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Two perspectives on public spaces

Jan Gehl & Anne Matan

To cite this article: Jan Gehl & Anne Matan (2009) Two perspectives on public spaces, , 37:1,
106-109, DOI: 10.1080/09613210802519293

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BUILDING RESEARCH & INFORMATION (2009) 37(1), 106– 109

Two perspectives on public spaces

Jan Gehl and Anne Matan

Designs on the Public: The Private Lives of New York’s Public Spaces
Kristine F. Miller
University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN, US, 2007; ISBN 978 0816649105

Convivial Urban Spaces: Creating Effective Public Places

Henry Shaftoe
Earthscan, London, UK, 2008; ISBN 978 1844073887

There has been much debate about definitions of public books concerned with public space. Designs on the
space – whether it is public or private, inside or Public (2007) by Kristine Miller is concerned with defi-
outside, restrictive or free, democratic and inclusive, nitions of public spaces and spheres, and expanding the
or otherwise. The everyday use of public space scope of the discourse on these spaces. Designs on the
has been changing – from necessary uses to optional, Public discusses, through six case studies, pivotal
recreational uses. This changing role increases the moments in New York City’s public spaces, three of
need for appropriate, well-designed places in which which are interior privately owned public spaces.
people choose to spend time, and that provide a Miller approaches the discussion with a unique
place for people to relax, socialize and be part of perspective, combining landscape architecture and
urban life. sociology, seeking to show how the politics and
the design of spaces are intertwined. Convivial
This challenge and debate about present-day public Urban Spaces (2008) by Henry Shaftoe is concerned
space and public life is clearly illustrated through two with providing appropriate urban public spaces and
Building Research & Information ISSN 0961-3218 print ⁄ISSN 1466-4321 online
http: ⁄ ⁄www.tandf.co.uk ⁄journals
DOI: 10.1080/09613210802519293

