scholarly journals Post-Pandemic City: Historical Context for New Urban Design

Author(s):  
Veaceslav MIR

Cities have been almost completely unprepared for the COVID-19 pandemic. Urban history has known many epidemics and pandemics, and there are clear historical parallels between the 13th and 19th century plague pandemics and cholera epidemics and the 21th century COVID-19 pandemic, from an administrative point of view. However, the cities’ public administration did not take into account the experience of the cities of the past to be prepared for the future problems. This requires developing flexible pandemic strategies and focusing on the decentralization of urban space through an even distribution of population in the urban environment. The COVID-19 pandemic will change the city, as previous pandemics and epidemics did. Urbanism v.3.0. will emerge, combining a green vector of development and digital technologies to ensure the autonomy and sustainability of buildings, districts and cities. At the same time, the role of culture will increase, which will become an effective tool for consolidating the soft power of the city in order to attract new people as the opposition of nowadays trend for living in the countryside.

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 98-103
Author(s):  
Z.Kh. Sergeeva ◽  

The modern urban space is overflowing with a variety of texts. From a sociological point of view, the opportunity to read and interpret urban texts is becoming very promising. Try to answer the question about the intentions of the authors of the texts, about the languages that the city text uses and what the city text can tell about us, about our time and the environment in which we live. In this article, the author considers sgraffito as one of the forms of manifestation of the urban text. As a specific case for a detailed analysis, a sgraffito with a double name «Soviet Tataria» or «Kazan – the capital of Tataria» was chosen. This choice seems to be interesting and relevant for several reasons. First, this sgraffito was created in 1967, during the «post-thaw» period – the interval between the second thaw of the early 1960-s and the stagnation of the 1970-s. Secondly, in the 1970s-1980-s it played the role of a significant symbol representing the Soviet image of the city of Kazan and the Republic of Tatarstan as a whole. Third, at the beginning of 2000-s, in the era of dismantling and rethinking the Soviet past, a discussion arose about the fate of Soviet monumental painting in a new historical context. Sgraffito «Soviet Tataria» was preserved and restored, but received a new name «Kazan – the capital of Tataria». At present, there is a gradual ousting of the texts of the Soviet era from urban discourse spaces. In Kazan, Soviet urban texts are being replaced by texts focused on traditional values, ethno-national and ethnoreligious content, as well as a variety of texts that are usually defined as street art, graffiti, etc. The state's monopoly on control and authorship in the creation of urban texts has been called into question.


Author(s):  
G. Z. Sultangazy ◽  

The formation and development of the intelligence as a political and creative force could not exist without the influence of the urban environment. The integration of Kazakh intellectuals into the urban space has led to qualitative changes in such aspects as city, intelligence, and its behavioral patterns. The study of the factors of influence of urban space on the development of social groups and institutions, namely on the qualitative characteristics of the national intelligentsia, the processes of their adaptation to the urban environment is an important task of the humanities, including the historical one. Modern Kazakhstani historiography is in the paradigm of assimilating the results of European and Russian urban history. This article will highlight the historiographic situation in this direction from the point of view of the development of urban issues. The article attempts to analyze the phenomenon the mutual influence of the city and the Kazakh intelligentsia at the turn of the XIX-XX centuries by the principles of historiographic generalization. The city, being a multifunctional space where ideas and innovations are generated, changes not only the landscape, but also the world perception in general. The activities of the national intelligentsia are associated not only with creativity, but primarily with public activity, and determined the development of Kazakhstan in conceptual framework. Today, Kazakhstani historiography is represented by separate studies on the history of the city, intelligentsia, Cossacks, and merchants. At the same time, there are not enough research papers that would consider the population of Kazakhstan and the city as a single complex body, which is in permanent interaction and mutual influence, focusing on the history of everyday life. One of the methods of this study was the historical and genetic one, which allows us to consider the problems in its development and identify patterns. The use of the historicalcomparative method revealed differences in the development of Kazakhstani historiography. A comprehensive study of the urban environment in the historical context allows us to understand the nature of the changes in which society and the state existed, as well as the motives and aspirations of Kazakh intellectuals. One of the results was the identification of common patterns of Soviet and Kazakh historiography, where the city and the intelligentsia are the objects of research and are not considered in close connection and mutual influence. The designated problems did not receive due attention from researchers of both the Soviet and modern periods.


