My recent visit to Leopold Café at Colaba Causeway brought back a few uncomfortable memories from the past; of that fateful day when Mumbai was seized and attacked by terrorists. It was 26 November 2008, which was soon labelled as 26/11 under the burden of sensationalism by the earnest media where one’s own identity is seen through the western lens even in times of tragedy. The American branding had become more essential to the media than the gruesome events that unfolded

I sat in the café, sipping my iced tea and reminiscing about the good old college days of being broke and still trying new hang-outs. Soon, I was consumed by the memories of the past when Leopold café was attacked leaving 10 people dead right here. It has been 3 years and it made me wonder looking at those bullet marks in the walls, if, with time, we ourselves blur our wounds or wounds themselves dissolve. And how much of it matters of physical traces in built spaces.

Leopold Café reopened shortly after the destructive night of the attack. Owners Fahrang & Farzad Jehani defiantly had stated: “We would never let terrorists win.” The first customer after the reopening ordered a pint of beer for himself and a Coke for his six-year-old son, and said Leopold’s reopening was a sign ‘Bombay is getting back to normal’.

By maintaining those bullet marks on the walls, the owners have attempted to retain that part of the history and curiously many visitors and foreign tourists take a tour and document it through images. In that sense, it may be a continuous reminder of the past.

The Café stills reeks every bit of its colonial belonging from inside and out. Fluted columns, old cream-coloured slow-whirring fans, dark brown partially worn out furniture, arched windows and semi-wood panelling on the upper walls. Its clientele has always been a good mix of foreign tourists, college students and street shoppers. It is always buzzing with activities, is almost never empty and has retained the influx of people to same extent as before the attacks took place.

The much talked-about fabricated impression of Mumbai’s resilience is media generated; people get on and continue with lives often because they may not have luxury of choices. Negative events leave scars on one’s mind and mostly carry traces of it for a long time. But what about the physical scars such events leave to the built environment? By merely fixing the broken surfaces, painting it and giving it a new appearance like nothing ever happened, can we overcome the past? As Salman Rushdie asks in his book Shame: “I too face the problem of history; what to retain, what to dump, how to hold on to what memory insists on relinquishing, how to deal with change?”

Originally a defunct Silk Factory; the building was retrofitted to suite the operations of Waterloo Architecture, Cambridge. The school and its new premises have been applauded and recognized for its design excellence, community connection and student initiatives.

During my visit at Cambridge I met Eric Haldenby, the Director of Waterloo Architecture. He narrated an interesting story about the move of the school from its older premises to the new silk factory. While he was writing an application for a research grant, he was requested to give a presentation to the city of Waterloo and Kitchener on community university partnerships for regeneration of mid sized Canadian cities.  One gentleman from the audiences, who also belonged to the business community of Cambridge, asked – what would it take to bring School of Architecture to Cambridge? At this time Eric was already facing the threat of loosing his faculty members, because of the uncomfortable and non-creative space the school was functioning in, at the main Waterloo campus, so he truthfully answered that ‘we would require a great site and good money’. This worked for Eric as he was then sanctioned a good site and some money for the school to be relocated to Cambridge.

The offered site was an old out–of-use silk mill. This silk mill was modified to suite the needs of the school and the school started functioning at the new address in 2004. Since then, Waterloo Architecture, Cambridge has positively changed the urban fabric surrounding it. The once unsafe backyard of downtown has become a thriving space for student interaction. The exhibition space and coffee house are thriving in the new school and provide a platform for community –university interaction, which is much appreciated by the City of Cambridge. This building has proved that small change can pave way for a big difference.       

I came to know during our chat that after this successful move, Eric Haldenby was honored for his tenacious efforts for the betterment of the architectural education. University of Waterloo has recognized his efforts by awarding him ‘Distinguished Teachers Award.’ Along with education, Eric is also interested in Mediterranean archaeology; design and management of historic landscapes /sites; design in mid-size cities; and community/university partnerships..

One of the important and unique interests Eric has is that he has been exploring the relationships between Archeology and Architecture since his earlier professional days. This has influenced a few courses in the school like the Rome Program.  The Rome program lets the students experience the nuances of working for and from one of the oldest neighborhoods of Rome.

Eric through such courses and many more innovative ways has inspired a generation of thinkers in Canada. Most of his students are involved in distinguished creative works across North America and some of them are even heading renowned architectural studios around the world.

When I met Eric last June, I realized that it was an interesting opportunity for me to interview Eric and understand the nuances and significance of his work. I have put forth some of the conversations I had with Eric.

Aditi Nargundkar Pathak: There has always been a dialogue active about reusing brownfield site. The campus of University of Waterloo’s School of Architecture, has won seven design awards including the Canadian Urban Institute Brownie Award in 2004 as the outstanding adaptive re-use of a brownfield site. Do you think the project has helped in regeneration of the surrounding urban fabric? If yes how so?

Eric Haldenby: The building has clearly influenced the city. The part of Cambridge City where the school is located was in neglect and process of deterioration for over 40 years. After the move of the school into the Silk mills the area has become more inclusive for its users and its earlier use of abetting prostitution and drug dealings had stopped. The demographics of the users has also changed, they now include students and the local community.

Originally we intended to build a new campus altogether but the local community suggested rehabilitating silk mills which already had a landmark status, as it was one of the largest buildings of riverside Cambridge. We readily agreed to this as we could move in sooner than expected and also at a lower cost.

