PLANNING AS A CRITIQUE 1

PLANNING AS A CRITIQUE1 TIIT REMM urban semiotician

Critique can be regarded as cultural critique and interpreting a work of art after the fact, characterised by given consideration to a given work that appears complete, yet also by the critic’s subjective choices in defining the work and putting it into context. The latter are closely linked to a third element – a critical and assessing attitude that opens the starting point of the work. On the other hand, creating a work of art is a critical action in itself, which reveals the creator, the work and the world and assumes a position. Analysis of spatial planning and public space is also cultural critique, however, planning itself is also a form of critique. Cultural critique is a part of culture and also part of contemplating and studying it; urban space critique, in turn, is a part of urban space culture, i.e. a critical participation in engaging the local environment (in addition to everyday activities and depictions) and also the reflective foundation of this relationship. Urban space critique is also an outlet and foundation of the theory of urban space (especially in the case of so-called critical theory). However, critique is not simply said about culture, it is also an integral part of space as a field of culture. In addition to cultural critique as a production of texts, it also constitutes socio-cultural critique in a broader sense. The history of architecture and urban planning is written as the story of outstanding social critiques, however, spatial planning is functioning as critical practice already at its most elementary level. In the consideration and functioning of public space, there are two central, overlapping but opposite processes – creating and using, even though the use of space is the creation of space and creation is the use of space. Both have their ideological and functional starting points, influences and constructions, which can be critically acknowledged and included in the dialogues of spatial planning. Like other forms of critique, dealing with spatial issues takes the existing situation as its starting point. The latter is by no means a ‘work of art’ that exists on its own, instead it is defined along with planning. It is a location; opportunities, needs and problems in someone’s view within the context of an integrated world view. In the multitude of circumstances and relevant subject, the planner creates a comprehensive situation to engage. From a perspective chosen by his or her preference, the planner asks what is the situation (possibilities, problems, needs, conditions, limitations), what is important about it and how to consider it. Diversity in planning and urban theories largely stems from the selective highlighting of one or other dominant in the multidimensional nature of the situation. Each proposed spatial design originates from a notional world with its problems, needs, logical structure and functional links 1

Remm, Tiit (2015). Planning as a critique. Välieluruumi ajakiri Õu, 9, 49−53.

and can therefore be, in best cases, considered attractive from the outside, but not entirely understood in the same way. Thus, planning or a project in a narrower sense (documents, drawings, the process) is mediation – it could also be said, the translation of one Utopian idea floating in its own juice into the concepts and values of another world. The central question here is on what level and by which means can common ground between different parties be found – a common vision of the space being created, which is still interpreted differently, a common understanding of problems, needs or values for assessing the shape and possibilities of the space. This is why the critical analysis of the worlds of participants could be what helps to reach a conclusion that is not merely mediation but a creative dialogue. Therefore, the planner or other author of spatial designs is a mediator – not the person drawing up a commission or presenting arguments, but a person who sees the different definitions of reality of the parties and the needs stemming from them and can present them and compare them and also present his or her own ideas based on the paradigm of planning theory and personal views, which can be used as a basis for consecutive layers (problems, goals, solutions, agreements, etc). At the same time, the planner can choose (at least to some extent) a planning theory or rather a planning method. In other words, he or she can choose the object and manner of critique. Naturally, this is just one case in the broader line of social dialogues. What is special is that public space can be both a being that entails possibilities and a being that can be divided, through which to divide starting points. The instruments for presenting and forming a plan, like drawings, descriptions, models and rules, on the other hand, are tools of dialogue – symbolic instruments for rephrasing the matters of closed worlds, that is to say, to make them understandable and connectable for others. Since these tools cannot be used for presenting a universal truth about public space, their value lies in the fact that they can be used to present what is in some way for someone – because a physical space is quite different for temporary users, local residents, owners, developers, officials, designers. This way, various tools can be used to present how space exists for different people and also to demonstrate how the designs still being planned affect different parties, to ‘mediate in advance’. In addition to grasping the entirety of the plan, it is also important to see the partialness of its functioning – because the use and the contemplation of space is always partial and at the same time, complete in its limited moment. A regional concept or vision competition that welcomes all participants of different backgrounds, therefore, gives an idea of the diversity of the region and the cohesion and disruptions in how it functions. Planning as the critique (in the sense of the critique of the outdoors, communities as well as ideologies) functions on various levels, a relevant example could be made with the trio from Tartu, connected both through space and persons: the general plan of

