 City air makes one free. It also causes asthma and lung cancer. So who is the city for? Is it cars, bikes, or prams? That's such a pedestrian question. But I'll own the demagoguery because today we'll talk big-town buzz. Greening cities and the movements across Europe trying to take space back from traffic and commerce in the name of nature, community, and maybe also fun. In London, you can actually swim in the Thames if you go far enough west. But for most people, they have to travel an hour or more in order to be able to do that. There are a lot of things where you would say it's common sense, but again, it's always our personal reality and it's difficult to see for everybody's eyes. There are very few big green spaces in Budapest, which is accessible for everyone, but there are a lot of parts that look like private parts. What's happening is that people who have money can afford to live in quiet places, insulate the houses so that they're quieter, but then they won't be as affordable. I mean, we create a lot of graphics and we try to translate kind of the data into something everybody understands. In Budapest, you don't have like any free toilets in the cities. Accessible public toilets would be so incredibly important for those experiencing commonlessness, but everybody just walking around. And that's the weirdest part. It's better for everyone, so why don't we just do it? Hello and welcome to Standard Time. I'm your host, Reiko Kingopop, editor-in-chief of EuroZine, the online magazine presenting you this show. EuroZine has a network of more than 100 cultural journals whose publishing we present to a global readership. We're also proud co-founders of the Display Europe platform showcasing diverse content from across Europe in 15 languages. Today, we're diving into the heart of green urbanism. As I wandered through the city traffic today, I was struck by a realization and also very nearly struck by a truck. The hustle of engines, the screeching of brakes. It's a rhythm we've all grown accustomed to, but as pervasive as this palming noise has become, so have the problems with our cities. Air quality is often so poor it's responsible for a staggering number of illnesses and even deaths. In 2019 alone, polluted air has led to unaccumulated 175,000 years lived with disability due to chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases in 30 European countries. Fine particulate matter resulted in 238,000 premature deaths. Now that's what city air does for you. Urban traffic and energy consumption contribute vastly to climate change and most of our infrastructure are not prepared to deal with the adverse effects of the climate crisis. Not only in terms of energy efficiency though, but also in social terms. In times of extreme stress, we depend vastly on our communities, but these communities, they need space and time and further means to form and function well so they can withstand stress when it arises. There's a lot of talk about car-centered cities and how traffic needs to move away from individual vehicles and towards greener options. And with this discourse only just budding, the backlash is already in full force. Populists are accusing environmentalists of hunting down drivers as if it were a matter of life or a death or even rather domination and dominion. Is it though our walking folks, bikers, wheelchair users, children and tram riders really such an angry mob threatening car owners? This conflict feels truly manufactured and that's because it is. Now this topic is so charged because owning a car is not only a means to get from point A to point B, it's a status symbol, a glaring emblem of your class. If you own a car, you own a piece of the concrete jungle, you feel entitled to space and you have 7,000 pounds of metal and plastic to prove your point. This is a privilege many of us are bereft of. This didn't start with the invention of the combustion engine though. Access to a vehicle has been a class marker for the longest time. In the novels of Onore de Bazak, we're talking 19th century novels, up and coming heroes have to develop entire schemes to keep their shoes clean so as to avoid betraying themselves in high society since they cannot afford a carriage to get from the city's outskirts into high-class downtown. Now walking is a privilege when you can afford to aimlessly stroll but walking with a purpose is a pauper's pastime in this world. It's true that across much of the 20th century, in Europe, traffic and commerce were considered of the utmost importance in city planning. Infrastructure is developed to support individual drivers mostly at the expense of public transport and communal spaces and many are calling for a change but across all modes of traffic we all eventually transform into pedestrians be it on our own feet, mobility aids or, as I prefer to commute, leaning back nicely in a stolen shopping cart. Don't look at me like I'm weird. It's way more comfortable than heels. Now, green urbanism envisions urban planning with communities and environment at the heart of city design. It's about reclaiming urban spaces for the people who live in them promising to make these spaces livable not just for pedestrians but for drivers too. And it isn't even such a novel concept. European cities have been crawling towards this effort for decades intertwining greenery with architecture, promoting public transport, cycle lanes and walk-off friendly spaces. Architects, scholars, activists and artists work on reimagining buildings as living, breathing entities that contribute to an urban ecosystem. It affects housing, traffic, work as well as care, fun and community. However, the road to green urbanism is not without its bumps. Financial constraints, legal entanglements and public awareness or the lack thereof pose significant hurdles. But the price is worth the pursuit. Cleaner air, clearer waters and a cohesive community are treasures that promise a richer urban life. With me to discuss are Jessica Furseth, a freelance journalist from London who explores the city scene on covering the unique and captivating aspects of urban life. She's joining us online. Ode al-Churak is a representative of the NGO from streets to homes pioneering the housing first method in Hungary. Lina Mosshammer is the co-founder and CEO of Punkt von Streich and a policy officer at Verkehrsklub Österreich. She's spearheading initiatives