By 2030, 60% of the world population will live in cities, which occupies just 3% of the Earth’s land[1]. As urbanization speeds up worldwide, cities provide spaces and environments for the living and growth of individuals with varied levels of incomes and different religions and ages. While making contributions to the prosperity of cities, these diverse population groups have the right to enjoy quality urban life. However, uneven and unequal resource allocation in cities has resulted in the conflicts among different groups. In United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the idea of building inclusive and sustainable city is underscored[2], which aims to create cities that attach equal importance to the contributions and demands of all population groups, because “everyone counts”[3].
Recent research on inclusive cities concludes that spatial inclusion, social inclusion, and economic inclusion are three factors to an inclusive city[3]. If interpreted from the perspective of landscape planning, spatial inclusion provides necessities and essential infrastructure and services for citizens; social inclusion focuses on guaranteeing the equal rights of every citizen, particularly the right to engage in the city’s decision-making process; and economic inclusion aims to give urban residents the opportunities to enjoy the benefits of the city’s economic growth. Based on the consensus of building inclusive cities, the Chinese government stresses in the National Plan on New Urbanization 2014–2020[4] that “people-first, fair and inclusive” is a fundamental principle in advancing new urbanization.
When examining individuals’ whole lifecycle, we have to admit that everyone would become the disadvantaged, whether in childhood, late adulthood or adversity. For every citizen, an inclusive city not only extends special care for the young, the senior, and other vulnerable groups, but also strengthens confidence of people of all ages for a better life via such special care, eventually towards a shared, prosperous, and bright future together. In the context of population aging and the new birth policy in China[5], it requires cities to guarantee vulnerable groups’ right to enjoy quality public services, particularly for the young and the elderly—this also mirrors the level of a city’s civilization and humanity. Uneven spatial development of a city significantly impacts on the life quality and health of the elderly and the young, because their daily life largely centers on home and within a limited walking distance. Restricted by their traveling abilities, children and seniors have less access to all sorts of urban services and resources unevenly scattered in the city. As a result, their life quality depends greatly on the services provided by the nearby facilities.
For vulnerable groups, an inclusive and friendly city means safe home, healthy environment, convenient transport facilities, harmonious neighbourhoods, inclusive public spaces, and equal rights to take part in community decision-making. To build inclusive cities and promote sustainable urban development, we need to put more efforts into creating more inclusive public spaces and engaging all citizens, especially the disadvantaged, in the design of urban public spaces.
In the practice of building inclusive cities, landscape architects should pay attention to two aspects. On the one hand, they need to learn about the varied demands and usage patterns of different population groups for public spaces. The understanding on people’ usage behaviours of urban spaces depends not only on landscape architects’ thorough observation, but also on extensive explorations of the motives behind such behaviours. On the other hand, they need to ensure the site users engaged into the decision-making on public spaces, and encourage different user groups to express their thoughts and expectations for site use. The task of landscape architects is to create quality urban spaces that maximize the service based on the delicate balance of the needs of all site users by their expertise. In this sense, the essence of creating inclusive urban space is to respond to the diversity and disparity of the behaviours and needs of all population groups, and to provide special amenities and aids for the disadvantaged, thereby sharing the benefits of urban development among all citizens.
參考文獻(xiàn)
[1] United Nations. (2020). Sustainable Development.
[2] United Nations. (2015). Goal 11 Sustainable Cities and Communities.
[3] The World Bank. (2020). Inclusive Cities.
[4] The State Council of the PRC. (2014). National New Urbanization Planning (2014–2020).
[5] National Bureau of Statistics. (2021). Main Data of the Seventh National Census.
本文引用格式 / PLEASE CITE THIS ARTICLE AS
Tang, P., & Dong, N. (2022). Everyone Counts—Creating Inclusive and Friendly Urban Spaces. Landscape Architecture Frontiers, 10(3), 8?11. https://doi.org/10.15302/J-LAF-1-010024
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