Building a global forum for public space

The Biennial of Public Space is an international forum for knowledge sharing, capacity building and advocacy for public space guidelines globally. Every two years it gathers urban experts from academia, civil society, private sector, local government and international organisations for the only existing summit entirely dedicated to public space.

After the Millennium Development Goals, it was evident that many of the goals that had not been met within the timeframe were related to urban issues, such as sanitation and adequate housing. Therefore, in the negotiations that preceded the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, there was a growing global understanding for the need of a fully urban goal. At the same time, groups of researchers and planners, connected many of the current challenges to the provision and quality of public services and public spaces. However, advocators for a SDG particularly targeting public space would need to come together to highlight the importance of shredding significant global light on the commons in our cities. To do so, the Biennial of Public Space was born.

A milestone for the Biennial of Public Space became the articulation of SDG 11 in the 2030 Agenda, and particularly the formulation of target 11.7: By 2030, provide universal access to safe, inclusive and accessible, green and public spaces, particularly for women and children, older persons and persons with disabilities. Further, the adoption of the New Urban Agenda feature the importance of good quality urban public space to ensure sustainable urban planning, design and development. However, global knowledge and guidelines were limited in this new field of international policy development. Building on the earlier work of the Biennale in drafting a global Charter of Public Space, together with UN- Habitat a Public Space Toolkit was developed to support the practice of public space planning, design, development, and management.

The principles in the charter have proved valuable with particular reference to; the prospect of public spaces to good quality lives of urban dwellers; the improvement of neglected spaces; the value of temporary interventions; and the importance of urban public art. The forum proceeded to produce international key messages and guidelines as support for implementing actors on the potential, provision, development and maintenance of public space that could be applied globally. Some of the key principles highlight that public space cuts across many sectoral issues and is a useful platform to address many development concerns, that public space must be regarded as a basic service just like roads, water and electricity and that master planning should include public space as a key structuring element of the city. It also underlines that in order to provide “universal access for all”to the public space, will require a special focus on marginalized groups.