The 15-minute city

Living in a city means accepting a certain level of dysfunction: long commutes, noisy streets, underutilized spaces. Carlos Moreno wants to change that. He makes the case for the "15-minute city," where inhabitants have access to all the services they need to live, learn and thrive within their immediate vicinity -- and shares ideas for making urban areas adapt to humans, not the other way around.

For too long, those of us
who live in cities big and small

have accepted the unacceptable.

We accept that in cities
our sense of time is warped,

because we have to waste so much of it

just adapting to the absurd organization
and long distances

of most of today's cities.

Why is it we who have to adapt

and to degrade our potential
quality of life?

Why is it not the city
that responds to our needs?

Why have we left cities
to develop on the wrong path for so long?

I would like to offer a concept of cities

that goes in the opposite direction
to modern urbanism,

an attempt at converging life
into a human-sized space

rather than fracturing it
into inhuman bigness

and then forcing us to adapt.

I call it "the 15-minute city."

And in a nutshell,

the idea is that cities
should be designed or redesigned

so that within the distance
of a 15-minute walk

or bike ride,

people should be able to live

the essence of what constitutes
the urban experience:

to access work,

housing,

food, health, education,

culture and leisure.

Have you ever stopped to ask yourself:

Why does a noisy and polluted street
need to be a noisy and polluted street?

Just because it is?

Why can't it be a garden street
lined with trees,

where people can actually meet
and walk to the baker

and kids can walk to school?

Our acceptance of the dysfunctions
and indignities of modern cities

has reached a peak.

We need to change that.

We need to change it
for the sake of justice,

of our well-being

and of the climate.

What do we need
to create 15-minute cities?

First, we need to start asking questions
that we have forgotten.

For instance, we need to look hard
at how we use our square meters.

What is that space for?

Who's using it and how?

We need to understand
what resources we have

and how they are used.

Then we need to ask what services
are available in the vicinity --

not only in the city center,

in every vicinity.

Health providers, shops,
artisans, markets,

sports, cultural life,

schools, parks.

Are there green areas?

Are there water fountains
placed to cool off

during the frequent heat waves?

We also have to ask ourselves:

How do we work?

Why is the place I live here,
and work is far away?

We need to rethink cities
around the four guiding principles

that are the key building blocks
of the 15-minute city.

First, ecology: for a green
and sustainable city.

Second, proximity:

to live with reduced distance
to other activities.

Third, solidarity:
to create links between people.

Finally, participation
should actively involve citizens

in the transformation
of their neighborhood.

Don't get me wrong --

I'm not angling for cities
to become rural hamlets.

Urban life is vibrant and creative.

Cities are places of economic
dynamism and innovation.

But we need to make urban life
more pleasant, agile,

healthy and flexible.

To do so, we need to make sure everyone --

and I mean everyone,

those living downtown
and those living at the fringes --

has access to all key services
within proximity.

How do we get this done?

The first city to adopt
the 15-minute city idea

is Paris,

France.

Mayor Anne Hidalgo has suggested
a big bang of proximity,

which includes, for instance,
a massive decentralization,

developing new services
for each of the districts --

(City sounds)

a reduction of traffic by increasing
bike lanes into spaces of leisure;

new economic models
to encourage local shops;

building more green spaces;

transform existing infrastructure,

for instance, fabrication labs
in sports centers

or turning schools into neighborhood
centers in the evenings.

That's actually a golden rule
of the 15-minute city:

every square meter that’s already built
should be used for different things.

The 15-minute city is an attempt
to reconcile the city

with the humans that live in it.

The 15-minute city
should have three key features.

First, the rhythm of the city
should follow humans, not cars.

Second, each square meter
should serve many different purposes.

Finally, neighborhoods should be designed

so that we can live,
work and thrive in them

without having to constantly
commute elsewhere.

It's funny if you think of it:

the way many modern cities are designed

is often determined
by the imperative to save time,

and yet so much time is lost to commuting,

sitting in traffic jams,

driving to a mall,

in a bubble of illusory acceleration.

The 15-minute city idea
answers the question of saving time

by turning it on its head,

by suggesting a different pace of life.

A 15-minute pace.

Thank you.