Inclusivity is a primary attribute of successful public spaces. The streets, plazas and squares, and parks and gardens are inherently democratic because they are open to everyone and equally accessible for all.

Inclusivity and democracy

Inclusivity is a primary attribute of successful public spaces. The streets, plazas and squares, and parks and gardens are inherently democratic because they are open to everyone and equally accessible for all. To exclude a section of society or a group of people is contrary to the idea of public space itself. The design of public spaces therefore depends greatly on the input of the people that occupy and use it and, as designers, listening is a crucial skill. We have anthropologists and other cultural experts as part of the team at Foster + Partners, who help us better integrate the needs and aspirations of people and communities into a design blueprint.

This is particularly evident in our large-scale urban projects in China. Amidst the impressive scale and speed of Chinese urban development, the smallness and slowness of daily life is often overlooked. Entire cities, metro systems and central business districts seemingly blossom overnight, often levelling villages and traditional communities in their wake. As planners, urban designers and architects, we must strive to reconcile the need for growth and development with the equally important prerequisite to preserve heritage and conserve communities. In rapidly changing cityscapes, nurturing the “neighbourliness of strangers”, to borrow French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas’s term, is imperative to social harmony.

To help its 11 million inhabitants move across the vast metropolis, the city of Wuhan in central China has rolled out 237 kilometres of metro lines in just 14 years. Comparing this to London’s 402-kilometre Tube network, which was built over a period of 155 years – the pace of urbanisation is staggering. This breakneck pace of development has turned large swathes of the urban fabric into an enmeshed construction site. In light of this, the city’s planners asked Foster + Partners to conduct a public realm study for one of the sites, identifying the best practice for stitching the urban fabric together and seamlessly combining the old with the new.

We talked extensively to the local community, observing the rhythms of everyday life, listening to oral histories, and compiling an inventory of needs from the locals to create an ethnographic analysis. The act of listening is the basis for all people-centred design and anthropological interviews are a vital part of truly understanding civic life. This provides invaluable cues for design. We interviewed locals aged six to 96 and compiled an inventory of design and programmatic interventions. For instance, we learnt that traditional wet markets providing fresh produce were disappearing, and hole-in-the-wall eateries specialising in the quintessentially Wuhanese breakfast, Guo Zao, and other affordable lunch options were also shutting down due to urban renewal. In response to the local appetite to revive street food, we designed a market park, lined with stalls that sells fresh produce and prepared food, creating a place to replenish and socialise. We also learnt that grandparents play a critical role in childcare during the week. However, their respective playgrounds and places to play Mahjong were geographically separated, so we created an Intergenerational Park. Here children can play within sight of their grandparents, creating a social arena that is greater than the sum of its parts.