“How do you think the perception of space here in Dar es Salaam differs from in North America?”

This question popped up during one of my attempts to understand my urban geographer roommate’s work. Leslie McLees’ PhD research focuses on investigating the meaning of space for the inhabitants of Dar es Salaam through urban agriculture activities.

While this is a hard question to answer, especially since we are only brief visitors of this city, it is an important one to ponder when considering urban planning. A city must be planned to suit the local needs and customs to function properly for those living within. Part of the problem is that a lot of the planning aesthetics, theories, and models are built on experiences of large “developed” cities such as London, New York, or Tokyo. Challenges arise when these values and principles are imported without adaption to local contexts.

Her answer?

In her view, perception of space in North America is very “zoned.” Every activity has a designated area and, on the flip side, excludes other activities within that place. Here is for residential housing, here for public space, here for commerce…and so on. Whether by cause or effect, our thinking is also often compartmentalized.

In Dar (or Bongo as the locals say), it seems, space is more fluid. Many different activities happen in the same area, at the same time, with no feeling of incompatibility. Urban farmers cultivate, vendors sell food and drinks, barbers cut hair, people socialize, children play, and all kinds of daily life just happen right there on the urban farms. Space seems to have many more layers of value because it is more compact.

My favourite example is seeing how road sides are also community spaces everywhere. You would never fail to see people sitting under the shade on any road, just socializing. Everyone is welcomed to join. Many times a day, when I’m walking slowly, I would hear “Mambo! Karibu! (Hi! Welcome!)”

I wonder how a truly Tanzanian city would look like?

As the old adage goes,  a picture is worth a thousand words. The Beauty of Data Visualization by David McCandless raises some interesting points about visuals that cross over to the world of development.

One day last year, with no specific end goal in mind, I decided to turn my world map into a 3D visual. Two countries at war? Stick in a couple of red pins and tie them together with red thread. Want to know who vetoed that UN resolution? Just follow the blue thread to the security council member. Countries that have had a female head of state were tagged in pink. Economic blocs were linked in green. Etc.

Soon enough I had a map coded in a language of shapes and colours. Some called it ingenious. One family member called me autistic. All I knew for sure is that with a few simple supplies, I had created a tool that instantaneously gave me a holistic background on the world.

As McCandless states, simple, good design can be the best way to share information. When represented visually, complex concepts and issues become accessible and appealing.  He puts our ability to process information in relative terms: sight = the equivalent of a computer, touch = USB stick, hearing and smell = hard disk, taste = pocket calculator (@9:10 of his talk.)

A visual tool Sustainable Cities uses in its planning processes is asset mapping – a creative and simple way to engage community members in identifying the resources in their own community. Rather than determining ‘needs’ (and eliciting the negativity that comes with focusing on what is lacking), asset mapping helps communities build social capital and become more self-reliant by discovering and utilizing local assets.

By both focusing on the positives within a community and conveying them visually, we are most likely to provoke a response… And as a result, produce an impact.

Ushahidi maps the world one SMS/text at a time

Crossposted from pradical.org by Doug Ragan, Senior Associate

I have been struggling to get my head around Ushahidi, Swahili for “witness” or “testimony.”

I knew it was created during the post-election violence in Kenya in early 2008. I had many friends who went through that terrible time, and felt equally horrified and powerless.

Horrified because I was getting reports real-time from Kenya through text messaging and emails. Powerless because they were still a world away, and what could I do? In the end I have to say that I didn’t come up with any good answers – thankfully no one I knew was hurt – and I was able to do a little bit of work with UN-HABITAT in getting some training materials to them for peacebuidling training with youth there. I congratulate those who were able to pull together that training in such challenging conditions and on such a short timeline. (maybe some of them can update where that training went). (If you are interested you can see some of their peacebuilding materials at the YOUCAN website)

What is as well heartening to see is that some people went farther – enter Ushahidi – which I have just in the last year found out about.

What is Ushahidi — well — it allows those being affected by the violence to both SMS/text message and/or post on a the Usahidi website all the incidences happening in regards to the violence. This gives people a “real time” map of what is happening.

Having done mapping extensively with a range of groups from Vancouver to Nairobi to Dar es Salaam, being able to map real time is a huge leap forward in the ability to use information. Often data is stuck in the pipeline, waiting for users to upload it in Arcview, google earth, or some other program.

Usahidi has now gone global, with it being utilized in Haiti, the oil spill in the Gulf (done by a great group – the Louisiana Bucket Brigade) and the floods in Pakistan. The amazing thing is how fast this platform is deployed and utilized.

Erik Hersman, one of the founders of Ushahidi, suggests that a digitally connected world not only grants us a front row seat to the rest of the world, but also the power to influence events and create change in a way that was impossible just a few short decades ago.  So that events that may occur thousands of miles away are in fact – quite literally – in our digital backyard.  Which makes it a lot harder to just sit back and watch. Read his blog post below.

