Analysis of the local communities focused around improving the quality of urban space on the example of activities in public spaces and cultural activities in Bytom

Bytom is a polish, post-industrial city which is looking for a new vision of the future. City dwellers are between a history related to coal and new challenges. It is not easy for them to understand that industry is a thing of the past and you need to look for yourself and your identity again. Groups of social leaders are trying to show a different picture of the city and engage more and more people to act for the city. Building the city's identity and new image are basic ideas. However, in the era of global discussion about climate change and the technologization of city life, it becomes important to become aware of the role of greenery and community. In the article I want to show how Bytom social activists promote and animate the local community in the spirit of collectivism and improving the quality of life in the city. The assumption of the described groups was the maximum involvement of residents in activities to improve the space in Bytom. In the article I want to show what tools they used and what effects they obtained. Particularly important here are activities that contribute to making the community aware of the role of greenery and pedestrian space. The effects of social activities show more clearly how important are strong communities opposing local authorities and supporting good investment decisions. Analysis of the activities of social groups showed how important local leaders play and how various methods and tools used by them gave measurable effects in the city space. The bottom-up activity helped to understand the advantages of a pedestrian city, which is Bytom, and to show how little it takes for the city to gain a new image.

Hinterlands of Budget Air Travel. Investigating the Journey of Aviation Fuel

This paper investigates the oil infrastructures, as intersections of trans-territorial networks systems of power and their exchange with local practices: the journey of Jet A1 aviation fuel that facilitates thebudget air traveling in Berlin's airports, from crude oil extraction in Russia, distillation in Schwedt -Eastern Germany, to refueling off the aircraft by tanker truck sits source to its point of use. A case study focuses on the urbanism dynamics of Schwedt as an attempt to trace part of the planetary urbanism corresponding to Berlin's growing tourist industry's use of jet fuel. The first part of the research centers on oil landscapes' networks -the industrial footprint of oil: its transformation, storage, and transportation. Further provides a depiction of 'what constitutes aviation fuel and its production network' to view the actors involved in the process, the links between them, and the spatial implications. The second part addresses how aviation fuel has impacted Berlin and Brandenburg's hinterland: primarily, Schwedt, a shrinking city despite Berlin's recent boom, where the size of the traditional urban "city" form is diminutive in scale compared to the adjacent PCK oil refinery's "non-city" form of urbanization. The study's findings present new ways of interpreting and mapping the metabolic vehicles of planetary urbanization in both architectural and urban scales.

Spatial behaviour and healthy aging. A GPS-ased study of the older residents in Shanghai

The spatial behavior of elderlies is essentially the result of interactions between people and the environment. In order to explore a demand-responsive spatial intervention through new types of data from the perspective of urban planning, this study attempts to identify the differentiated trip features within the aged group, and proceed to gain a further understanding of their daily trip pattern, trip chain, and daytime activity sequence . 76 older residents from a typical public housing neighborhood in Shanghai were asked to carry an Android Phone for 102 consecutive days. By collecting and analyzing the trajectory data, we found that even in a highly consistent social and physical environment, there are still significant differences among the elderlies’ daily activities, mainly existing in the age and gender aspects. The research indicates that elderlies’ daily trip patterns are related to the starting point, effective interval, travel time, and the physical conditions of the individuals.

Waterfront yrban regeneration in post-industrial Shanghai: plublicness and policy suggestions for making more inclusive public spaces

Waterfront areas in the city were occupied by industrial factories and freight ports in industrial age because of their convenience for transporting materials and resources by waterway. In the post-industrial era, as the role of the city gradually shifts from the ‘production centre’ to ‘consumption centre’, redeveloping waterfront industrial areas has become a global trend. In China, the city of Shanghai begins to redevelop its waterfront industrial areas since 2002. A main goal of the redevelopment in Shanghai is to ‘return the river to the public’, namely to open up the enclosed industrial compounds and transform industrial sites in the waterfront areas to public spaces. Focusing on the waterfront redevelopment and regeneration in Shanghai, this paper quantitatively assesses the publicness and quality of the newly created public spaces in three selected waterfront areas in the city. Drawing on the results of the empirical assessments, the paper argues that Shanghai has not achieved its goal of returning the river to the public yet. In response, the paper proposes some suggestions for policy-making aiming at improving the publicness and inclusiveness of public spaces in post-industrial redevelopment areas in Shanghai and other cities in the global south.

