THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

TO DENSIFY OR NOT:

the pandemic as a driver of urban transformation

David Bülow

Urbanism drowning in the uncertainty of the Covid-19 pandemic. David Bülow (2020)

“The streets were all empty, The pews were all bare. The neighbours were treated Only with what we could spare. Alone we sat, fearful and forlorn, Locked in our homes, to weather this storm.” Darren C Mossman (2021)

The Covid-19 pandemic is challenging one of the basic tenets of urban orthodoxy namely that there are numerous benefits to be derived from urban density.

BY LLEWELLYN VAN WYK, B.ARCH; MSC. (APPLIED), URBAN ANALYST

Oliver Schaper argues that at the core of what makes dense urban environments authentic lies a network of forces that create unpredictability, serendipity and diversity – qualities that in times of social distancing appear to be a threat to our personal safety and wellbeing.1

Richard Florida, a professor in the University of Toronto’s School of Cities, agrees, arguing that the very same clustering of people that makes our great cities more innovative and productive also makes them, and us, vulnerable to infectious disease.2

However, the question remains whether density supports higher rates of infection. David Madden argues that there is no simple relationship between urbanisation and infectious disease. He notes that researchers have traced how interactions at urbanrural peripheries create new vulnerabilities to disease, and cites a study published in 2017 that looked at 60 countries and found that, overall, infectious disease burdens decreased with urbanisation. While epidemics have periodically devastated poor and marginalised urban communities, cities have also spawned

new health policies, housing reforms and social movements that help people survive disease.3 As he points out, much of the anxiety about cities during the pandemic has centred on fears that population density might heighten the risk of contagion. He argues that density and crowding are not the same thing. Overcrowding is the result of inequality and the housing crisis, not an unchangeable feature of urban life.

As Florida points out density is likely just one of several key factors that determine how vulnerable places are to the virus. Globally, Covid-19 has taken root and hit hard in several types of places. One is large dense superstar cities like New York and London, with large flows of visitors and tourists, diverse global populations and dense residential areas. A second is industrial centres like Wuhan, Detroit and Northern Italy, which are connected through supply chains. The third is global tourist meccas like the ski slopes of Italy, Switzerland and France, and their counterparts in the Colorado Rockies. And in smaller communities, the virus targeted nursing homes and funeral parlours, and of course cruise ships, which are like dense small cities at sea. As he notes, there is no simple, one-size-fits-all explanation when it comes to cities and the virus.

It is important to distinguish the unfortunate hot spots where it first cropped up from the characteristics of places that may propagate, or limit, its spread. Cities differ along many dimensions – population size, age, education level, affluence, religiosity, the kinds of work people do, levels of social capital and more. These factors may affect their vulnerability to the coronavirus. Analysis done on the geography of Covid-19 finds that it is not density in-and-of-itself that seems to make cities susceptible, but the kind of density and the way it impacts daily work and living. That is because places can be dense and still provide places for people to isolate and be socially distant. Simply put, there is a huge difference between rich dense places, where people can shelter in place, work remotely and have all their food and other needs delivered to them, and poor dense places, which push people out onto the streets and onto crowded transits with one another.

There are several other factors in addition to density that merit closer attention as the virus’s spread is tracked. Two obvious ones are the age of population and pre-existing health conditions. It is critically important to look closely at the uneven impact of the virus on poor and minority communities. It is also important to zero in the differences in the kinds of work people do: the shares of the workforce that can engage in remote work versus the share of frontline workers in healthcare, delivery and grocery stores that are particularly vulnerable to the virus. Then too, that some things we want to encourage in cities, like tight social bonds and civic capital, make them more vulnerable. Rather distressingly, it appears that the virus may reinforce some key faultiness of our existing economic and geographic divides.4

Elek Pafka, a lecturer in urban planning and design at the University of Melbourne, takes this argument further. Writing in The Conversation, he notes that physical distancing has been the most common measure to contain the spread of the virus. But, he argues, this does not mean higher-density cities are necessarily more vulnerable and lower-density cities more resilient to the pandemic. He acknowledges that some say high density is a key factor while others argue it is unrelated. But he posits that evidence invoked on both sides has often been anecdotal.