The decision of placing the Waterloo Cambridge Architecture in riverside Cambridge has also brought some positive changes in the community perception. Recently the city moved into new city hall and with the help of school they built the first LEED gold building in the community. The housing market around the school improved as well. Initially there were 1000 units in the area, which are now 2650 units. This is a solid indication that there was a whole new population moving into the city. Ramifications of this regeneration were also seen in other secondary midsized cities like Sudbury and Saskatoon.

I think that municipality of Cambridge was a key stimulator in this decision.  I think that such collaborations between municipalities and midsized cities with population of 250,000 are needed to the overall improvement of the urban language.

Aditi Nargundkar Pathak: Do you think the success of the building has also influenced the students in anyway?  I am asking this because as architects we are always trying to study and sometimes also define the emotional, physical and performance based impact, a well-designed building will have.

Eric Haldenby: It is a very astute question. Influence on education has been huge .We have Co- op education system in school, which means our students do 4 months of professional work 4 months of study in campus. Up until 2004, 50% students worked in Toronto, 25% worked else where in Canada and 25% worked outside the country. When the school moved the Cambridge the distribution changed, about 25% worked in Toronto, 25% worked elsewhere in Canada and 50% outside Canada. We are speculating that this distribution changed because the students became more autonomous, confident and independent.

After moving here, I have seen many examples of students being autonomous. Our Graduate students pushed themselves and built a 14-bed student resident. The city raised money for the project and worked together with our students.

Real indicator of our success was the’ applicant numbers ‘, before we got 10 applicants for every seat at Waterloo Architecture, and now we get 40 applicants per seat. This happens because when students come to visit during our open house they want to be a part of our family. Our buildings design stresses that the students are extremely important for e.g. all the students face the river and our faculty and staff offices face the town. Students get the light and the view, which I feel, changes the spirit and output of the school.

Aditi Nargundkar Pathak: Moving on to the next part – you are also the principal investigator of Community/University Research Alliance (CURA) (involving Architecture, Planning, Geography and Environment and Resource Studies and partners representing the Cities of Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge and the Region of Waterloo), What do you think are the main factors to be considered while designing urban area in mid – sized Canadian cities?

Eric Haldenby: The challenge for the midsized Canadian cities is that when they were first built, heavy manufacturing industries like automotive, textiles etc. were the economic centers and thus the life revolved around them. Today the situation is as Richard Florida’s theory puts it that high bohemians, or high creative class i.e. technology workers, artists, musicians etc. constitute the main users of urban cores. Therefore for a city to thrive it has to evolve to suite the needs of these high bohemians. The old mills and factories have to be retrofitted.

In CURA our research focus has been on tourism and post-secondary school project as community changers. With CURA we worked on 49 published monographs, they varied in the content based on different aspects of urban life e.g. safety, pedestrian access, social service distribution etc. But I firmly believe research universities will become directly involved in renewal of urban areas and their deterioration will be minor compared to others. Partnerships between municipalities, businesses and post secondary schools can work as community changers.

Aditi Nargundkar Pathak: What according to you is an ideal urban environment for the mid – sized Canadian cities?

Eric Haldenby: Ideally every city should use its own cultural mix to create its own ‘ideal environment’. But the direction in which the cities are now evolving seem promising to me. Today the demographics of the cities are changing ‘the generation Y does not want to move to suburbs anymore. Baby boomers don’t retire in suburbs either and there is return to the urban core for want of better design and cultural activity. The urban areas are becoming a more attractive option to live in. It is becoming increasingly essential for urban public spaces to be of higher quality and multifunctional. The very general way in which public spaces present themselves are that in urban areas there are open spaces and amenities that keep changing in function, while in suburbs we find more of open roads and parking lots. The private properties in suburbs have high quality of space but the public plazas are very few or absent. In urban areas on the other hand where population is much closer to each other, we can’t waste public space and hence higher quality of space is required.

So my vision for an ideal urban space is like this – it should be conducive for innovation, creative open-endedness and invention. Ideally cores have to be vibrant high quality plazas, ignored spaces must have clear imperative. With denser cities becoming the reality, quality of public spaces is becoming increasingly important for the well educated.

Aditi Nargundkar Pathak: Another interesting subject you work in linking archeology, architectural history and architecture. You have been working on mapping the urban topography of Roman Carthage and a study and reconstruction of the Villa at S. Giovanni di Ruoti. How important do you find studying these maps is when you are designing the future urban environments?

Eric Haldenby: It’s a biographical question. When I got out of architecture and was setting up my practice, during one of the down times, I got an offer to teach at Waterloo. I decided to take it up and got into teaching. At school I ran into a student who had cycled from Greece to Norway, at that time I decided to may be do something different, so I cycled from Athens to London. Once I came back, I was impressed with the classical architecture and started the Rome program, which is still running and successful. We send our fourth year students every year to our schools Traverse studio in Rome to experience the heritage of western architecture and be influenced by it.

There I was invited by a classical archeologist to interpret few of his findings, I already had interest in history and was fascinated by deep and profound relationship existing in archeology and architecture. I took this opportunity and helped in spatial visualization of a space.

As far as the importance of studying these maps goes, until the beginning of the 20^th century there was a very thin line between architecture and archeology. During the modernist era it was dis-owned, but again the designers realized that history can only help us and so now naturally designers gravitate to building up sensitivity to history. I personally think that studying classical architecture deepens consciousness of a designer.

Aditi Nargundkar Pathak: Would you agree that there is a strong presence of form based building regulations in Roman cities? Do you think these studies can be used to evolve form based building codes for newer small and mid sized cities in Canada or world?

