What type of cities do we want our children to grow up in? Car-dominated, noisy, polluted and devoid of nature? Or walkable, welcoming, and green? As the climate crisis and urbanisation escalate, cities urgently need to become more inclusive and sustainable. This book reveals how seeing cities through the eyes of children strengthens the case for planning and transportation policies that work for people of all ages, and for the planet. It shows how urban designers and city planners can incorporate child friendly insights and ideas into their masterplans, public spaces and streetscapes. Healthier children mean happier families, stronger communities, greener neighbourhoods, and an economy focused on the long-term. Make cities better for everyone.
Although rarely explored in academic literature, most inhabitants and visitors interact with an urban landscape on a day-to-day basis is on the street level. Storefronts, first floor apartments, and sidewalks are the most immediate and common experience of a city. These "plinths" are the ground floors that negotiate between inside and outside, the public and private spheres. The City at Eye Level qualitatively evaluates plinths by exploring specific examples from all over the world. Over twenty-five experts investigate the design, land use, and road and foot traffic in rigorously researched essays, case studies, and interviews. These pieces are supplemented by over two hundred beautiful color images and engage not only with issues in design, but also the concerns of urban communities. The editors have put together a comprehensive guide for anyone concerned with improving or building plinths, including planners, building owners, property and shop managers, designers, and architects.
An illustrated, essential guide to engaging children and youth in the process of urban design From a history of children’s rights to case studies discussing international initiatives that aim to create child-friendly cities, Placemaking with Children and Youth offers comprehensive guidance in how to engage children and youth in the planning and design of local environments. It explains the importance of children’s active participation in their societies and presents ways to bring all generations together to plan cities with a high quality of life for people of all ages. Not only does it delineate best practices in establishing programs and partnerships, it also provides principles for working ethically with children, youth, and families, paying particular attention to the inclusion of marginalized populations. Drawing on case studies from around the world—in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, India, Puerto Rico, the Netherlands, South Africa, and the United States—Placemaking with Children and Youth showcases children’s global participation in community design and illustrates how a variety of methods can be combined in initiatives to achieve meaningful change. The book features more than 200 visuals and detailed, thoughtful guidelines for facilitating a multiplicity of participatory processes that include drawing, photography, interviews, surveys, discussion groups, role playing, mapping, murals, model making, city tours, and much more. Whether seeking information on individual methods and project planning, interpreting and analyzing results, or establishing and evaluating a sustained program, readers can find practical ideas and inspiration from six continents to connect learning to the realities of students’ lives and to create better cities for all ages.
Given the significant benefits of play on children's health, wellbeing and happiness, the design of a new residential community should begin with the question: How can we provide the youngest residents with opportunities to freely play outdoors, walk independently, and feel a sense of belonging and ownership within their communities? This publication, funded by the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust, explores various design interventions and policies from around the world, which aim to improve liveability for children and their families living in urban environments.
First Published in 2006.Leading planning and geography authors present this comprehensive assessment of the extent to which the physical and social make up of Western cities accommodates and nourishes the needs of children and youth. Examining the areas of planning, design, social policy, transport and housing, Creating Child Friendly Cities outlines strengths and deficiencies in the processes that govern urban development and change from the perspective of children and youth. Issues explored include children's view of the city and why this is unique; the 'obesity epidemic': is it caused by cities?; the journey to school and children's transport needs generally. With illustrations and case studies, Creating Child Friendly Cities presents planning professionals with a solid case for child-friendly cities and an action plan to create places for children to play.
Building on the success of their Global Street Design Guide, the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO)-Global Designing Cities Initiative (GDCI) Streets for Kids program has developed child-focused design guidance to inspire leaders, inform practitioners, and empower communities around the world to consider their city from the eyes of a child. The guidance in Designing Streets for Kids captures international best practices, strategies, programs, and policies that cities around the world have used to design streets and public spaces that are safe and appealing to children from their earliest days. The guidance also highlights tactics for engaging children in the design process, an often-overlooked approach that can dramatically transform how streets are designed and used.
Designing Cities with Children and Young People focuses on promoting better outcomes in the built environment for children and young people in cities across the world. This book presents the experience of practitioners and researchers who actively advocate for and participate with children and youth in planning and designing urban environments. It aims to cultivate champions for children and young people among urban development professionals, to ensure that their rights and needs are fully acknowledged and accommodated. With international and interdisciplinary contributors, this book sets out to build bridges and provide resources for policy makers, social planners, design practitioners and students. The content moves from how we conceptualize children in the built environment, what we have discovered through research, how we frame the task and legislate for it, and how we design for and with children. Designing Cities with Children and Young People ultimately aims to bring about change to planning and design policies and practice for the benefit of children and young people in cities everywhere.
This proceedings book presents papers from the 10th Cambridge Workshops on Universal Access and Assistive Technology. The CWUAAT series of workshops have celebrated a long history of interdisciplinarity, including design disciplines, computer scientists, engineers, architects, ergonomists, ethnographers, ethicists, policymakers, practitioners, and user communities. This reflects the wider increasing realisation over the long duration of the series that design for inclusion is not limited to technology, engineering disciplines, and computer science but instead requires an interdisciplinary approach. The key to this is providing a platform upon which the different disciplines can engage and see each other’s antecedents, methods, and point of view. This proceedings book of the 10th CWUAAT conference presents papers in a variety of topics including Reconciling usability, accessibility, and inclusive design; Designing inclusive assistive and rehabilitation systems; Designing cognitive interaction with emerging technologies; Designing inclusive architecture; Data mining and visualising inclusion; Legislation, standards, and policy in inclusive design; Situational inclusive interfaces; and The historical perspective: 20 years of CWUAAT. CWUAAT has always aimed to be inclusive in the fields that it invites to the workshop. We must include social science, psychologies, anthropologies, economists, politics, governance, and business. This requirement is now energised by imminent new challenges arising from techno-social change. In particular, artificial intelligence, wireless technologies, and the Internet of Things generate a pressing need for more socially integrated projects with operational consequences on individuals in the built environment and at all levels of design and society. Business cases and urgent environmental issues such as sustainability and transportation should now be a focus point for inclusion in an increasingly challenging world. This proceedings book continues the goal of designing for inclusion, as set out by the CWUAAT when it first started.
In Playborhood: Turn Your Neighborhood Into a Place for Play, you'll find inspiring stories of innovative communities throughout the US and Canada that have successfully created vibrant neighborhood play lives for their children. You'll also get a comprehensive set of step-by-step solutions to change your family and neighborhood cultures, so that your kids can spend less time in front of screens and in adult-supervised activities, and more time engaging in joyful neighborhood play.
