Chapter 15

City, Urbanism, Social Sustainability

and the Right to the City

Fermı́n Rodrı́guez Gutiérrez

Abstract This chapter presents an approach to the concept of right to the city
by proposing a methodology that assists the equitable city in improving the living
conditions of its inhabitants. The issue is addressed by presenting a path of research
and support to the territory of Asturias for territorial development that CeCodet
(Center of Cooperation and Territorial Development) of the University of Oviedo
has worked since the late 1990s. From the initial research and projects regarding the
citizens’ use of time in relation to the urban space, to the personal time management
difficulties with citizens’ mobility and the consequences in terms of social sustain-
ability, this chapter proposes a new process of research and action research for urban
planning that reconsiders the central relationship between civitas and urbs.

Keywords Just city • Right to the city • Sustainability

15.1 From Urbanism to Social Sustainability:

Methodological Considerations1

We try to apply the territorial perspective as an element to control the transformation

of the territories within a local scale, to help to establish transformation control as

1
That is assuming that the territory, the city, is a living organism, composed of its physical body and
of the inhabitants that provoke its transformation. It is, in other terms, the inhabited city. Because
of this reason, urban and territorial transformations are filtered through slow processes of study,
project and learning by its inhabitants. This is why the authors give a high value to the choice of
terms.
F. Rodrı́guez Gutiérrez ()
CeCodet, University of Oviedo, Mieres, Spain
e-mail: [email protected]

D. Henckel et al. (eds.), Space–Time Design of the Public City, 217

Urban and Landscape Perspectives 15, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6425-5 15,
© Springer ScienceCBusiness Media Dordrecht 2013
218 F. Rodrı́guez Gutiérrez

a systemic need through an active strategy that aims at sustainability as well as

through the development of the capabilities of the territory.
Using an ontogenetic perspective, we compare territory with a living being that
passes through different stages where the development of knowledge and its practice
is dynamically combined in a sequence of successive stages of learning. Territorial
agents participate and learn as isolated monads and as elements of a set which, at
the same time, affects the learning process of each of them.
We believe that the concept ‘territory’ is equivalent to ‘civitas’ (Rodrı́guez 2004).
Space and territory do not mean the same thing. There are many types of space; one
of them is the geodesic space, which carries different qualities understood as values,
such as freedom, security and autonomy, providing it with citizen density, which
prevents against risks of territorial transformations, contributing to social welfare.
The ‘civitas’ territory depends largely on the excellent work of participants. In this
sense, the amount of territory in a given space is variable. It depends on the excellent
action of the participants, the conditions of space, the interaction with other local
systems and random factors.
In the current context of our global civilization, transformation control is a
structural key for the system that needs a specific method of regulations, known
as governance, and focuses on the basic unit of development, which for us is the
local scale, in practical useful projects for people.
Here, we review some of these projects, applying the value of their contributions
to territorial development, which at the University of Oviedo has been developed
since 20 years ago in the Center of Cooperation and Territorial Development
(CeCodet) of the University of Oviedo (Rodrı́guez et al. 2001).
The territorial system is presented according to its scale in different sizes. The
basic scale is the local unit, which is embodied in the city as settlement of modern
civilization, which concentrates population and economic activity, and consumes
resources. The city is the most dynamic representation of the population system. Its
dynamism and size make it essential, to avoid structural crisis, the aspiration to its
government according to general interest. Here, we explore new fields of the urban
experience, such as those related to the management of people’s time, mobility in
the urban body and social sustainability.

15.2 The Temporal Cycle as a Management Tool

Time is a powerful tool for the management of the city. Time cycles are vital for
the establishment of systems of transport, management of public spaces and the
schedule of public and private services. In short, the adaption of the rhythms of the
city to the rhythms of the citizens, offering a comfort and easy use of the city, can
improve the quality of life.
The rhythms of the city are variable. They change depending on the temporal
cycle and the socio-economic status: a woman that works does not use her time
in the same way as an unemployed person, a student or a male worker. Nor is the
15 City, Urbanism, Social Sustainability and the Right to the City 219

