STEVE GOLDSTEIN: As communities around the U.S. have gone through variations of shutdowns, sheltering in place and stay-at-home orders, we've seen many fewer people commuting to and from work or running their errands. And that's given planners and others focused on downtowns and public transit a moment to consider what cities should look like and how they should function in the near and, maybe, distant future. Jennifer Keesmaat, CEO of the Keesmaat Group and former Chief Planner for the city of Toronto, is with me to talk about that and her recent piece for Foreign Affairs: " The Pandemic Does Not Spell the End for Cities." Jennifer, it does seem logical people would wonder if cities will be hurt by the pandemic — that we don't want to be as close together because of the impact of COVID-19?
JENNIFER KEESMAAT: Cities are about sharing things. We share parks, we share transit, we share libraries, we share pools, and for the past three months, we've been told to stay apart. Our cities may be part of the problem. So, that really was at the root of the motivation of writing this piece, was exploring this question as to the role cities play in pandemics and the role that cities play in health. And it was really about asking the question about what the way forward ought to look like.
GOLDSTEIN: And the way forward includes, based on what you talked about, certainly in some cities in America, making us less car dependent, building streets in a different way or utilizing the space differently. Can you talk about that a little bit where transportation might come in there?
KEESMAAT: Well, absolutely, because one of the things that I discovered in my analysis is that the problem in cities isn't, in fact, density. The problem is actually how we use space. And in many cities, we've been adding density. We've been adding more people. We've been giving over a tremendous amount of space to cars. And so the question emerges, if we need more space in cities, why are we wasting so much space on parking cars, on allocating road space to cars, when in reality, if we want spaces and cities not to be crowded, we need to use space really efficiently. And cars are pretty much the least efficient way that you can move people in cities. So we want to get at this question of density versus crowding, then we need to use space better in cities. And to use space better in the cities, we need to embrace transit, we need to embrace cycling, we need to embrace walking as being fundamental or foundations to urban mobility in the future.
GOLDSTEIN: Essentially, how much do you see this as the time for a vision, the time for a road map to rethink about how they do things when it comes to how many cars are parking on the streets? How many parking garages we have?
KEESMAAT: This is a phenomenal moment and opportunity for cities, in part because we've just gone through this unprecedented situation of lockdown. So many of us have been working in different ways. We've been moving around our neighborhoods in fundamentally different ways. People in my neighborhood have gotten their bikes out and have been riding their bikes. You know, they had to blow the dust off them because they hadn't been ridden in many, many years. And what it has done is it's recalibrated how we think about public space and how we think about ourselves, both in our neighborhoods and in relation to our commute. What that has done is it has created a window for change, in part because we were thrust into change, whether we wanted it or not. And a lot of us have been asking questions about whether we want to go back to that new normal. Having abandoned the long morning commute, many people are asking whether they want to commute at all or whether they want less of a commute or maybe the commute could only happen a few days of the week instead of being so grueling and happening every single day. So a window has opened in front of us. The question is whether we will use that window to advance change.
GOLDSTEIN: How long would it take to get a majority of people on the same page as far as city planners go, as far as, even the residents of various cities?
KEESMAAT: Well, one of the things we've seen during the pandemic is that when you have a high level of public buy-in, change can happen rapidly. I would say years are much, much too long. We know that we have a climate crisis. We know that mobility in our cities, driving cars in our cities is a fundamental contributor to that climate crisis. We also know we have a public safety crisis as a result of cars. People are dying on our streets. And there's a quality of life crisis. And so the question must be asked, in a crisis, just like the pandemic, we implemented new policies very quickly. Why wouldn't we change the way we use our cities very quickly?
GOLDSTEIN: Mass transit vitally important. And yet, in the face of COVID, we have seen people obviously less inclined to be in such close quarters. Can mass transit counter that? And how long would that take? And what are some ideas you would have for getting people comfortable with mass transit again? I know some still are, but, in some cases, that's just out of necessity.
KEESMAAT: Well, I think that's true because we were in a situation where everyone who could stay home was staying home. And by default, people were on mass transit because they were essential workers and they were required to get to work. But there is a significant portion of the population that sort of instantly abandoned transit. And while I can say this, I used to use transit every day, but I have been on transit for well over three months now, which is a bit mind blowing to me. I think that as we understand more about the virus and how that, how it spreads, that will continue to quell concerns about it being spread on transit. There's no traceable event that is linked to a major public transit system in the world. And we do know that the the way we use space — so, for example, touching shared surfaces is a big indicator of contagion. So is there a way for us to use transit where we're wearing masks, we're not touching surfaces and where surfaces are being sterilized or wiped down with a much higher frequency than they were in the past? Absolutely. Like, that's all within the realm of possibility. Building public confidence is really going to come back to ensuring that there is compliance in wearing the masks and ensuring that people really understand the connection between where contagion has taken place and where it hasn't taken place.
GOLDSTEIN: That is Jennifer Keesmaat. She is CEO of the Keesmaat Group. She also served as chief planner for the city of Toronto. We were talking about her piece for Foreign Affairs: "The Pandemic Does Not Spell The End For Cities." Jennifer, thanks so much. It's really great to talk with you. I appreciate it.
KEESMAAT: My pleasure. Thank you.
