The Best Sidewalks in North America
Sidewalks are the foundation to making the social life of communities thrive. The best sidewalks share certain traits that make them welcoming, accessible, and socially active places.
Starting with Sidewalks is the Key to Creating the Social Life We Want
Sidewalks are the foundation to making the social life of communities thrive. The best sidewalks share certain traits that make them welcoming, accessible, and socially active places.
You can tell a great city by its corners. If the intersection is owned by the vehicles, it is a city for cars and traffic. If the community controls the intersections/corners, it is a city of neighborhoods.
At the street level in Brooklyn and Paris, buildings with small shops that spill into the public space and have a small plaza or double-loaded sidewalk thrive.
Imagine if the places where we live were shaped for, and from, our social lives, re-imagined to make it easy for us to gather, shop, have fun, eat together, and be around people different from us. we would collectively have an impact on the health of our planet.
Benches and seating are not objects; they are mirrors to our social behavior. We have seen it time and again that where there is seating, there is life.
Zurich shows us how people thrive in places that reflect their personality and different people need different settings. Diversity of seating is a necessary amenity.