“Jan Gehl might be the most famous architect that you’ve never heard of,” filmmaker Andreas Dalsgaard told a sold-out Frontline Club audience Tuesday evening 20 August, where he screened his latest project: The Human Scale.

The movie explores Gehl’s innovation in architecture and city planning over the last several decades, from his native Copenhagen to Chongqing, Dhaka, New York and Los Angeles, to name only a few places.  His re-shaping of urban life aims to accommodate the billions of people pouring into cities worldwide, yet just as importantly, to nurture the community, intimacy, spontaneity and local culture that he sees human nature craving.

Andreas M. Dalsgaard. Photo: Jim Treadway

In both the film and Q & A with Dalsgaard that followed, the contrast between the traditional modernist cities built in the 20th century and Gehl’s own re-conception of them was highlighted.

Traditional modernism, practiced by planners like New York’s Robert Moses and Paris’s Le Corbusier, featured high-rise buildings whose construction often razed old neighbourhoods, callously neglecting to regenerate the sense of community that they fostered.  Vehicle traffic was accommodated above all while pedestrian life, with the vitality and social fabric it created, began to fade.

Gehl, by contrast, has emphasised sensuousness and intimacy, reorienting spaces to bring people into the street where they are offered “little invitations” – to sit, walk, cycle, and engage in social and commercial activity that fits with local culture.

Much of his inspiration came from cities of centuries past: “we always did the old cities in 5 km/hr scale,” he says.  “That means that when you move at 5km/hr – walking – people are sort of squeezed a little bit together.  And it’s a very sensual and interesting world.  You can see all the details and colours, smells and acoustics.”

Dalsgaard particularly appreciated the sensitivity in Gehl’s approach:

“That to me is maybe the most interesting thing . . . they have the humble approach of going in and trying to understand the local context, understand how they work . . . and from there on, they try to find solutions.  And then afterwards, after things have been done, they also do post-evaluations, to understand:  did it actually work?  How did people use this space?  And I think it’s becoming something more and more common in architecture to actually do these things.  And not just build it and then it’s there, and ‘it’s a “piece of art” according to the architect, and everyone has to be happy.”

Above: Dalsgaard with Documentary Programmer Wotienke Vermeer; Dalsgaard introducing the screening

Dalsgaard continued:

“You can’t copy-paste [between cities] and you shouldn’t . . . . Because Scandinavia and Copenhagen is such a unique society model that is so hard to copy, because it’s so connected to culture and hundreds of years of societal development.  Like you can’t take democracy and just put it into Egypt and think everything’s going to be fine.  So the idea that you can just put a bike lane up in New York, or Dallas, Texas, and people are just going to happily jump on their bike – I don’t think it’s so easy.  Because there’s so many different layers and factors and things that have to work together.”

More information about The Human Scale can be found here, view the trailer:
[vimeo clip_id=”67638874″ width=”400″ height=”225″]

See Jan Gehl’s books here:  Cities for People and Life Between Buildings

By Nicole Hunt

The day after the Bahrain Grand Prix, 21 Bahraini activists, including hunger striker Abdulhadi al Khawaja, are due in court in Manama on Monday to hear the outcome of their appeal against life sentences handed down in June 2011 for conspiring to overthrow the government during last year’s protests. The decision to schedule the hearing after the Grand Prix was a controversial one, as al Khawaja’s deteriorating health two months into his hunger strike raised the very real possibility that he could die before the race took place. UK supporters said al Khawaja’s death would be a ‘stain on Bahrain’.

Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi is set to take up her seat in the Pyithu Hluttaw (House of Representatives), following a landslide victory by her National League for Democracy in 1 April by-elections, though there have been suggestions that NLD MPs will boycott the opening over an oath of allegiance that forces them to swear to safeguard the constitution. Suu Kyi’s parliamentary debut comes amid news that she may travel to the UK and Norway in June, where she would be able to see her grandchildren for the first time and finally pick up her Nobel Peace Prize, awarded in 1991.

The late Malawian President Bingu wu Mutharika, who died of a heart attack on 5 April, is laid to rest at his family farm in Thyolo. There is speculation that close ally Robert Mugabe and Sudanese President Omar al Bashir could be among attendees at the state funeral; Malawi came under fire from the International Criminal Court last year when it failed to arrest Bashir during a visit to the country for a regional summit. Bashir is wanted by the court for alleged war crimes in Sudan’s Darfur region.

All eyes stateside on Tuesday as a pre-trial hearing begins at Fort Meade, Maryland, for Private First Class Bradley Manning, who has been charged with a variety of offences, including aiding Al Qaeda, for his alleged role in leaking sensitive military material to WikiLeaks, among which was a video which later became WikiLeaks’ Collateral Murder film.

In New York, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is due to give the keynote speech at the Time 100 Gala Dinner, being held in honour of those named to Time’s 100 Most Influential People list on 18 April. In addition to Clinton and President Barack Obama, this year’s list also included the likes of Syrian President Bashar al Assad, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti and, of course, Kate and Pippa Middleton.

And, just for good measure, Republican primaries also take place in New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Delaware, and Connecticut, though now that everyone is agreed that Mitt Romney will win everything, it’s a less exciting race.

Why will journalists be fighting for a place at the Scottish Parliament’s Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee meeting on Wednesday? Because US property tycoon Donald Trump – who at one point pictured himself being the focus of those Republican primaries – is scheduled to appear to give evidence on government plans to build an offshore windfarm near his £1bn golf resort. In written evidence submitted ahead of his appearance, Trump said the plan would destroy Scotland’s countryside and coastline, and was tantamount to ‘committing financial suicide’ – a jibe that would have stung even more after the controversial Skintland issue of the Economist.

Charles Taylor’s nine-year war crimes case comes to a head on Thursday as the Special Court for Sierra Leone announces its verdict. While media coverage in the summer of 2010 suggested that perhaps Taylor was on trial for giving Naomi Campbell a diamond or two, the former Liberian President has actually been tried for crimes against humanity, violations of Article 3 of the Geneva Convention, and other serious violations of international humanitarian law – including, of course, allegedly giving Sierra Leonean rebels arms in exchange for so-called ‘blood diamonds’.

In a less groundbreaking trial – though one that receives headlines whether models are involved or not (and they frequently seem to be) – former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi returns to court in Milan on Friday to face charges of paying for underage sex. While the trial is now over a year old and coverage has been relegated to the Italian press for some time, recent hearings have reignited international interest as the lurid details of Berlusconi’s ‘bunga bunga’ parties have been disclosed.

EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Catherine Ashton begins a three day trip to Myanmar on Saturday, where she is scheduled to meet with government officials and opposition members (including Aung San Suu Kyi) and is expected to open the EU’s new embassy in Yangon. Her visit follows a meeting on Monday of EU foreign ministers, during which they are expected to relax sanctions on Myanmar in the wake of recent political improvements.

Guinea-Bissau had been scheduled to hold its presidential run-off vote on Sunday, following first round polls on 18 March, but as front-runner Carlos Gomes Junior was arrested as part of a military coup d’état on 12-13 April, the election will not be going ahead. The military junta has announced a two-year timeframe for new elections, which has been agreed by opposition parties but not Gomes’ ruling party.

Sunday also marks the 20th anniversary of the beginning of the Los Angeles riots, which left 53 people dead and over 2,000 in three days of violence following the acquittal, by an all-white jury, of four police officers who were videotaped beating black motorist Rodney King. The anniversary comes amid heightened racial tensions in the US following the delayed arrest of George Zimmerman for the murder of Trayvon Martin.