P2P Urbanism

Overview page

P2P URBANISM AS A GLOBAL MOVEMENT FOR IMPROVING URBAN ENVIRONMENTS

Definition and principles

P2P Urbanism may be understood as that collection of urban interventions carried out cooperatively by, amongst others, inhabitants, professionals, NGOs, public agencies, researchers, activists, artists, sociologists, and urban scientists meant to study, construct, and repair the city in a way that anyone may choose, participate, share, and modify theories, methods, and implementation technologies at any one time.

Extract from "A Definition of P2P Peer-to-Peer Urbanism":

P2P (PEER-TO-PEER) URBANISM is an innovative way of conceiving, constructing, and repairing the city that rests upon five basic principles.

1) P2P-Urbanism defends the fundamental human right to choose the built environment in which to live. Individual choice selects from amongst diverse possibilities that generate a sustainable compact city those that best meet our needs.

2) All citizens must have access to information concerning their environment so that they can engage in the decision-making process. This is made possible and actively supported by ICT (Information and Communication Technology).

3) The users themselves should participate on all levels in co-designing and in some cases building their city. They should be stakeholders in any changes that are being contemplated in their environment by governments or developers.

4) Practitioners of P2P-Urbanism are committed to generating and disseminating open-source knowledge, theories, technologies, and implemented practices for human-scale urban fabric so that those are free for anyone to use and review.

5) Users of the built environment have the right to implement evolutionary repositories of knowledge, skills, and practices, which give them increasingly sophisticated and well-adapted urban tools.

P2P Urbanism presented at the International Commons Conference in Berlin

Many separate efforts taking place over the past several years came together around 2010 to define P2P Urbanism. The movement combines social and geometrical notions into one unified approach on how human beings interact with their built environment, and how optimal socio-geometric conditions create society as we know it. This network of thoughts and the principal ideas of its participants were presented at the Berlin Commons Conference sponsored by the Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin, 1 November 2010. This was an event of major importance, as it helped to firmly anchor P2P Urbanism to the Commons movement arguing for and implementing a shared responsibility in both the design and use of the urban environment.

The book: "P2P Urbanism" by Nikos Salingaros and friends

Encouraged by the interest generated by the presentation in Berlin, some of the key recent writings are put together into a book draft: "P2P Urbanism" by Nikos Salingaros and friends (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/P2PURBANISM.pdf), which will hopefully be published at some point soon, and also in other languages. It is now available for free download. The individual articles are all on the web and already available in several languages. Of course, this book represents but one portion of the broad range of thought behind P2P Urbanism, which is to be developed more fully in future essays by other authors.

Contents -- subject to change:

1. A Definition of P2P Peer-to-Peer Urbanism. Available in SPANISH (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/p2purbanism-definicion-spanish.pdf).

2. A Brief History of P2P-Urbanism. Summary in POLISH (http://www.naszaprzestrzen.pl/2010/10/p2p-urbanism-czyli-urbanizm.html).

3. Peer-to-Peer Themes and Urban Priorities for the Self-organizing Society.

4. Socially-­Organized Housing: a New Approach to Urban Structure (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/socialhousing.pdf). Also available in PORTUGUESE (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/socialhousing-portuguese.pdf) and SPANISH (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/socialhousing-spanish.pdf).

5. Let Children Help Design our Cities (http://www.raisethehammer.org/article/675).

6. Michel Bauwens Interviews Nikos Salingaros on Peer to Peer Urbanism. Also available in GREEK (http://www.greekarchitects.gr/gr/αρχιτεκτονικες-ματιες/peer-to-peer-urbanism-id1973) and ITALIAN (as Chapter 16 of "No Alle Archistar: Il Manifesto Contro le Avanguardie", Libreria Editrice Fiorentina, Firenze, 2009).

P2P Urbanism World Atlas

Agatino Rizzo has undertaken to map existing projects that exemplify the many diverse aspects of P2P Urbanism into the P2P-Urbanism World Atlas. The nature of these projects illustrates best the broad range of ideas that make up P2P Urbanism beyond physical planning and urban construction. This map also provides a central point for future reference, as other groups discover that they have not been working alone. Anyone can add to this map, and the ultimate purpose is to link all P2P Urbanism groups into an interactive network. To subscribe to the discussion group, please visit this webpage.

