Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
encouragement of commercial enterprises such as cafes or food trucks in these pub-
lic spaces, to provide additional facilities for people using the outdoors in winter.
Enclosed residential courtyards
which also act as sun pockets are a popular ex-
ample of this approach for they help encourage social interaction. Increasingly, win-
ter cities also have cafes with open patio areas warmed by gas radiant heaters in the
late autumn or early spring, whilst customers may also be provided with blankets,
thereby extending the outdoor season of the business. These are typical features in
most Scandinavian cities.
Some cities in winter climates are also
adjusting the natural environment
to pro-
vide more protection, especially against winter storms and spring floods. In the
former case annual spring flooding along ice-jammed or north-flowing rivers has
led to measures to reduce or break-up the blockages. Flood protection works, such
as those that have a separate channel to take flood waters around the settlement in
the spring run-off, can be seen by the example of Winnipeg in Chap. 9. The wide-
spread adoption of the concept of green belts around cities popularized in Garden
City plans and post-World War II British New Towns has also been adapted to assist
in Winter City protection. Green Belts or Green Wedges with large belts of conifers
have become a popular device for sheltering settlements, mitigating the adverse ef-
fects of wind in particular and providing an accessible recreational area for the local
residents. One of the best examples is the so-called 'Green Scarf' of trees around
Reykjavik in Iceland, a city that also discourages housing developments in exposed
areas. Iceland had a particular exposure problem since its inhabitants had cut down
most of the natural forest on the island by the twentieth century to increase pasture
areas. Since the 1930s the government has encouraged tree planting—involving
citizens in the task to give a sense of ownership over developments—not simply to
provide shelter in winter, but to also create greater recreational opportunities in the
forested areas in summer.
Another frequently used principle is the encouragement of
public transit
to re-
duce individual car use and its resultant pollution, as well as the associated car
parks. To make these systems work effectively there is the additional need for warm
bus or rail shelters, frequent service to minimize wait times, with clocks and devices
to show the time of the next transport, as well as integrated public transit connec-
tions to airports and bus and rail stations to avoid outdoor waiting. In this context
Scandinavian cities in particular are light years ahead of American or Canadian
centres, where the result of more conservative governments, lower taxes, and often
fragmented political jurisdictions, have meant that public transit systems have never
been developed to the same extent. This means that taxis or infrequent bus services
are the only ways that people can access their public transit terminals. In Copen-
hagen, by contrast, Chap. 6 has already described how a new underground Metro
transit system running through the city built an extension to the airport as an early
priority, and is now being complemented by a underground circular transit line that
will connect the inner suburbs to the city centre by 2018.
Improving and maintaining circulation patterns
in Winter Cities is also a major
goal, such as by ensuring that pavements and roads are more adapted to winter
conditions and with fences alongside to reduce snow drifting on to their surfaces.