the city centre, the detailed plan of the bus terminal and the vision competition for the Annelinn district.1 1. The largest prefabricated housing area from the Soviet era in Tartu. The plan for the centre of Tartu has been based on a situation where the visions of the centre’s development have become outdated, yet the detailed plans demand decisions that are hindered by the inability to relate to the future. Instead of promptly drawing up the plan after a quick makeover, a long process lasting several years has invited various local and remote groups to participate and through them (apart from discussing details), it has included various basic views of the essence of the region both in the form of the worlds of actual participants as well as theoretical constructions as possible developments and needs. The residents, entrepreneurs and road users do not differ in their needs or preferences in terms of urban functions and design, but in the logic and basis by which they connect them – that should be the basis of the logic that helps us understand how the city centre functions and how to organise the complicated logic of the group of needs and possibilities. The process that closely connects various needs may result in a specified plan, but it happens without any serious critique or surprises. At the same time, a founding text of space and world view has been created, and its central function turns out to be to support communal constancy. In the case of the detailed plan of the Tartu bus terminal (which admittedly involves conflicts that are more personal and related to recent history), the opposing starting points of the parties of the dispute become apparent. A critical view of the current situation is common, but when the solutions are conflicting in the assessments and models of, for example, traffic experts, there is an even weaker link in the assessments they are based on: the bus terminal, the Tasku centre, the Sadama neighbourhood, the city centre… For whom and for what and why at all? This way, the fundamental social critique most strongly manifests itself in the specific case of a confined outdoor space and not so much in the large-scale ideological shaping of urban space. If you take the vision competition of Annelinn, aimed at open participation, as region-based, you would expect to see the entire richness of ways of understanding Annelinn. Every vision, as a precondition, presents a critique that opens and assesses the region. The basis of the proposed solutions is seeing the problems or opportunities, which, in turn, is based on an understanding of the region’s essence in itself or in a spatial, temporal, cultural or social context. Yet the competition submissions reveal that the starting task presented quite a defined object (the socalled pedestrian arc and rays) and a dominating understanding of the essence, problems and solutions of the region, which could be drawn out predominantly in the form of landscape architecture. Yet, a variation in the functional essence of Annelinn as a space of pedestrians (highlighted among all other aspects of the region) can be seen (for example, according to traffic, events, meetings, regular activities and observation). For a relatively compact collection of critique, the focus on pedestrians

could seem to solve all problems, including the usability of space, maintenance, safety, traffic, communal identity, communication and mental health, recreational activities and economic growth. However, the cohesiveness of a world created from a single viewpoint ignores a large part of local diversity – including problems – to deal with them separately, for example, in the planning of parking, which one of the winning entries directly engages. In this, one of the problems in the cohesiveness of the region’s liveliness is the gap between how pedestrians and drivers experience space, to the point where the child coming home from school by foot and the parent driving home from work do not inhabit the same Annelinn in the cognitive sense and they have no idea where the other could be before reaching the front door – unless the parent has grown up in Annelinn, since the slides (the slippery lanes that appear when pavements freeze over) have remained the same. It is precisely these personal relations with the environment that point to the essence of the critique of the outdoors – to enlighten, yet also to promote the ways of relating to the environment that originate from specific viewpoints. Planning, in turn, is a special moment in creating an environment and meanings, where the numerous relations of people and the environment meet. This multidimensionality gives rise to a moment especially rich in meanings, where the material, practical, symbolic and ideological nature of outdoor space and its reflection in culture engage – sometimes in conflict, sometimes in harmony – various parties, their (power) relations, world views and ideas of the future and the past, visions of the processes and situations related to design. Yet planning is only one of those moments when engaging the outdoor – the creation of rich meanings and often the ‘world of its own’ lies both on the pages of articles on the outdoors and art as well as in their everyday use.