21/05/2020
How do we move forward? Urbanism is living locally.
Living locally means consciously deciding to live and work within a tighter area, instead of traveling long distances back and forth between home and work. Even as we move around our neighborhoods more frequently, the shorter distances make our lives more sustainable. We use less fuel and energy. We walk more and bike more. Longer journeys are less frequent, with higher levels of mass-transit use. Living locally creates more meaningful relationships with neighbors, fostering a better sense of community. The following are ways to make it work:
1. Lift restrictions, allow densification and a mix of uses but guide the free market.
The city blocks of Paris and New York grew from rows of single-family homes. Landowners built denser to meet demand, and the lenient land-use restrictions allowed the evolution of these places into the diverse and vibrant neighborhoods of these cities.
Our subdivision and village gates should not be barriers against mixed land use. They should merely define the porch of our communities, and not keep out the activities that make neighborhoods dynamic and livable. Burgeoning urban villages like BF Parañaque used to be single-use bedroom communities, but as land-use restrictions were lifted, shops, services, and small businesses catering to the large residential catchment area became viable and self-sustaining. Some stores have even become unique destinations themselves, attracting visitors from outside their respective villages! These local businesses add character and contrast to the homogenized menu of fast-food outlets and stores found in our malls. Let’s learn from these examples.
Review village and subdivision land-use restrictions. As land values rise, properties within villages become too valuable for their original zone In the exclusive gated villages of Makati, San Juan, Pasig, Mandaluyong, and Alabang, single-family residences and villas will eventually become high-end luxuries hard for nuclear families to maintain, sell, or keep as rental assets. This phenomenon is happening even in what were once middle-class subdivisions, as original settler families move out of bedroom suburbs to be closer to schools and places of work, or to scale down as couples leave empty nests or age. This drives the conversion of villages into rental housing communities. In some cases, houses are illegally converted into dormitories for the waves of foreign (Korean and Chinese) expatriates coming here to learn English and work in the Philippines.
Identify strategic avenues and intersections inside subdivisions, which can serve as spines or nodes for possible commercialization. Allowed uses can include small businesses, food and beverage outlets, services, co-working facilities, and even remote office branches for bigger companies. The aim is to provide local choices for resident entrepreneurs, customers, and employees. Instead of commuting or driving out of the subdivision to transact business, walking or biking to the neighborhood grocer or café is an attractive alternative. Unpacking some of the concentration of commercial activity from our CBDs into the suburbs would automatically reduce the supply of the traffic flowing back and forth between them during the day.
As developers convert more post-industrial lands into residential towers, the more they exhaust land supply and exert pressure on the surrounding residential communities to densify and build taller. Like compounding interest, this force could grow compelling enough for residents of exclusive villages to vote in favor of the densification of their communities.
Of course, design, density, and scale restrictions will have to be reviewed, and buffer zones defined. This will require the work of dedicated village administrators and associations interfacing with the city and local government units. Many people will complain and say, “Not in my backyard!” But change is inevitable, and market forces will prevail in time.
Aerial view of the Coastal Road (Manila-Cavite Expressway). Coastal Mall (center), City of Dreams Manila (lower right), Bayview International Tower (Tower opposite the field), July 2014. From the Article of https://bluprint.onemega.com/euclidean-planning-is-dead-long-live-urbanism/ Photographed by Jimaggro via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0). Vibrance and saturation brought to -15.
