The future of centres isinclusive, green andproductive!

How do you bring more quality of stay into the city centre, how more culture and identity? This year’s Kulturkonferenz Ruhr in Herne addressed this question with an extensive programme. At the invitation of the Regionalverband Ruhr, lala.ruhr contributed a workshop – the title of which also referred to our approach: The future of the centres is inclusive, green and productive!

We were able to win over three organisations from our network to examine Herne’s inner city with us from different perspectives: The Dortmunder Urbanisten e.V. (speaker: Annette Bathen) addressed the idea of productive inner cities. The group from kitev (Oberhausen, speaker: Petra Jablonická) dealt with green stations as special transit spaces. “Gemeinsam für Stadtwandel” (Essen, speaker: Martina Nies) focused on the collaborative city. All three presented their perspectives on the city in short inputs before a tour together with the participants of the cultural conference – cultural workers as well as representatives from administration and urban planning – collected concrete ideas and suggestions for the transformation of concrete spaces in the city centre.

During the tours, exemplary ideas for transformation were discussed in concrete terms and recorded photographically – the basis for our memory maps of the potential places in Herne’s inner city.
One example: the car park on Cranger Straße as a busy main street: during the excursion it became clear that it is empty for most of the day and is only used during “rush hour” in the afternoon when parents pick up their children from the adjacent primary school. The idea that emerged during the tour: with simple means such as plants, the square could be quickly, effectively and clearly separated from the main road. Some of the hardly used parking spaces could be replaced by benches and a bike (repair) café with music could be placed there during the midday rush hour to encourage parents and children to cycle to school and spend time together in the new green oasis.

This idea is exemplary for many of the impressions, photos and visions that were discussed in the final round: to be implemented with simple means, commitment and cooperation. In addition to concrete results on site, this also promotes a process culture that involves different actors and empowers them to shape the inner city as a place worth living in. All participants in the workshop agreed that the multitude of exemplary approaches found in all three tours can also be used in your daily work with cities.