Urban Commons in Active Mobility Experiences

Abstract

Our study focuses on the challenges facing sustainable urban mobility in the megacity of Sao Paulo. We aim to explore the panorama of active mobility initiatives, proposing to analyze the relationship between urban commons and innovation in public services. We selected the Reduced Speed Zone and Complete Street initiatives, which aim to improve road safety conditions (public services focused on common infrastructure), active mobility and access to public transport, and may also potentially help to reduce noise levels, improve air quality (social dilemmas/common issues/negative externalities) and reduce greenhouse gas emissions (global commons). Based on an analytical model for interpreting innovation in services, considering competences and techniques originating from the provider (municipal government) and users (through civil society organizations), our findings identified innovations at a local level within infrastructure treatment for pedestrians. These public services were introduced in a participatory process and a collective re-appropriation of urban space. The projects contribute to the development of service provider competences, related to various interactions with civil society, resulting in a systemic view with regard to the uses, local dynamics and behavioral aspects of the users themselves. Service provider techniques may be both temporary and permanent intervention methodologies, besides methodologies for project impact evaluations. These techniques are associated with tactical urbanism as a technique for temporary urban interventions. User techniques were identified for application of the propensity score-matching method, which aims to evaluate the impacts of an instance of intervention through the comparison of groups, as well as through technical inspections and local interviews. The relationship management generated relational and organizational competences for civil society organizations. However, despite the advances indicated by the analyzed experiences of active mobility – highlighting the role of civil society organizations – and by some progress made in the regulatory framework, innovative practices have been restricted to the treatment of infrastructure for pedestrians, a change of speed limit for vehicles, and horizontal signaling to mark the perimeter of these areas. Therefore, there is a large-scale potential for the continued introduction of innovations regarding the improvement and scale gains of public services for pedestrian mobility, promoting participatory restructuring as a form of (re)appropriation of urban public spaces by its own users, improving the current negative externalities and social costs of urban mobility.