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Ushahidi: Creating a Cartography of Crisis

March 20th, 2008

On January 17th the following things happened:

Protesters gathered in groups and attempted to walk into the town centre; police fired live shots and tear gas canisters to disperse them.  Three protesters were seriously injured and one shot dead.

Police battled youths who set fire to roadblocks; the police shot indiscriminately, “targeting anyone on sight”; one man was shot in the stomach as he stood in front of his house.

A 13-year old boy was laid to rest next to his uncle´s house; the burial was attended by hundreds of residents who wailed and lit up bonfires.

Most likely, you didn’t hear or see these stories, except in perhaps an aggregate way: they all happened in Kenya, a result of the post-election violence which engulfed the country.  In situations such as these, the major media outlets give the world a “big picture” view of the crisis: violence, rioting, bloodshed, deaths. But the individual events, the microcosmic acts of violence, go largely unreported.  They aren’t, however, unseen.

In the days following the Kenyan crisis, a group of Kenyan bloggers from both inside and outside of the country got together and created a website to map the spread of violence.  The site, called Ushahidi, allows users to report incidents of violence (as well as peace efforts) via the web or SMS.  Incidents are verified and then uploaded to Ushahidi’s site and displayed on a geo-tagged map.   The site also features a tool that allows for a “timeline” view of events (see below). The value of the site isn’t in its archival capabilities; as Global Voice’s Ethan Zuckerman wrote in this post, the importance of Ushahidi is helping people visualize the spread of violence in real time.

Why is this important? With all of the famines, wars, floods and other crises in the world today, what good will visualizing the chaos in Kenya do?  Friend and fellow blogger Erik Hersman, one of the founders of Ushahidi, answers this question in the most eloquent way I’ve seen yet.  In this post he suggests that a digitally connected world not only grants us a front row seat to the rest of the world, but also the power to influence events and create change in a way that was impossible just a few short decades ago.  So that events that may occur thousands of miles away are in fact – quite literally – in our digital backyard.  Which makes it a lot harder to just sit back and watch.

Ushahidi is a potent example of the power of what I (and many others) call “collaborative cartography.” Rather than simply create user-generated maps of local wifi hotspots or cool coffee shops, however, maps like Ushahidi have the potential to effect change. As part of its annual conference, Netsquared is hosting a competition to identify the best mapping mashups geared toward accelerating social change. Ushahidi is in the running, as are others like the Rosetta Project. Voting is open to the public until the end of the day Friday; the top twenty will receive a share of $100k in prize money to further develop their sites.   You can support projects like Ushahidi by voting here.

I had an “aha” moment the other day.

I was having dinner with some new friends. The person who sat next to me was an American who worked with the department of social work at the University of Dar es Salaam. Among all the interesting differences she learnt about social work in the US and in Tanzania, one in particular stood out in her mind.

Government-provided social safety networks are practically non-existent in Dar es Salaam – the government simply doesn’t have the funding to provide extra support. While North American social workers often refer patients to appropriate social support networks, Tanzanian social workers have to rely on informal ones.

Due to the social stigma attached to HIV/AIDS, often families will not care for the sick. Instead, Tanzanian social workers will take them to the “ten cell leader”, who cares for ten small groups of sick individuals. The end goal is to try to educate and convince the family to take the patient back into their care.

Then, the “aha” moment came.

What if the “development” power dynamic were reversed, and Tanzanian development workers came to Canada to tell us that: “you really should implement this ten cell leader institution. It works great in our community! Why not yours?” What would be your reaction?

I wonder how many ideas work for us that sound absolutely ridiculous to the people we are trying to work with? I’m not saying that cross-cultural teaching is a bad thing – I’m sure we have all learnt amazing ideas from people of varying backgrounds. That is the beauty of diversity. But how often is success lost in in the nuances of another culture?

Anyone else have any examples of our “common sense” colliding with common practice?

The World Youth Conference in León, México is an event set up to engage youth around the world on 13 issues of development (one of which being international migration), with a special emphasis on the Millenium Development Goals. After a successful week involving governments, NGOs and individuals from around the world, it concludes today with a dark cloud hovering above. To the north, 72 international migrants were assasinated by what is currently assumed to be drug cartel Los Zetas.

And herein lies the dichotomy of development – to stay or to go? Slow and incremental success at the community level, or going against the odds to cross the border for individual economic payoff?

Both have their benefits; both are fraught with challenges. One has sights set on the short term, while the other looks beyond. But in the end, if we can create sustainable communities and cities with opportunity and hope for their youth, then there will be no need to run.

-Is the city eclipsing the nation-state?

- According to Professor Richard Wilkinson of the University of Nottingham, inequality is a trigger for violence. As mega cities are home to incredible income disparity, how will the continued growth of cities affect the state of violence in the world?

-Will NGOs begin to shift in focus from rural to urban? How will their structure and methods of implementation be affected?

What are your thoughts?

