On a sunny summer day, under a Nordic blue sky, the vast web of Helsinki's forests, fields, beaches, and other green spaces conjure an urban wonder: a city thoroughly interwoven with nature. After four months of living in the capital of Finland, I'm of a mind to say that life here is very good. 

The good life that Helsinki offers may not be immediately apparent to the short-term visitor. This Baltic city is not a cosmopolitan center brimming with dazzling shopping, a vibrant food scene, or a pulsating nightlife. Instead it's a rather homogeneous, predictable place where the everyday is given priority over the spectacle. In fact, tourists here have often told me that they find the city boring, and boring it may be if you are looking for big-city life of the sort on offer in Paris, London or New York. 

The beauty of Helsinki is found in the ordinary, in its steady attention to the banal underpinnings of a secure, pleasant and healthy urban environment.  My time here convinced me that it delivers an exceptional quality of life, across many measures, for the majority of its inhabitants. It's not surprising that Helsinki typically ranks among the top ten cities in the world for quality of life. This quality of life is based upon factors such as safety, state of its infrastructure, access to nature, and quality of education and health care. It results from a high level of what I call urban organizational competence (the level and sophistication of a city's ability, through a variety of agencies, entities and experts, to organize and run itself) - a concept I will be writing more about in the future.

Finland has one of the most melodious national songs I've ever heard, Finlandia, by the Finnish composer, Jean Sibelius. 

An American composer used the melody in a hymn called This Is My Song (click and take a moment to listen), which I like because it makes clear, in such a beautiful way, the relativity of love of one's country: a recognition that although I may think my country is the most beautiful place in the world, people in other countries believe the same about their own countries. 

The following segment of the lyrics brought me to another place:

My country's skies are bluer than the ocean,
and sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine;
but other lands have sunlight too, and clover,
and skies are everywhere as blue as mine.

Although the sentiments of the song appeal to me, a worrisome realization comes to me that maybe, in fact, skies are bluer in some places than others, at least figuratively.

Before coming to Helsinki, I spent over three months in the United States, with long stays in Portland, Oregon and San Francisco, and shorter stays in Chicago, Columbus, Ohio, and New York. Arrival in Helsinki (like arrival in most northern European cities after time in the United States) presents a sharp, uncomplimentary contrast. Americans are often immersed in stunningly shabby physical surroundings, with urban planning and design (not to mention maintenance) decades or more behind other countries at a similar level of economic development.  Not only is their physical environment bluntly inferior, but they must contend with systemically ignored, but intense and simmering, social problems which impact security and much else. Because of inadequate investment, public institutions such as schools and government offices are also often poorly run and shabby. This is not an exaggeration. If you have experience between the two worlds, you know what I'm talking about. 

If Helsinki and Columbus (cities of very similar size and income level) were two types of cars, Helsinki would be a newish BMW 3-series (the European sort, nothing particularly fancy) and Columbus a 15 or 20 year-old Chevrolet Cavalier. The contrast is truly that profound. The aged condition of the old Cavalier represents the physical infrastructure of American cities. The technology in the car represents the sophistication of its public institutions, and the safety features, the city's crime situation. You might plug some new expensive equipment into the Cavalier - maybe a fancy new stereo or navigation system (which might correspond to a great university or fancy office building in a city) - but you still have the hugely outdated, run-down automobile (and city). The same goes for most other American cities in comparison with cities in the northern areas of Europe, Australia, and the wealthier countries of East Asia. Portland, Oregon may be one of the notable exceptions, but is itself still far behind. It's a national embarrassment for the USA, readily apparent to visitors from other wealthy countries who often are polite enough to say nothing about their surprise to rather patriotic and proud Americans.  

This posting on Helsinki will shed some light on what makes for really blue urban skies, and maybe help Americans understand their perennial overcast condition. Please note that I don't revel in my role as an annoying gadfly raising uncomfortable questions about urban life in the USA.  How happy I would be if America, instead, were an inspiration to the rest of the world that was leading the way in quality of urban life. 

Where's the cement?
An American arriving in Helsinki might experience a certain unease, a sense that something essential is missing. It's that comforting frosting of absolutely featureless, cheap cement covering all surfaces. Its absence will be noted because cement by the square yard is one of those things that makes American cities, well...American. 

In Helsinki, a needy cement junkie will have trouble tracking down any reassuringly vast expanses of the substance. It is used commonly in things like highway overpasses (and even here with much more finesse than is the norm in North America), but not in pedestrian areas or generally on streets. 

Why is there such a striking difference? A simplified answer that pops into my head is that the appearance of US cities is simply a reflection of American society and its values. Fundamentally, Americans don't care much about how their cities look. Design has given way to expediency. Low cost is the driving force in urban design and maintenance decisions. Americans are happy to accept  an unattractive physical environment, with a kind of rough functionality, if that saves them money and allows them to consume more of other things (including fighter jets and missiles). Besides, as they drive rather than walk or bicycle, why worry about the details? In a car-centered society, it's easy for streets to simply become high-speed corridors for driving, with little or no reason to stop and take a stroll.

Another more disturbing possibility is that most Americans simply don't know the difference between good urban design and bad. As they've rarely seen examples of beautifully constructed and managed cityscapes they believe that their streets and pedestrian areas are actually quite nice and as good as (or better than) streetscapes anywhere else. This seems to be confirmed by the boosterism and pride I encounter in American cities. What's most surprising is that many Americans have visited cities abroad with world-class design and infrastructure yet still don't expect or demand such standards at home. This could confirm the notion that they simply aren't able to see the differences and are aesthetically neutered. 

A disturbing consequence of America allowing its cities to sink to such a low level is that the skills and craftmanship required to orchestrate and build beautiful streets may have become a lost art in the United States. Even if we wanted to catch up, we would need to import talent to do it right. 

Below are some pictures of the beautiful, high quality, and carefully maintained street and sidewalk surfaces in central Helsinki. 

Wherever you go in Helsinki, you are faced with first-rate infrastructure. It seems that the Finns don't bother building it if they aren't going to do it well, and subsequently maintain it rather impeccably. I've found the same to be true in other Nordic countries, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland and Austria (not to mention Australia and wealthier East Asian countries). These are the countries that do public infrastructure best. These are also the countries with incomes most similar to those of the US. They are therefore ideal to use for comparison purposes. 

I mentioned above that the car-centered nature of American society might account for the lack of detailed design and attractiveness in its urban streets. But this would hardly explain the parlous state of much of the USA's highway infrastructure. In Finland, highways are smoothly paved and streets do not have potholes. I really don't think I ever saw a pothole on a Helsinki street, and this in a climate that can be brutally cold in the winter. What explanation, I wonder, do American cities give? It certainly isn't that their residents, on average, are poorer than those in their northern European counterparts. Average incomes are rather similar. It may however, be related to the massive inequalities in income which don't show up in typical averages. I will come back to this question later.

The quality Finnish infrastructure extends to bridges, public buildings, sports facilities and even the water pipes that I've seen replaced during construction projects. Below are some scenes of cutting edge infrastructure and architecture that surrounds you in Helsinki. 

The most outstanding physical feature of Helsinki is it's wealth of green and natural spaces. Helsinki is a wooded, rocky peninsula jutting out into the sea that at times seems to just incidentally have human settlements interspersed throughout.. 

From where I lived in the north of Helsinki, in the Paloheinä neighborhood, I could ride my bicycle almost all the way to the center of the city (a 45-minute ride) without ever crossing an intersection and without seeing any cars. This is because Helsinki is designed in such a way that wooded and natural corridors (as well as protected seaside areas) extend like a circulation system throughout and around the city. They give residents quick access not only to peaceful, natural areas but also to safe routes for bicycle commuting . Even Oslo, another city with a wealth of green, doesn't have this same connected system of green spaces and corridors penetrating so deeply into all sections of the city.  

