Engineering the Pedestrian. Timescape of Urban Walking after the 1920s

Abstract

This paper addresses the historical construction of urban mobilities in the North-Atlantic area during the twentieth century. In investigating the conflicting temporalities of pedestrians and drivers, it shows how urban mobility temporalities have been organised around industrial timescapes, banning stillness and favouring cars as fast vehicles: the result is today’s overlapping urban mobility arrhythmias, where slow users are penalised. The construction of a new timescape of urban mobility and its subjugation to industrial rhythms was part of a larger process of social engineering of walking and its de-sensing. The privilege granted to fast and motorised vehicles has created mobility injustice, while their role in CO2 emissions invites us to reconsider the current practises and to reverse this mechanism, giving more time/space to slow mobilities.