City Lab Barcelona

City Lab Barcelona is a blog about experiments in urban planning. The word 'experiments' can take on different meanings, and here I use 'experiment' to refer to 'doing things that are new or different' but also, and perhaps more importantly, 'to test formal hypothesis about how cities work'. Experiments are always exciting because we do not know in advance what the outcome may be. In this sense, city planners are experimenting all the time, testing new ways of engaging with the public or new ways of promoting sustainability.

I have already made the case for formal urban experiments in the City Fix and academic writings such as here and here. This blog will be a place to extend my argument for urban experimentation. I also hope to engage in productive exchange and learn from others who are 'thinking experimentally'.

Right now, most urban experiments are informal and there are very few formal experiments. I hope (and expect) that in the next decade we will increasingly see more formal urban experiments that will help us learn about how cities work.

My laboratory for urban experimentation in the next decade will be the city of Barcelona (Catalonia, Spain). As a compact city, with a fascinating urban history and a progressive electorate, Barcelona has already developed several provocative urban experiments, making it the ideal city in which to push these issues further.

Inevitably, this blog will include commentary on urban experiments being developed by local city planners who are working on novel programs, street designs and new city configurations that aim to make this city more livable and healthier. What can we learn from these city experiments? If we experiment, what are we learning?

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Kids on Bikes: Bicibus in Barcelona's Eixample

Photo credit: Patricia Alvarez @patalgar The image of kids riding their bike to school in a big city is highly inspiring. Kids on bikes. Together in a group, going to school. Pedalling together along city streets, each on their own, yet together in unison. Yesterday we saw images of the first Bicibus in the Eixample grid of Barcelona (see here or here ). You can think of BiciBus as a sort of critical mass for kids going to school. This was not the first Bicibus in Barcelona, that honor goes to the group in Sarrià, and yet the first group in the Eixample somehow feels like a turning point. If we can insert kids on bikes here, we can do it anywhere. @BicibusEixmaple is an experiment that we should all be watching closely. Until recently, most #BiciBus projects have been in smaller towns, with bikable streets and distances that are amenable to cycling school commutes for kids and parents. In the suburbs, one can ...

The Gender Gap in Urban Cycling

What is the gender gap in urban cycling and why is it a key indicator for an equitable and just city? We know that improving cycling infrastructure has become an essential best practice in urban planning - to reduce carbon emissions, to improve health, to slow the city down, to reduce air and noise pollution. But does everyone benefit equally from new bike lanes? If the dominant users are white males, are city investments reinforcing gender inequality? How do we estimate the proportion of female cyclists and bike lane users in a city and what can be done to reduce gender differences? What would a cycling network look like if it were designed by and for women? What types of bike lanes are better for women? If planners were to incorporate a feminist perspective in the design of new cycling infrastructure, what would this look like? Thinking about gender equity in urban cycling policy and design opens a whole range of questions that urgently need to be addressed to create an e...

Superilla Barcelona

The city of Barcelona has made an important step in their journey to become a greener city . The Mayor Ada Colau and her team announced the winners of the Superilla Barcelona design competition for the street re-design of four streets in the Eixample grid: Consell de Cent, Compte Borrell, Rocafort and Girona - and the conversion of four vehicular intersection into green plazas. The protagonist of this transformation is Consell de Cent , a street 2.8 km in length aiming to be the pioneer green corridor, and the test be of ideas for a much wider transformation. With a budget of 37.8 million Euros, the immediate goal is to complete the green corridor on Consell de Cent and the four plazas by February 2023 - and yet the ambition is clearly wider. As illustrated by the name of the project, Superilla Barcelona , this is not to be a one-off city greening project, rather they are talking about a new urban model for Barcelona's Eixample district, and a full overhaul of what it f...

City Lab Barcelona

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