Author(s):  
Andrea Oldani

One of the most predictable implications of photography consists of the ability to fix some images returning them in a variable timeframe for the observation. In all the major world cities, it is common to incur in some book where recent photos are compared to old ones searching the same point of view in order to make the comparison more accurate and stimulate the critical ability of the observer. An exercise that sometimes stimulates a sort of regret for the past, pointing out a diffused excess of nostalgia for times gone by. Nevertheless, the reality and meaning of modern city images are not always so prosaic. What happens when photographs are evocative of a reality that is completely lost in the collective imaginary even though it still exists and functions, despite being forgotten and buried in the depths of the city? This is the case of very few pictures capable of telling the story of a city, Milan, and its only “real” river, the Olona, whose waters, humiliated and rejected, continue to flow in total amnesia. It is a different story when photography does not have the role of nourishing nostalgia, but the power to make visible and explain the variation of a presence and its progressive obliteration. Some pictures testify to the passage from the bucolic amenity of the river and its banks in a pre-urban context to a muscular urban infrastructure. A rigid channelized river, shown with confidence, is trying to keep its presence, until the moment of its inevitable decline and disappearance. It is in these images that the possibility of reconsidering the Olona as a part of the new project for the city lies.


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Carolien Fornasari ◽  
Aurora Rapisarda

Abstract. Within the context of postmodern tourism, the importance of preserving and enhancing environmental and cultural assets of destinations is increasingly being recognised as one of the keys to sustainable long-term development of territories. The paper focuses on the complex diachronic relationship between the town of Trento, in the Trentino- Alto Adige region, and its watercourses, and, in particular, on its connection with the Fersina stream. The aim is to raise locals’ and visitors’ awareness of a largely forgotten urban water landscape, and to implement the town’s existing cultural and environmental tourist offer. This is achieved through the revival of collective memory of the fundamental role of water for the development of Trento and through the requalification of the stream and its network of canals, which once brought water to different parts of the city-centre. For such purpose, the validity of cartography and other geo-historical sources has been acknowledged; maps are particularly useful sources for retracing territorialisation processes, and rediscovering past territorialities and related landscapes. Accordingly, we have carried out a geo-historical analysis of cartographic representations of the town, shedding light on the past widespread presence of water within urban space and making some proposals for the enhancement and communication of such heritage.


2020 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 331-353
Author(s):  
Fabiano Rocha Diniz ◽  
Luiz Vieira Filho ◽  
Roberto Montezuma

Recife is an amphibious city whose urban development does not value its rivers. In the past, the city’s main watercourse, the river Capibaribe, was understood to play a key role in structuring urban spaces and providing connectivity. Since then, this understanding has dwindled, and the resulting situation is a cause of great concern. Recife City has turned its back on the banks of its rivers and neglected both their capacity to smooth and shape urban space, and their potential to create a coherent image of the city. Recife is one of those cities in the world that are most vulnerable to climate change, ranking 16th in the list of world hotspots. In order to confront these challenges and rethink the role of the river that runs in the heart of Recife, researchers, architects, engineers, and sociologists from Research and Innovation for Cities — Universidade Federal de Pernambuco (INCITI-UFPE) were invited by the Recife City Hall to draw up plans for a park stretching along the river’s banks. Capibaribe Park Project attempts to answer one key question: How can we use the river to transform the city? The park project is based on a structural approach to landscape and is guided by the precepts of sustainability and regeneration of public spaces, in line with the emerging paradigm that combines a cross-disciplinary and cross-sector approach with water-sensitive design and social participation. The present article presents an overview of the main characteristics and development of this project, its theoretical and methodological underpinnings, its contribution to society, and the results achieved so far. It shows how, in addition to the planned park, the project also envisages the installation of a much more extensive system of parks, as a first stage towards the creation of park-city by the 500th anniversary of the foundation of Recife, in 2037.


Terra ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 132 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-30
Author(s):  
Silja Elina Laine ◽  
Ranja Hautamäki

Shifting Landscapes of Monuments – Mannerheim Statues in Tampere, Seinäjoki, Mikkeli, Lahti and Helsinki The article sets out to look at the statues of C. G. E. Mannerheim (1857–1951) in the cities of Helsinki, Tampere, Seinäjoki, Mikkeli and Lahti. It focuses on the landscapes of the statues and the dialogical relation between the statues and their surroundings. In all cities considered, either the statues have been moved from their original place or moving has been proposed. Statues have often been studied from a point of view of the politics of history and memory. While recognizing this, we propose that urban design has an important role in modifying the ways that statues relate to public space. Statues are not only artefacts that exist in urban space, but they also produce public urban space and hierarchy. Therefore, the article focuses on the role of urban planning and design in producing and cherishing military heritage.