Which urban development for Algiers far from oil dependency? Towards TOD solution

This paper is questioning which kind of urban development is adequate for Algiers far from oil dependency and basing on what was achieved since the approval of its Masterplan in December 2016 and regarding to the potentialities and opportunities already set in the territory. The very principle of development in the territorial model already outlined a solution oriented towards the reorganization of traffic according to a principle of macro-mesh transport network structuring a new poly-centrality. At the nodes of this network, the place of these centralities, exchange hubs have been programmed. Thus, all the conditions are met so that in a second step, in terms of details, the city of Algiers can opt for a Transit-Oriented Development TOD that makes Algiers an attractive and competitive territory. By an analysis of the contents of the policy orientations of the PDAU (masterplan) of Algiers1 , a participative observation of the actions carried out by the city of Algiers, one will identify the goals already achieved for the development strategy plan. One will also show that the TOD solution is the easiest if not the only one and that all the legal and strategic conditions are met to facilitate the transition to detailed development plans.

Research on geo-ecological restoration of mountain towns upon the influence of earthquake disaster. A case study of 4.20 Lushan Earthquake

Earthquakes have a great destructive effect on the geo-ecological environment of mountain towns, and the restoration of the geo-ecological environment after the disaster is of great significance to the sustainable development of mountain towns. This paper applies the improved ecological footprint method to build a geo-ecological restoration footprint evaluation model from the aspects of factors affecting the geological ecology. Moreover, Comprehensive evaluation of geo-ecology were selected to analyse the dynamic change process of geological ecology before and after the Lushan earthquake in 2010-2017. The results show that earthquake disasters have a long-term and dual impact on the geo-ecological environment of mountainous towns. Earthquake disasters can change the geo-ecological footprint by reducing the output of ecological products, changing the population composition, diet structure and even the fuel ratio, thereby affecting the geo-ecological restoration process for a long time. On the one hand, the effect of sustainable restoration of the ecology after the disaster in Lushan County has achieved initial results, the geo-ecological deficit has been reduced by more than 43%. But on the other hand, the comprehensive evaluation of ecological restoration in Lushan County is in an unsustainable state and the geo-ecological environment is facing tremendous pressure. Based on this, this article considers the degree of geoecological restoration in Lushan County, and proposes a countermeasure for future geological and ecological restoration in Lushan County.

Design public spaces to enable all 0-5 year children flourish

The Public Spaces of Tomorrow are places that enable young children 0-5 to flourish. Contemporary places support healthy child development. The early years are the foundation for lifelong physical and mental health, wellbeing, and social skills. Designing, planning, and building new public spaces for our babies and toddlers should take into consideration the wellbeing of their caregivers. Engage parents, grandparents, siblings, or pregnant women in the design process provides for the ability to create new types of public spaces. Knowledge of how to do it for wellbeing in specific circumstances, places, social or natural environment is the purpose of the work (for ex. the Covid-19 pandemic is still unfolding but the principle of healthy development or caregiver isn`t changing). Responsibility of local authorities, urban planners, architects, park managers, all people engaged in city planning and functioning, have their role to play. During the collaborative workshop Mentor and Student Research Lab 3 in Poland (Gdańsk University of Technology) numerous investigation and methods were tried to answer research questions on how to resolve problems of designing public spaces of tomorrow.

