In this proceedings document, you’ll hear from our Global Exchange staff and fellows on lessons learned from the Urban Design Study Trip to Copenhagen.

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By Clara Parker

In an opening lecture on Gehl’s approach to shaping cities for people, Lead Designer Olivia Flynn playfully contrasted the notion of Copenhagen as a “caring city” with images from New York City. A split screen displayed examples of Copenhagen’s infrastructure of care – protected bicycle lanes, thoughtfully constructed playgrounds, and food security and food waste mitigation programs – alongside images of New Yorkers carrying each other’s strollers up subway stairs, community fridges, and people marching in a Black Lives Matter protest. The message was not lost on us. Our group of urbanists from the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, engineering, housing, economic development, construction, planning, sustainability, and environmental justice had traveled across an ocean to learn from a city made famous for being a model of caring, happiness, and livability. And yet, in the department of caring, our own city has a lot going for it, too. 

Urban Design Forum’s study trips speak to this split-screen display. We travel to other cities not because they are doing things right that New York City does wrong, nor to extract ideas we might replicate at home. Our goal is to learn from the thinking, decision-making, politics, culture, and approaches of other cities and to enter dialogues with our hosts about the challenges we share.

On our second day in Copenhagen, we visited the Climate Quarter in Østerbro, the city’s first “climate-resilient district.” One entire city block in the quarter has addressed the region’s cloudbursts and subsequent flooding with trenches, rainwater gardens, and water reuse for the homes above. What struck me was not so much the creativity and technical innovation on display – we have that in abundance in New York – but the collective mindset: flooding was treated as a shared challenge and every resident had a say in the solution. 220 tenants voted to combine their courtyards to build a rainwater management and collection system that diverts water to the outdoor rain garden and supplies surplus to washing machines and toilets in the apartments above. In a mixed-income and mixed-tenure residential block, homeowners and renters had equal say in shaping their shared space. While we may not be able to replicate all the details of the Climate Quarter, we can take inspiration from the mindset: that climate resilience is essential for every neighborhood, and the solutions should be innovative, participatory, and equitable.

Convening an interdisciplinary group of mostly strangers for a study trip to a foreign country is somewhat of an idealistic experiment. Will everyone get along? Will people be interested in the same things and find every itinerary item useful in the same way? Minutes into our opening reception in Gehl’s offices, it was clear that these were the wrong questions. The group needed no prompting to talk to each other and share about themselves. And while they were not all interested in the same things and approached each activity with very different perspectives, interests, and questions, the result was an enriched experience where each individual’s learning was multiplied by the increased connections and new ideas that could never result from traveling and studying alone.

In his seminal text, Experience and Education, John Dewey makes the case that the most impactful learning results from active participation, with others and in context. Urban Design Forum puts this ethos into practice in our fellowships, tours, and leadership circles. Now we have another powerful venue to connect and inspire New Yorkers to design, build, and care for a better city. 

Proceedings Document

Fellow Reflections