Urbanized Page #3

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and bicycles have pavement,

and the cars are in the mud.

So it's a priority for the pedestrians

and the bicycles

and then later sometime

we will pay for the cars.

But first the pedestrians.

So this completely shows respect

for human dignity, for everybody,

not just those who have cars

who normally think to be the important

ones in developing country cities.

Again, this democracy at work.

In Copenhagen we have,

for 30 or 40 years,

had this very distinctive policy

to invite people to bicycle

as much as possible.

There is a complete network

of bicycle lanes citywide.

In what we call Copenhagen-style

bicycle lane.

We always have the bicycle lanes

next to the sidewalk.

The sidewalks are the slow traffic,

the bike lanes are a little bit faster,

and then there would be parked cars,

and then there would be the traffic.

In this way you have the parked cars

to protect the bicyclists,

instead of the bicyclists

to protect the parked cars.

It helps invite a lot of people

who would be too afraid to bicycle

to get the idea, "I can actually do it,

because now it is much safer."

In ten years we have seen

the bicycling doubling.

We have seen that now we have 37%

of everyone commuting to work

arriving on his bicycle.

It keeps people fit, it doesn't pollute

and it doesn't take up much space.

It's a really smart way

of getting around the city.

I think a good city

is like a good party.

If you ask a guy that was

at a good party on Friday,

he says "Oh my dear, I was only home

by 5;30 in the morning."

If people get involved in social

activities

they will forget place and time

and just enjoy.

That is why I would say, do not look at

how many people

are walking in the city,

but look at how many people

have stopped walking

to stay and enjoy what is there.

The challenge is how

do we make sure

that public open spaces

are inviting and well used.

And in these spaces, design detail

makes all the difference.

There should be multiple kinds

of seating,

many different reasons for people

to come into a space.

For instance, movable chairs.

People, when they sit in a chair

that's moveable,

they just move it so much.

So it's kind of their chair

and it's their place.

Movable chairs also let you socialize,

they let you be by yourself,

they let you be part of the city,

or away from the city.

Knowing about Homo sapiens and

the kind of creature he is

has been a very important key

to understanding why some places

work and some places don't.

Much of it is bound to our senses,

how long you can see

and how long you can hear.

How your eye is horizontal,

you see very little upward,

you see much more downward,

and you see much,

much more out to either side.

That is leftover

from the evolutionary process,

when the walking animal was out

walking on the plains,

the enemies were out there

and in front of you,

but they were not up there.

But you should look out for snakes and

scorpions and boulders.

The eye can't command an area

more than about 100 meters

by 100 meters.

That is the distance where you can see

other people and movements.

But if it gets bigger, the eye can't

see what's going on.

Then you feel less comfortable.

That's why nearly all the squares

in all the old cities

will be smaller than this 100 meters.

We are really talking about the urban

habitat of Homo sapiens.

It's the same Homo sapiens

all over the world.

Cultural circumstances differ

economic circumstances differ,

climatic circumstances differ,

but basically we are

the same little walking animal.

The rise of post-industrial sites in

cities around the world,

have come about only

in the last 30 or 40 years,

and people don't know

what to do with them.

They think should be removed

and erased.

What we've found over the

past 10 years is that you can

actually take these post-industrial

conditions and through creative design

actually produce something

that people love.

It's not erasure

and it's not preservation.

It's really transformation.

I lived about a block away from

the High Line for over 15 years,

and never paid it any attention at all.

Trains ran on the High Line

until about 1980

and then they stopped entirely.

It was the realization

that this thing was actually

this monumental structure

that ran 22 blocks,

three neighborhoods.

It just seemed like

this amazing opportunity

to experience the city

in a whole new way.

I'd read on the agenda

of a community board meeting

that it was going to be demolished.

And sat next to Josh, and we didn't

know each other,

and he was sort of interested

in it in the same way I was.

And no one else in the meeting

was interested.

There was one person who spoke

who I think was literally

frothing at the mouth about how

terrible the High Line was.

So after the meeting,

we exchanged business cards

and said, you know, "Why don't

we do something together?"

When we came up here we realized

there was something magical

up here already.

The High Line was this

extraordinary artifact,

rusting steel where grasses and flowers

had taken seed naturally.

As a landscape architect,

a question I always ask is what

will design actually mess up here.

What through design

will you anaesthetize?

Will you destroy?

Because a lot of these sites have

a sort of charm to them

that really I'm always looking to try

to capture and actually amplify.

It's much more about

a symbiotic relationship

between nature and civilization.

Because a city's a messy place.

And so there are lots of places

for nature to move in

and not take over

but form a relationship

with the urban infrastructure

in a really interesting way.

Having the grasses and flowers

come up through the paving

was a big part of the design.

It really is about showcasing Manhattan

in a way that is authentic.

It's not overly manicured,

or overly scripted.

And the noises, I guess,

are part of it.

The fact that the High Line

was driven by, at the very start,

Robert and me, but very quickly a

large group of neighbors,

community members, New Yorkers

and ultimately people

from all over the country,

I think has imbued the park

with a communal sensibility

that very much effects

the environment that is up here.

Underneath the design,

a lot of what we see today

is the result of the care and attention

that went into the zoning.

We were just passionate

about saving the High Line.

Zoning was just one piece of it, I only

played a role in the zoning,

and being obsessive I think I said,

if I didn't think about

the High Line every single day,

it was going to come down,

that was my mindset.

These are the two blocks we wanted

to talk to you about.

The Department of City Planning is

responsible for shaping

its neighborhoods, its waterfronts,

its industrial lands,

and its business districts.

Really shaping the form of the city

and where it's going grow, where

it's going to develop.

This is a double problem,

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