Eric Haldenby: Roman buildings surely had Roman codes. The traditional forms were governed by traditions and nurtured innovation. There was a – clear dialectic in the Mediterranean of residential and official architecture. – Examples can be seen not only in Rome but also in Turkey, Italy and Spain.

These ancient cities were mainly courtyard cities, the forms of buildings was the basis here – the archetype. Public spaces had a specific function for e.g. in Islamic cities mosque absorbs the public space.

William MacDonald in his book ‘The Architecture of Roman Empire has studied the Roman Armature in detail. The Roman manifestation of armature is heroic and ennobling –In cities like Andalusia, Pompeii policy in urban armature is used as primary source for city design. The classical cities had panorama of ideas for urban armature. The soil geology governed the forms and deigns of the cities. The modernists on the other hand did not even consider ground. The peaks, bushes, swamps, sand dunes etc. all were part of the city.  Archeology gave me the opportunity to see this happening and this experience in architecture makes you see things differently.

Aditi Nargundkar Pathak: What areas of collaborative research in architecture and Architecture do you think can be explored?

Eric Haldenby: William MacDonald has written well on urban armature organized on the top of the hill in Roman Carthage. During one of our excavations in Roman Carthage, we found water channels .In a podium we found huge cisterns, there was water distribution system in place. Romans were hydrological geniuses; they built on hills collected and stored water and distributed the water in the city.  There is a tendency to study history of great buildings but whole underground ground is unexplored. Integrated systems -thinking approach was prevalent in Rome and this way they used their resources better and in multiple ways. I think we can learn a lot more from these old cities. Study of urban services can be major area of research, which has not been analyzed fully.

As an Architect and an Urban Designer myself, I always find that numerous variables/ factors influence my design decisions. I am sure my peers would agree with that.  We try to take in to account the site conditions, the climate, the local culture and local adaptability and space use trends, the form, the function, our own belief system, the theories and manifestos that we relate to etc. before arriving at any design solutions.  After talking to Eric and after visiting Waterloo I have realized that one very major influence, which is quite underrated, is that of our teachers. Their experiences act as our extended senses.

At Waterloo Architecture, Eric Haldenby has been one of the most influential contributors to the thought processes of his students. His innovativeness and open-ended creativity has compelled his students to push their own capacities. Eric through his own experiences in Archeology, Architecture and CURA has been running a successful Rome and Architecture program. In way he has been part of changing Canadian cities. After my small talk with Eric, I have formed an opinion that innovative teachers of Architecture have the tools to bring about a positive urban morphosis.

photo credit: fortherock

Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh had highlighted on the need to increase quality of life in India cities while launching the program “As we build infrastructure we must also improve the quality of living for all those who live in our cities. Our vision of urban development has so far been uni-dimensional. This must change. We have thus far focused more on space and less on people. We need to have an integrated framework, in which spatial development of cities goes hand-in-hand with improvement in the quality of living of ordinary people living there. ”. Kamal Nath , the new Union Cabinet Minister of Urban Development also recently highlighted that the JNNURM Program is focused on  improving the quality of life in our cities.

To corroborate the government’s assertions that the program is intended to increase thequality of life for most of the people in Indian cities, I analysed the program’s investments in the transport sector that intimately affects the quality of life of ­­­the community.

The total number of projects in the transport sector approved by the Government of India and related spending illustrates a focus on flyover & road related projects that aids car users.

Source: JNNURM

Source: JNNURM

Mapping the above  investments alongside current “modes of transport” in Indian Cities shows that even though car users are a minority in Indian Cities, they are arguably the biggest beneficiaries under the JNNURM Program.

Source: Traffic & Transportation Policies and Strategies in Urban Areas in India, Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India, New Delhi

Principles of urban planning based on dense, walkable, mass transit driven development are critical in ensuring a livable & inclusive city. Experts like Urbanist Enrique Penalosa have often argued that ” In developing-world cities, most of people don’t have cars, so when you construct a good sidewalk, you are constructing equality. A sidewalk is a symbol of equality” .

While I recognize that the road infrastructure is also used by Public Buses and Intermediary Public Transport ( Like Taxi’s & Rickshaw’s) ,

I am still not comfortable with such a disproportional amount of spending on an infrastructure that will push exclusive Auto Centric Development.

So I conclude that the Indian government’s declarations that JNNURM is aimed at increasing the quality of life for most of its people seems like a populist rhetoric given that their actual  investments show a penchant to serving elite needs.

photo credit: gallagher.michaelsean

The short-term efforts needed to achieve long-term change towards sustainability are to a large extent about creating habits and making sustainable choices natural. In order to get to that point and not fall off the ‘sustainability wagon’ on our way there, we need to address this temporal asymmetry and provide encouragement in the short run. By taking advantage of the agreements and commitments made every day we can ensure we´re not only giving up an easy and convenient way of living but are also getting rewards in the short run.

In the stalemate following the past few years’ climate negotiations, some government and industry players have stopped waiting for an international agreement and made their own moves towards more sustainable practices. One example is the City of New York, which in its PlaNYC has made a commitment to sustainability that spans over the various sectors that the City can influence.

Last year, as part of this commitment, the City of New York together with representatives from the real estate industry developed alease system that will make it easier for commercial landlords and tenants to share costs and benefits of energy efficiency measures. The firstcontract that was signed using the new lease language was between private actors Silverstein Properties and WilmerHale for a floor of the 7 World Trade Center, and the new green leasing system will also be used for all new leases that the City signs as a tenant.

