8/15/2019 Is Bad Urban Design Making Us Lonely_ - CityLab
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Is Bad Urban Design Making Us Lonely?Social interaction can be
encouraged by our built environment. But it isn'talways.
NATE BERG | @nate_berg | Apr 16, 2012 | 8 Comments
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Where we live can play a huge role in our social lives. Bigger
cities offer moreopportunities for interaction, suburban areas
prioritize private spaces overpublic ones.
But even small-scale urban design details can have a large
impact on our social lives. Bad urban design is one of the major
causes of loneliness and asocial behavior in Australia, according
to a new report [PDF] from the GrattanInstitute, a think tank
focused on public policy there.
"Cities can help social connection, or hinder it," the report
notes. "They can beso poorly organized that they are hard to get
around – a problem not just forgetting to work, but also for seeing
friends and family and participating in
From The Atlantic
http://www.grattan.edu.au/publications/137_report_social_cities.pdfhttp://www.citylab.com/http://-/?-http://www.citylab.com/http://www.grattan.edu.au/publications/137_report_social_cities.pdfhttps://twitter.com/intent/user?screen_name=nate_berghttp://www.citylab.com/authors/nate-berg/
8/15/2019 Is Bad Urban Design Making Us Lonely_ - CityLab
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social activities."
Urban dwellers in Australia have fewer friendships and
neighborhoodconnections than they did 20 years ago, according to
the report, which coversissues like accessibility and transit,
suburban commute times, public spacesand the layouts of
neighborhoods.
The number of Australians living alone is at a record high -
singletons accountfor about one-quarter of all Australian
households, and government estimatessuggest that number will rise
to 28 percent in 2030. The number of lonelypeople is also on the
rise. According to a recent study, the amount of peoplewho had no
local friend they could ask a favor of grew from 11 percent to
13percent from 1984 to 2005. The amount of people who had no
trusted friendsgrew from 6 percent to 8 percent.
The situation is even more dire in America. In 1985, 10 percent
of peoplereported having no close friends with whom to talk about
important personal issues, and 15 percent reported having only one
close friend. In 2004, thosenumbers rose to 25 percent and 20
percent, respectively.
These gures are from The Atlantic 's May cover piece, which asks
"Is FacebookMaking Us Lonely?" The article shows that a wide
variety of inputs orconditions can contribute to loneliness, and
that even tools intended to makeus more social, such as social
networks, can have unintended negative impacts.
This can also be true in urban design, according to the Grattan
Institute report.
"People often nd ways to meet despite physical obstacles," the
report notes."Conversely, the best-designed spaces don’t guarantee
connection."
But there are solutions. Among other ideas, the report suggests
better sharedwaiting areas for commuters (perhaps with greeters who
could offer real-timeinformation on delays); improving public
transportation quality (to cut down oncommute times); parks and
sports facilities (the report is particularly fond of mini-parks);
and local events that bring people together.
Asocial behavior can't be blamed completely on poor urban
design. But as thereport from Australia shows, the placement of
building access points and thelocation of outdoor seating can have
a noticeable impact on how much social interaction takes place in a
city – or doesn't.
Photo credit: Sander van der Werf /Shutterstock
http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-90737p1.htmlhttp://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1969/12/is-facebook-making-us-lonely/8930/
