Conceptualising creative city through characterising creative milieu in Central Geelong

Nur Melati Zamri

Professor David Jones

Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

LaTrobe University
1st 2nd October 2013, LaTrobe University, Melbourne Campus, Melbourne
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

LOOKING THROUGH THE LENS OF CHARLES LANDRY

Born in 1948, studied in Britain, German and Italy.

Aims to help cities become more resilient, self sustaining - identifying and make the
most of their resources and reach their potential by triggering their inventiveness and
open-minded thinking.
Coined the term Creative city in 1980s, soon after founded Comedia in 1978, a highly
respected European consultancy working in creativity, culture and urban change.

KEY AUTHOR
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

THE URBAN SHIFT

Century of cities - shift from an industrial era to a knowledge-based era has

entirely switched the citys functions and policy from being the producer by
maximising productivity to reintegrating the system as a whole.
The challenge for cities from the older era is how to adapt to 21st century desires
and needs. This requires more than just shifting the citys visions but also the shift
in thinking holistically; the instruments, and the aspirations.

industrial

knowledge-base

CREATIVE CITY

BACKGROUND
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

THE CREATIVE CITY

An on-going process - a journey rather than a destination, a process not a

status

[A] creative city posits that conditions need to be created for people to think, plan
and act with an imagination in harnessing opportunities or addressing seemingly
intractable urban problems
More than 100 cities and regions call themselves creative cities.
Often involves a checklist of requirements and interpreted as a successful recipe
expected to be replicated without considering the distinctive aspects and locality of
places and circumstances.

These common misinterpretations trigger competition between cities who replicate

the same strategies and policy interventions.

Having an art or cultural centre does not make a city creative, instead it needs the
creative milieu to be a successful creative city.
BACKGROUND
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

THE CREATIVE MILIEU

Milieu - environment.
A place that contains the necessary precondition of both hard and
soft infrastructure to allow people to think, plan and act with their creative
imagination to harness any opportunity for solving the urban problems.

What makes a milieu creative is that it gives the user the sense that they can shape,
create and make the place they are in; that they are an active participant rather than a
passive consumer, that they are an agent of change rather than a victim

hard infrastructure
network of buildings and
institutions of a creative milieu

BACKGROUND
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

successful
creative milieu

soft infrastructure
system of associative structures and
social networks, connections and
human interactions

THE CREATIVE MILIEU - ITS CHARACTERISTICS

Understanding Landrys concept of the creative city involves four main

themes:

supporting

harnessing

maximising

provide

LOCALITY

DIVERSITY

INTERACTIONS

CAPACITY

Refers to both
businesses and
cultural aspects;
specifically to an area
which can harness,
inspire and innovate.

The soft
infrastructure
describes social
diversity
Hard infrastructure
refers to physical
diversity. It provides
spaces that
encourage business
or living at various
scales

creativity needs to be
communicated and a
creative milieu can be
the physical urban
setting where a group
of people can engage,
communicate and
share in an openminded environment

Suggests the ability of

a building or space to
adapt to changes.
Can be classified as
temporary or
permanent capacity

to test it in case studies

BACKGROUND
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

GEELONG - The peri-urban city

Originally known as a port city due to its

location on Corio Bay and Barwon River.
Developed a strong (20%) manufacturing
industry.
The emerging of tourism and hospitality
industries that soon made up 10% of the
local activity caused Geelong to develop
into a major commercial and residential
area.

In response to this, the Council recognised the need to provide facilities to support the
transition.
what are the value added outcome to Geelong through implementing the characteristics?

CASE STUDY
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

TESTING THE THEORY

1. Literature review
2. Data collection:

QUALITATIVE

QUANTITATIVE

face-to-face interviews with 20 selected

professional practitioners in Geelong.
conducted with open-structured questions
and recorded through note taking.

Site analysis in selected areas through

observation and documentation within
central Geelong. Elements being
identified, observed and analysed.
-Pedestrian count, include:

x 20 professional
practitioners invited

10 replied

METHODOLOGY
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

Walking

Primary
sitting

Going to destinations

Secondary sitting

Cycling

Standing

Browsing

Laying

Service
s

Playing

Leisure

Commercial
activities

Each characteristic is investigated by using appropriate scales of intrusion.