rhythm of a citizen of ‘blue collar’ culture the same as that of a ‘white collar’ citizen.
As society changes and some social groups dominate over the others, the uses of the
city and their times change.
It is necessary to analyse the usage of time, the rhythms of the city, to understand
and govern it, looking for a qualitative step from ‘urbs’ to ‘civitas’.
The time of the city has been studied from a variety of approaches, which have
been enriched over the years. The first stage, with a gender perspective, was hosted
from feminist positions with the first women who joined the labour market in the
services sector and in managerial positions. They discovered that neither society nor
the city facilitated their lives. Its beginning took place in Italy, where women still
had a very traditional role.
Those first researches analyse the use of time at home and in public services. In
a second stage, the discussion extended to the world of work. Two models appear:
– The French-German, supported by trade unions and classic large companies who
propose the reduction of the workweek to 35 h and/or ruptures of the standardized
work cycles
– The Italian model, based on more flexible consultation on working hours,
encouraged by companies from the industrial districts
Analysis on the time of the city emerges in a third phase. It first appears in Italy
and extends across Europe. The time of the city presents itself as a new form of
global planning and regional/sectoral management, influencing the pursuit of life
quality through the city pulse, synchronizing its beat, to prevent collapses and
diseconomies. In some locations, citizens exchange their time through local time
offices or time banks.
The CeCodet of the University of Oviedo has been involved, since its foundation,
in these study approaches. Academic research, basic or applied, on the use of time
has been a constant of the centre. In 2002, in the framework of the Master in
Local Development, driven by CeCodet, some research papers focused on the use
of time: ‘Time and city in Gijón: A proposal to improve quality of life through the
organization of time’ or ‘Time and city in Avilés’. CeCodet worked in projects such
as ‘Times of women in the Caudal and Nalón mining regions’, ‘Women times in
Siero’ or ‘The uses of the time in Gijón: analysis from a gender perspective’.
CeCodet participated in the implementation of activities like ‘The night is
yours’ or ‘Open until dawn’, developed from the city councils of various Asturian
municipalities to provide healthy entertainment alternatives for young people.
CeCodet also participated, along with the Maison du Temps et de la Mobilité
of Belfort, is the programme ‘À travers la nuit’, which analysed nightlife in various
cities. Nightlife economy is often ignored, but it employs 20 % of the total, involving
economic sectors such as industry, hotels, transport, health or security forces. In
Asturias, 30 % of the employees work in shifts.
220 F. Rodrı́guez Gutiérrez

15.3 Mobility, Sustainability and Time

Mobility is a key element for the functioning of a city and its territory. It occupies
a growing part of the citizen’s time and is directly related to the use of their
time. Transport systems often alternate high use intensities with hours of weak or
medium use.
Contemporary cities, with their tendency to sprawl, do not facilitate sustainable
mobility. This results in is a seemingly dysfunctional city that places its own
efficiency at risk. Some authors point out that part of the relative decline of the
United States has to do with the economic and social costs of this model of city.
Spain is no stranger to this.
Public transport is a challenge, especially in middle or small size cities, where
their low intensity of use complicates their profitability. This is also the case in urban
areas not officially recognized, where transport networks are not well developed.
The Central Area of Asturias is an example.
The endless growth and displacement gives rise to social and environmental
sustainability problems. Cars neither fit in the city centres nor on the routes that
reach them. The increasing specialization of city districts, which dedicate urban
centres to tertiary activities and peripheries to housing and infrastructure, is a cause
of massive and highly concentrated radial mobility at certain times of the day. The
amount of underground parking facilities has grown. In Oviedo’s downtown, capital
of Asturias, there are 3,000 street parking spaces to accommodate approximately
90,000 cars that enter on a daily basis.
There is a noticeable increase in time dedicated to obligate mobility. The time
spent is proportional to the size of the city. Additionally, there is an increasing com-
plexity of trips in several stages and multimodal methods of transport. Numerous
studies have shown the correlation between both traffic congestion and stress and
automobile use and obesity, not to mention the inherent difficulties that this system
imposes to social relations.
In Spain, transport-related carbon dioxide gases that affect global warming have
increased by 57 % between 1990 and 2003. They now account for 28 % of total
emissions, which tended to decrease in recent years. All of the Spanish urban
areas assessed, except for Alicante and Navarra, exceed the limits of pollutant
agents. It is also significant to look at the consumption of soil. Urban areas such
as Madrid, Murcia and Alicante have seen approximately a 40 % increase in their
urbanized soil. Leisure mobility is increasingly important and more dependent on
the automobile.
In short, the rising need and consumption of sustainable mobility resources is
imperative – always in relation to the time spent on transport and the associated cost.
The application of sustainability criteria to growth and urban planning represents
a profound revision of growth models.
Since the end of the nineteenth century, low-density growth has been associated
with well-being and health, as a reaction to the overcrowding of the cities. Indeed,
studies conducted at that time showed clear correlations between mortality and
15 City, Urbanism, Social Sustainability and the Right to the City 221

population density. Therefore, the appropriate model to improve the conditions of