Application research of the Chinese traditional ecological wisdom

In the transition period of China's urbanization rate reached 60%, the excessive stage from the traditional industrial civilization to ecological civilization is the inevitable choice. In the transition period, we cannot only absorb the western development experiences of eco-city, but also should combine China's traditional ecological wisdom from the agricultural civilization during thousands of years. In this paper, the author analyses the concept and origin of traditional ecological wisdom, the related research status and development trend at home and abroad. Collect and select the technique or technology which is full of ecological value or representative, the ecological engineering which is time tested or benefited by ten thousand generations in certain region of China, establish a case base of the Chinese traditional ecological wisdom. On this basis, research the ecological concept, principles, strategies and methods of these cases. Construct a set of system principle to concise wisdom and draw the outline of urban soul. Finally, combining with China's environmental problems since the industrialization and the various problems encountered in the process of ecological city construction, to explore how to use the ecological wisdom spectrum guiding the sustainable studies, planning, design and management of the contemporary urban. Through the study of this article, it has the theory significance by constructing the principle of traditional ecological wisdom. It has the cultural meaning by inheritancing the traditional culture essence. It also has the practical significance by discovering the power source of the eco-city construction in the future.

What is the quality of a city? Ways of thinking spaces that change

Understanding the effects of a metropolis' changes in scale - the rate of growth and its speed - rather than pursuing the search for optimal city size, is mandatory. The New Urban Agenda discussed performance dimensions of the contemporary city’s functioning mode, knowing that place quality derives from a mutual effect with the society that uses it. However, our research focuses on how city performance dimensions can be measured to establish the values of the metropolitan form that are capable of endowing metropolitan projects with meaning. The Metropolitan Paradigm of inter-scalar connection and the Metropolitan Architecture Project Hybrid Typology are the references to measure the metropolis’ performance. The Metropolitan Paradigm concerns the five city dimensions: physical, economic, energetic, social and governance. In particular, the aim of the paper is to study the physical metropolitan framework and its impact on the lives of metropolitan inhabitants, socio-economic flows and the meaning of the concept of "environment" today. The city is still analysed as a spatial phenomenon represented by data/quantities related to space. Nevertheless, the value of form plays a fundamental role within the Metropolitan Discipline at all scales, as spatial relationships within metropolitan settlements are increasingly not metric but relational. In conclusion, we study the connection between history and geography, environmental issues, the Metropolitan Structural Paradigm, and the new Public Realm heterogeneous elements to represent the metropolitan quality and living-related values that constitute the Metropolitan Democracy’s opportunity.

Contribution of planed urban green spaces for promoting human health. Case of Chandigarh, India

Goal 11 of the Sustainable Development Goals has the seventh target of its Sustainable Cities and Communities focused on providing access to safe and inclusive green and public spaces. Principles of sustainable development necessitate that a balance is struck between environment and development to ensure healthy urban living. It has long been established that the presence of natural areas and planned open green spaces in and around urban settlements contributes to a quality of life by providing important ecological, social and psychological benefits to humans. In India, rapid urbanisation is resulting in significant land being used for developmental activities resulting in decline in open spaces across cities. It needs to be noted, the case in Chandigarh, India is different from rest of the country, where open spaces are considered as inviolable land use. Being a rare exception amongst the cities established immediately after India’s Independence, urban greens were visualized and planned as an integral component in the city’s Master Plan. Le Corbusier conceived the master plan of Chandigarh as analogous to human body, where green spaces symbolized the lungs. The greens in Chandigarh were created as functional, organized and natural spaces for integration and convergence of mind and body, that is the city as well as of its population. The research delves into the aspect of inclusivity of its various green spaces based on the social survey of the city’s residents. The intent is to determine the usability and accessibility of the greens by the residents for various recreational, cultural and ecosystem services. The measures of inclusivity of the green spaces are defined to address the key question being researched upon, that is if green spaces have contributed to Chandigarh being a healthy city. Built upon the social survey tools, the authors discern the typologies of green spaces as the measure for building a healthy city contextualized for Chandigarh.