Stepping up to the challenge of better cities

As you may know by now, I have co-written a book called The Joy Experiments with writer and strategist Paul Kalbfleisch.?Part of the book’s purpose is to articulate why I and HIP Developments spend so much time on city building activities on top of our condo building projects. The other purpose is to help start a new conversation about what we need from cities at a time when we are dealing with social division as well as economic and political upheaval. What we are all feeling is the anti-social implications of social media and the pains of an economic system that isn’t working as well, or as fairly, as we know it must in order to create sustainable prosperity for the majority of people.?

In moments of massive change, we tend to reach out and lean on, as John Lennon put it in a song, “Whatever gets you thru the night”.?Often that bit of hope can be in the form of a wall to protect us or a bridge that can help us move to a better place. Interestingly, Lennon called the album that the song appears on “Walls and Bridges”.?Sometimes the happenstance of the creative mind can see very far into the future.?We really are at a point where so many decisions are a choice between social walls and bridges.?

In the past, the things that might have gotten us through the night would have been faith in big institutions such as religion, national identity or paternal like leaders. But today, large political and social organizations are very slow moving and as a result are sliding dangerously out of step with the rapid change caused by technology and global economies.

As we move away from these old and rigid institutions, society seems to be looking with fresh eyes at the potential role of our cities and the neighbourhoods where we live. People are starting to think smaller, seeking hope at a local level. They are putting more faith in the idea of “community”; an altruistic place where a person can feel connected to something of value and in control.?Another way of putting it is:

Community is the new faith.

This is great news, but the timing of this newfound interest in community is a little unfortunate.?For a very long time, the priorities of western society have slowly dismantled many “community” structures as part of an effort to find the most efficient way to achieve individual convenience and gratification at the price of collective good. Organized religion, as a social structure, once gave people a physical and social sense of belonging in their neighborhoods. That role has all but vanished from many of our lives. ?Throw into the mix the decline of Boy Scouts, Girl Guides, glee clubs, pool halls, business clubs, corner stores or even the absence of the mailman who knew everyone.?What foundational social structures has replaced these things???Sure, we sign our kids up for every sport under the sun, but that has become more of an exercise in checking off the boxes rather than a way of spending quality time with neighbours.?

Other communal structures such as government funded social services and public parks have also fallen into a slow decline as businesses became more global and less local.?As a result, a larger portion of local taxes is being shouldered by citizens. But let’s face it, we as citizens have tended to demand lower taxes at every turn while we focused more on investing in ever larger backyards and higher fences. ?

In many ways we’ve got the society we have asked for.?So, how are we doing??The good news is we have done all this without driving ourselves into an economic spiral. The bad news is we are in the grips of a social recession.

Putting it bluntly, we are lonelier than ever before!???

In 2014 Maclean’s Magazine reported that over 30% of Canadians said they felt disconnected from their communities.?More people are living alone than ever before and many people see friends less frequently than in the past.?

In 2018, a Cigna study in the United States revealed that loneliness was at “epidemic levels”.?

·?????Nearly half of Americans always or sometimes feel alone (46%) or left out (47%).

·?????54% said they always or sometimes feel that no one knows them well.

·?????Generation Z (adults ages 18-22) get the title “the loneliest generation”?and they feel they are in worse health than older generations.

So, we as a society are faced with a challenge.?We can’t just passively “place our faith” in the idea of community, we are going to have to quickly start putting that faith to work building the cities we desire because right now our social fabric is in decline. ?This will require us prioritizing common good at least at an equal level to individual convenience. As an example – let’s go back to talking about backyards, tall fences and private amenities.?Instead of prioritizing space that belongs only to ourselves - ?walled in and private - we need to think about the city as our backyard and the joy of engaging with people…even strangers.

?This common good approach also applies to transportation, public art, bike lanes, hospitals and affordable housing.?And this involves the “f” word.?Funding.?Priority and funding go hand in hand and a community worthy of our faith will require a shift in funding at a government, business and individual citizen level.?

?In The Joy Experiments we go deeper into these topics and offer the art of the possible.?I invite you to read the book. In the meantime, if you find yourself putting more and more faith into your community and the city you live then, I’d like to leave you with the following thoughts:

?Every faith has its congregation – a group of people united in a cause and belief.?That’s why I so strongly support the idea of collaborative city building that involves government, private sector and citizens.?

?Every faith has its identity – the stories of its uniqueness, values and priorities.?As cities become the focus of communal faith, the importance of an identity that we can all connect to will increase.

?Every faith has its congregational spaces – physical places where people can gather and feel that they belong.?Public spaces in cities have always provided this value and today it is needed more than ever.

?Every faith spurs action – especially the experimental kind where people are willing to try what has never been done before, knowing that even if things don’t turn out as planned there will be enough knowledge gained to encourage the next steps of faith in action.

?Every faith has leaders – people who have a way of encouraging people to set aside a slice of their personal advantage for something that pays dividends for everyone.?

Do you think that this moment of change is also a moment of opportunity to build cities differently? ?

The Joy Experiments is available for purchase at www.thejoyexperiments.com