A greenlease addresses the split incentive problem that occurs when one party bears the cost or inconvenience of acting sustainably while the other reaps most of the benefits. In New York, the dominating lease form in the commercial real estate market is the gross lease, which means that energy and other related costs are included in the rent. Under such conditions, the landlord bears the capital cost of improving energy performance, while tenants would benefit from the energy savings. With a green lease however, both the cost of improving energy efficiency and the benefits from such an investment can be shared between the landlord and the tenant under a mutual agreement to act sustainably. And although the green lease developed by the City of New York focuses on energy efficiency improvements, other areas, such as the use of environmentally friendly cleaning products, recycling or limited tenant improvements, can easily be incorporated into the agreement as well.

The green lease is an example of how individual players can make an impact at every level, every time, all the time. For a building that was planned and constructed sustainably (e.g. a LEED certified building), it doesn´t make sense not to also manage, operate and use the building sustainably. A green lease is thus a way to ensure that the sustainability efforts undertaken by the building owner aren’t undermined. However, there is no reason why existing conventional buildings can´t be run in a more sustainable manner as well. When two or more parties enter into an agreement over something, this should be seen as an opportunity to also address sustainability issues.

A green lease is a way to align the interests of tenants and landlords to act more sustainably by giving both parties (economic) incentives to do so. However, there may be difficulties involved with green leases too. One of them is that the parties involved in the agreement have different incentives to point out if the other party isn´t fulfilling its commitment, so this will need to be carefully addressed in the contract. For example, the landlord may have little incentive to point out that the tenant isn’t recycling if she/he is worried how the tenant will act if faced with sanctions. It may therefore be better to have a continuous improvement scale with corresponding rewards, rather than to penalize the other party should it fail to live up to the commitments. This is especially important if we want to ensure that not only the very easy tasks are included in the commitment but also harder goals, that the parties may be unsure of whether they can live up to. We want to provide opportunities to exceed expectations (and to celebrate this when it occurs)! Reward systems have their flaws too but if carefully designed to emphasize that we are all in this together for a greater cause, the chance of success should be greater. Following this, it is also important to engage all actors that will be affected by a green lease. For example, the workers that use the building may be affected differently in their everyday practices than will the management who committed to the sustainability goals, and thus might need education and/or resources to live up to the commitment.

That said, green leases and other contracts that give incentives for all parties to act more sustainably are an untapped opportunity to behave more sustainably, whether in a green building or not. My big idea is to take this opportunity and turn it into something fun; a sustainability challenge that we are all part of and that can be used to acknowledge and reward everyday sustainability practices. When the landlord fulfills his promise to install bicycle storage rooms and showers in the building and the tenants reduce their driving to work as a result – treat all the employees to a bicycle picnic in the nearest park. Or when the employees have reduced the energy consumption in the building – reward them by letting them get off work early on a Friday to re-energize themselves. The small gestures count and should be acknowledged and celebrated, only then can we build sustainable practices into our everyday life. By taking advantage of the long and short term contracts signed every day we can help each other remember and achieve this.

As a planner I tried to find answers to my above stated queries and it further led me to explore my beliefs and religion that I practice. As I read more on this aspect I began to realize that Hinduism is not a religion but its a way of life that one should lead in his/her lifetime. In this world there could be millions of material manifestations and forms, but the sustaining force for all is not material but spiritual. Everything has life, so all the life is reverent and has to be protected, upheld and sustained. Respect for the environment is the part of Hinduism where earth is our mother, the mountains are abodes of gods, trees are sacred, rivers are holy, and the animals are vehicles of the Gods, and above all, man’s sustenance has to be ecological.

Hinduism also talks about the essence of vegetarianism: eco-consciousness. There is no absolute truth in Hinduism, truth is relative, and so is our diet. The consumption of animal flesh itself is not non-vegetarian. If an Eskimo killed an animal and ate its meat to survive, or in the desert one kills someone for its flesh, he is still vegetarian. This is because, in the food chain, one consumes the least life form for one’s survival. But in case of tropical India, where there is plenty of vegetation, kill only vegetable, because it has a lesser life quantum than an animal. One doesn’t need to consume more than necessary; there is enough for everyone’s need.

Thus, sustainability can be defined from spirituality and Hinduism which is essentially a dialogue of values that defies consensual definition. This aspect is the strength of India and I am sure that this path will reveal a permanent path to sustainability to all architects and urban planners.

photo credit: Arun Katiyar

photo credit: dileeshus

Urban planning is a logical initial stride towards an organized development of a city or a commercial hub. In doing so, larger governing body looks after the development process and more often than not, follows a yardstick of regulations, forms and codes. This would work well in an environment where dynamic forces are negligible. But dynamic forces do exist, migration issues, pandemics, employment and economics predispositions, cultural mutinies and social confrontations. All these are primers and catalysts which work towards the way we organize or interrupt ourselves in a recognizable pattern in an urban setting.

Such patterns are always available and it only presents the fact that planned approach has its limitations in our organic approach towards life and living. Allow me to give you an example. An urban place, striving really hard to combat basic disease, basic sanitation in the vicinity which is inaccessible due to lack of good infrastructure and heavy migrant influx, has built a fancy state of the art commercial retail establishment. Would such a mall work? Another example is to build a fancy futuristic commercial premise with only escalators as means of climbing the floors. This would work well if the generation living is adaptable and youthful. I have noticed older and aging generation in India is not comfortable using escalators since it was not a regular feature in the buildings in their times of adaptability. They excuse themselves from the family and take the elevator or staircase and meet them at a final floor of the destination and split while returning too.