My typical ride took me through what is called Helsinki's Central Park, and along the way, I was ceaselessly amazed at the range of uses I found for the open spaces that dominate the city. The pictures below show some of the natural spaces, all without the artificial feeling that over-engineered green spaces often have in cities.  They include clean rivers, farmland, vast areas of garden allotments, seashore, and most commonly, forests that go on and on. This despite the fact that the population density in Helsinki is higher than in comparable American cities such as Columbus or Portland. 

A highlight of life for me in Helsinki was the ease of movement around most of the city by bicycle. In all but the center of the city, Helsinki has an uncommonly good system of paths for bicycles..

Bicycle infrastructure in Helsinki seems to be divided into three main types: 
1) shared sidewalks (pavements) along streets; 
2) shared paths through green areas, and less commonly; 
3) dedicated bicycle lanes.

As is common in Norway, Sweden and Finland, most sidewalks along bigger streets are wide enough to accomodate both pedestrians and biyclists. Often there is a line demarcating walking and cycling areas. Just like people walking, bicyclists on shared pavements yield to cars at intersections, although they are generally protected by raised crosswalks that dramatically slow traffic down, making bicycling safe along streets even for children. 

The most pleasant, and fastest, way to get around by bike in Helsinki is on the shared paths through green areas, or along the coast. These paths are not specifically for bicycles, and are used by pedestrians, joggers, skateboarders and others (see picture above), and can be covered with asphalt or finely crushed stone. Although they are multi-use, they are almost never crowded and it's very easy to quickly cover large distances, totally isolated from automobile traffic. All streets and roads encountered are either crossed by dedicated bicycle/pedestrian bridges or avoided via underpasses. It's a lovely way to get around as it's safe, you have beautiful scenery all around, and the air is fresh and clean. I used paths like this every day to get into the center of Helsinki. 

Helsinki has a few examples of dedicated bicycle lanes, the most interesting bit being the Baana Bicycle Corridor, built along an old rail line. This is a very cool stretch of urban bicycling. Take a look at the link. 

The three types of bicycle infrastructure, sadly, disappear in many of the older core neighborhoods of Helsinki. In these areas it's necessary to ride on the cobblestone streets with traffic. If this part of Helsinki were all you saw, you would not think Helsinki is an excellent city for bicyclists - which in fact, it really is. 

I wrote a bit above about the ample green space in Helsinki, but I want to focus a bit more on the impressive array of outdoor recreational facilities on offer to the public here. 

Not only are forest areas and green belts within a short walking distance of all inhabitants, but there is a very generous allocation of well-maintained playgrounds, sports fields, swimming pools, beach areas. marinas, and more - among the best I've seen anywhere in the world. 

Although these facilities are well used, because of their abundance they rarely appeared crowded. There seems to be space for all.  I was highly impressed with the quality of materials used and general upkeep.

Below are some pictures of the kinds of generally free, meticulously maintained public facilities that most city-dwelling Americans could only dream of. 

When not riding my bicycle, I used public transport in Helsinki. In comparison to most European cities I've lived in, Helsinki is underserved by metro lines. There is one main line, which runs from west to east, but most of the city is not covered. There are commuter train lines that go to the suburbs, and these serve some parts of the city. The city also has many tram lines in the central area, as well as ferry routes linking the city to its islands. On the whole, however, I imagine most people using public transport in this city rely on buses. 

As I was living in a neighborhood far from train, tram, or metro lines, I used bus to get around. Buses were frequent, very clean and pleasant to ride.  A nice thing about Helsinki's well-organized bus system is that generally you know rather precisely when the next bus will come. Nearly every bus stop has a digital display that tells you how many minutes before a particular bus arrives. See the middle picture below, showing that bus 63, a line I used frequently, would arrive in 2 minutes. This sort of system is not common in the United States, but it's the norm in much of Europe and East Asia. 

Like any city, Helsinki has its relatively low income areas. These tend to be on the eastern side of the city, but there is no clear division between wealthy and poor areas here: the eastern parts of Helsinki have wealthier districts, and the western parts have poorer districts, too. 

Finns are uncomfortable with any suggestion that a class divide exists in this city, but it certainly does. In fact, many of the conurbations outside of center are rather forlorn looking and unattractive. There are signs of social problems such as alcholism and poorly integrated groups of foreigners. What does not exist in Helsinki is a green divide. Even the relatively poor here are blessed with an embarrassment of well-maintained green spaces close at hand. 

What struck me most about the lower-class parts of the city is that people are often living in large, high-rise apartment blocks (such as the buildings in the pictures above and below), rather isolated from other buildings, and often quite a walk from any stores. In the summer, it's somehow bearable because of the profusion of green in all directions. But I imagine that in the winter it would be rather bleak, as there is little activity in the environs. Most of these high-rise developments are like islands in the middle of forest. The developments are often centered on a metro stop, where there is always an adjacent shopping center. These commercial centers themselves can be fairly unattractive. I think urban design of this type is a legacy of bad planning ideas from the 1960s and 70s. Most Finns wouldn't want to live in places like this today. However, from disussions I've had with local people involved in urban planning issues, the shopping center-centric style of development continues in Helsinki, continuing to breed car dependancy and continuing to isolate people and deprive them of lively, interesting streets. Timo Hämäläinen writes an interesting blog, called from Rurban to Urban, discussing the challenges Helsinki faces in creating lively, engaging streets and communities. 

Below are more examples of high-rise apartment blocks in the east of Helsinki.

Even in the expensive center of the city, (especially here, I think) there is a lot that can be done to improve the experience of being a pedestrian or bicyclist - and improve the quality of life for local residents, as well. 

Several things strike me about streets in the center. They are:
* narrow sidewalks
* excessive space allocated to car parking
* a lack of trees and other green elements
* a lack of bicycle lanes, and 
* a general low level of activity (and hence, perhaps, the perception of tourists that this is a boring city).

In terms of street design in its old urban core (a rather small part of the city), Helsinki is behind the times. The streets, although often lined with beautiful buildings (and also many bland ones erected in a misguided period of urban renewal in the 1960s), lack beauty because so much space is devoted to automobiles. The streets are rather lifeless and drab as there is no leftover space for trees, cafe-lined sidewalks, and bicycle lanes. Wandering these streets in the winter could be quite depressing. 

I wonder why so little interesting retail and so few restaurants and cafes line most of these streets. Perhaps there are zoning regulations that keep many business out or maybe high taxes act as a discouragement. It's certainly not that Finland lacks an interesting retail sector. In fact, its shopping centers are full of innovative Nordic chain stores (from Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland itself) that would be a hit in the US or other parts of Europe. The outside world only knows about IKEA and H&M, but there is much more.  If only Helsinki could manage to get these stores (and restaurants) out of the shopping centers and back onto its streets - this would no longer be a boring city for foreign visitors. 


Below, some streets that could use a bit more life (the first from Itäkeskus, a major hub in eastern Helsinki). 

I can't end this posting without sharing a bit about my favorite neighborhoods in Helsinki. 

Although I love the elegant central districts, with their Jugenstil architecture, the places I find most charming and most uniquely Finnish are the areas of wooden houses and wooden apartment buildings in neighborhoods such as Käpylä and Vallila. It would be a dream for me to have a house in one of these areas. 

There's something about these neighborhoods that make you want to settle in. The scale is very human, there's a lot of common green space, and fundamentally, it's just beautiful. Below are some views from Käpylä.

Helsinki is a great foil to the American cities I've most recently visited and blogged about. It provides a contrast, and ultimately an excellent model for how pleasurable city life in the USA could be. 

