PUBLIC SPACES - PEOPLE'S PLACES
BY
: MEETALI GUPTA
UNIVERSITY
: GURU GOBIND SINGH INDRAPRASTHA UNIVERSITY
ADDRESS
: GGSIPU, SECTOR 16, DWARKA, NEW DELHI 110078
ABSTRACT A public space is a city's activity zone. It is a space that is free most of the times and available for the community for using and enjoying irrespective of their social, cultural and economic background. It is not only a breathing space but a platform to exchange ideas, communicate and interact. The so called modern cities have not evolved in a way to respect the prevailing social environment and deal with problems like cleanliness, encroachments and democratic quality of a space. "Urban public spaces" thus seem to be in a state of "loss". Due to the social, economic and cultural diversity in India, it becomes important to look at the public realm. The real challenge though is not to create these spaces but to carve out efficient public places.This paper is an attempt to discover the parameters which would contribute in a better analysis of urban public spaces in India and highlight the role of scale, placemaking and context in making a public space efficient, when viewed from the lens of different groups of people. The parameters discovered were applied to public spaces like Connaught Place, Hauz Khauz village, Janpath (Delhi) and Times Square (New York) to understand placemaking and gentrification in such spaces. Key words - Urban Public spaces, public realm, public places, placemaking, context, gentrification
INTRODUCTION A public space helps us to define the Era we are in; to represent the interest of our generation and to add value to the existing urban fabric. The traditional Indian cities are an example of streets and chowks (public squares) forming the built mass (structure) whereas the so called, modern cities focus only on the built structure. The fact that in today's time when talking about modern cities we talk about recreational, breathing spaces separately, points towards seclusion of such spaces and their functions, in contrast to the traditional cities whose fabric itself would create them. In a developing country like India, understanding the factors leading to the efficiency of such spaces is thus a physical and psychological need as it would help people to demand better spaces, instilling in them a sense of respect and belongingness for the city.
TYPES OF PUBLIC SPACES Public spaces can be natural or planned. The realisation of the need to plan public spaces felt by the Greeks , who believed in arĂŞte i.e. human achievement , is seen in Parthenon ; the planned semi-open public space that portrays physical greatness and attention to detail towards scale , proportions and open-built ratio of public gathering spaces. Romans on the other hand contributed towards enhancing the importance of built public spaces to gather a large number of people through the introduction of Roman vault construction. Open planned public spaces held equal importance with most of the activities taking place outdoors resulting in the formation of the Agora or the market place which was later seen in the design of contemporary cities like Jaipur where the streets and markets (commercial spaces) would open up in the chaupar - the central gathering public space.
PUBLIC SPACE QUALITY (neglected non-physical aspects) There are many neglected dimensions which contribute towards the quality of a public space today. Cleanliness in a public space is one of the most important parameter which ideally may not have anything to do with the socio-economic class or status of a person. As observed, the area around the bins also gets littered leading to unhygienic environment which could be the reason to have no bins inside metro stations. In Connaught Place, the central business district of Delhi, the block edges and areas around bins along with the middle circle seem to be under unhygienic conditions. In India, encroachments are yet another problem which hampers the quality of a public space. With the coming up of the street vendors act of 2012, vendors are not allowed to make noise to grab public's attention, not given electricity and water connection as well as a permit to cook. (Times of India, Oct5, 2015).The street vendor's act has limited its scope as being an agent of generating employment only. Why couldn't it go beyond and make use of the vendors and hawkers in enhancing the public space's quality? It isn't only these vendors who encroach the public spaces but also people who own shops who try to extend their temporary structures onto the road or foot path hampering the pedestrian movement. Aren't the rights of each citizen violated when the public footpath, road or pedestrian alley is encroached? Where does their right to equal access on the public area stand in such a scenario?
FROM LEFT TO RIGHT-RAJENDRA PLACE , (IMG1, IMG2) THE PRIVATE PARKING ENCROACHES THE PEDESTRIAN WAY AND THE FOOTPATH THUS MERGES WITH THE PRIVATE USE. BELOW THE METRO STATION THE FOOTPATH IS ENCROACHED BY HAWKERS AND VENDORS FORCING PEDESTRIANS TO WALK ON THE MAIN VEHICULAR ROAD.
The kind of commerce and activities in a public space will also help in determining its quality. The market itself has added the recreation factor to the public space in India. Hauz Khauz village, a street celebrating life with artistic touch in- residences converted to studios and boutiques, acted as a magnet to attract food joints and cafes. The multifunctional dimension, by increasing the active period of the space, makes it more secure; an issue felt in many public spaces especially during certain times of the day. Connaught Place, having a functional multiplicity remains active most of the time. It maybe affordability which may restrict people from different economic strata to access all the spaces. As in the case of Hauz Khauz village, the psychological accessibility of low income group seems to be less and the vendors along with the open green monument area help in breaking the wall of gentrification to a certain extent. Not everyone may relate to every part of Connaught Place but most Indians do relate to Janpath (a commercial district of CP). In this case, the encroachments and vendors offer a sense of belongingness to the area which reduces again towards the Tibetian market. The highline project in New York is another example of gentrification, where with the development of the highline as a public space, the low income group was forced to leave the vicinity that was taken over by market driven functions.
