CHANGING NOTIONS OF PUBLIC SPACE: ITS PHENOMENON AND POSSIBILITIES

Abstract

At the turn of the 20th century, society as a whole was forced to deal with the inadvertent by-products of modernization. Urbanization is increasing at a staggering rate world wide and its impact on the urban form and society can most definitely be felt in the public spaces of today. While the city is constantly changing, public spaces - a mirror of the society, which build these cities, have altered its nature too. This new city and society with their new sets of values and systems have created a public space that is lacking in its original intention as a place for collective interaction across all social groups.

The “public” in public space is disappearing. The result is a highly privatized and simulated environment where public space is in fact an artificially controlled environment. The developments of these theme parks and malls begin to take over the role of public space in the congregation of crowds. However their main concern is only attracting the consumer dollar. The freedom of interaction in the traditional public space is replaced by one that is highly choreographed. It is this conscious design or more aptly put, the de-signing of these spaces, which has removed the meaning of “public” in public space.

While these de-signed public spaces are functioning within the information society, other phenomenon of this society also gives clues on the emergence of another new public space, which has not been fully taken advantage of. Through an investigation on the changes in the perception of public space today, the notion that public space is a neutral meeting place for all social groups regardless of ethnicity, class and lifestyle should be discarded. A successful public space of today is in fact a space where there appears to be a dominant social group. The challenge posed by this dominant group invites interaction when the different social groups start to claim their stakes on the public arena. This fosters participation instead of a kind of spectatorship currently occurring in theme parks and malls. Hence there is a renewed meaning of what constitutes effective interaction among social groups that we can adopt in the creation of future public spaces.