There are many reasons for Helsinki's superiority. One is its outstanding urban organizational competence: Helsinki is a metropolis under professional management and benefits from a highly evolved ecosystem of actors who cooperatively create a great city. 

Another underlying reason for its high rank in urban quality of life is the relatively low social inequality, and very high social mobility, in Finland. Residents of Helsinki have a shared destiny and work together to make their city a wonderful place to live. People here are not condemned to an inferior life if they are born in poorer areas. Social mobility is very high. 

I miss Helsinki. Beyond all the wonderful things about life there, and the lessons it holds for American cities, what I miss the most are the friends I love dearly. I was unfortunate enough to have an accident the day before I was scheduled to leave Helsinki. This led to knee surgery. My friends Pia and Jan took care of me for several weeks while I began my recovery. The silver lining to this situation was that it gave me more time to spend with them, especially with their precious kids, Lilya, Linnea and Linus. Below are pictures of my constant companions, Linnea and Linus. I can't wait to get back to Helsinki for a visit next summer. 

Taking in the view on the balcony of my friends' home in the Castro district of San Francisco (picture, left), it's hard to imagine a better city to be in the world. There are the hills, the fresh air, and the lovingly maintained gardens in the back of most of the neighboring buildings. It's simply beautiful.  

There are few cities where I feel as good and at home as San Francisco.  The city justifiably has important symbolic value throughout the world as a bastion of individual freedom and human dignity, and this is undeniably a desirable feature of life in this area.  The Bay Area, San Francisco's region, is my favorite part of the United States.  I lived in the East Bay (Berkeley) over 10 years ago while in grad school, and I never forgot the unique feel to this area.  The climate is mild, the vegetation is Mediterranean, the people are generally tolerant and open-minded, and there's simply a spontaneity and sense of possibility in the air here. Most residents wouldn't think of living anywhere else. 

From another height, looking out over the city from one of its rocky hilltops, it would be easy to idealize this city and imagine it as one of the most sophisticated and livable in the world. San Francisco, however, is usually experienced at ground level, and the experience here strays from any idealization of that sort. 

This city is no earthly paradise, although it has an incredible charm and many attractive attributes.  But its global reputation and image are bound to disappoint on closer examination, as many foreign visitors have told me.  This extremely expensive city has seriously rough edges that drag down its quality of life in multiple ways. Despite being virtually the wealthiest large city in the United States, it often has a ramshackle, dirty and run-down look to it.  This shabby appearance comes as a surprise to many visitors from abroad who expect more from this legendary city.  In fact, in the face of incredible natural advantages, a highly educated population and wealth, it settles for a second-rate quality of life for the bulk of its inhabitants.  Yes, I did say San Francisco has a second-rate quality of urban life.  In this blog posting I will explain my view.  Brace yourself as I dig further into the pathologies of American cities. 

But first a little glimpse of beauty from this city (it is rich in beauty like this), to highlight the shame of allowing so much of it to be so mediocre.

There are four outstanding things I will focus on, common to American cities, that stand in the way of San Francisco reaching its very high potential. They are poor infrastructure, lack of human scale, autocentric design, and immense social problems.  

The American Society of Civil Engineers, in their 2013 Report Card for America's Infrastructure, gave the United States an overall grade of D+ for its crumbling infrastructure.  This is close to a total failure.    
I am rather astounded at the general public's apathy in the face of our country’s shamefully ill-maintained infrastructure.  I'd expect outrage, really. Perhaps Americans have gotten used to this state of affairs, and don't know what quality public infrastructure looks like in other wealthy countries around the world.

This rough infrastructure is, in fact, one of the things most characteristic of American cities.  San Francisco is no exception, and a walk around this city can be a big surprise to visitors from northern Europe, Japan or Australia. Things are simply not well maintained, or maintained in a manner fitting a poor, developing world city, not one of the wealthiest and potentially most beautiful cities in the world.  Sidewalks and streets are haphazardly patched, public transport is rough, and city parks are often in poor condition.  

The poor infrastructure of this city is highlighted by the liberal use of cement, frosting all surfaces often without leaving any space for trees and vegetation or other features.  Although San Francisco is politically 'green', the city itself is in desperate need of more trees.  SF ranks 17th of the 20 largest cities in the US in terms of its urban forest and in terms of street trees, I'm sure it must be at the absolute bottom.  Many, if not most, streets of San Francisco are uninviting urban deserts, despite enjoying an exceptionally good climate.  Below are a sampling of San Francisco's cement-covered and lifeless streets.  

Streets in San Francisco, like those in most other American cities, are often exceptionally wide.  Their breadth is totally out of proportion to the height of the buildings that run along them, making for unattractive and often very uninviting streetscapes. Streets seem to be simply thought of as corridors for mobility. Other functions of streets, as public space, for example, are just an afterthought.  

For most of the world's urban history, cities and streets were built on a human scale.  Streets in older cities around the world tend to be relatively narrow, and these streets seem in scale with the buildings that line them.  Americans seem to have forgotten what makes for exciting, engaging and beautiful streets.  The key is a profound sense of humanity in design. This is quickly recognizable.  Streets and public spaces designed with humanity attract people, not just passers-through, but people who stay for extended periods of time.

Exacerbating the scale issue in San Francisco is what I call a low density of detail in many areas, making streetscapes unappealing and unengaging. Great streets have many details, complex details, providing many reasons to stop and do something, if it only be to sit on a comfortable bench and admire the fine paving stones and beautiful landscaping.  This density of features can be called 'friction'.  Streets with friction are destinations in and of themselves, places you go to do many things at once (without having to get in your car and go elsewhere) and places that bring people together.  San Francisco has many streets like this (for example, Dolores and Mission Streets), of course, but far too many of its streets are rather lifeless.   This is a shame, as open spaces in cities are opportunities for the common good and streets are generally the most common open spaces citizens have to enjoy.  Streets should be the most important public spaces in a city.

Its easy to see when a street has become a successful public place because it will attract people.  Streets that are unsuccessful have few people and are lifeless.  Naturally, cities need a full range of street types (including quiet residential streets), but San Francisco has vast wasted street spaces that could instead be alive with street life and business opportunities.  

Market Street is emblematic of what's wrong with many of San Francisco's streets.  It is a low density, extremely wide expanse of cement and asphalt, with generally very low friction (except in the heart of downtown and near Castro Street).  I would never want to spend time on most of it.  It is ugly, a haven for San Francisco's homeless and really a showcase of the city's social problems.   

Maybe I should applaud SF for not hiding America's reality of haves and have nots, but still, Market Street is generally not a pleasant place to be, despite its key location running from downtown to the Castro.  It should be San Francisco's most vibrant and attractive street, without excuses.  

A main driver of the scale problem in San Francisco is the autocentric design of its streetscapes.  

In American cities, people on opposite sides of a street are usually separated by wide swathes of fast-moving traffic.  Cars, and space dedicated to cars, eat up the bulk of the open space streets provide, Streets are not primarily thought of as places for people to gather and do things, but instead as spaces to facilitate the rapid movement of automobile traffic.   

In San Francisco, the car-dominated street design spreads over into the design of sidewalks and buildings to an extent that I have not seen in any other densely populated American city.  Despite having decent public transportation within the city (decent, not great), a high proportion of residents of San Francisco have cars and use them to commute, particularly if they work outside of the city.  Regional public transit in the Bay Area is inconvenient and expensive.        

This reliance on auto transport created a problem:  where to park all the cars in this densely packed city. The solution was to build housing with garages on the first floor, in addition to allocating much street space for car parking.  A distinctive feature of San Francisco, therefore, is the garage doors facing the streets throughout much of the city, as you can see in the picture above.  This proliferation of garages along the city's streets drastically distorts the function of the city's streets by creating dead zones along sidewalks.  There is no space for shops or cafes,  The streets are bare of trees and vegetation because cars cannot leave garages if trees are planted along the street.  The result is an abundance of lifeless and treeless streets that are wholly unattractive and serve no social function.        