in mobility solutions striving for a gender-sensitive and sustainable approach to urban transportation. With them we'll explore the contours of green urbanism delve into case studies of cities that have turned a green dream into concrete reality and discuss how we too can be part of this verdant vision. So check it out. There is a lot of talk in political discourse right now about how drivers and cars dominate cityscapes. Now that's nothing new to discover. But there's a lot of talk about tension between drivers and anybody that wants to limit their reach to the city. Is there really such a huge conflict there? Lina, you work with hard data on the availability of public space and who uses it in what way. How do you see this? Look at the distribution of space. We give a lot of space to cars and with that it's very difficult to really create equality between the different modes, between the different people. If I'm walking, if I'm cycling, if I'm with children there's just not enough space. That's a big issue. I mean for example here in Vienna there has been a lot of work done already to improve it and you can see it but there is still a lot to do. Yeah, we are sitting here in the Zonwen-Fiatel where it is an open ambition to reduce car traffic. The housing project that is housing us actually dedicated parking spaces to the outskirts of the district where people don't even come in with cars but there seems to be a general problem with our concept of access to public space or what even constitutes a public space. Adela and I come from a city, Budapest, which uses its main river line as a highway and has just recently started to refashion this and Jessica, you just published with Eurasian an article specifically on the relationship between European cities and their rivers. Can you tell us about this, please? Yeah, so in London where I live the Thames is quite severely underused. It's a central riverway that everybody knows and loves but it's not really a part of daily life in the way that it really should be. We have a little commuter boat going up and down every day and it's like its cutscene is this thing that's separate it's almost decorational. Yeah, there are ideas around increasing the use of the river for freight and also for transporting people but it's slow going. There's also been efforts to use the river for recreation and leisure, swimming, paddle boarding and things like that but most people just don't think that's even possible because they just assume it's too dirty. Yeah, in a previous episode we talked with the founders of the Schwimmverein Donau Canal which is the Viennese sort of, I would say initiative or working group to promote swimming in the Danube Channel here which is a really lovely place and it's also kind of a grey zone as they explain. It's not illegal but it's not like 100% legal to do but of course when we talk about the use of public space for leisure, for fun, for community there is a huge aspect that we mustn't forget about and that's about how poor people use public spaces and maybe it's worth hammering at home. Poor people are a lot of people so they're not like some minority that we can just forget about so how does this relationship with the public space show up for people in housing poverty or experiencing homelessness? Yeah, so I think in the last few years there has been like some changes which person have poor people live on the streets because there has been a law that criminalizes people sleeping on the streets or in the parks and they actually can get a fine by the police if they are being seen there. I think it's important to mention that this is also enshrined in the Hungarian base law which is functionally the constitution. Yeah. The criminalization of rough sleeping. Yeah. And also I think in the last few years when the gentrification started inside Blapest there has been like new parks being created but they are closed up with fences on the outside and they are closed after the evening and they only open in the morning and also they have like seats with dividers which can stop people from sleeping there so I think they are trying to create new spaces but it's only for like the upper class and the poor people they can go inside these parks and they can use these public spaces because everyone thinks that they are too smelly and things like that so they have like these stereotypes in their heads and yeah so most of these parks are closed up. And accessible public toilets would be so incredibly important for those experiencing homelessness but everybody just walking around so when talking about this kind of infrastructure what do you think would be ideal? The biggest problem is that in Blapest you don't have like any free toilets in the city few like facilities being built in the last few years but you have to pay like one euros for using it I think it has to be made accessible to all of the people so I think it's the municipality who has to be elite A big thanks to our partner Bikes and Rails here in Vienna this housing project relegates all parking spaces to the outskirts of the district making the main access road free of traffic The focus here is on promoting eco-friendly modes of transport aligning with the wider urban development concept of Zonwen-Fiatl Ost Bikes and Rails isn't just a housing project though it's a movement towards a more inclusive, ecological and affordable urban living It's part of the pioneering Habitat Initiative aiming to create self-governed, affordable spaces all across Austria so if you're in Vienna, make sure to swing by Bikes and Rails and experience this blend of community and green urbanism for yourself So here at Bikes and Rails there is a café but it is conceptualized as a public living room so you can come in and you don't necessarily have to consume something to sit around and hang out with others This is kind of a continuation although an expansion of the old-timey Vienna's café ideal where you buy one coffee and can sit there for hours How do you see these kinds of public spaces? It's always a good thing to have a space where you're not pushed to buy something and just to be able to use that public space or even like sheltered space I would say it's not an excuse for a city or a government not to do something, it's an extra it's something really nice where people can get together and I know a lot of projects being it for just to have a