Governing bodies can use strategies and authorities to seek some order and organize people in certain desirable pattern to achieve the final vision. Such attempts, if they neglect the status in quo and conditions on how vibrantly people on their own adapt themselves or adapt the space to suit their needs and requirements is a very critical factor to be considered. And this adapting happens all the time and this is more and more visible in places of retail establishments. The generation which is not able to afford high price tags go to fancy places only to browse and go to street markets or bazaars to find similar looking things or cheaper imitations to meet the pricing they can afford.

Organizational attempts to give urban space some sense of homogeneity is an ambitious premise since the population that inhabits it, is rarely homogeneous.  They are varied with background, cultures, beliefs, history, personal traits and quirks, desires, future aspirations and own sketchy framework to achieve them. Migrants to USA  from India and China rarely adapt to food habits available and offered. Asian markets, Indian spices and vegetables become a sought after category after initial exuberance of salads, sandwiches, fries and so on. This illustrates that there is a force working towards making strikingly different food joints and supporting peripherals to meet the migrant inhabitants. Speaking in Indian context, aspiration of a migrant father from a rural environment, now working in a service oriented industry in a city will be different from a young girl moved from a small town to a big city to peruse and pursue a dream in the city. They both will be working towards urban forces like means of commuting, public transport, cultural adapting, work environment, food habits, socializing habits, aspirations and adapted methods to go about all of them.

In a nutshell, by assuming  readily that statistics and data are perfect and planners and designers should use these calculations and parameters that will allow them to come up with some meaningful viable structured solution is a weak and temporary one. In short, the vision imparted from college curriculum through standardized methodology of planning  minus the ethnographic study of current forces that are impacting and might impact may have limitations. Strategy which relies mainly on power relationships based on top-down approach can overlook critical dynamic variables of diversity, uncertainty, resisting forces and individual capability to adapt in their own understood way. More and more social and urban theorists, interventionists and design critics see the failure of what the “plan” and “design” can guarantee and what form it eventually takes and settles for.

Nancy Chase

Natural areas bond measure

What steps did you take to ensure the second bond measure for natural areas acquisition succeeded after the failure of the first $200 million bond measure in 1992?

After Multnomah County Parks and Recreation’s successful transfer to Metro, Metro had experienced staff to manage parks, trails and natural areas. We had already built political support for the region’s natural areas master plan through public outreach and political consensus building. One of the criticism from the failed bond measure was that we only had “greenies” advocating for the bond (the first bond measure was sponsored by the Audubon Society). In response to this criticism, a Blue Ribbon Committee of business leaders from the region was formed to help package the bond measure and give strategic advice. Involving the business people not only helped create a better package, but many of them also became contributors to the bond campaign fund.

The Blue Ribbon Committee stressed the need for the bond package to be specific about the natural area acquisitions and trails that would result if the bond was approved. The committee respected the biologists selections, but once they had this list, they picked out additional areas to spread the money evenly across the region — everybody would get something. They also recommended that rather than all the money coming to Metro, a percentage of the bond should go to each local government so that they could buy the smaller areas within their jurisdictions. So all of a sudden there was something for each little town. This was important for the bond to pass — after all, if people are paying taxes, they should see the benefit from it in their jurisdiction and city, regardless of how high the project ranks. Hence, the business component brought in more of the ground level realities and practical marketing approaches to the bond measure.

It should be noted that government staff  are not allowed to campaign in favour of a bond measure, but only present the facts — here is what it is going to cost you, and here is what it would buy. Informational maps were created showing where each project is going to be along with a concise description of each project on the backside of the map. There were additional fact sheets answering common questions and highlighting the economic impacts of trails and natural areas in neighbourhoods, such as an increase in tourism, property values and tax revenue. Private funds were raised to hire a campaign manager and staff who along with numerous volunteers worked with neighbourhood groups and non-profit organisations to turn out a positive vote.

We understood from many meetings with the community and park advocates what people thought was important to preserve in Portland’s quality of life. Many of the voters had moved up in the 70s and 80s from areas of the country that had been poorly developed, such as California, and had seen what happens when growth is unplanned; they had moved to this area because they liked the trees and the natural areas. So people were very supportive of protecting natural areas and providing trails that link to natural areas.

So the second bond measure was successful because we had managed to get the pricing right and were specific about where the money would go. Metro had also acquired the management ability. Politically too, Metro shared responsibility and funding with all its partner jurisdictions, making them much more cooperative.

Obviously, this bond couldn’t achieve everything, and that is where the prioritising work we had done earlier, before there was money, really helped. We could confidently tell any city or county that complained about fund allocation that it was their council that adopted this plan. The Blue Ribbon Committee picking out the best out of these priority projects was also helpful in prioritising fund allocation. For instance, Fanno Creek trail is not biologically the best, but it passes through seven jurisdictions serving a wide population base. The focus on selection was definitely to serve regional, not local needs.

Why was the third bond measure introduced?

The bond dollars were nearly expended and there was still a need for more natural area and trails acquisition. It had been quite a booming economy and a lot of people realised that the areas that they considered important were not on the second (first successful) bond measure list. So the third bond measure was proposed for finishing off some old projects and proposing a new project list. They also created a nature in neighborhoods grant fund,  to use for green projects such as bioswails for stormwater runoff, or adding natural areas in older parts of the city such as Irvington. For instance, the fund could be used by a school to pull up some of its paving to plant trees and create a community garden; or create a little nature park within developed neighborhoods.

