forests and streets
adding page because of this article (shared by Luba):
https://opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/ken-worpole/law-of-forest-and-freedom-of-streets
Urbanists have for some time now been drawing attention to the ‘over-scripting’ of public space in modern urban regeneration schemes, so that all conflicts and loose ends are designed out of the development, and people are subtly organised and choreographed into patterns of use and timetables decided by others. This disallows for that sense of wandering, of going off-piste, and of discovering a neighbourhood or district by serendipity. The very qualities for which we admire historic European towns and cities have often been designed out of many new urban quarters in the UK. The Bankside Urban Forest was intended to resist this over-inscription of public space.
The notion of the city as a forest is not a new idea. The idea of creating forest-like conditions as the basis for a new kind of urban public realm, builds on the past, but also embodies new ecological imperatives for making cities more sustainable environmentally, economically and socially. At its heart lies the historic ideal that both the forest and the city (Stadtluft macht frei – city air makes you free) are realms of individual liberty, and need be defended as such.
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be you. 