life in the city proposed lower density, large avenues and extensive green areas to
put people in contact with nature.
European hygienist models coincided at that time with philosophies advocated
by Thoureau and others as the ‘city beautiful’ movement. Proposals to build new
cities arose in Great Britain, and, in the case of Spain during the dictatorship of
Primo de Rivera and the second Spanish Republic, towns and satellite cities of cheap
houses were proposed and built. Similarly, Frank Lloyd Wright advocated the wide,
extensive cities, connected by highways, whose model was unveiled at the universal
exhibition of 1939, stunning the world. Other models, such as Le Corbusier’s,
propose the opening of free spaces in exchange for an increased building height.
The coincidence of these proposals with the diffusion of the automobile made it
possible to translate into reality a model of low density, open spaces, to extremes that
distort the original model. Both in Europe and in the United States, both extension
and height models were used, although with an almost total dominance of the
suburbia in America and more of a mix in Europe.
The sum of these city models and the patterns of evolution already shown lead
to a city model which, in the current state of application of technology, is inefficient
and probably not sustainable from an energetic or economic point of view.
The trends need to be reverted. Reduce distance and amount of travel. Make
them more efficient in both the urban and territorial scale. This will give back lost
time and improve the quality of life of inhabitants. In architecture, design and build
homes that save energy.
That is why there is an open debate on the model of city and its ideal density. The
Americans, at the beginning of the 1990s, began to question the sprawl that marked
their urban areas: the Smart City movement emerged, seeking a more compact
model. The debate between the advocates of both trends continues and goes beyond
the academic world and into the media, as the rise of energy prices makes dispersed
urbanization very expensive.
In Europe, the debate continues, although European cities have greater diversity
than the United States. In Spain, the situation reveals nuances. On one hand, our
cities are dense but show signs of expansion in the form of rural area occupation,
where agricultural farms are transformed into residential areas. However, the
model of higher densities is being currently defended instead of having buildings
surrounded by green areas.
The patterns of evolution of the cities, which respond to the logic of economic
production in market economies, suggest that mobility will continue to be essential
and may even increase. That is why it is important to intervene in the city by taking
on and working with these trends (Mückenberger 2007).
We must work to determine optimal density to concentrate the city without suf-
focating it and locate employment favouring the creation of secondary employment
centres that balance distribution, complement the residential uses with tertiary uses
and establish lines of communication between them. We must respond to periph-
eral mobility and harmoniously combine the three pillars of planning: residence,
222 F. Rodrı́guez Gutiérrez

transport and equipment and services, taking into account the need for efficient
accessibility, energy and the environment.
It is essential to think about the energetic model of transport. Technologies that
transform the notion of transport must be developed to gain more efficiency.
Social habits play an important role in energy efficiency. The access to tech-
nologies that allow the reduction of mobility, such as telework, online commerce
or flexible working hours to help ease congestion and rush hours, should be
facilitated, along with information to the citizens about sustainability as an element
of efficiency and savings for the consumer.
The incorporation of sustainability to the markets, as a criterion for costs
reduction, may be a crucial step to improve the efficiency of our cities. Technologies,
both of transport and telecommunications, can play an important role, avoiding the
consumption of time, resources and cost of travel.

15.4 Social Sustainability and the Right to the City

Sustainable mobility introduces the three facets of sustainability: environmental,

economic and social.
Social sustainability leads us to the right to the city, a right of the so-called fourth
generation, following the first (eighteenth century – American and French Revo-
lutions), second (nineteenth century – working class rights) and third (twentieth
century – United Nations letter). This is very important in a world where more than
50 % of the population lives in cities, and, properly applied, this can be the key to
work on the concept of ‘civitas’.
In an era of urbanization on a planetary scale, the city crisis manifests itself, for
the society that inhabits it, in terms of exclusion, marginality, inequality and spatial
segregation. The cities, engines of economic development and wealth generators, are
not capable of eradicating poverty, which affects an increasingly broader population
stratum. Personal contacts, exchanges, meetings, which are at the heart of urban
living, are becoming rare because there is no place or time to celebrate them.
The public spaces have been abandoned for the home-refuge and are occupied and
privatized by the car.
Some of the answers to these urban issues are based on the definition of the
right to the city, understood as the equal use and enjoyment of the cities within
the principles of sustainability, democracy, equity and social justice. The concept
‘civitas’ (Rodrı́guez and Villeneuve 2001) extends the traditional approach based
on house and neighbourhood to the inclusion of living quality on the urban scale
along with its rural surroundings: this is also described as a step from the right to
housing to the right to the city (Borja et al. 2001).
Citizens’ welfare depends to a large extent on a well-planned environment that is
pleasant to live in. Poor conditions of housing and transport, or the lack of spaces for
communication and entertainment, have strong effects on the population. Hence, it is
15 City, Urbanism, Social Sustainability and the Right to the City 223