Allowing car owners to dominate so much of a city's open space is not only detrimental to urban livability, the use of this space by cars costs a city money.  A study from Connecticut shows how much allocating and subsidizing parking spots actually costs a city (in the case of Hartford, it comes to about $1,200/year per parking place).  In San Francisco's case, as sidewalk and street space in front of the endless garages cannot be utilized for anything else, there is a huge hidden subsidy that must be considered beyond the subsidized street parking the city provides.  

Finally, San Francisco shares the American problem of vast, inadequately addressed social problems.  Visitors to San Francisco will quickly note the huge numbers of homeless people on the city's streets.  

Riding public transport is another way to come into contact with large numbers of people with serious problems.  You simply don't see this kind of thing, on this scale, in other wealthy countries. Crime is also higher than it is in most of Europe, Canada, Australia or Japan. 

San Francisco has, it must be said, a very racially and economically diverse population.  The varied groups have different needs and interests, and the national and local governments have not been very skillful at managing the situation, resulting in severe problems such as homelessness.   

What I write about San Francisco may seem harsh and clearly, to some extent, stems from my frustration with the same sorts of problems I see in every American city I visit. The solutions seem so obvious to an outsider, but they are never simple.  San Francisco, in particular, pains me because the city so obviously has many of the ingredients required to make it one of the great cities of the world.  It is surrounded by natural beauty, is a welcoming and accepting place, has a very vibrant city culture by any measure, including a remarkable food scene.

Some tweaks to the system are underway that will make San Francisco a better city. 

For example, an organization called 'Friends of the Urban Forest' (FOF) is helping city residents convert some of that great expanse of concrete in front of their homes into gardens and tree planting spaces. (See picture to right) My friends Buddy and Orie (whose veranda is featured in the first photo of this blog posting) have just participated in a project in their neighborhood with FOF.  The results are wonderful. However, like much of the urban improvements going on in San Francisco, projects like this tend to be driven by the educated and wealthy, and are not benefiting all areas equally.  I rarely saw urban greening projects in the poorer parts of town.  

Another encouraging sign is that the generally rather dreadful Market Street, which I write about above, is undergoing massive development now that will no doubt clean it up and restore some of its traditional role as one of the great streets of San Francisco. New high rises are popping up along several areas of the street, and new shopping and commercial development will follow to bring life back to this area.  

Finally, I've just read that a law involved with major urban planning projects is changing in California to be less car friendly.  This will allow for public transit projects to get approval more easily and speed up developments such as San Francisco's new bus rapid transit line.    

When I look at my pictures from San Francisco, I really miss this city and my good friends there.  I'm hopeful that San Francisco will tackle its quality of life issues and move towards a respectable position in the group of the world's most livable cities.   It has a long way to go.  

I spent the month of March in the lush, green and rather beautiful city of Portland, Oregon. Portland will serve as my entry point into American cities on this trip to the USA.  I chose to visit it because of its almost legendary status among urban planners. 

Soon after arrival I recognized how unique this city is in the United States. Portland capitalizes on its assets in a way that creates a flourishing and very livable city - the best I've seen in any major US city.  It offers a vision of what a medium-sized American city can be with the right policies, planning, and execution.  It's a world apart from the typical American city, both in its well-designed urban environment and its stunning natural surroundings. 

Portland's differences, however, go beyond its great urban design and rich nature. There is a major demographic difference here.

I flew to Portland from San Francisco and upon entering the airplane immediately noted something odd.  As far as I could see, there were only Caucasians on the plane. The impression of a relatively homogeneous population was supported by what I saw in the center of the city.  It certainly seemed to be a very white city. In fact, Portland's population is 74% white, the highest of any major city in the United States. By comparison, only 45% of San Francisco's population is white.  (See core city populations in chart at right.)  

As the cities in the United States with the highest livability rankings all tend to have large white (or in the case of Honolulu, Asian) populations, this is a significant point to grasp when struggling to understand America's urban problems and blight.   It illustrates the continuing damage America's history of slavery, racism, segregation and unwillingness to effectively deal with social problems has wrought in those cities with large non-white populations.  I will write more about this in a subsequent posting.

I came to learn that Portland's relatively few non-white inhabitants (both blacks and Hispanics) have gradually been pushed to the edge of the city, far away from many of the things that make Portland such a livable city, due to gentrification.  I stayed in what had previously been an African American neighborhood in NE Portland (Irvington), but today there are relatively few black Americans living there.  I became friends with one of my neighbors, Susan, and her good friend Ed, a homeless African American who sometimes sleeps on Susan's porch.  They told me about a pervasive, if not overt, racism that exists in this supposedly very progressive town.  Ed's life story was probably not atypical for a black American man.  From the start he had no advantages and faced multiple hardships.  It's amazing to me that he still has an optimistic life view.  

I felt it important to bring Portland's demographics to the fore because they may help explain its unique character.  

It is a strikingly clean city, with innovative street design, excellent public transport, an enviable food scene, and a large population of active bicyclists.  

It is also a city of vibrant and lively local neighborhoods.  I found its many independent coffee shops to be an excellent indicator of an active and vital community. These local coffee shops provide social and work spaces where people can interact, and these interactions extend out into the sidewalks and streets. They are important social hubs that tie neighborhoods and the city together.  

For a city of low diversity, Portland also has an amazing range of ethnic foods and overall a food (and beer) scene considered to be one of the best in the United States.

Typical neighborhoods in Portland are impressive, and really seem almost suburban. Beautiful homes are the norm, with large lush gardens surrounding them. In this respect, living standards appear to be very high in Portland, and would vie with those in the richest countries around the world.  

The vast majority of streets are lined with trees, and there is almost always a planting strip, or green right of way, between the sidewalk and the street that is planted with trees, bushes, flowers and grass.  A planted right of way is rather common in American cities. What is not common is the exuberance of vegetation (this is a moist and temperate climate) and the high number of plant species that are grown around houses.  As you can see in the picture to the right, this typical Portland street does not show large lawns, but instead a variety of vegetation and high species diversity.  This is a city where gardening is taken seriously and front yards are really more like gardens.  

See some typical Portland streets scenes below.  

In terms of public green space, Portland has among the most public park space per person of any major city in the US. In a recent study, it ranked 5th in the US, after cities such as Raleigh, NC and Lincoln, NE.  And even without the public parks, the city's large yards and private green spaces keep you enveloped in green at almost all times. It's hard to get away from it, except in the very core of the city.

Portland also stands apart in its innovative street design in many areas.  Like most American cities, sidewalks here are generally artlessly covered with cement, and streets are often rather roughly covered with asphalt (and are very often in need of repair).   

But there are signs that Portland is trying to do things a bit differently.  To the right you can see a picture of a swale, an area designed to absorb rainwater runoff from the street and keep it from overwhelming sewers.  You find these all over the city, planted with species that like water.  

There are also a variety of curb extensions (often at corners) that make pedestrians more visible to traffic, make street crossing distances shorter, and also slow traffic to improve safety.   

Traffic is also slowed in some neighborhoods with features such as speed bumps and mini-roundabouts (often with very nice plantings within).

Below you can see a few pedestrian surfaces that break with the generally bleak cement pedestrian landscape.  

Wherever I go I rely on public transportation (or bicycle or foot) to get around, and immediately upon arrival in Portland, I experienced the seamless transition from the airport terminal to the region's light-rail system.  I felt as if I were in a northern European city with the well-designed system quickly and quietly taking me to the center of the city, often through beautifully green neighborhoods.   