2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 109-120
Author(s):  
Cecília Avelino Barbosa

Place branding is a network of associations in the consumer’s mind, based on the visual, verbal, and behavioral expression of a place. Food can be an important tool to summarize it as it is part of the culture of a city and its symbolic capital. Food is imaginary, a ritual and a social construction. This paper aims to explore a ritual that has turned into one of the brands of Lisbon in the past few years. The fresh sardines barbecued out of doors, during Saint Anthony’s festival, has become a symbol that can be found on t-shirts, magnets and all kinds of souvenirs. Over the year, tourists can buy sardine shaped objects in very cheap stores to luxurious shops. There is even a whole boutique dedicated to the fish: “The Fantastic World of Portuguese Sardines” and an annual competition promoted by the city council to choose the five most emblematic designs of sardines. In order to analyze the Sardine phenomenon from a city branding point of view, the objective of this paper is to comprehend what associations are made by foreigners when they are outside of Lisbon. As a methodological procedure five design sardines, were used of last year to questioning to which city they relate them in interviews carried in Madrid, Lyon, Rome and London. Upon completion of the analysis, the results of the city branding strategy adopted by the city council to promote the sardines as the official symbol of Lisbon is seen as a Folkmarketing action. The effects are positive, but still quite local. On the other hand, significant participation of the Lisbon´s dwellers in the Sardine Contest was observed, which seems to be a good way to promote the city identity and pride in their best ambassador: the citizens.


Author(s):  
Ramnik Kaur

E-governance is a paradigm shift over the traditional approaches in Public Administration which means rendering of government services and information to the public by using electronic means. In the past decades, service quality and responsiveness of the government towards the citizens were least important but with the approach of E-Government the government activities are now well dealt. This paper withdraws experiences from various studies from different countries and projects facing similar challenges which need to be consigned for the successful implementation of e-governance projects. Developing countries like India face poverty and illiteracy as a major obstacle in any form of development which makes it difficult for its government to provide e-services to its people conveniently and fast. It also suggests few suggestions to cope up with the challenges faced while implementing e-projects in India.


2015 ◽  
Vol 795 ◽  
pp. 24-30
Author(s):  
Andrzej Chluski ◽  
Dorota Jelonek ◽  
Cezary Stępniak ◽  
Tomasz Turek ◽  
Leszek Ziora

In the contemporary economy the more and more greater role is played by state and local government institutions. Offices of public administration not only create law, but more and more often become initiators of the different type of investments undertaken on the ground of their jurisdiction. Often neighbouring administrative units begin to compete between themselves in gaining of investments and resources for the purpose of its own development. In the functionality of mentioned offices the greater role is performed by IT systems building the architecture of a given unit, clearly expressed among other things in the idea of intelligent city. Applied by offices of public administration IT systems are more often opened for suppliants creating e-government tools [1]. In this paper was presented the role of e-government tools in the business activation of the region on the basis of IT systems made available by Czestochowa Municipal Office. The review of potential directions of the e-government tools usage in different areas of social-economic life of the city will be presented


2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 352-364
Author(s):  
Natalia G. Fedotova

The article is devoted to the discourse of the city’s cultural memory. The relevance of studying this topic is determined not only by the fundamental aspect associated with the episodicity of existing studies of this phenomenon. From an applied point of view, the city’s cultural memory is a symbolic resource that can be used to create an appealing image, form a sustainable urban identity, and strengthen the citizen’s sense of belonging to the city. The accumulation and objectification of cultural memory take place in symbolic forms, which makes it important to study the practices of symbolizing the urban past, the essence of which is to generate the significance of the relevant or latent layers of cultural memory for the citizens.The article presents the results of the final stage of research related to the study of the process of constructing the cultural memory of the city. The purpose of the article is to analyze modern practices of symbolizing fragments of the urban past, which mean their significance for contemporaries. Basing on the culturological cross-section of the issue, the author integrates different research contexts. The methodological basis of the article is the communicative approach that focuses on the processes of meaning formation, and the constructivist method that considers memory as a multi-layered and dynamic construct. Analyzing the practices of symbolizing the urban past by the example of Russian cities, the author of the article demonstrates how the episodes of the city’s memory are updated in the modern world, how cultural meanings become memorable for citizens. The author uses the results of previous studies and identifies the following elements of the symbolization of the urban past: a) ways of encoding fragments of the past; b) communicative trajectories of memory symbolization; c) factors of producing meanings about the collective past of the city. The obtained results open up new frontiers in understanding the processes of formation of the collective ideas about the city, and prospects for empirical research, forecasting and constructing the cultural memory of Russian cities, giving them the opportunity to change their present and future.


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