emphasizes the design and use of current public spaces.
Shaftoe’s discussion of convivial space characteristics
and considerations is complemented by carefully illus-
trated examples, from Europe and elsewhere, showing
not only the design, but also the psychology of the
spaces.
The definitions used by the authors have considerable
differences and cause one to question whether what
one author considers public space would be considered
so by the other author. This difference could be caused
by the authors’ approach, academic traditions or could
be a question of where you draw the line – is it inside,
outside, public, private, the legal definition, or the
feeling or perception of the space? The approaches
taken by the authors differ considerably with Shaftoe,
through Convivial Urban Spaces, providing practical
place-making insight about different facets of public
spaces which would impact on their use, and with
Miller, through Designs on the Public, approaching
the subject not only from an aesthetic perspective,
but also from a social justice perspective. While the
authors’ works are firmly embedded in their different
academic traditions – Miller within Landscape Archi-
tecture and Humanities and Shaftoe within Urban
Planning, Architecture and Urban Design – the works
are united through their multidisciplinary approach to
examining the perceptions of places. Both authors
reference environmental psychology and sociology. In
addition, the authors are united through their advocacy
for the creation of democratic, inclusive public spaces.
Miller’s Designs on the Public is concerned with how
the current definition and perception of public space
within the design fields is as publicly owned, open,
democratic and accessible spaces, and how this defi-
nition does not necessarily have a basis in reality. She
defines public space as a ‘kind of hybrid of physical
spaces and public spheres’ and bases her definition ‘on
the assumption that physical space is important to
democratic public life’ (p. xvi). Her primary goal is to
widen the public space discourse to include the history
and politics of spaces. The author follows feminist
political thinker Nancy Fraser’s idea that there is no
‘public’, rather there are ‘multiple publics’ and therefore
‘multiple public spheres’, referencing Fraser (1992).
The public spaces examined in Designs on the Public
include three exterior places (the steps of City Hall,
Times Square, and Federal Plaza) and three interior pri-
vately owned public spaces (the Atrium at Trump
Tower, the former IBM Atrium, and Sony Plaza). Each
chapter is devoted to one of these spaces and discusses
a pivotal and controversial moment in the place’s
history, creation or design. Miller states that the:
Stories [of the places] show that public space is
not a concrete reality but rather a tenuous con-
dition. What we believe are its essential and
Review
enduring qualities – openness and accessibility,
public ownership, and ties to democratic life –
are at best temporary conditions, and more
often are completely absent.
(p. x)
Miller does not concentrate primarily on the everyday
use of the spaces; rather, she is concerned with how the
perception of the space might impact their use, and
highlights that designers and planners often ignore
the social, political and historic natures of the places
for which they are designing.
Miller’s primary concern in her discussion is emphasiz-
ing the importance of consideration of the historical,
political and social context of places as she states that
the ‘realities’ of spaces are ‘much more complicated’
than a ‘seemingly straightforward term such as public
space’ would suggest (p. x). Miller questions why
urban designers, urban planners and architects’ ‘com-
monsense’ definitions and ideas about public spaces
are ‘so far from reality’ (p. xi) concluding that a key
reason is probably a ‘preoccupation with the enduring
physical qualities of public spaces’ and that:
By focusing on the physical and the concrete, we
often ignore the nonphysical qualities – legal,
economic, political, aesthetic – all of which
affect a public space. Public spaces do not exist
as static physical entities but are constellations
of ideas, actions, and environments.
(p. xi)
Miller is asking urban designers, urban planners and
architects to broaden their professional biases and
scope of thought on how they think about spaces to
include not just what we can see, but those invisible
processes which impact the space:
Public space, if it is going to play a role in demo-
cratic life, must be a hybrid of actual physical
places and active public spheres. To tie public
spaces to public spheres we must investigate the
constantly changing intersections of physical
places, the laws and regulations that govern
them, the people who claim them through their
use or demands, and the government officials to
answer these demands.
(p. xi)
Designs on the Public raises questions about the
‘ownership’ of public spaces, and how design and aes-
thetics shape the use of a space. The author states that:
even if we do acknowledge a role for public space
beyond relaxation and recreation, it is difficult to
trace the ways in which public spaces relate to
immaterial concepts like democracy.
(p. xiv)
107
Review
Miller does not provide her own definition of
democracy, or what would constitute a democratic
space, rather encourages and inspires the questioning
of spaces beyond design.
In contrast, Shaftoe’s Convivial Urban Spaces is
primary concerned with the use of spaces. This
book’s concentration is on ‘small-scale open spaces in
towns’ (p. 11) and his definition and approach is
based on the desire to enable designers, planners and
politicians to create appropriate and convivial public
places. His chief concern is the use of the spaces, and
what makes a used and appropriate place, and his
work is structured around themes of good places.
Shaftoe asserts that the debate from the 1960s and
1970s, authored by Jane Jacobs, has been:
superseded by narrower technical discussions
about physical sustainability, security, manage-
ment and aesthetics.
(p. 2)
Therefore, he sets out to determine and explain what
gives places ‘personality’ and what places ‘ordinary
citizens’ consider ‘good’ (p. 4), basing his research
not only on the design of these places but also use
and user behaviour.
Convivial Urban Spaces defines ‘convivial spaces’ as
‘open, public locations . . . where citizens can gather,
linger or wander through’ (p. 4) and states that:
Places where people can be ‘social and festive’
are the essence of urbanity. Without such con-
vivial spaces, cities, towns and villages would
be mere accretions of buildings with no deliber-
ate opportunities for casual encounters and posi-
tive interactions between friends and strangers.
. . . Without good urban spaces, we are likely to
drift into increasingly privatized and polarized
society, with all its concomitant problems.
(p. 5)
Shaftoe asserts that good urban places are the ‘heart
of democratic living’ (p. 5) referencing Carr et al.
(1992). His discussion is based on a multidisciplinary
approach to studying the perception and function of
successful urban places, stating that the ‘litmus test of
conviviality – successful spaces have people lingering
in them’ (p. 9) and that for a space to be a real public
space it must be used.
Convivial Urban Spaces affirms that design and archi-
tecture alone cannot create vibrant places; rather, it
has a ‘softer’ influence as design interacts with location,
management, ‘animation’ and culture. The author
stresses the importance of places growing organically
and advocates a ‘bottom-up, democratic’ approach
(p. 84). This book endeavours to address urban
108
planning’s professional ‘obsession with order’ (p. 82),
as Shaftoe states that places need to have some unpre-
dictability, be quite small, but also ‘breathe out’ to the
surrounding areas (p. 73). He pays particular attention
to the non-visual elements of a place as these are often
the elements ignored by designers and include sounds,
feelings, smells, textual qualities, movement (both the
feeling of movement and the actual movement
through a space), and taste. In this regard his work
goes beyond Urban Design and Architecture’s visual
preoccupation, expanding the knowledge base of
both fields.
The inclusiveness of public spaces is at the heart of both
of the authors’ discussions; however, Shaftoe’s concern
centres on providing inclusiveness through appropriate
and safe design, and has a pragmatic approach to the
issue. His emphasis that public spaces must be inclus-
ive, including ‘grey’ or ‘slack’ areas where activities
sometimes deemed as undesirable can take place, par-
ticularly spaces that are inclusive of teenagers, home-
less, street people, etc. These groups, as stressed by
Shaftoe, are all citizens, even if they are not always
treated as such. His text is particularly adamant
about creating appropriate places for teenagers to
hang out and states that:
We should be enabling th[e] healthy socialization
process by ensuring that there are places and
spaces where youngsters can gather and ‘hang
out’. . . . Young people gather in what are seen
by adults as inappropriate places because we do
not provide appropriate places. Where are they
meant to gather?
(p. 40)
Rather appropriate spaces that address the vulner-
ability of this, and other groups, need to be created
including places that provide for different types of
use and that are adaptable for different users.
Miller is also concerned with inclusiveness through
design, however she approaches the issue by including
inclusiveness provided through laws, ownership and
rights to a place. This provides a uniquely American,
or perhaps Western, perspective to the issue, as
would public places such as the interior, multilevel
places provided by Trump Tower or the nested, com-
mercial places of Sony Plaza be considered public
space in another context. Yes, the public has a right
to these places, but as they are not used as such, are
they real public spaces? These types of internal spaces
would more likely be defined as private and closed in
a European context as they are not ‘open’ to the
public as such. Miller discloses and adds to the ‘end
of public space’ and social justice debates and legal
battles, both of which are more common in the US
than elsewhere (Davis, 1990; Harvey, 1996, 2000).
Miller provides these examples to show that aesthetics,