I continued to use Portland's buses and trains on nearly a daily basis.  For an American city with a relatively low population density, Portland has rather excellent public transportation. It's not at all unpleasant to use and it's often possible to get to even marginal areas of the city with only one transfer.  Buses and trains are clean and well-maintained.  

The city's investment in light rail transport has, according to studies, helped the city retain its core population better than cities that didn't create light rail systems. But contrary to my expectations, and despite the obvious huge investments the city and region have made, the percentage of commuters using public transport in Portland has actually decreased over the last 30 years.  Cars have become more and more dominant. See research here. 

The underlying problem is that driving is still heavily subsidized here as elsewhere in US.  Gasoline taxes do not cover the cost of building and maintaining roads.  Parking, even when there is a charge, is also usually heavily subsidized. There are few disincentives to drive.  This is where Portland and other US cities differ greatly from cities in most other developed nations. American cities make driving far too attractive and hence steer people away from public transport. Some might say that if driving is the preferred form of transport for city dwellers, why not subsidize it?  The problem is that car-centric cities are less attractive and healthy places to live.  Automobile dependence undermines the development of cities built on a human scale, places that are pedestrian friendly, where walking is easy, and where local community life thrives.  It's interesting to note that the most walkable areas of US cities, those areas most similar to older cities in Europe, are generally the most sought after and expensive. What's more, car dependence is unsustainable and is adding to environmental problems, such as air pollution and smog.    

Portland may have one of the highest livability rankings of any American city, but it still clearly exhibits why US cities lag behind their wealthy counterparts in other parts of the world. The problem is inconsistency and unevenness.  The city's fantastic attributes are often not nicely tied together and some areas and some details are jarringly unattractive.  

The problems, as above, often go back to the automobile. The domination of the landscape by automobile infrastructure robs it of human scale, creating many central sectors where pedestrians (and pedestrian associated businesses and features) are rare.  Highways bisect the city and create vast zones along their edges that are cut off from areas on the other side.  These areas are generally undesirable places to live. Motor vehicle infrastructure also deprives vast areas of the center of development.  I saw extensive empty spaces, very centrally located, that could provide land for development.  But I don't imagine anyone would want to develop property beneath or adjacent to a highway overpass.    

The picture above shows the almost completely lifeless (with the exception of auto traffic) east bank area of Portland. There are virtually no shops, no restaurants, and no housing.  There is no reason to come to this place except to pass through by car, although it has some of the best views of downtown Portland.  This barren no-mans-land seals the eastern side of the city off from the river and the promenade that runs along it.  I find it hard to grasp how anyone envisioned or approved such an incredible destruction of potentially highly valuable space right at the city's core.      

You can see more pictures from this area below.  

Another telltale sign of the American city is the ubiquitous parking lots on vacant land in city centers and surrounding shopping centers and other businesses and institutions. Prime downtown areas of most American cities, including Portland, have barren parking lots, even on corners of major intersections as in the picture at the left.  

Everywhere I went in Portland, I was met with parking lots, whether it be on vacant central city lots, in front of unsightly strip malls, or in immense proportions surrounding malls, office towers or institutions such as hospitals. The parking lots are dead zones in the city, and break up the texture of downtown and other areas. They break the flow of pedestrians walking between businesses.  See more examples below.

Portland, I should mention, has made one significant improvement to parking lot blight.  In certain central city areas, these parking lots are surrounded by the city's excellent food carts.  These food carts bring life and vibrancy back to these areas. 

Another thing that catches my attention (and probably anyone coming from Europe or East Asia) would be the extraordinarily broad areas smothered, really, with a coat of asphalt. Streets in Portland are incredibly wide, and vast areas, particularly at intersections, are large enough to house sizable sporting facilities such as tennis or basketball courts. There is a huge amount of not only wasted, but possibly permanently destroyed land, in this city.  Once again, the desire to give a majority of the city's public space to automobiles brings unappealing results.  The vastness of these streets takes away charm from neighborhoods, encourages cars to drive faster, and in hot sunny weather, must create a strong heat-island effect. You can see some examples of Portland's remarkably wide streets below.  

I should also mention here that although sidewalks are not allocated a particularly generous amount of space, they are likewise generally covered rather artlessly with a non-permeable frosting of absolutely unadorned cement.     

Portland is renowned in the United States as a kind of bicyclist's paradise. Having lived in the Netherlands, Germany and Japan, I found the bicycle infrastructure, like much else in the city, not up to the highest international standards. In fact, I believe that riding a bicycle in Portland can often be quite intimidating.  

This will come as a surprise to many bicyclists in Portland, who I think live in a bit of a bubble (without exposure to cities with far better biking infrastructure). 

In this city, bicycles generally share the streets with cars, with no marked bicycle lanes on most streets. I am aware that some people believe this state of affairs is actually better and safer.  But for children, the elderly, and those not particularly comfortable riding bicycles (like new riders), the major streets are intimidating. In the center of the city and along some main thoroughfares there are rather poorly marked bicycle lanes, but they are incomplete and confusing.  

These bike lanes are intimidating for most potential users because they are not well demarcated and not fully separated from traffic. In the downtown area, bicyclists share the crowded city streets with fast-moving traffic.  With the incredibly wide streets this city has, why can't dedicated and separated bike lanes be added at least to major thoroughfares?  Portland prides itself on being a bike-friendly city, but the enthusiasm for biking is not, as far as I can see, based upon excellent biking infrastructure.  There are, certainly, better-than-average bike parking areas and many excellent bike shops. But people here simply love to bike and those who bike a lot are apparently comfortable sharing space with automobiles. 

I normally write about the green divide wherever I go.  Portland is no exception in having a green divide and the divide here is driven by the same factors as it is throughout the country.  

Many of the policies that make Portland so attractive to many young people (and not only the young) are similar to those of upscale suburbs. Portland's urban growth boundaries and other regulations raise land prices and render housing less affordable, just as large lot zoning and expensive building codes do in some wealthy suburbs. 

They both contribute to reducing housing affordability for historically disadvantaged communities, and push these people out of the nicer areas. 

Above you can see an unpaved street in the poor, eastern side of Portland.  Houses here are small, often in poor condition, and the surrounding infrastructure is dramatically different from the center of the city.  There are often no sidewalks, streets are in poor condition even when paved, and there are fewer trees planted along the street.   

I've got my biases. One of them is that urban greening and infrastructure design is way ahead in the rich world, particularly in northern Europe and countries like Singapore and Australia. 

Travel, however, melts away prejudices.  My recent three-week stay in China certainly altered my elitist views associating beautiful city infrastructure and urban greening with the so-called rich world.

China is on many peoples' minds.  I believe it's a generally poorly understood country that, due to its growing economic and political power, tends to give rise to fears in other countries.  In this sense, China is a bigger version of the demonized Japan of the 1970s and 80s.  While I think fears of China are misplaced - China's rise offers more benefits than disadvantages to the rest of the world - I can see how its rapid move into the future could be unnerving to some.  Some of the nasty side effects of its massive industrialization are alarming, particularly the air and water pollution.  But on the whole, I would say its advances are positively breathtaking.  Based on decades of living and traveling in East Asia, I believe China's future is quite bright and shows clear parallels to the rapid economic rise of countries such as Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, albeit on an enormous scale. 

In my recent three-week stay in China, I visited Hangzhou and Shanghai.  It would be odd to classify either of these two cities as 'poor' and typical of the developing world.  Although China is ranked at the same per capita income level as countries such as Colombia and Thailand, in terms of physical infrastructure Chinese cities have more in common with those in far wealthier countries.  As a matter of fact, I believe statistics on China (at least regarding the coastal areas) are misleading.  This country is far ahead of where most people think it is. 

