City streets, a coming of age project.
Family oriented and kid friendly urban development to leverage climate robust and connected urban growth.

The street, the first and most basic public space that shape our cities underwent a fundamental but very gradual and therefore rather unnoticed change. This transition went hand in hand with the rise of the use and ownership of the private car; the logic of the automobile permeated and defined the design of this inherently diverse and open public space into a compartmentalized, traffic oriented spatial division. Streets are roads. At a similar pace, climate change gradually rose to the critical point it has reached today. Despite a solid scientific consensus and a growing public awareness, it still remains hard use this leverage towards the necessary change. In spatial planning and urban renewal, it has raised or strengthened strategies such as a modal shift (more active mobility and public transit, less individual cars), densification (countering further urban expansion and sprawl), resistance and to new climate stress such as heat, drought, heavy rainfall, noise and air pollution. The street is the space where all of these challenges come together. This project links this need for a new design paradigm to attractive, family friendly urban development. This way, the street becomes a strong leverage to maintain a diverse urban population, by particularly attracting middle class families, both to guarantee a balanced social mix and a solid fiscal base, to accompany the transition to climate robustness and sustainable mobility.