important to use urban planning as a set of techniques that are intended to modulate
and define the form of the city.
Urban rights are:
– Right to diversity, multifunctionality and complexity. A city where the greatest
variety of social groups, uses and urban tissue can be accommodated.
– Right to facilities and infrastructures for the satisfaction of the individual and
collective needs, also including spaces of social relationship.
– Right to public spaces designed to foster personal relationships and neighbour-
hood, with aesthetic value and quality, free from cars.
– Right to mobility for all. All citizens must be able to move in a competitive
public transport, between the different neighbourhoods and areas of centrality,
taking into account the specific needs of each group.
– Right to accessibility. Housing, public spaces, streets and squares should be
accessible to all citizens in an autonomous way.
– Right to the collective identity. The sense of belonging is essential for integration
and the achievement of collective life within a territory. The positive elements
of identity are essential; they can be historical and cultural values or physical
features of the territory with which its inhabitants may be identified.
– Right to participation. Urban legislation should provide channels and policies for
the informed participation of citizens in the planning of their environment.
CeCodet worked with the right to the city in the district of La Calzada,
Gijón, Asturias (Rodrı́guez et al. 2007), initiating and attempting to implement a
methodology that would diagnose the degree of social sustainability in large-scale
urban territories, find the relationship between urban shape and social sustainability
and identify possible actions to guide towards a socially sustainable urban planning.
These objectives highlighted the need to identify indicators for the social
sustainability of cities; to establish comparisons between urban entities and the
layout of time series; to validate each of these indicators; to set out a method to
obtain each one of them and apply these indicators to a specific territory; to prove
their validity; and to establish comparisons with other areas wherever possible. We
believe that the project, pioneer in Spain, fulfilled its goal, testing a methodology
to measure the social sustainability of an urban territory. The proposed method
successfully combines various approaches that complement each other and are self-
enriching. Most of the indicators worked and fulfilled their mission satisfactorily
allowing the comparison between different areas and scales: the town of Gijón (local
level), Asturias (regional level) and Spain (national level), clarifying the relative
position of the study area.
During the development of the study, subjective indicators were found to be an
important measure of social sustainability. Thresholds and standards are useful for
measuring the environmental and economic sustainability, but are not adequate tools
to measure social sustainability. In the case of La Calzada, where, according to the
standards, there is a shortage of areas for public, the majority of the citizens do
not perceive such shortage. This may be due to the proximity of the majority of
households to the green areas, despite their scarcity.
224 F. Rodrı́guez Gutiérrez

The perception of the city changes with each individual. Some barely sustainable
neighbourhoods, considered ghettos for people of high socio-economic status, are
among the most coveted areas of the city to reside. The degree of sustainability is not
the same for all: for a young person versus an old person, for those who spend their
daily time moving from one side to another versus one who has nowhere to go, for
someone of high socio-economic status versus someone with few resources. Hence,
the need arises to combine qualitative with quantitative indicators to understand
social sustainability.
The combination of qualitative and quantitative methods has been a proven
success. The various sources complement and enrich one another, providing nuances
and giving more validity to the analysis. However, these types of indicators offer
limitations in establishing time series and in comparison with other areas.
Cities are complex systems that offer various forms of sustainability according
to their different areas. Dense, diverse and accessible downtowns that are well
equipped with services and amenities can lose population as a result of high
land prices and sometimes due to the lack of equipment. On the contrary, many
neighbourhoods, abundant in facilities and green areas, are inhospitable due to lack
of streets and meeting areas, but they have a growing population.
The case of La Calzada is exemplary. Although it is not a physically appealing
neighbourhood, and it was not designed or planned, it is nice for its inhabitants.
Its urban fabric promotes social life. It has good equipment and some gardens. Its
biggest weakness is how it relates with the rest of the city, the surrounding big
avenues and railway tracks, which create a barrier between La Calzada and the rest
of Gijón.
We think that this work is a step forward in the measurement of social
sustainability. But there is still work to do.

15.5 Common Challenges

The road ahead is long and requires an urban planning tool that complies with the
objective of arriving to ‘civitas’. As for Spain, urban construction coming to a halt
in recent years is an opportunity to rethink the role of the city.
Some proposals advocate working with the existing city, intervening in neigh-
bourhoods constructed during the decades of 1950s, 1960s and 1970s: the neigh-
bourhoods that have transformed their inventory, regarding use and functionality
over the years.
We have explored new areas for the establishment of formulas of city man-
agement and the improvement of the living conditions of its inhabitants. As time
progresses and societies and territories transform, new challenges that threaten the
urban balance emerge. Research possibilities are endless: it is necessary to advance
in knowledge alongside with the changes that an evolving society brings.
15 City, Urbanism, Social Sustainability and the Right to the City 225

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