A public space which doesn't cater to the needs of the people but rather puts forward more barriers like gating, ticketing, restriction on vendor entry etc ,makes one question the democratic quality of the space and
furthermore the society's psychological development. At the same time public spaces do provide opportunities to gather protest or start environment friendly drives. For example -a car free day and Rahigiri in Connaught place, a yoga day in Times Square. People seem to have turned a blind eye towards all of the above factors. The question though is- is it only the designers who can create good quality public spaces? Are the parameters existing today to term a public space "efficient", sufficient and replicable in our diverse cultural and social geography? DESIGNER'S LENS (physical aspects) Some of the physical or the designing parameters of the public spaces have been provided by various architects and planners. Kevin Lynch, in his book, Image of The City tries to capture the aspects of designing which will help one to form a clear image of the city. His design aspects to increase legibility include the presence of - nodes, paths, edges, landmarks and districts at the city level. All of which increase the mental imaging of an area. Responsive Environments (Ian Bently, Alan Alcock, Paul Murrain, Sue Mcglynn, and Graham Smith) is a step ahead towards the designing and planning aspects of public spaces. It talks about permeability, variety, richness, robustness, visual appropriateness and personalisation of the space. The radial plan of CP, may offer numerous approach options through public and private conveyance but the similarity in facade decreases its readability. Being visually and physically permeable, the lack of landmarks seems to be a problem. Though, Janpath on the other hand, due to undefined entrances to spaces, has less visual permeability leading to zones left unexplored by the locals. Thus, greater is the visual permeability, more will be the physical permeability of the area. More the legibility more will be the permeability of the space.
SIMILARITY IN FACADES IN CONNAUGHT PLACE (IMG3)
Robustness in design and variety, along with multifunctionality increases the popularity of the space. CP shows structural robustness with residences converted to cafes, whereas Janpath provides spatial robustness where squat vendors personalise the space and people use curbs as seaters. Similar looking buildings reduce variety in form in CP. The restriction to height along with visual appearance reduces the degree of space personalisation, minimising visual richness which can then be seen only at the micro level like Janpath. Therefore, Personalisation of space adds to the visual and physical variety as well as richness to the space at both scales.
PERSONALISATION OF SPACE BY HAWKERS IN JANPATH (IMG4) William Whyte, in his book, Social Life of Small Urban Spaces, analyses the interaction aspect of the design. Looking into the designing of various plazas and parks, Whyte puts forward five main influences which make these urban public spaces active by attracting maximum number of people. These influences being shade provided by trees , availability of food , sitting space and street furniture designing , corners and edges as the most occupied zones, water, fountains attracting people and people attracting people. All of these factors point towards the concept of placemaking. For different people, different aspects make a space, a place. For a person employed in the studios, the Hauz Khauz monument area is a recreation zone while for a visitor it is a high end commercial recreational hub. A regular street transformed into a high end commercial public space, the case of Hauz Khauz village is an example of placemaking, which as a concept is also offered by PPS (Projects For Public Spaces); an initiative to look into the needs of the public realm and realise the potential of unused spaces in order to convert them into usable public places. Like in the city of Milwaukee which now uses the two acre previously unused surface parking land as a gathering space for residents, to conduct performances (opportunity to display culture) and enjoy food by local vendors. (Economic opportunity).In this case too elements like street furniture highlighted by Whyte played a vital role. Another successful intervention of PPS has been in Times Square, New York. Sustainable approach of LED lighted ball, signages and boards on New Year's Eve, the mass yoga event (mind over madness) and the effort to increase the pedestrian area of Broadway streets. All depict the potential and importance of a public space for its city.
TIMES SQUARE AT NEW YEAR'S EVE ALONG WITH THE LED BALL INTRODUCED IN 2008 (IMG5)
A MASS YOGA EVENT AT TIMES SQUARE (IMG6)
BROADWAY STREET - BEFORE AFTER. (http://www.pps.org/projects/timessquare/) (IMG7) These studies offer us with a layer in terms of designing. Though, the question still stands - Are these parameters applicable to every urban planned public space? How can one guarantee that these would enhance the quality of the space if taken into account by designers while designing?
CONCLUSION Not all factors may exist in all urban public spaces but this doesn't make a public space less efficient. What is important is the scale at which the factors exist. Connaught Place may have most of the parameters present, but Janpath on the other hand, being a small scale public space, caters to a specific purpose and is successful in its own way. While variety plays a major role in making Connaught Place what it is today, Janpath gets its character not by variety but affordability offered by the commerce developing in the zone, though having a singular function. Times Square depicts the beliefs of its people as Connaught Place does for Delhi. It is an example of an urban public space which has transformed itself with time as has Connaught Place. Though, due to the huge socio-economic diversity in the Indian context, the sense of belongingness which every Indian feels with CP may vanish if the vendors, hawkers and markets like janpath are removed from the picture. This holds no importance in the context carried by Times Square. Hauz Khauz village on the other hand talks about gentrification and psychological accessibility of an urban public space. This artistic commercial hub of Delhi attracts people of a certain socio-economic background. Still when looked as a public space, it is efficient for what it stands. Thus, though all of the above mentioned urban public spaces have similarities and are popular in their own way but their differences from each other impart a unique character to them and the parameters of such differences and similarities can therefore not be generalised.
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ALL IMAGES AND FIGURE CREDITS FOR THE PRIMARY CASE STUDY ( C.P) - SRITOMA BHATTACHARYA AND MUKUL GUPTA OF BATCH 2012-2017 WHILE FOR JANPATH DIVYA JHANJEE AND DIVYA OF BATCH 2012-2017
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