economy framework. The article reports comparative analysis of economic and planning policy documents from Scotland, England and the UK and findings from expert workshops held in Scotland, which identify four key policy areas for ‘inclusive growth’: skills, transport and housing for young people; city-regional governance; childcare; and place-making. These policies share with the ‘Foundational Economy’ an emphasis on everyday infrastructure and services, but add an emphasis on inter-generational justice and stress the importance of community empower- ment as much as re-municipalisation. Factors enabling IG policy development include: the necessary political powers; a unifying political discourse and civic institutions; and inclusive governance and participatory democracy

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Building Equality: A “Litmus Test” for Recognising and Evidencing Inequalities and Segregation in the Built Environment

open access articleThe current convergence of global challenges, particularly the climate change emergency, the Covid-19 pandemic, and the Black Lives Matter movement, have highlighted the need for a new lens to challenge and interrogate key urban planning assumptions related to spatial urban inequality. Yet urban inequality is often and invariably described from a limited economic perspective, commonly interpreted and measured as income inequality. This is an overtly statistical measure, or Gini-Type index, often giving limited and unsatisfactory results. Yet, in practice, the spatial distribution and concentration of income inequality is a multi-scalar, multi-variant, and multi-disciplinary issue and has links with other and wider dimensions of inequality and well-being. As such, this article argues for a holistic understanding of urban inequality that goes beyond narrow empirical and quantitative models. It presents collaborative research that aims to impact the actions of urban professionals, to accurately identify and adequately respond to urban inequalities. Through the establishment of an interdisciplinary expert panel, we have uncovered a series of provisional mechanisms and responses to aid practitioners to achieve more spatial equality. We introduce an integrated analytical method, the “litmus test,” that acts as a planning tool for understanding, evaluating, and responding to inequalities and segregation present in the built environment. This novel methodology and procedural framework will assist us in (a) identifying and defining different forms of inequality and segregation beyond the current scope of physical and agency-based forms; (b) measuring and demonstrating the latter with a combination of qualitative, empirical sources that are materially significant in supporting and evidencing planning strategies; and (c) setting out a series of planning and built environment specific responses