In this posting I will focus in particular on Hangzhou, the capital of Zhejiang Province in eastern China.  It's a city I knew little about and which I had never before visited.   Hangzhou came as a surprise. It enchanted me with its beauty, exuberance of green and sense of order and well-being. 

Hangzhou is a mid-sized Chinese city of 6 million people but, according to the Chinese government, it has a metropolitan area population of 21 million.  Yes, 21 million. Population numbers in China are mind-boggling.  Nearby Shanghai (only an hour away) has a metro population of 23 million.  Ningbo, Suzhou and Nanjing, also within roughly an hour of Hangzhou, each has a metro area population at or near 10 million.  These cities, like Hangzhou, have populations in the range of a Paris or London, but remain virtually unknown to much of the outside world.  They deserve (and will get) more attention.

The history of Hangzhou stretches back over 2000 years of Chinese history.  Marco Polo claimed to have visited Hangzhou when it was the capital of China, saying that it was 'greater than any city in the world'. It lies at the southern end of the famous "Grand Canal" (see map above), the largest artificial waterway in the world (built in the 6th and 7th centuries A.D.), which wends its way over 1700 kilometers from Hangzhou to Beijing. 

This ancient city must be one of the most pleasant in China.  I arrived from steamy Hong Kong in an ideal season.  The autumn weather was not too warm and the blooming sweet osmanthus filled the air with a captivating scent - so good I wanted to taste it (and in fact there are sweets based on osmanthus flowers here).  It was a magical experience.  

I quickly came to the conclusion that Hangzhou is, in many respects, a nicer place to live than very rich Hong Kong.  There is a sense of open space here and an incredible proliferation of green wherever you look. 

Hangzhou has also protected many  historical areas and structures, especially around the beautiful West Lake.  Further away from the lake, however, it's less likely to find much of anything old.  Rapid growth has meant the redevelopment of much of the city.  The upwardly mobile Chinese prefer new, modern streets that are as clean as those you would find in Japan.  And I must say these streetscapes are well-designed and well-built (see picture above). But the loss of the older neighborhoods is sad in that the streets and alleyways in these areas are especially vibrant.  They are abuzz with life and activity, and there seems to be more leeway in these places to stretch out and relax, whether it be people sitting on a curbside or restaurants extending their tables and chairs out onto the pavement.  Somehow these older streets are the 'authentic' China to me. 

Below you can see a couple of scenes from back streets and alleys, the places I would typically go to find a fresh bowl of steaming noodles or dumplings.  Although these are really remnants of the past in Hangzhou, they are alive with energy.  And it's interesting to note that like all streets in Hangzhou, they are tree-lined.  The Chinese have been at the street-tree planting thing for a long while.

City planners in Hangzhou  are the most determined group of tree enthusiasts I've ever come across.  The evidence surrounds you.  Rarely have I visited a city, anywhere in the world, that has lavished so much attention and care on the planting and maintenance of trees, both in parks and along streets and roads. 

Tree planting is not done haphazardly.  Instead planting areas for trees are large and well-designed.  The Chinese seem to be well-versed in the latest research on urban tree planting and landscape architecture.  Trees here won't suffer from lack of space as they grow.  The landscaping along the edges of streets was also impressive, and brought back memories of super-organized Singapore. 

You would be hard pressed to find a large American city that lavishes as much care on its trees and landscaping,  and universally uses such a high quality of materials in the construction of its streetscapes.

Below are some pictures of tree-lined streets in Hangzhou.

As I mention above, the city of Hangzhou pays close attention to the choice of materials it uses on new sidewalks and pedestrian streets.  Instead of poured concrete or asphalt, sidewalks and other pedestrian surfaces tend to be paved with carefully laid, high-quality paving stones.  The streets and landscaped areas are also edged with stone curbs.  It gives the city a classy feeling and a sense that it is being built for the long term.  Things may move fast in China, but that does not necessarily mean that things are done shoddily.  See some paving examples below. 

I noticed many urban greening innovations while in Hangzhou.  The city is doing its best to green areas that normally are barren and lifeless. 

At the right is an example of planters placed on top of the barrier along the edge of a highway bridge.  These planters are filled with flowering bushes, and include an irrigation system. 

Another typical eyesore that the Chinese manage to green are multi-level parking garages.  I saw planters placed along the edge of all levels of parking garages, where the cascade of plants and bushes camouflages the structure.  These parking garages were transformed from urban blight to vertical gardens that can be green centerpieces of their neighborhoods.  For years I've wondered why unsightly parking garages have to mar our cities.  There is a solution. 

When considering urban quality of life, it's impossible to leave out ease of mobility in and between cities.  China provides an excellent example of how good transport is planned and developed.  This country is investing heavily in public transportation, ranging from new subways to high-speed intercity trains.  It is arguably developing one of the world's most sophisticated transport systems, on par with countries such as Japan and Germany.   

Shanghai already has a very extensive (and still growing) modern subway system.  Hangzhou has built its first hyper-modern subway line, and has 6 more lines under construction or planned.  You can see an entrance to the metro and a shiny subway station platform in the two pictures below.     

In terms of intercity mobility, China has built the world's most extensive, and most heavily traveled, high-speed train network.  This has all come in only the last seven years.  There are now over 12,000 kilometers of these elevated train lines, and the network is expected to grow 50% by 2015.  I took a high-speed train from Hangzhou to Shanghai, leaving from the shiny, new Hangzhou East Train Station, pictured above.  The experience was not very different from taking a shinkansen (bullet train) in Japan, although the Chinese have still not cultivated polite queuing behavior.  This is one of the interesting contrasts you find in China - strikingly modern infrastructure but a civic culture still catching up. 

An unpleasant reality of life in Chinese cities, Hangzhou being no exception, is very bad air quality.  Heavy industry and coal-fired power plants make the air hazy and unhealthy to breathe.  I didn't really notice the bad air in Hangzhou or Shanghai, but I was aghast at the haze I saw when I left Hangzhou by train.  A heavy smog hangs over the countryside.  Some of this may have simply been water vapor evaporating from rice paddies, but it's obvious that the country has an air-quality crisis on its hands. 

The rapidly growing numbers of automobiles on Chinese roads (more cars are sold in China than in any other country) is exacerbating this air pollution problem.  Some cities are trying to limit car ownership through license plate lotteries, and Hangzhou is considering this, as well.  But as the city is a center for auto manufacturing, strong limits are unlikely. 

A bright spot is the universal system of bike lanes on all major roads in Hangzhou.  Biking in this city is a pleasure as you are totally separated from automobile traffic on wide, well-paved bicycle lanes surrounded by lush green landscaping.  These lanes are at least double if not triple the width you would find in a city like Amsterdam.  There are separate traffic lights for bicycles and even covered shelters at intersections for bicyclists waiting in the rain or strong sun. 

Hangzhou also has the world's largest bicycle sharing system, with (as of January of last year) over 66,000 bicycles available at 2,700 stations.  The Citi Bike system in New York, by contrast, has about 6,000 bicycles. Hangzhou plans to extend the system to 175,000 bicycles by 2020.  You can see a bike-sharing station in the picture above. 

The most famous tourist attraction in Hangzhou is West Lake.  It's been a source of inspiration to Chinese artists and writers throughout China's history and historically an inspiration to gardeners even in Japan and Korea.  It's now a UNESCO World Heritage Site,

The temples, pagodas and gardens around West Lake make up a rare, ethereally enchanting place.  For me, the closest parallel to the otherworldly beauty of this area is the fringe of temples along the edges of Kyoto in Japan.

The rather vast area of picturesque landscape and mountains surrounding the lake (more than 8,000 acres) give Hangzhou a green heart and I think may be the inspiration for the well-tended greenery throughout the city. 

