Integrating energy efficiency and human well-being into architecture and urban planning, creates green liveable cities like Copenhagen.
People have always come first in the mind of Jan Gehl, the 81-year-old Danish architect. Throughout his career, his aim was to improve the quality of life in cities by focusing on the needs and desires of pedestrians and cyclists. He wanted cities to be liveable, easy to move around, with green spaces and light, and to stimulate, rather than smother, people’s senses. Today these goals have a double mission: to improve people’s well-being and to reduce emissions. FORESIGHT has taken a walk through the streets of Copenhagen and looked at how the city’s space and light accommodate people and, increasingly, generate energy. The building occupied by the Copenhagen International School in the Nordhavn district is an exciting example where space, light, human well-being and energy efficiency have come together in harmony, offering a blueprint for future sunlit projects.
PHOTO: Lars Just, TEXT: Philippa Nuttall Jones
In Roskilde, west of Copenhagen, Rabalder Park reverberates with the sound of kids on wheels as soon as school is out for the day. But when downpours still their happy cries and send them scuttling for cover, the rumbling of wheels-on-concrete soon becomes the roar of water-on-its way.
The photo essay on the following pages turns its focus on wind energy and reflects on its enormous power for helping us keep the planet fit and healthy for coming generations.
Two climbers hang high above. Viewed from the ground they resemble tiny spiders clinging to the skeleton of what was once a giant grain storage silo on the dockside of Copenhagen’s northern inner harbour.
The surface is broken by a boy’s back as he emerges, dripping, into the baking sun. Out on the water a handful of kayaks do battle, while in the kids’ pool Frederik Koustrup shouts in delight as his friend Kalle lifts a new handful of trailing seaweed high into the air. Lifeguard and mother smile to […]
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