Playing around with streets

Fun, art and gleeful spontaneity in the streets feature in this delightful and inspiring 20 min talk. The playfulness here is not just in the streets but with the streets.

Ted Dewan at euroGel 2006 from Gel Conference on Vimeo.

The potential highlighted here for life in streets is in total and utter contrast with the automobile dependent landscapes in my post below.

Ted Dewan is the pioneer of 'road witching'. Towards the end of the video he makes some connections with David Engwicht's 'mental speed bumps'. David also promotes safety through intrigue and uncertainty. Ted's talk also mentions the emerging possibilities of Shared Space. All of this is about reclaiming at least some of our street space as public realm again. It is about treating streets as places not highways.

Do you think these ideas are relevant in the rest of the world, outside rich western cities? I think so.

Hat tip to the wonderful How We Drive blog.

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