A special characteristic of Hangzhou, and a showcase of its horticultural genius, is the well-tended parks along its many canals.  These canal-hugging parks run all over the city and go on for kilometer after kilometer, offering a very quiet refuge from the noise and commotion of the city. 

I was amazed at how carefully designed and constructed these parks are. One day I rode my rented bicycle for hours following canal after canal.  I filmed a video of my ride along one canal, and you can see this below. 

Please note a few things about the video before taking the plunge.  It was taken while riding a bicycle and is rather shaky.  This can make for a nausea-inducing experience (maybe best not to watch it in full-screen mode).  The bicycle I rented had extremely squeaky brakes, and you can hear these throughout the recording.  Finally, I was suffering from a nasty sore throat and am clearing my throat often while I speak.  In its defense, the video gives you a great picture of a part of Hangzhou that most tourists never see.

As usual, I end with a glimpse of a few of the tasty meals I had in Hangzhou.  China is a country with a serious food culture.  Hangzhou is filled with restaurants of all kinds and levels and I must say the food is absolutely delicious.  Somehow I hadn't expected the food here to be so good.  But it was mouthwateringly tasty.

On the left, a local restaurant with scrumptuous food and a convivial atmosphere.  The men at the left really wanted to talk, although they could speak very little English.  We enjoyed a few beers together.  My friend Ting, who guided me through the culinary scene in Hangzhou, is a bit camera shy but joined me for many of my most memorable meals.  I want to extend my thanks here to Ting and the many other Chinese people who welcomed me and spoke with me about urban greening in Hangzhou.


Below are pictures of a few simple dishes, all very inexpensive, but very delicious. 

While living in Berlin last summer I conceived of a research project that would take me across Asia, a continent that I spent a good part of my life in, but about which I have never written.  This was a large gap in my research about the 'green divide' and I decided to revisit some representative cities in the Middle East, South Asia and East Asia. 

Istanbul struck me as an ideal starting point from Berlin.  It's a city that straddles both Europe and Asia, combines both European and non-European characteristics, and is a global megacity where I was sure I could learn a lot.  It turned out to be an unexpectedly good choice that changed my thinking about developing world cities on many fronts. 

As with most every other city I've been to, Istanbul is a place that tourist attractions do not define or explain.  My previous short visit to the city followed the typical tourist itinerary of a few days in the old city, visiting the Egyptian Bazaar and nearby mosques, drinking tea and smoking the hookah.  This time around I rented an apartment for a month in the centrally located Beyoglu neighborhood, the historically European (ethnically and culturally) enclave of Istanbul.  It made an ideal base for exploring the far reaches of the city as this area, including Taksim Square, is the major hub of much of the city's transit.   My goal for the month was to meet as many people involved in urban studies and planning (academics, activists, government officials), and visit as many neighborhoods and parts of the city, as I could in a month.  Very quickly a new identity emerged from the mists of the tourist fog and I realized that I'd been hostage to an image of the country and city quite at odds with reality

Istanbul is a a huge, modern Mediterranean city that has more in common with Rome than with Cairo or other Middle Eastern cities.  It is an elegant, hilly city surrounded by the Sea of Marmara, the Bosporus and the Black Sea.  Water is rarely far away.  Maybe most surprisingly, it is enveloped in expansive green forests like you might expect to see around some cities in Central Europe.  Few cities in the world have as much forest within their borders as Istanbul (although this forest is shrinking).  I would never have imagined it. 

Below on the left is a map of the Balkans, including the region around Istanbul.  Istanbul really is a European city.  On the right: a closer view of the Istanbul region.  The city is perched along the Bosporus, which connects the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara.  It's easy to see its strategic historical position with control of movement between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, and between Europe and Asia.

In addition to it's surprisingly green environs, Istanbul also surprised me with a higher level of organization and quality of infrastructure, including parks, than most other cities at this income level.  Mexico City or Sao Paolo (cities with a similar GDP per head), are far behind, both in terms of the quality of their streets and other public infrastructure.  Istanbul just looks far more developed and livable than cities in many of Turkey's economic peers.  As I talked with people about this, an explanation emerged:  the city has an ancient urban culture and has been a part of European history for thousands of years.  Istanbulites take pride in the central city and the city invests to keep it livable and attractive.  I believe another part of the explanation for the feeling of organization and well-being lies in the relatively low income inequality in Turkey.  Istanbul is certainly a city of contrasts.  Impressively wealthy areas line the waterfront contrasting with areas of poverty further inland.  But with a GINI coefficient quite a bit lower than Mexico's or Brazil's, the contrasts are not as extreme and there seem to be relatively few parts of the population totally left behind by Turkey's strong economic growth. 

As delighted as I was with Istanbul, any city of this size has problems, and Istanbul has most problems typical of large urban areas.  Two things in particular, however, conspire to diminish the quality of life here:  the city's high population density and its growing dependence on the automobile. 

Istanbul's population density is readily apparent, as much of its large population is squeezed into neighborhoods along the coastline.  City neighborhoods tend to have multistory apartment blocks lining narrow streets.  And with a rapidly growing number of cars, these streets are overtaxed and bogged down with traffic for much of the day. 

The city is complicit in this expansion of automobile transport.  Its investments in bigger roads encourages more car usage, and comes at the expense of open spaces and forests. The automobile-traffic clogged streets hinder movement in buses, by far the most common form of public transport in Istanbul.  While there is one bus rapid transit line in the city (with dedicated lanes not shared with cars), it is not well integrated with the rest of the city's transport infrastructure and is itself overcrowded. 

The rapid growth of the city over the last decades, encouraged by expanded automobile infrastructure, has led to a massive loss in green cover over the last 35 years.  The pictures below, courtesy of an academic researcher in Istanbul, show how the city's (and region's) forest cover has dramatically shrunk since 1977.

The reliance on the automobile in this densely populated city has not only led to a dramatic decline in forest cover, but has distorted the structure of neighborhoods.  In a city where streets and sidewalks make up a large percentage of available public space (there are not many parks in central areas), city sidewalks are often almost comically marginalized to make space for cars and car parking.  The images below show some typically vestigial sidewalks in Istanbul providing practically no room for pedestrians to walk.  This situation is often aggravated with the most confounding design and placement of bus stop shelters which totally block the sidewalk and force pedestrians to enter the busy street to pass. 

But as I write above, Istanbul strikes me as a highly organized, efficiently managed city.  Everywhere I looked I noted impressive infrastructure improvements, ranging from new subways and bridges to expansive new parklands along the waterfront.  The streetscapes themselves are being renewed with better sidewalks and newly laid brick streets.  .  There is a certain amount of dissatisfaction among many groups with the ruling party's conservative policies in Turkey, but it's hard to deny this government's success in making massive improvements to the physical structure of Istanbul.  In a city growing and evolving as rapidly as Istanbul, mistakes are naturally being made.  I will go into some of these further below.  But first, I share some pictures below of newly redesigned streets with protected sidewalks and carefully laid pavement bricks and stones.  These new streets are not the exception in Istanbul, but are becoming the rule. 

The city is also managing to plant trees in the sorts of narrow streets that typically remain treeless elsewhere.  In cities around the world urban planners tell me that there is no place to plant trees in narrow streets like those found in many poor districts (particularly informal neighborhoods).  But Istanbul provides a great model for what can be done. The pictures below come from several different neighborhoods in the city.  . 

