Futures

Abstract

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the need for more adaptive and resilient forms of urban space. It has brought new interest in the potentials of temporary and tactical urbanism, and new parameters that shape it, including ‘social distancing’ requirements, unpredictable lockdowns and changes in regulations, a reduction in commuting and travel, and people working, socialising, exercising and shopping closer to home. Urban governments have sought to deploy and enable temporary and tactical urbanism to respond to sudden, unanticipated slowdowns in the economic and social life of cities, and to quickly create new spatial opportunities. Cities worldwide have recognised a specific opportunity to mitigate the decline in public life during the pandemic by repurposing street space for people. When the pandemic subsides, cities must decide what comes next. Are these tactical transformations a temporary change before a return to long-term masterplanning, strict regulation and car-dependent cities, or are they a harbinger of a more agile urban realm? Through the lens of these pandemic responses, the various threads of analysis introduced in this book are drawn together to speculate on the future of temporary and tactical urbanism. This discussion is organised around the five key matters of concern identified in Chapter 2: urban intensity, community engagement, innovation, resilience and place identity. The chapter critically examines the claimed public benefits and the fairness of a more agile ‘bottom-up’ urbanism and of more flexible, facilitative planning. It reflects on the core tension within temporary and tactical urbanism between democratic engagement and neoliberal capitalism.