One thing I want to note on the first successful bond measure is that we really felt it was important  to keep the public informed of our progress. So our public relations staff ensured that every time an acquisition was made, there would be press coverage. When we had all the pieces to form a particular natural area park, we would make sure that local politicians and citizen representatives were invited to do the speeches and ribbon cutting. Every two years, we also produced a formal Report to the Citizens. The reports informed citizens of the progress in terms of acres acquired, trail miles, etc. and included detailed photos and information. The report copies were made available at Metro, and distributed to all local council representatives and posted online.

So by the time we were ready with the next bond measure, people were familiar with the programme and its track record. One drawback was that in areas where we had already acquired all the desirable land parcels in the previous bond measure, the support groups were not as actively campaigning for the next bond measure although they were still supportive. The third bond measure therefore passed quite easily.

Today we have a big pot of money for natural areas preservation and development from the two successful bond measures that Metro initiated. We raised $227 million from the recent bond and $135 million from the previous one.

Future:

What are the next steps for developing natural areas in the region?

We are looking for ways to  link the natural areas together so that they are more accessible to the public as well as on foot or bicycle. We also need to increase awareness amongst people and education at every age about getting to these areas and engaging in a range of activities for enjoying these amenities. We should also look beyond the 2040 plan at maybe 2060 to see how we will find the large areas for that period.

Another thing to look at is more amenities for urbanised areas such as street trees, bioswails and naturescaping. For instance, when someone builds an office building, in many areas you are required to have a percentage of landscaping for trees in the parking lot etc. It would be good if we could focus our energies on native landscaping in yards to reduce water usage and provide habitat for bird species and insect species. In my own yard, there is no lawn but there are a lot of flowers and the insect count is tremendous; a reliable food source leads to more birds. I think even if you are in a developed neighbourhood you can do a lot to help the environment through such measures.

My takeaways:

1. Successfully raising money through bond measures requires building a constituency, involving all stakeholders, and designing an effective and simple information and outreach campaign.
2. Allocating the money amongst jurisdictions so that everyone benefits leads to a win-win solution so that everyone is on board and agreeable.
3. Determining priority projects before bringing in discussions of money and financing is a useful strategy to ensure that money does not skew focus.

photo credit: garycycles5

Chess in a Tripod MetroCT deals with Metropolitan Planning: Land-use, Urban Transport, Environment and Housing integrated urban allocation and administrative policy-making.

This book is based on the 1996 Regional (Metropolitan) Plan for Madrid, a Methodology to address the current urgent need of metropolitan growth allocation. The system has been used in several places like Bogota and can be extended to other metropolitan areas with specific patterns.

It can help to solve many of the problems of growth in numerous metropolitan areas in the world.

There is a worldwide needs for comprehensive vision for metropolitan planning confronted with uncontrolled urban growth. The book explores the methods and opens a potential for debate among Professionals, University scholars as well as Local Authorities. The potential application is pretty wide ranging.

The Method is unique. Madrid experience, directed by this author in 1996-99  establishes a system (CiTi Method) to confront, control, tame and articulate the explosive growth (100% in 20 years) of most of the 200 metropolis of the world and 400 large urban areas.

Being an aspiring civic leader, I was really curious to find out what distinguished the political and social environment in the past that put the region on a sustainable path towards becoming the greenest region of the US. Evidently, one of the key areas where this legacy of planning has showed immense positive effects is the abundance of natural wealth in and around the Portland metropolitan region.

The best resource for understanding the complex history of the region’s planning framework, particularly for open spaces, is undoubtedly Mel Huie, who is a legend in trails planning and development. Another planning stalwart from the region who has been key in the success of the region’s natural areas programme is Nancy Chase. Mel Huie and Nancy Chase are experts on natural areas planning and acquisition and have been working with Metro and allied jurisdictions for over 30 years. These two are in fact a part of that cohort of visionary leaders, planners and citizen advocates that put into motion the processes and changes which placed the region onto a progressive path.

Nancy Chase

Mel Huie

In the following interviews, Mel Huie and Nancy Chase describe the political environment and the planning imperatives that sowed the seeds for Portland’s effective natural areas program me, and discuss the impacts and challenges at the ground level.

Major governance innovations and planning best practices that distinguish Portland seem to have come about around 30 years ago. What was unique about Portland’s leadership at that time?

Mel Huie: In general for the US, the concept of transit and development of natural areas had started taking shape long back. The concept of streetcars began emerging in the US around 1897, when American cities throughout the US were created through ’streetcar suburbs’. Typically, a developer would build the houses and sometimes owned a streetcar company, which would be tied to the electric power company to replace the horses (that were unsanitary because of all the manure). Developers set up streetcar lines in Portland as well, going into the housing areas through the tie up of the streetcar company and the electric company. But the streetcar was abandoned in the 50s and 60s with the advent of freeways (we still have homes and storefronts built along historic streetcar lines).

On the natural areas side, historically there was the Olmsted brothers’ plan for trails and natural areas across the US. In the 1920s and 1930s there was the City Beautiful Movement, particularly famous in New York. There were poor masses that were stuck in tenements and needed fresh air. So parks and open spaces were created under this movement. On their free day of the week, the masses would have a park to relax in. The sociologists and planners also thought of it as social engineering because they were able to get people out of slums to have fresh air in parks, which could help lower crimes. But this movement also lost steam as the depression and World War II came.

It was in the 70s that Portland had a very young dynamic mayor — Neil Goldschmidt. He came into power in 1973 at an age of only 32. Neil Goldschmidt represented City of Portland in CRAG, which was a bi-state association of heads of governments from five counties and cities and the predecessor of Metro. He hired a team of young, dynamic people, which actually included me as I was on CRAG staff.

