15-Minute Cities – Edmonton’s bold plan for a sustainable net-zero city
Source: David Dodge · GREEN ENERGY FUTURES · | June 15, 2021
“The ‘15–minute city’ may be defined as an ideal geography where most human needs and many desires are located within a travel distance of 15 minutes.”
The idea of the 15-minute city was popularized by Mayor Anne Hildago of Paris who was apparently inspired by the French-Columbian scientist Carlos Moreno and later adopted by the C40 network of mega cities committed to addressing climate change.
Edmonton award-winning architect Shafraaz Kaba defines it more narrowly as “very simply it’s a place where you can get all of the immediate needs and amenities within a 15-minute walking distance of your home.”
Edmonton city planning engineer Howaida Hassan clarifies. “We’re not talking about 15-minute driving, you’re talking about 15-minute walking, biking, or taking transit to what you need to
The car as hero and villain
The car it turns out is both a hero and the main villain in the story of how we built sprawling, unsustainable metropolises dissected by extensive networks of roads that separate people in communities and people from many of the things they need or want.
We saw the car as an incredible invention, our ticket to freedom and we embraced it “wholeheartedly and built our cities around it,” says Hassan. “It’s a cautionary tale.”
The 15-minute city is not only part of the solution to urban sprawl and neighbhourhoods fractured by endless freeways that form Berlin walls between our communities. As it turns out it is also part of the recipe for building climate-resilient, more efficient and people-friendly cities.