Too little attention is paid to what urban density means. Density in cities takes on a broad range of meanings, such as density of buildings, residents or jobs. There is often confusion between internal densities within buildings, which vary widely with wealth, and the external densities of street life, which we share. To complicate things further, each of these concepts can be applied to a range of scales, from a building to a neighbourhood to a metropolis. In identifying what kind of density is relevant for the spread of the coronavirus he notes that it has become increasingly clear Covid-19 is mainly transmitted through extended close contact, particularly in enclosed spaces, where droplets and aerosols accumulate. The density that matters is internal population density – generally measured as square metres per person. Thus, high-risk places can include dormitories, open plan offices, churches, hospitals, public transport, planes and cruise ships.

The evidence to date points to much less transmission through casual contacts in outdoor spaces such as streets or parks. Neither gross residential densities of suburbs or neighbourhoods nor overall metropolitan densities necessarily reflect conditions at the scale of human encounter that determines transmission risks. Pafka suggests there are two main reasons for this. First, densities at the street or walkable neighbourhood scale can differ vastly from metropolitan or postcode averages. A local main street, for instance, can be dense when the average is low. Second, a short physical distance between people is not the same thing as social encounter. The density of quarantine accommodation (such as a hotel) may be much higher than that of an aged-care facility, but we have seen the latter can be quite lethal.

Internal densities are geared to wealth. This means some people live and work under conditions where they can adapt to this virus, and some do not. Reflecting on what this all means for the design and planning of a healthy city; he acknowledges that some might be tempted to propose “pandemic-safe” urban forms like the anti-

urban utopias of the early 20th century. But he cautions, if urban form is solely conceived to distance people, to eliminate the friction of social interaction, it will also eliminate urban buzz, reduce economic productivity, sociability, walkability and ultimately public health as well.

Instead, we should use this crisis as an opportunity to rethink urban resilience from a broad and nuanced public health perspective. Questions that he raises includes how to design a more adaptable city that maximises capacities for change in both its architecture and urban design as well as how do we undo the rigidities of the “masterplan”? Referencing urban sociologist Richard Sennett, how to design a city that works like an accordion – where people can spread out when necessary and vice versa? What we need to do is design a more equitable city without the internal densities that have proven so deadly.5

That means that the spread of pandemics in cities is not just about combating density – it’s also about addressing the underlying inequalities that force people to live in unhealthy environments and shoring up neighbourhoods’ public health. If cities are going to respond better to future pandemics, they are going to need stronger health infrastructure for the most vulnerable – and housing policies that right historical wrongs. Pandemics, we are often told, reveal a society’s hidden flaws. The coronavirus has shown that many cities remain highly polarised and unequal. That is especially true for urban centres where nearly a third of the country’s population lives. As Coburn put it, “We have not, in the United States, addressed the fundamental inequalities in cities, and we must – if we’re going to have a healthier kind of urban environment.”6

Andy Forbes from Forbes Real Estate Council has a different take on this subject. While he agrees that the problem is not density or cities, in his view, the dilemma lies in how we use our open space. If we do not factor human experience into our decisions for highdensity development, we give up green space and pedestrian areas. The more we sacrifice quality of life, the more we give way to smaller spaces that can result in packing people. As cities smartly densify, streets will play a critical role in supporting the new types of connected spaces and communities for people. Density is about healthy mobility, but also about creating destinations that are a breath of fresh air.7

Acuto argues that it is a bit early to take on lessons learned from Covid-19, but you would probably have a big conversation about the value versus the risks of densification. Clearly densification is and has been the problem with some of this. Covid-19 puts a fundamental challenge to how we manage urbanisation. He suggests that rethinking density management is a key for longterm survival in a pandemic world.8 Part of this rethinking means thinking about decentralisation of essential services. Looking at where we might see radical transformation because of the pandemic, it must be remembered that the need for changes will have to be weighed against changes needed to support climate change adaptation and mitigation.

If the city is spread out rather than further densified, much better public transport connectivity will be required. What should change is the decentralisation of services, better managing of supplies and nets of smaller entities in food delivery. But should is different from will. Will market forces sway the things we do towards what is marketable and economically profitable versus saying this clearly is a call for redundancy in public health and public transport?

If cities are going to respond better to future pandemics, they are going to need stronger health infrastructure for the most vulnerable – and housing policies that right historical wrongs.

Silvia Taveras and Nicholas Stevens argue that it is the combination of diversity and density that makes urbanity – it’s a product of diverse social opportunities in close proximity.9 This is why densifying cities has been a goal for achieving healthy, social and prosperous cities. However, the risks of Covid-19 transmission have strengthened anti-density discourses. It is worth remembering that ways of fighting disease, such as sanitation, were only possible because of their financial savings and infrastructure efficiencies enabled by denser cities. Density done right is safe, and it permits the human interactions and connections we need – and which we are now missing.