Actually, at the time when Neil Goldschmidt became mayor, the downtown and urban core of the city was deteriorating and everybody was moving out into suburbs. So in the late 70s they came up with the transit model (in 1986 the first light-rail became operational). Around the same time, there was a lot of pressure to clean up the Willamette river in Portland. This was during the period when Tom McCall was the governor. So in a way, an innovative mayor was complemented by an innovative governor who came up with the Willamette greenway plan and the state comprehensive land-use goals. The goal of the Willamette greenway plan is to have a continuous greenway from the headwaters of the Willamette south of Eugene, Oregon all the way up to Columbia.

At the state level, we had elected visionary leaders who wanted to preserve the Willamette River greenway, and ensure public access to all the beaches. In fact, Oregon has always had a history of green activism, even before the famous Tom McCall came up with the state land-use guidelines and urban growth boundaries in 1979.

So the governor and the legislature made all this possible. The legislature passed a lot of progressive laws (that it might never pass today!). The state required by law that all the cities and counties at Metro have a comprehensive plan for future growth. Within each plan, there was a set of goals such as for transportation and for urban growth, and the protection of natural areas, parks and trails. In 1973, the first comprehensive plan for Portland city was drawn focusing on transportation needs and natural areas, and included the Tom McCall Waterfront Park.

What happened at the ground level after these initial pathbreaking legislations were introduced?

Nancy Chase: Actually, there was financial crisis in the 80s. At that time, I was working for Multnomah County Parks and Recreation with Charlie Seiko. Back then, cities did small little neighbourhood parks and activities like swimming and tennis, and the counties did these larger- scale parks where you could go camping. With the financial crisis underway, the politicians and the county commissioners got together and decided that where they really could make a difference through their actions was in the social services (healthcare for mothers and infants, jails, juvenile courts, homeless etc.). In this discussion, parks were thought of as an extra responsibility that probably Multnomah county could not handle. Planning and parks was not a funding priority at the time; when we would put up project proposals for funding, we would always be behind other priority projects under social services.

So discussions began for giving the Multnomah county parks — Blue Lake and Oxbow — away to the city or private interests. This generated the momentum to look at the provision of park and open space services in the region.  Some cities were doing a good job providing neighbourhood and community parks and the counties were trying to provide regional parks; but because everybody in the overall region used all these services, there was some inequity for tax payers and there was no panning on a regional scale.  What was really needed was a regional plan to look at these large-scale natural areas, parks and trails.

At that time Metro was just starting to work on regional park planning. So representatives from all local governments started working with Metro to identify park needs and determine which entities should be responsible for these services. For two years after that, staff and elected representatives from all jurisdictions got together and put together a natural areas plan. The end product was the Greenspaces Master Plan showing what the best natural areas left in this whole region (covering all three counties) were. We did this planning process in two stages. At the time, Mel Huie represented Metro and I represented Multnomah county. Metro also hired biologists to evaluate the natural areas that were left.

Mel Huie: Between 1988 and 1992 the Greenspaces Master Plan was developed. It was a Metro initiative, that led into the natural areas master plan. Overall, it took about four years to develop that plan because it was developed through consensus amongst all the jurisdictions.

Nancy Chase: The meetings and consensus building itself was a long and tiring process that lasted 2.5 years. As part of building the natural areas master plan, we conducted a series of workshops and forums for all the citizens and neigbourhood groups to get together and nominate natural areas and trails they felt should be preserved. We had over 200 public meetings. There was a huge difference in scale on what jurisdictions and people thought was important. It came down to nominations as small as one tree that one little city really wanted to preserve versus 5,000 acres on Sandy River.

What was important about our strategy for these discussions was that we did them before the discussions of money were brought onto the table. Money was not even in the picture. People did say why are you doing this when you do not have any money to buy it. We all had been in government and politics long enough to know that discussions around money could skew the focus. Our philosophy was that it was essential to know what natural areas were biologically important and document the facts. By eliminating any financial discussions we tried and managed to keep the discussions firstly on a scientific basis and secondly, even if an area did not qualify on scientific merit, we considered areas that were located in such a way that the neighbourhood really could make use of them and liked them. So the strategy was to have people nominate areas based on both biology and what would help keep communities together, such as a particular natural area in private ownership that everybody liked to walk to. To the component of natural areas, we also added the notion that we needed trail corridors to link these areas, so that people could either get there on foot or bicycle.

The end product, which was the master plan, ended up being universally adopted because Mel Huie took the resolution to every single city and jurisdiction to adopt it. Every city and every county approved this master plan. So before any money was involved and before it became controversial, the areas in the master plan were universally recognised as important for the region. This proved to be instrumental because we had a document approved by everybody about what was important to be saved before there was money to buy the natural areas.

Besides getting an agreement on what was important, this process was also building up a constituency, because all the neighbourhood meetings gave us a list of people who thought it was important and participated actively on a citizen base. A lot of these active people formed their own unit-level groups (such as Friends of Fanno Creek) that advocated for protection of specific natural areas. These ‘friends groups’ worked on protecting these natural areas and Metro could work with these groups. The workshops and forums along with newspaper articles also raised the visibility on the issue.

Simultaneously, we were working with Metro councillors to create an understanding that regional parks should be something Metro does as a region. We were pushing for a transfer of Multnomah county parks and recreation to Metro given the county’s financial limitations and priority to social services. It worked out very well.

