Urban greenways and public ways: realizing public ideas in a fragmented world

How do we make things happen in the public realm? This paper first considers four forces surrounding change and urban fragmentation: technology and the culture of compliance; connections between ecological literacy and sustainability; the uncertain ethics of public life, the relationship between education and place. Decision-making and management models such as “muddling through” and “groping along” are also examined as implementation techniques which others have used. A brief summary of the City of Vancouver context introduces the Urban Landscape Task Force and its report Greenways • Public Ways. The mandate was to discover what the public valued in the urban landscape and to recommend ways to manage, protect, and enhance it. After a public process, research and deliberations, the Task Force noted a serious neglect of the public realm and all its attendant issues, and recommended 15 Essential Actions to the City Council. Barriers to implementing these public ideas in the political and bureaucratic climate of a land-poor but landscape-rich city are identified: the culture of conformity and compliance; the lost art of public conversation; political or bureaucratic fear of change and the unknown; lack of a sustainable vision for the city; public service overload; lost identity with public places; visual and ecological illiteracy; participation overkill; a lack of “real” examples. The conclusions are drawn from the Urban Landscape Task Force experience, and six strategies are suggested to implement public ideas: (1) reviving citizenship; (2) building partnerships; (3) making big moves; (4) making small moves and trial offerings; (5) modelling after nature and beauty; (6) educating for community-based literacy.