The scrutiny is not just at the city scale, but is driving the creation of an intermediary scale, the megaregion. The pandemic, Anthony Flint, a Senior Fellow at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, argues is exactly the kind of crisis that reveals what Europeans refer to as “territorial cohesion.”10 We generally think of three basic levels of governing – national, regional, and local – but Flint states that planners have long recognised that a lot of activity occurs at the interregional scale, across geographically proximate clusters of settlement. People may live in one region but commute to a city in another or live in the city and travel to a second home in another region.11

The megaregion framework, he argues, has been useful for all kinds of initiatives, from protecting wilderness that similarly cross political jurisdictions to designing transportation policy including inter-city high-speed rail networks, agreeing on carbon emissions reductions or building more affordable housing across a larger catchment of labour markets.

Flint notes that others who have studied megaregions say the approach will be well-suited to coordinating re-openings, or continuing closures, as regions manage the next phases of the Covid-19 pandemic. And if that’s successful, regions may use megaregions to make future improvements in housing, transportation and the environment. Flint also points out the observation of Robert Yaro, professor at the University of Pennsylvania, that “it’s clear that actions to manage and recover from the pandemic will require regional action, since the virus doesn’t respect arbitrary political boundaries.”

Yaro argues that this kind of collaboration support the longerterm steps needed to rebuild the economy – and build the mobility systems and settlement patterns needed to mitigate against future events of this kind. Historically, states have often resisted working together so for many it is gratifying to see how a planning construct could become so useful in this desperate time of need. Planners have been trying to illustrate the advantages of a regional approach for many years. In the future megaregions could become the policy vessel for new realities, including more people working remotely, allowing them to spread out across agglomerated labour and housing markets.

But the behaviour of people in a pandemic is probably not the best guide to how they want to live their lives in normal times. As Tavernise and Mervosh note, so much is unknown: what will happen to housing prices, whose meteoric rise in cities was a big part of what was driving people away? Or immigration – one of the most important forces contributing to growth in cities? And cities themselves will likely look different, as they begin to plan for the possibility of pandemics. Undoubtedly, one of the biggest questions for the future of cities is what becomes of low-wage workers, who are an essential part of urban populations, but often work in jobs impossible to do from home.

It is important to realise that cities, suburbs and rural areas can all be hit by Covid-19. Regardless of size or density, all places need to invest in the qualities that build residence. Strong regional economies built from local assets can creatively adapt to shifting demands. A flexible built environment that is green, walkable, and has low barriers to new and mixed land uses can reduce crowding and provide a platform for new businesses to launch and grow. And inclusive and civically organised neighbourhoods can communicate public health measures, promote compliance, manage fear and support vulnerable individuals and businesses. As Loh and Leinberger note, while fear of cities regarding pandemics may be misplaced, the solutions to such crises can have a place everywhere.12

The evidence to date points to much less transmission through casual contacts in outdoor spaces such as streets or parks.

REFERENCES

1 Schaper, O. 2020. “Defining the future of our cities: Five areas of opportunity for a post-pandemic world." Gensler, May 08, 2020. 2 Florida, R. 2020. “The geography of coronavirus.” Citylab, April 3, 2020. 3 Madden, D. “Our cities only serve the wealthy. Coronavirus could change that.” The Guardian, June 2, 2020. 4 Florida, R. 2020. “The geography of Coronavirus.” Citylab, April 3, 2020. 5 Pafka, E. 2020. “As coronavirus forces us to keep our distance, city density matters less than internal density.” The Conversation, May 14, 2020. 6 Osaka, S. 2020. “Does city living spread coronavirus? It’s complicated.” Grist, June 22, 2020. 7 Cohen, A. 2020. “Finding the right words: Smart density is city wellness.” Forbes, May 1, 2020. 8 Klaus, I. 2020. “Pandemics are also an urban planning problem.” Citylab, March 6, 2020. 9 Taveras, S. and Stevens, N. 2020.“Cities will endure, but urban design must adapt to coronavirus risks and fears.” 10 Flint, A. 2020. “Covid-19.” 11 Flint, A. 2020. “Covid-19.” 12 Loh, T. and Leinberger, C. 2020. “How fears of cities can blind us from solutions to Covid-19.”