Focusing on two cities that are exemplar for their urban regeneration, London and Barcelona, two public events will bring together urban professionals, academics and community activists to situate questions around temporality at the forefront of the research agenda on urban change. The first event, hosted by the Urban Lab and Urban Salon at University College London, on the 29th of November 2016 will discuss and reflect from a long term perspective on the regeneration of these respective cities and discuss: How do temporal considerations (investment cycles, deadlines, changing global and local politics) affect the planning and construction of buildings and cities? What kinds of times are fostered or eliminated in the landscape of urban regeneration projects? How do different temporal narratives, practices and ideologies converge or conflict to produce a particular sense of place? What is the relationship between neoliberal time and urban planning? Which lessons can be learned from the regeneration processes in both cities?
Building on the workshop in London, the one held on the 12th and 13th of December in Barcelona will hone into the neighbourhood of el Raval. Drawing on my 20 years of work on the urban transformation of el Raval we will focus on evaluating its regeneration process and, in particular, on how a diversity of everyday temporal practices interact, contest and align themselves with institutional times in urban regeneration projects. In particular we are interested in thinking through how different temporal attachments and uses of space developed by locals, new migrants and tourists frame, support or disrupt urban renewal processes and communal living. Do we need to conceptualise urban planning and urban citizenship in new ways? As Sandercock (2003) asks: “how can ‘we’ (all of us), in all our differences, be ‘at home’ in the multicultural and multi-ethnic cities of the 21st century?”
Each of the events will have a closed door event to allow for in depth discussion and a public event which will be life streamed, please click on the below London/Barcelona links to see the programme timings.
Please contact me if you’d like to take part in one of them or would like further information: [email protected]
RSVP: urbantimescapes.eventbrite.co.uk
Watch live: ucl.ac.uk/live
Barcelona
RSVP: [email protected]
Watch live: www.cccb.org