which she defines as the sensory experiences of a place,
as well as laws and barriers, can limit the ‘public’ use of
a place by limiting who feels they can use it. Addition-
ally, these case studies emphasize that used public
spaces are not necessarily democratic, inclusive or
even public.
The idea of public spaces as democratic is both
applauded and questioned by both authors and it is
here that the different approaches of the two books
are brought into focus. While Shaftoe uses Carr
et al.’s (1992) definition of democratic spaces,
Miller questions their representation of these spaces,
stating that their idea was an ‘abstract’ concept as
they do not:
attend to the complexity of those relationships
[the relationship of design shaping use, aesthetics
shaping use, democracy, ownership, public par-
ticipation etc.] in specific places.
(p. xv)
Despite this variance, the authors are united in their
encouragement of democratic public spaces.
Ideas of public space and public realm are often used
interchangeably within public space debates. Miller’s
book reignites the discussion about the difference
between public space and public realm1 (or sphere),
and how they are not necessarily the same. In
Miller’s discussion, her case studies are technically
public places, but they do not all represent public
realms. This is the focus of her attention. Shaftoe’s
examples, by his own definition that a public space
must be used to be a public space, constitute public
realms regardless of their ownership, however due to
the pragmatic nature of his discussion, this is not the
primary issue or even his point, rather he is concerned
with the creation of appropriate public places.
Miller and Shaftoe discuss their points through care-
fully illustrated case studies. Miller’s studies are of
six spaces in New York, whereas Shaftoe provides
examples primarily from Europe (although some are
from the US and other places) and his adopted home
town of Bristol, UK. The case studies are central to
Miller’s discussion, whereas Shaftoe’s study is orga-
nized around themes of convivial spaces (geographical,
physical, psychological, etc.), with the case studies pro-
viding illustration of either ‘good’ or ‘bad’ examples.
Review
The books are easy to digest, with both authors refresh-
ingly and unapologetically personal, backing up their
concepts with well-researched and documented
studies. Both books offer unique contributions to the
public life conversation, delivering practical, well-
explored and documented observations about public
life and the arenas that support them. The authors
strengthen the voices advocating for public spaces
designed for people, that are healthy, lively, sustain-
able, safe and democratic public spaces, that provide
a people friendly social realm, able to complement
modern, consumer –private-orientated lifestyles.
Jan Gehl
Gehl Architects –Urban Quality Consultants
Copenhagen, Denmark
jan@gehl.dk
Anne Matan
Curtin University Sustainability Policy (CUSP) Institute
Perth, Australia
anne.matan@postgrad.curtin.edu.au
# 2009 Jan Gehl and Anne Matan
References
Carr, S., Francis, M., Rivlin, L. and Stone, A. (1992) Public
Space, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Davis, M. (1990) City of Quartz: Excavating the Future on Los
Angeles, Verso, London.
Fraser, N. (1992) Rethinking the public sphere: a contribution to
the critique of actually existing democracy, in C. Calhoun
(ed.): Habermas and the Public Sphere, MIT Press,
Cambridge, MA, pp. 109 –142.
Harvey, D. (1996) Justice, Nature and the Geography of Differ-
ence, Blackwell, Malden, MA.
Harvey, D. (2000) Spaces of Hope, University of California Press,
Berkeley, CA.
Lofland, L. (1998) The Public Realm: Exploring the City’s
Quintessential Social Territory, Aldine De Gruyter,
New York, NY.
Endnote
1
Using Lofland’s (1998) definition of public realms as ‘not geo-
graphically or physically rooted pieces of space. They are social,
not physical territories. Whether any actual physical space con-
tains a realm at all and, if it does, whether that realm is private,
or parochial, or is public is not the consequence of some immuta-
ble culturally or legally given designation. . . . It is, rather, the con-
sequence of the proportions and densities of relationship types
present and these proportions and densities are themselves fluid’
(p. 11; original emphases).
109