DISTINGUISHIN
G LOCALITY

ENRICHING
DIVERSITY

PROMOTE
PLACES FOR
INTERACTIONS

PROMOTE
CAPACITY

SMALL SCALE
OF
INTRUSION

MEDIUM
SCALE OF
INTRUSION

LARGE
SCALE OF
INTRUSION

POSSIBILITIES

CASE STUDY
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

DISTINGUISHING LOCALITY - SMALL SCALE OF INTRUSION

Small

scale - least amount of intrusions, more temporal in nature, requires the least
amount of physical structure to reinforce the changes in the area.
Example : laneways.

The best example of a successful laneway in Geelong that developed the character of
a creative milieu is a caf called Fuel Coffee + Food along Gore Place.

Fuel Coffee + Food cafe

blocked area

new cafe

FINDINGS
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

DISTINGUISHING LOCALITY - SMALL SCALE OF INTRUSION

Gore Place - displays a successful

means of harnessing locality by
developing creative milieu through
introducing retail activity in the
laneway - new cafs opening up
towards their backlane.
Interviews: 60% agree upon the
significant of locality portrayed at the
site.
Several key barriers:
-permeability
-walking and cycling facilities
-facade treatment
-usage - services
Poor hard infrastructure - leads to
poor soft infrastructure.

Average pedestrian count per hour in Gore Place.

FINDINGS

Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

ENRICHING DIVERSITY - MEDIUM SCALE OF INTRUSION

Refers to a higher degree of built work and physical installations.

Provides a higher degree of interactions by promoting diversity in both social and physical
context.
Example : any programs extended into the public realm, street vendors, or even small shops.
Little Malop Street in the heart of central Geelong - the favourable urban plaza - intended to
create a public place to allow impromptu gatherings or community events to take place
and replacing the dull commercial facade.

FINDINGS
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

ENRICHING DIVERSITY - MEDIUM SCALE OF INTRUSION

Convincing amount of pedestrians.

However it is the street shops (hard
infrastructure) experiencing dullness.
Interviews: 90% of the participants
agreed about the insignificant amount
of diversity harnessed.

Several key barriers:

-large scale of retail (lack of
intensification)
-poor pedestrian facilities
-sidewalk barriers
Poor physical diversity restraining the
creative milieu from growing

FINDINGS
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

PROMOTE PLACES FOR INTERACTION - LARGE SCALE OF INTRUSION

Biggest intervention and

reconfiguration involving mixed - used or
creative cultural complexes.
Libraries, art galleries, and museums
are among the examples of cultural
complexes in a creative milieu which
perform as the community nodes.
In Geelong, the cultural precinct is
located along Little Malop Street towards
Gheringhap Street.

Why are these creative buildings

developed an uncreative milieu?

FINDINGS
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

Geelong
City Library
Geelong
Performing Art
Centre

Geelong
Gallery

PROMOTE PLACES FOR INTERACTION - LARGE SCALE OF INTRUSION

Interviews: 90% of participants

strongly agree that there are
insignificant amounts of interaction in
the area.
Several key barriers:
lacks human scale activities and its
hard street edge makes it hard to
promote interactions
lack of indoor and outdoor
connections the key activities are too
internalised.
Lack of interactions restraining the
creative milieu from growing

FINDINGS
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

THE POSSIBILITIES

Refers to the capacity of a space to

allow changes and by definition, it
deals with flexibility, complexity and
uncertainty.
Open or enclosed areas and they
vary in size and function.
In Geelong - Johnstone Park, a
landscaped garden located in the
heart of central Geelong, has the
strategic location surrounded by civic
buildings

FINDINGS
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

THE POSSIBILITIES
Very

insignificant amount of
interactions reflecting the minimum
amount of potential creative milieu
being harnessed.
Several key barriers:
-Vehicle priorities oriented
-Lack of walking and cycle
amenities
-Lack of commercial engagement
Weak creative milieu due to the
lack of soft and hard
infrastructures.
The capacity of the park
is not fully harnessed, decreasing
the creative milieu.

FINDINGS
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

 Uneven level of creative milieu,

making it hard for Geelong to fully
harness the creativity.
Weak soft infrastructure in most of the
case studies, due to poor hard
infrastructure.
70% of the participants were reticent that
Geelong was currently steering towards
becoming a creative city.
Through this research, it is suggested for
those cities who are ready to adopt the
concept of creative city, they first need to
unravel the key issues by underpinning
the characteristics of a creative milieu and
adapt to it accordingly.
This research explores the intangible
aspects of the concept of creative milieu
as the basis of building a creative city.
The focus of this research was only to
identify the possibilities for solving urban
issues by unraveling the key problems
through looking into characteristics of
creative milieu.
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference

CONCLUSIONS

THANK YOU...
Beyond the Edge: Australias First Peri-Urban Conference