Ryan Whitney is a Project Officer for the Sustainable Cities: PLUS Network Africa Program. The program is funded through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and aims to support urban sustainability issues in Dar es Salaam and create learning networks between cities.

Walking in Dar es Salaam

Walking in Dar es Salaam elevates our senses; it’s a mixture of unplanned settlements, vibrant dirt roads, and paved highways. In these spaces, you find a hodgepodge of humanity: Laughing children, lost chickens, and decades-old buses imported from Japan.

Somehow, the disjointed development patters all fit together, shaken-up in an urban mixing bowl, and displaced before us: A newly planned highway bi-sects an unplanned settlement; a mercades-benz rubs shoulders with a rusted bicycle; a bajaji honks as a ‘mama’ hops out of harms way.

Fascinatingly, in unplanned settlements, or those often viewed as ‘forgotten’ by modern planning principles, communities come to life. Neighbourhoods become a maze of dirt paths; defined, unassumingly, by one-story shacks of disjoined shapes and sizes.

Unplanned Settlements, Planned for People

From above, unplanned settlements resemble a broken-window, with shards of glass lying at awkward angles, the space between them forming paths. Once inside, however, we look through the glass from another perspective: The shards become housing units, the spaces between the glass become places where public life lives.

It is in these unplanned settlements that Dar es Salaam comes to life: People flood the streets to socialize, purchase vegetables, and play football. Motorized traffic remains rare, and, despite the lack of modern infrastructure, these settlements maintain strong social cohesion because they are designed for face-to-face interaction.

Unfortunately, planners often look at unplanned settlements as ‘mistakes.’ Without modern building ordinances, no drainage or sanitation infrastructure, and no zoning principles, it is obvious that these communities were built by the poor, and for the poor.

What we need to learn, however, is that despite the lack of formalized planning, these communities have been built around the social needs of people. This often forgotten concept of a ‘liveable city’ can teach us many lessons in urban planning.

Pedestrians and Liveability

What does ‘liveable’ mean and, more importantly, what does a ‘liveable city’ look like?

Liveability is a concept that refers to people’s ability to live in a place. In terms of a city, it encompasses factors that relate to the quality of life and the well being of residents. These factors include, but are not limited to, public transportation, access to education and health care, safety, political stability, environmental protection, and urban green space.

Depending on your global location, highly publicized, liveable cities, such as Vancouver, Melbourne, and Copenhagen, often come to mind based on their progressive policies towards urban sustainability, including public transportation and green design.

For others, the concept of urban liveability is rooted locally and very context-dependent: The local sourcing of food from small-scale urban gardens, or, as in Dar es Salaam, the strong social networks formed between residents of unplanned settlements.

Regardless of location, the most liveable cities in the world all have one element in common: They prioritize people, and recognize the importance that residents play in creating a great city. In short, liveable cities are built around people and, by definition, designing environments that cater pedestrians is indispensible in creating a liveable city.

Unfortunately, western planning principles, now adopted in cities around the world, have often ‘planned’ people out of our cities, by disregarding the needs of pedestrians. Only in the most progressive cities, are these issues regaining relevance.

What Can Unplanned Settlements Teach Us?

What do urban environments that cater to people look like? While there is no perfect formula, they are often dense and provide a street layout favourable to interaction: Integrated retail and residential buildings, small blocks, paths dedicated to pedestrians, and public spaces.

We can learn from unplanned settlements because, at their root, they are spaces designed for people, by people. While there is much to improve in terms of sanitation and infrastructure, they can be considered a model in terms of community cohesion.

Government officials need to learn, as well as fix. They need to understand the importance that urban planning and design plays in fostering healthy communities that prioritize people, not only money and automobiles.

We only need to look to the difference between ‘planned’ and ‘unplanned’ settlements in Dar es Salaam to see how the latter prioritizes people and public life.

In the unplanned settlement of Mikocheni A, for example, people fill the streets, housing remains dense, and the community constantly gathers in the various small-scale public spaces.

In adjacent Mikocheni B, the situation is very different: Fences surround individual homes, vibrant public spaces are non-existent, and the motorized vehicle is given more priority. Life here becomes privatized and focuses on the individual, as opposed to the community.

What type of community do we want to live in?

The Value of Learning

On the surface, Dar es Salaam appears to be an unliveable city that is uninviting to pedestrians. The roads are congested, the streets are often unpaved, and very little pedestrian infrastructure separates people from motor vehicles.

Looking deeper, however, towards the unplanned settlements, the city contains a very strong pedestrian-based environment. It is here that the more subtle elements of a liveable city, including a strong sense of community and a pedestrian-based environment, are most visible.

When looking at the many problems that unplanned settlements face, government officials should also look at the way that people have been planned into the development. People based design should, therefore, become a priority along with improving infrastructure.

For now, however, the pedestrian lives on in Dar es Salaam, flourishing in the areas forgotten by planning. Follow them and you’ll find what this city is really about: Community, friendship, and the formation of bonds to get through the hardships of day-to-day life.