Mel Huie: On January 1, 1994, Multnomah Parks and Recreation became a part of Metro, and that way we brought one implementing agency under us so that there was less fragmentation.

Nancy Chase: While this was still in process we were putting together the first bond measure for $200 million. It was organised by a group of volunteers and the first time we had ever done anything like this. It nearly passed even though we we were not specific about what we would buy – just trust us!

Even before the bond measure was introduced, we managed to build political support by inviting politicians and staff to field visits to cities where such plans were successfully in place. In particular, a trip to Oakland was organised, where the East Bay Regional Park District Master Plan was in effect. When the politicians returned, all of a sudden our Greenspaces master plan started to make sense to them in terms of what we were trying to achieve. By the time we introduced the first bond measure for $200 million, there was universal political support for it.

Unfortunately the first bond measure lost by a very slim margin. Exit polls that asked voters why they voted either way indicated that a lot of people who voted against the bond measure felt it was a huge and open-ended plan, so that they did not know if it would directly benefit their area or not. One of the comments from newspaper editorials questioned Metro’s ability to effectively utilise the $200 million to start buying land and managing it when the organisation had never managed property. That is a huge leap to take!

But we picked ourselves up from there and went ahead with transferring Multnomah county Parks and Recreation to Metro. I became a Metro employee. So all of a sudden, Metro had a parks system and a maintenance staff with over a 100 years of experience in managing property. So they had that component ready and we went ahead with two successful natural areas bond measures.

It has been about 20 years. What impact have you seen with the natural areas acquisition programme?

Nancy Chase: I think there is this huge support for natural areas and it still triggers people to continue voting in it’s favour. State wide there have been measures to help, such as ensuring clean water and protection of salmon. I think people really care. We have successfully managed to save some of the green spaces in perpetuity.

Natural areas in Portland are enjoyed by wildlife and residents alike

Mel Huie: I think that the government managed to buy whole trail corridors in one go such as the Springwater Corridor, the Gresham-Fairview trail and the Trolley Trail because these came up, in accordance with the 1974 bicycle plan, on former streetcar lines that were abandoned. Luckily, the right-of-way remained intact; it wasn’t parceled up and sold to next door neighbours.

Another positive impact is that there is a lot more integration in trail planning in the Portland metropolitan region. The Greenspaces Master Plan has facilitated this integration and coordination.

What are the challenges?

Mel Huie: Implementing the plan is taking a long time, because we are a public agency. We cannot just buy the land we want all the time; some years there is money while other years there isn’t.

Nancy Chase: In fact you can still drive around the area and see land that may seem protected but is in fact in private ownership and not really protected. We have targeted 10 per cent under public ownership, but is that really enough? Within the urban growth boundary, if we are going to have high density, people need to have these parks and natural areas nearby.

The biggest challenge is have we really bought enough land to make it worthwhile for the species over there. It needs to be linked to other natural areas for a deer to be able to survive and not be killed by cars. To have a diversity of species, you really need hundreds of acres linked to larger areas. I do not know if we would ever have enough money to buy it all. Portland was lucky because we had an urban growth boundary around the Portland metropolitan region, which does allow larger land parcels for species outside the boundary.

Another challenge is not having the checkerboard pattern. With the willing seller programme we are going to have holes in public ownership of the land. You have to hope that eventually we might be able to buy that land but it is an unknown and once it gets developed into housing it becomes quite unlikely.

Has there been a conflict between developing trails for people by promoting health and outdoor recreation and protecting wildlife in natural areas?

Mel Huie: I think it is a dichotomy, but the initial focus was more on protecting and preserving natural areas and wildlife. Now there is increasing emphasis on access and public health, passive recreation as well as complete routes for alternative transportation, while the focus on protecting natural areas remains. The scientists see it as imperative for protecting habitat and wildlife and birds; but the plan is for wildlife and people. Both goals are important.

Nancy Chase: The conflict is because people scare off wildlife. In biology it is called the edge effect. If you build a trail or road, then the wildlife on either side of it (depending on the species) gets impacted up to a couple of 100 feet. In our urban areas, however, we do not have any ‘critical’ wildlife species, mammals anyway, because they were all driven out long ago. But we still try to respect the protection of wildlife.

It is kind of a balancing act, because if we do not let people in at all to a natural area, you do not have what we call a constituency to protect it later. Say if politics changes or government laws change in future, you really need the local people there to be supportive to protect the natural areas. That means people need to come there and use it and love it. Earlier it used to be that you would put a trail paralleling the stream, and so the whole time you would have people walking just two feet from the edge of the stream which would be harmful biologically. So now we work with trail planners so you have the trail off the river and then we have spurs coming in as viewpoints to the river. We keep a 50-100 foot buffer so people are not right at the edge of the bank. We also identify sensitive areas such as Eagle’s nests etc. and make sure the trail or the parking lot does not go near it and disrupt it. So we have a good biological inventory and make sure we leave plenty of large areas and do not have trails crisscrossing every where. We minimize the trails enough so people can have a look and get where they’re going.

My takeaways:

1. Good policies can create an impact in the long-run, but only if complemented by consistent ground-level activism.
2. It is important to build political and public support (a constituency) as well as reduce institutional fragmentation and disagreement to transform visions into reality. This is a time taking and painstaking process and requires extreme commitment and deliberation.
3. Natural areas are of vital importance to cities, especially in densely developed urban areas. People must be able to enjoy theses aces to appreciate them and eventually finance their revival; however with minimal impact on wildlife and habitat.