Trees on streets provide many benefits, but they don't transform streets into areas where children can play safely and where people can spend leisurely afternoons away from the crowds and noise of the city.  Accessible parks are an essential part of the good life in any city, and this is an area where Istanbul has traditionally lagged.  The current administration recognized this shortcoming of the city and has embarked on an ambitious park-building program the scale of which I've seen nowhere other than China.  Vast areas of the city's shoreline, areas along highways, and significant portions of any new development are now being devoted to parkland and green spaces.  Even crowded, poor neighborhoods are getting new small parks.  I'm not exaggerating to say the developments are remarkable and impressive.  Detractors may say that these parks are cosmetic cover ups or used to direct attention away from land grabs elsewhere. But from what I could see, no matter the government's intentions, these are real parks used by large numbers of people.  Below are some images of Istanbul's well-tended parks and green spaces.

Where the city may be failing in its modernization and upgrading efforts is in the poorest parts of the city, informal settlements known as gecekondu ('geh-jay-kondoo'). This terms means something like 'built overnight' in Turkish.


Gecekondu are found throughout and all around Istanbul.  I visited several, but in this section will write about the gecekondu I encountered in the Tuzla district. 

A position I had rigidly maintained for years was that the 'Green Divide' (the unequal distribution of urban trees and green space in favor of the wealthy) uniformly exists across cities around the world.  Before coming to Istanbul, as I discussed my upcoming research with academics here, I was typically confronted with disagreement on this thesis.  I assumed that there was some communication problem, as many Turkish academics are not accustomed to using English.  How could it be that the poor would have street trees and green spaces while those of higher economic classes didn't?  This went against everything I had witnessed in urban Latin America, Africa and even the United States.  But in Istanbul the poorest really DO have more green, as you can see in the pictures below. 

Sadly, the somehow charming, green gecekondu settlements are under threat and are being dismantled, often replaced with soulless high-rise apartment blocks totally set apart from nature and dislocated from the pre-existing social fabric.  It's as if the Turks had learned nothing from decades of misguided urban redevelopment in Europe and North America. 

In Tuzla I saw widespread destruction of homes, especially along major streets.  I wondered what had become of the families who had built their Istanbul lives here.  There was no indication of what would follow this demolition, but with the rapid growth of this city, I imagine that cleared areas along wide thoroughfares would be converted to a mix of high-rise commercial and residential use. 

As a gecekondu neighborhood develops, population density increases and the settlements gradually take on the dense character of much of the rest of the city.  Trees and small garden plots disappear, and the buildings become taller and taller.  In some cases, gecekondu are destroyed to make way for highrise developments like those pictured below.  They seem like human warehouses to me.    You can see a couple of examples in Tuzla below. 

A feature of Istanbul that sets it apart from many other cities is its countless beautiful staircases, which connect neighborhoods and bring people up into the hills of the city, or down to the sea. 

The most wonderful thing about the staircases is that there are, of course, no cars.  They are in fact a model for what the streets of Istanbul could be like if they were pedestrianized. 

Staircases provide much needed, car-free public space in the city, and I would always see people sitting on these city staircases, especially in the evenings.  Often large groups gather here, enjoying a beer and sometimes even a barbecue while taking in the view..  

Below are a few shots of some staircases I climbed. 

People make all the difference.  My productive time in Istanbul was made possible by the dozens of extremely kind and generous Turks I met.  I don't believe I've ever met such a universally giving and hospitable group of people in all my travels.  `

A small sampling of the wonderful people who helped me in my research and who often became friends. 

And as usually, I include some pictures of the wonderful Turkish food I enjoyed. 

As I've written earlier, Berlin is a uniquely green city - without a doubt one of the greenest large cities in the world.  This green reality has arisen through a long history of enlightened city planning, high level urban ecological understanding and, rather perversely, the incredible destruction of the Second World War and the city's subsequent political division.  In this posting I will write about a particularly German notion of urban green space, one that is occupying a more and more central role in the green identity of Berlin and that has arisen from Berlin's unique attributes and history.  I will start with a bit of a history. 

At the end of World War II Berlin found itself in an odd situation.  It was a divided city, ultimately between an East German controlled East and a West German controlled West.  This division separated the city not only politically, but also in terms of ecological study and practice.  The universities and practitioners in the western part of the city gradually became more and more detached from those in the eastern part, especially after the wall went up.  What's more, with the erection of the wall and strict travel restrictions, ecologists in the West were deprived of access to Berlin's green hinterland, the countryside surrounding Berlin, their traditional area of research.  This left ecologists and natural scientists with a greatly restricted area for research and ultimately redirected a group of them to the variety of open spaces within the city itself that supported nature.  Berlin had a large number of new habitats for these researchers to examine:  large tracts of empty land left over from destroyed buildings (rubble fields, really) and abandoned industrial infrastructure which were gradually being recolonized by vegetation and wildlife.

To learn about this 'new' object of ecological study, I paid a visit to Dr. Ingo Kowarik, a warm and welcoming ecology professor at Berlin's venerable Technical University, TU. I visited him at his office in the Ecological Institute of the university in the upper-class Berlin district of Steglitz.  The physical appearance of the Institute, I must say, embodies much of the charm that characterizes Berlin itself today.  It is not a shiny, meticulously maintained facility, but instead a lovely old, somewhat timeworn former villa.  The gardens around the villa also reflect the condition of much of Berlin's green space.  There are no manicured gardens, but simply an un-fussily managed yard with lawns, bushes, trees and a few flowers.  It seems to benefit from a kind of benign neglect that gives it a cozy and welcoming feeling,  Berliners today seem to have a view of urban nature not as something pristine and manicured but instead a bit more messy and accessible, I think.

Dr. Kowarik acquainted me with the details of the early history of the novel urban ecosystems that have arisen on rubble fields and old industrial sites, calling them collectively 'Nature of the Fourth Kind.'  This term positions these ecosystems in a conceptual framework devised by Dr. Kowarik.  The framework contains four types of urban ecosystems and ranges from "Nature of the First Type' to 'Nature of the Fourth Type' as outlined in the chart above.  The lower the classification number, the more 'wild' and similar an ecosystem is to the region's original, pre-human ecosystem.

An excellent example of 'Nature of the Fourth Type' and its integration into Berlin's green infrastructure is the Natur-Park Südegelände.  This park has been developed on the site of a huge abandoned railyard, previously the largest in the city.  After the war and the division of the Berlin, the yard fell into disuse.  Over time vegetation grew on what had once been a very inhospitable surface of gravel, cement, and rail ties.  A whole ecosystem, including grasslands and groves of trees, evolved and was discovered by local environmentalist who lobbied for the site to be protected.  They won their battle, and today this popular park, full of biodiversity, is one of a handful of 4th Nature protected areas in the city.  More parks of this type are now planned, including one on the area of what used to be the Nordbahnhof, the North Train Station. Some may see a similarity between 4th Nature parks and the High Line Park in Manhattan.  The difference is that the vegetation in 4th Nature parks sprung up naturally, without direct human involvement.  It evolved on its own, creating an ecosystem over decades.   

Below are some pictures from the Natur-Park Südegelände.

A key lesson from my ongoing research project in many cities around the world is the incredible difference helpful local contacts make in understanding complex phenomenon, such as the urban environment.  A fine example is the ecologist Dr. Gottfried Wiedenmann who works at the Natur-Park Südegelände (see picture at left).  Dr. Wiedenmann generously gave me time and shared his deep knowledge of the history of Berlin's ecology and its 4th Nature sites.  It transformed my thinking about this topic.  It also reinforced my belief in the underlying strength and depth of Berlin's network of urban greening specialists.  

The lessons of 4th Nature parks for rust-belt cities in the US, and other declining industrial cities, are great.  Berlin makes me think a lot about Detroit (which in some ways resembles Berlin after the war), and I imagine there must be a huge potential for 4th Nature parks in that city. 

More sharing of best practices like this are required throughout the world, but especially in the developing world where cities have limited space and resources.  4th Nature parks use abandoned land that is often unsuited for other types of development and are relatively inexpensive to develop and maintain.  This is just one great innovation that I've learned about in Germany.