How do we accommodate a growing urban population in a way that is sustainable, equitable, and inviting? This question is becoming increasingly urgent to answer as we face diminishing fossil-fuel resources and the effects of a changing climate while global cities continue to compete to be the most vibrant centers of culture, knowledge, and finance.
Jan Gehl has been examining this question since the 1960s, when few urban designers or planners were thinking about designing cities for people. But given the unpredictable, complex and ephemeral nature of life in cities, how can we best design public infrastructure--vital to cities for getting from place to place, or staying in place--for human use? Studying city life and understanding the factors that encourage or discourage use is the key to designing inviting public space.
In "How to Study Public Life" Jan Gehl and Birgitte Svarre draw from their combined experience of over 50 years to provide a history of public-life study as well as methods and tools necessary to recapture city life as an important planning dimension.
This type of systematic study began in earnest in the 1960s, when several researchers and journalists on different continents criticized urban planning for having forgotten life in the city. City life studies provide knowledge about human behavior in the built environment in an attempt to put it on an equal footing with knowledge about urban elements such as buildings and transport systems. Studies can be used as input in the decision-making process, as part of overall planning, or in designing individual projects such as streets, squares or parks. The original goal is still the goal today: to recapture city life as an important planning dimension. Anyone interested in improving city life will find inspiration, tools, and examples in this invaluable guide.

The first Danish language version of this book, published in 1971, was very much a protest against the functionalistic principles for planning cities and residential areas that prevailed during that period. The book carried an appeal to show concern for the people who were to move about between buildings, and it urged an understanding of the subtle, almost indefinable - but definite - qualities, which have always related to the interaction of people in public spaces, and it pointed to the life between buildings as a dimension of architecture that needs to be carefully treated. Now 40 years later, many architectural trends and ideologies have passed by over the years. These intervening years have also shown that the liveliness and liveability of cities and residential areas continues to be a important issue. The intensity in which fine public spaces are used at this point in time, as well as the greatly increased general interest in the quality of cities and their public spaces emphasises this point. The character of life between buildings changes with changes in any given social context, but the essential principles and quality criteria to be employed when working with life between buildings has proven to be remarkably constant. Though this work over the years has been updated and revised several times, this version bears little resemblance with the very early versions, however there was no reason to change the basic message: Take good care of the life between your buildings.

For more than forty years Jan Gehl has helped to transform urban environments around the world based on his research into the ways people actually use - or could use - the spaces where they live and work. In this revolutionary book, Gehl presents his latest work creating (or recreating) cityscapes on a human scale. He clearly explains the methods and tools he uses to reconfigure unworkable cityscapes into the landscapes he believes they should be: cities for people. Taking into account changing demographics and changing lifestyles, Gehl emphasizes four human issues that he sees as essential to successful city planning. He explains how to develop cities that are lively, safe, sustainable, and healthy. Focusing on these issues leads Gehl to think of even the largest city on a very small scale. For Gehl, the urban landscape must be considered through the five human senses and experienced at the speed of walking rather than at the speed of riding in a car or bus or train. This small-scale view, he argues, is too frequently neglected in contemporary projects. In a final chapter, Gehl makes a plea for city planning on a human scale in the fast-growing cities of developing countries. A 'Toolbox', presenting key principles, overviews of methods, and keyword lists, concludes the book. The book is extensively illustrated with over 700 photos and drawings of examples from Gehl's work around the globe.

Seit mehr als 40 Jahren befasst sich der Architekt und Stadtplaner Jan Gehl damit, Platze, Strassen, ja ganze Stadtviertel zum Wohle der Bewohner neu oder umzugestalten. Er stutzt sich dabei auf Erkenntnisse, die er durch langjahrige Untersuchungen von Grossstadtsituationen in verschiedenen Landern gewonnen hat. Indem Gehl selbst Millionenstadte kleinmassstablich und im Detail betrachtet, entwickelt er Mittel und Wege, dysfunktionale und unwirtliche Stadtlandschaften entscheidend zu verandern. Dabei finden demografische Entwicklungen und sich wandelnde Lebensstile ebenso Berucksichtigung wie gestalterische Prozesse. Wichtigster Grundsatz fur Jan Gehls Stadtplanung nach menschlichem Mass: Der Stadtraum muss mit der Geschwindigkeit eines Fussgangers erlebt werden statt aus einem Fahrzeug heraus. Nur so kann es gelingen, sowohl traditionelle Metropolen wie die schnell wachsenden Stadte von Entwicklungs- und Schwellenlandern zu Stadten fur Menschen zu machen. Das Buch prasentiert Jan Gehls Arbeit im Bereich Neubau sowie der Umgestaltung stadtischer Raume und Verkehrsflachen. Darstellungen seiner Planungsmodelle in Text und Bildern sowie Planungsprinzipien und Methoden veranschaulichen, wie einfach lebendige, sichere, nachhaltige und gesunde Stadte in Zukunft entstehen koennen.

Der danische Architekt Jan Gehl, einer der weltweit wohl bekanntesten Stadtplaner, erlautert in seinem Buch Leben zwischen Hausern die fundamentale Bedeutung sensibler Raumplanung fur ein gutes Zusammenleben in unseren Stadten. Dabei nennt Jan Gehl entscheidende Eckpfeiler fur die Verbesserung der Lebensqualitat. Im Objektiv seiner Betrachtungen steht der Mensch, dessen grundlegende Bedurfnisse die Gestaltung oeffentlicher Raume bestimmen sollten. Und im Gegensatz zur Architektur, die ebenso wie unser Leben wechselnden Moden und Stroemungen unterliegt, bleiben diese Kriterien uberraschend konstant. Das Buch, vor uber 40 Jahren erstmalig in Danisch erschienen und mittlerweile in mehr als 50 Sprachen ubersetzt, hat nichts von seiner Aktualitat verloren. Vielmehr liefert es nach wie vor grundlegende wie uberraschende Vorschlage fur eine entscheidende Verbesserung der Lebensqualitat in unserer Welt. Hiermit erscheint dieser Klassiker der Stadtplanung zum ersten Mal in deutscher Sprache.