New Design Tools

The design component of P2P Urbanism that builds cities and restructures dysfunctional urban regions using urban microsurgery relies upon a recently-developed toolbox of methods. These methods are scattered among the work of different authors. "Socially-Orbanized Housing", which is Chapter 4 of the above book "P2P Urbanism", gives a detailed description of some techniques.

Those readers who don't already know the "Pattern Language" of Christopher Alexander are referred to an (unauthorized!) online summary (http://vasarhelyi.eu/books/A_pattern_language_book/apl.htm).

Further techniques are found in the books of Nikos Salingaros "Principles of Urban Structure" (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/urbanstructure.html) -- most of whose chapters can be found on the web -- and "Twelve Lectures on Architecture: Algorithmic Sustainable Design" (http://www.bod.de/index.php?id=296&objk_id=354912), whose chapters are free on the web in an early version (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/algorithmic.html).

A methodology for designing successful urban space is published by Nikos Salingaros and Pietro Pagliardini: "The geometry and life of urban space" (not yet available in english). ITALIAN version is Chapter 15 of "No Alle Archistar: Il Manifesto Contro le Avanguardie", Libreria Editrice Fiorentina, Firenze, 2009. SPANISH version is available online (http://viewer.zmags.com/publication/b55fd62e#/b55fd62e/8) published in Cuadernos de Arquitectura y Nuevo Urbanismo, Tecnológico de Monterrey Campus Querétaro, Número 6/7, año 4, Marzo 2010, páginas 7-20.

The P2P Urbanism Video Lectures

An ongoing series of video lectures in which members of the movement describe their own particular work and interpretation of P2P Urbanism. Interviews are conducted by Yulia Kryazheva of arch4people, based in Delft, Holland. The intent is to build up a body of reference points coming from different directions so that readers can understand what the movement is about, and gain ideas about possible implementations and extensions. As more lectures become available, the collective input will help to re-define the implications of P2P Urbanism.

1. Stefano Serafini -- http://vimeo.com/15704797

2. Federico Mena-Quintero -- http://vimeo.com/16039076

Work in Progress

Even before the International Commons Conference in Berlin, many P2P Urbanism ideas and applications have been circulating in draft form. Hopefully, they can be catalogued here as soon as they are published.

1. Peer-to-Peer Urbanism
2. P2P Urbanism Definition
3. P2P Urbanism Projects

Criticism of Anti-urban Geometries

The P2P Urbanism movement is founded upon evidence-based socio-geometric concepts; that is, experimentally verifiable reactions to different types of urban form and different types of social interactions that are either permitted by an existing socio-political framework or actual physical structure. Focusing on the physical structure of urban regions that represent the worst of inhuman environments leads to strong criticisms of post-world-war II urban planning. Michael Mehaffy and Nikos Salingaros have termed this type of anti-urban geometry "Geometrical Fundamentalism". This essay is published as Chapter 9 of Nikos Salingaros' book "A Theory of Architecture" (http://zeta.math.utsa.edu/~yxk833/architecture.html), with an older version online (http://www.math.utsa.edu/ftp/salingar.old/fundamentalism.html). ITALIAN version is Chapter 8 of "No Alle Archistar: Il Manifesto Contro le Avanguardie", Libreria Editrice Fiorentina, Firenze, 2009, with an earlier version available online (http://www.ilcovile.it/scritti/fondamentalismo_geometrico.htm) published in Il Covile.

Related Concepts

1. Architecture of Resistance
2. Commons-based Urbanism ; Urban Commons
3. Komunal ; Komunal Urbanism Social Charter
4. Open Source Architecture ; Open Source Cities ; Open Source City ; Open Source House ; Possibilities of Open Source Architecture
5. Participatory Design of Cities ; Participatory Urban Planning
6. Resilient Cities ; Resilient Urban Design Principles ; Urban Resilience
7. User Generated Cities ; Do-It-Yourself City ; User Generated Cities
8. Urban Art Interventions

Projects

1. Bio Urbanism
2. Gruppo Salingaros ; Nikos Salingaros
3. P2P-Urbanism World Atlas
4. Pulska Grupa

More Information

1. Article by Nikos Salingaros: Peer-to-Peer Themes and Urban Priorities for the Self-organizing Society
2. Interview: Nikos Salingaros on Peer to Peer Urbanism
3. P2P Urbanism: From Exclusion to Autonomy