café but also to have like share mobility options They are really nice projects and it's always important to let people participate We do work a lot with data and of course there's quantitative data but we also need this qualitative one to really get to know the people and say hey what do you really need There was for example in Vienna a project where they took a look at a park and said how there are not so many girls playing in that park, why is that? and they actually talked with them and they designed like how does this park should look like for you to really use it and to feel comfortable in there and you can really see an improvement afterwards and I mean there are so many things which we maybe not think about because you usually plan for what you know and you can't know everything Okay I can get this out of my mind what do girls need to want to use that park I mean it cannot only be tampon dispensers we need those all over the place of course No it's very simple, for example it's like a place where you can sit and talk together which is at one point like something where you can sit just in a group but at the same time it's visible and you feel safe in there for example if it's a place where you can sit but it's all like hidden if you're safe you just don't use it so it's really small measured sometimes that can really improve public space Okay I was thinking more frivolous thing That's why I'm not supposed to come up with this myself Jessica? Yeah I was gonna say I worked on a project once where the issues that concerned women to use a sports centre were things like the road where you parked your car or where you got off the bus to the sports centre had to be lit rather than go behind and be dark and secluded there's also things like childcare especially for low income people you know if you don't have childcare you can't go to the gym and as well just to have like you said to have a place to just talk and hang out and have it to be friendly and sports centres can be very a bit aggressive sometimes they can be a bit macho and you know they struggle to get a teenage girl to participate which can be a reason for that and also having changing facilities that are comfortable so you don't have to smell all day it can be very simple things Yeah I understand from a lot of sources that often times it is incredibly hard to persuade municipalities to change even when it's not like a load of money to invest there but it's sort of more like a cultural change or like a shift in mindset how do you go about this because you use data in a lot of ways but you also use data to prove things I mean I'm not demeaning your work but observing how a crosswalk needs more time in the green shouldn't take very complicated AI right? No no no I mean there's a lot of things where you would say it's common sense but again it's always our personal reality and it's difficult to see so including people data can show a lot I wouldn't say it's necessary for a crosswalk it should be possible also for children also for elderly to pass and we have the data it's not always possible I mean we create a lot of graphics and we try to translate kind of the data into something everybody understands if we take a look at the last years and I tell you we have more and more streets and parking spaces it sounds a lot but when I tell you it's the area all of Vienna which we like sealed in the last years it's just it's a more of a picture in your head and then it's also of course easier to argue for some change or argue for something like we need something new we need something different Yeah I think this is very often brought up that Vienna has consecutively through a lot of years have been named as the most liveable city in the world definitely in Europe but let's talk about accessibility you published on the relationship of the city with noise can you tell us about that how Europe is faring in this regard and what can be done or maybe what is done already? Yeah so European countries tend to adhere to the nurse rules set by the World Health Organization but you do get pockets especially in the city where there are sections of the London Underground where the noise levels are comparable to standing under a jet plane and there's very little they can do about that unless they take up the tracks and do them again and there's obviously no money for that an interesting fact is that 50% of London is actually green space which you wouldn't think looking at it but that's because most of that green space is around the city and it's so big so you don't get that experience inside the city and there's a lot of debate in London around noise from aircraft because they're considering expanding the airport, a Heathrow or maybe one of the other ones they haven't quite decided I think the research showing the connection between noise and things like heart conditions heart attacks, strokes and other health conditions as well like maybe in mental health it's really strong it also impacts things like concentration in children just to be interrupted every time a plane passes which can be like every couple of minutes or even less than that it can impact children's ability to learn and there's some interesting research on that from the US about children in school next to train tracks and how they fed compared to children who didn't learn next to train tracks and it's like they lose years of learning just by being interrupted every two minutes but the problem is that it's just incredibly difficult to know what to do about it because we need the housing and the alternative where are people going to go where are they going to live it's a very difficult choice to make well I would assume that there are the two main paths quite like with energy use that one of them would be of course different regulations or a different approach for new build but also insulation insulation is a big issue all over the place also because of heating and air conditioning and the weather becoming more extreme but it's also very very pricey what's happening is that people who have money can afford to live in quieter places do you build the school next to the train tracks so do you build it somewhere quieter then the school will cost more money do you insulate the houses so that they're quieter but then they won't be as affordable so those are the sorts of questions that we're facing we are actually on the right side