How can urban planners influence the 15-minute city narrative?

Urban planners need to align on the wider benefits of a 15-minute city to reframe its narrative, argues AECOM’s Director of City Masterplanning and Urban Design Elad Eisenstein.

The concept of 15-minute city has gripped public and political debate with opinions ranging from the simple and compelling views that locating most essential services and amenities within walking or cycling distance from our homes supports the shaping of sustainable communities, to the more extreme view that the concept infringes personal liberty. 

Despite the strength of the concept, there isn’t yet a real-life example of a 15-minute city that has been built. Instead, the concept’s application in recent years has been mainly associated with the construction of cycling lanes, the planning longer-term low-traffic arrangements or sometimes with adding a bit more amenity in local neighbourhoods. So, with few meaningful reference points, the concept is highly malleable by media. If it is to be supported, it matters that the concept is used appropriately, maximising its full potential and not just focus on singular, mostly traffic-related applications. 

As planners, to keep support for the concept, we need to ensure that our profession is aligned on the wider benefits of a 15-minute city and what it might look like, so that we can help reframe the narrative.  

It’s about balancing the mobility network, not a battle against the car

Cities have an obligation to reduce transport emissions. It’s a complex task and reducing car use can only be achieved meaningfully when other low carbon, and as attractive, means of transport are provided.  

People have the right to use a car, particularly in places where there are no relevant alternatives. The main question is when do we use the car, and what for? Better planning of local neighbourhoods will create choice, with more attractive, healthier, and safer options to move around. The car (hopefully a zero emission one, or a shared one) can then be used when needed but not as first choice. 

The challenge is transition, as people are asked to change their behaviours and adapt to a new normal which impacts their daily routines. Whilst new developments such as King’s Cross, for example, prioritise walking and embed low traffic principles very successfully, residents and businesses that choose to locate there mostly buy into this from day one.  

So, what can we learn from great places like King’s Cross? I believe its success is not just because of how well it has been planned but also because of the quality of place delivered (as well as how it is maintained and ran). Quality delivery is key to stimulating behavioural change.  

Create and communicate the ripple effects of infrastructure

Cities must ensure that they can maximise the value of the investment in infrastructure, to create truly sustainable places. The 15-minute city concept can bring more benefits to local communities from infrastructure development, for example using the investment to spur regeneration around stations. Designing and delivering integrated developments around transport nodes helps maximise the value of the investment in infrastructure, delivering wider services than transport, such as housing and other mix of uses, within walking distance of the station – there are some great examples of this, particularly across Asia, such as West Kowloon Station in Hong Kong.  

Looking beyond transport, larger developments present opportunities to rethink green and blue infrastructure including better and greener streets, a more attractive network of public open spaces and parks including spaces in buildings such as sky gardens and green facades, delivering comfort, microclimate protection, biodiversity, and other sustainability and place making benefits.  

Stratford and the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London is a great example where planners leveraged the value of the park and concentrating high-density development around transport nodes, shaped a range of places that are highly walkable, vibrant and safe for local communities, workers and visitors. 

If embraced by local communities and when making economic sense, integrated sustainable infrastructure can become one of the most positive catalysts for shaping the future of our cities. 

Settling the challenge of business district vs suburb

One of the challenges about the 15-minute city concept is the negative impact its local focus – and supporting more working from home – might have on central business districts (CBD) which thrive on an ecosystem of people coming in to work by public transport, going out for lunch, and socialising in the evening.  

However, this isn’t the case of one against the other. Good cities are planned as a holistic network, where central urban areas and suburban neighbourhoods complement each other.  

In Sydney, Australia, there is now a strong push to make the CBD relevant again, not by attracting 9-5 workers back, but by diversifying the offer as a mixed-use piece of city, attracting a much wider range of businesses as well as residents, around a 24/7 environment.   

In Melbourne, the city’s largest infrastructure project in decades – the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) – presents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to revive suburban environments by making new stations focal points for new ‘centres’. This supports the city’s long-term plan which promotes ‘living locally’, providing people more services and opportunities closer to home. 

Delivering much needed change to the city’s building stock

With most of the decarbonisation efforts now focused on retrofitting existing stock, the 15-minute city offers an opportunity to do a ‘deep dive’ into local areas.  

Following the coronavirus pandemic, many employees have seen their offices getting a much-needed facelift with more collaboration space and a friendlier, more relaxed environment – attracting workers to come back to the office, for at least part of the week. Local high streets and town centres, which have struggled to adapt to the change in the retail landscape following the rise in online shopping, have seen new uses like wellness, shared workplaces, galleries and local artisans take up vacant retail units.  

These new uses encompassing retrofits are a fantastic opportunity for cities, enabling significant gains from a carbon perspective but also enhancing place quality and experience. For urban environments, which usually take years to adapt and evolve, there are opportunities to increase the pace of change. 

Conclusion

The 15-minute city concept isn’t a ‘one size fits all’ plan. It is not meant to be a perfect model for new city living, simply because there isn’t one. It is there to present and guide to a different future – shaping more liveable places, healthier and more sustainable communities.  

There is much more to the 15-minute city than how we move around. If considered holistically, it gives us useful tools to balance global challenges of climate change, economic instability or health and to balance those with the needs and aspirations of local communities. As urban planners, we should align behind these wider benefits so that the narrative moves on from the concept simply being about car use or working from home.  

This article was originally published in The Planner.