031

Title:

Alternative Mobilities and the Future of the Street

Discipline: Urban Systems

Presenter:

Esther Zipori

Abstract:

This poster presentation provides a theoretical review of the transformation of the urban street from a public social space to the automobile space we are familiar with today in North American cities. It is a shortened review of my dissertation proposal to be presented in Spring 2020 at the Urban Systems Department at HCAD. The focus of this study is the street as a space that is distinguishable from the ‘traditional’ studies of urban public space, which tend to focus on the park, the public plaza, or the square. In the context of this study, the street is not a word of description but a place of interchanging flows of people, infrastructures, and objects. By looking at how alternative mobility futures are being conceived, planned, and speculated, as well as how they are introduced to the public (the street), I seek to advance the understanding of what the future of streets might become. A brief review of twentieth and twenty-first-century urbanism and theoretical discourse provides the broader context of the socio-technical changes in urban built form in the United States. Lastly, a discussion is provided on the practices of studying public space from the perspectives of various street users. The study is then organized through two lenses, the lens of mobilities and the lens of the future. Lastly, a survey of alternative mobilities projects and policies is provided that will be studied after the approval of the full proposal.

Author(s):

Esther Zipori

Funding Acknowledgements:

nan