or the good side of the tracks here but we are very close to how the main railway station here in Vienna and we are listening to the trains break but it's not that oppressive as if a subway was running over our heads which is a case sometimes Adil how do you see accessibility in public spaces from your point of view in Budapest most of the social services are on one of the side of Budapest and it's not in the outskirts maybe so I think that is an area which has very few green spaces and not so much parks so I think they are being pushed out of these accessible spaces so it's more noisy not very controlled spaces the affordable houses are in the outskirts of the city and the wealthy people live in the center so I think there are very few big green spaces in Budapest which is accessible for everyone but there are a lot of parks that look like private parks I mean there is a concept called 15 minute city which says that you should be able to reach everything within 15 minutes if you take that concept and I think there are many areas not just Vienna that have it more and more to really think about there are people living there and they should be able to have everything like kindergarten shopping like supermarket and everything even if you are for example not able to go everywhere but you have everything you need for everyday this helps a lot but of course it's a development it's not everywhere if you take a look at all the European cities there is still a lot of work to do to really to get there but there are also so many easy measures that you could take that are not costly as an example we have at the moment an initiative calling to make it easier for cities to reduce the speed limits because if you say okay that's a living area I want there to be some space for people and safer space it should be possible to change something and it shouldn't be that difficult as it is right now especially when I'm in smaller cities or even rural areas there I feel even less safe because usually you don't even have a walking path it's designed the same way as it was when there were less cars and there were less traffic and it's sometimes even more difficult to walk those five minutes at least in Austria in the suburbs or like in a countryside than it is in a city I taught all my urban family members to tell the difference between a street where you walk on the street and where you have to go to the pedestrian side strip but if there isn't a sufficient walking pathway you just go out in the road and make that face but you can't really do that if you're vulnerable in any way or can't jump away and there is a very strong accessibility element there because you can only own a space when you have the means to own that space so for instance the community or the culture of traffic there allows you to do that and the wording I mean it's not in every language I guess but we call it street if it's for cars and we call it bike lane when it's for bikes we call it at least in German it's like people who walk space and people who cycle space and just the street is the street and it's automatically for cars sorry to talk that much about cars I don't think we can talk less about cars because they're everywhere I mean not particularly here so we briefly mentioned accessibility from the point of view of someone with say sensitivity so from the noise point of view but of course a big bulk of accessibility is just mobility like whether you can actually physically enter and use a space so how are we figuring with physical accessibility measures like removing barriers you know ranging from ramps to elevators to spaces specifically designed to be available it goes in the right direction I mean we even have laws on European level for example to like it's mandatory that public transport is accessible so we go there we get there but still not everything is accessible and I think what's most important if you really put that into focus so say we want to have something which is inclusive which works for people with disabilities which work for children and that's the weirdest part it's better for everyone so I don't switch to it I will testify that a barrier free toilet is an ultimately just much better toilet for any human to move around but that brings me to the question how you know and we're four women here talking about from a bunch of corners of Europe this is very much also gender issue right do you see a specific gender aspect in how people use spaces in your work it's a very bad thing in Budapest that they don't have enough space for homeless women to be separated from men because they don't feel safe and yeah it's a very big problem that women can't have their own like social services like mental health advisors and social workers because they are afraid to use these facilities built for mainly men so it's about dedicated space and Jessica when you look at European cities do you see dedicated space organized well enough to suit women or people of all genders and not just you know the standard white heterosexual male human that was long considered sort of like the measuring stick for humanity the example that comes to mind in London is that we have dedicated swimming ponds this is on the Hampstead Heath they're gender inclusive so it's trans inclusive spaces but they are it's been separated for 100 years and they also have handicapped facilities in these places as well with hoists to put you into the water if you have a physical disability it has a very different energy there which is a little hard to describe it's less splashing for one and just like a really like calm relaxed place where you are around women of all ages and especially bodies that you don't necessarily see in a very sporty gym and I find that's very very very lovely place to be that's my main example of that for London but I don't think there's a lot of spaces like that this program is brought to you by Eurazine your go to place for engaging reads from over 100 partner publications across dozens of languages to support our work and enjoy special benefits visit patreon.com slash Eurazine and become a supporter starting at 3 euros a month this talk show is a production of Display Europe a new content platform that respects your user data we are covering politics culture and more and we say a big thanks to Bikes and Rails for providing the venue for this episode Lena you are a founder of an