4.3 - What attempts have been made to find sustainable solutions to problems faced by cities?

4.3 - What attempts have been made to find sustainable solutions to problems faced by cities?

1. Greenwich Millenium

   • Used to be 212 acres of the most contaminated land in the country (Largest gas works in EU)
   • Saving water
     • Rain falling on dome roof used for toilets
     • Rain falling on supermarket roof used to water plants
     • Waste water from baths, showers and wash basins in village homes is filtered + used to flush toilets + water plants
   • Saving energy
     • Supermarkets use electricity for light, heat and fridges
       • Makes some of its own - wind + solar power
       • Has banks of earth on each side to keep warm in winter and cool in summer
       • Glass roof lets light in
   • Village houses
     • Well insulated to keep heat in
     • Sheltered from cold winds
     • South-facing glass walls - traps sun's heat
   • Cutting traffic
     • Car = pollution - clogging up streets
     • Good bus service
     • Tube station beside dome
     • Lots of cycle tracks
     • Many parking spaces
     • Order from supermarket over the internet - shopping delivered

2. Abu Dhabi, Masdar (Carbon neutral city)

   • World's first carbon neutral city
   • Designed to be without cars and skyscrapers - powered by the sun
   • Only way to survive inhospitable terrain is with technological support
   • Need to combine 21st century engineering with traditional desert architecture
   • Built the biggest solar farm in the middle-east to power city and offset inevitable burning of diesel and baking of cement in construction
   • 1 projected = circle of mirrors reflecting towards a tower
     • Heat energy powers heat and drive generators
   • Narrow street - buildings shade one another
   • Surrounded by a wall - stops over-expansion
   • Wind towers encourage a breeze - cools streets with no energy use
   • Conventional cars must be checked in at gates
   • Pedestrianised streets - 'foot friendly'
   • Personal rapid transport + pod-cars
     • Driverless vehicles guided by magnetic sensors - powered by solar energy
   • Quality of air will be better than anywhere in the Gulf + world
   • On top of wind tower, light portrays energy efficiency - Red = too much Blue = just right
     • 45m tall + visible for miles around

3. Curitiba, South Brazil

   • Pop 3 million
   • 99% are happy with the city
   • Prioritising people over cars
   • Lots of green spaces, pedestrianised roads
   • No graffiti
   • Appeals across generations
   • Jaime Lerner - Urban planner for Curitiba - was an architecture student + now mayor - good experience
     • Given task of demolishing buildings to widen road
       • Did the opposite - opened paving + a malll
   • Public transport
     • Pop 10x in 50yrs
     • Once clogged with cars
     • Created main artificial traffic routes with 3 main paths
       • One in
       • One out
       • One 2-way road with bus routes
     • 2 million people transported each day
     • It is not subsided - pays for itself
     • Triple articulated buses - 3 carriages
       • 200x less expensive than subways - no tunnels needed
       • Buses becoming slow - people buying tickets on buses + queuing
         • Created platforms - glass boarding tubes - buying tickets elsewhere
       • During peak hours - buses every 60s and always full
   • Parkland/ open space
     • Extensive network of paths
     • Large network of parks circle city - greenbelt
     • Built parks in 2 months
     • Increased land value + created 'leisure paradise'
     • Well maintained, variety of landscape
     • Parks also allowed flooding - cheaper than hard engineering
     • Sheep put in for maintenance of grass + land - much cheaper than machinery
     • Has 4x recommended green space per resident
     • Slums do border the edges of the city - Favelas
   • Helping poor
     • Equation of co-responsibility
       • Poor people clean up their surroundings and in return the govt feeds them
         • People can live off of this
       • Give food rather than money - people will not buy correct things to live off of
     • Little can be done to improve housing quality
       • Housing build illegally on wetlands
         • The govt will reclaim the suburb but residents will be moved to a better suburb with power and roads

4. Keep Leicester Cool

   • Series of steps to encourage people to reduce usage - publicity
   • Insulating housing
   • Switch to renewable energy
     • E.g. solar panels - Govts reducing costs of tech - money saved pays off in long run
   • Recycling
   • Composting - reduces landfill sites being filled
   • Make gardens greener - plants absorb co2
   • Review methods of travel - reduce amount of petrol used
   • 'Think before you fly' - uses enormous amounts of fuel
   • Buy local goods - reduce transport needed for delivery + boosts local economy
   • Save water - reduce impacts of climate change