initiative specifically dealing with women's mobility how do you see the situation tell me something nice tell me something I can be happy about I mean safety is a big issue and it's a big topic but it's also you can also see more broadly in general we founded women in mobility to make women more visible like women working in mobility I mean we are 20% there is not really a balance and as said if you plan for something you know and there is only 20% women and they are mainly not in a decision making it's difficult to have this like just mixture of ideas and mixture of perspective it's not just men and women it's like all the diversity to have that represented in a decision making you already said it we usually plan for this like stereotype and we just go from A to B and that's that we go to work and we go back or we go to school and we go back but the reality is much more diverse and at the moment it's still women who do the majority of the caretaking so it's mainly women but it also supports men so it's for everybody if you consider more these diverse paths so for example I go from home to kindergarten but not alone I have I have the child with me then I have to go maybe to work then I go shopping then I bring the child to the sports event in the afternoon something like that and all those things are making mobility more complicated but at the same time like we can use all the diversity also of opportunities which we have much more like we have scooters walking we have e-bikes we have whatever so it's not bad as you said it's something positive but we really have to consider it and we really have to take a look at how are people actually getting not just from A to B but A, B, C, D and whatever so for the last question I want to come to talk about climate change because when we're talking about greening urban spaces and changing urban spaces climate change and the adverse effects of climate change are all over the place and they are not properly addressed on a mass scale I think one thing that we associate with homelessness as an experience would be the punishing European winters but another aspect that we talk less about when addressing homelessness and poverty is the punishing heat that comes in its place how do you see this in your work so I mean a lot of fire tenants who were previously like homeless live in the forests surrounding Budapest and they I think they are not affected by this warmth maybe as much as people living in the central of Budapest because 90% of the spaces are covered by concrete and so it's very hot in the summer but I think what is mostly affects our tenants right now is like the gas prices and like the electricity bills which is very hard to pay in Budapest the social housing and the municipality on flats are in a very bad condition and they don't have good insulation they don't have good windows and it was very hard last year in the last winter to pay their bills because they have seven times more amount of bills than they used to have before and it's also a very big problem for people living in housing poverty on the countryside because they also have these houses from each other and they also need a very much of support to have heating in the winter and I think it's a very big problem because it not only affects the most poor people but more and more people Jessica when we talk about greening spaces and the relationship with green spaces often it is framed in terms of leisure and fun and beauty and calm and these sorts of terms are also a major factor in mitigating climate change effects both in terms of heat and cold and the changing environment. How do you see this unfolding in London where you say that much of the green space is concentrated on the outskirts of the city? Well what I was thinking as you were talking about the cities heating up because the city centres are hotter than the rest of the country and I think it's two thirds of Europe's population live in cities or urban areas so that is most people and one of the things that has come up a lot in my recent writing is around access to swimming which sounds trivial because swimming is just a bit of fun but it has to do with it's cooling off, it has to do with doing something that is nice and fun and it's to feel a part of your city but in London you can actually swim in the Thames if you go far enough west but for most people they have to travel an hour more in order to be able to do that. The other swim spots in London and there are several but they are all charged for those. Lina, how are we fairing in terms of climate change in greening cities? We know what we should do we often talk about CO2 emissions and yes we have to reduce them massively but it's much easier to talk about people about your health about your environment, about green space and that's like the solutions are there and the solutions are more green space, there are more space for you, there are better health for you so the solutions we have especially when it comes to cities are good for everybody so that's I would say that's the positive part we have the measures, just need to implement them So all we need is the determination? All we need is the determination and really doing it Okay, I think right now we have the determination to go inside and get a hot tea because it was dumb enough to bring us outside Thank you guys for joining us thanks to the crew for catching pneumonia because I wanted to be outside and see you next week This program is brought to you by Eurazine your go-to place for engaging reads from over 100 partner publications across dozens of languages to support our work and enjoy special benefits visit patreon.com and become a supporter starting at 3 euros a month this talk show is a production of Display Europe a new content sharing platform that respects your user data we are covering politics, culture and more and we say a big thanks to Bikes and Rails for providing the venue for this episode this program is co-funded by the European Cultural Foundation a creative Europe program of the European Union please note that the views expressed here are those of the authors and the speakers only they do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the European Union or their European Education and Culture Executive Agency even though I think it would be great if they just took everything we said here and ran with it especially the public toilets