What could a street look and feel like in 2030? Even though streets form a central part of our urban landscape, the design of streets has remained somewhat unchanged for the past 100 years. In the face of global challenges, how could streets better respond to our needs, people and nature? Kera New Street is a glimpse into that future, an experimental and a spatial entity that invites people to experience and envision future streets along with the sustainable solutions needed to implement them.
Local
Finland
City of Espoo
Mainly urban
It refers to other types of transformations (soft investment)
Yes
ERDF : European Regional Development Fund
The New Street in Kera was implemented by the ‘Smart and Clean – Collaborative Kera’ project, which receives ERDF funding from the structural funds programme ‘Sustainable growth and jobs 2014–2020’, granted by the Helsinki-Uusimaa Regional Council.
No
Yes
2022-09-30
As a representative of an organization, in partnership with other organisations
Name of the organisation(s): City of Espoo Type of organisation: Public authority (European/national/regional/local) First name of representative: Tessa Last name of representative: Armour Gender: Female Nationality: Finland Function: Specialist, urban sustainability Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Konsernihallinto / Strategia / Kestävä kehitys PL 12 Town: Espoo Postal code: 02070 Country: Finland Direct Tel:+358 40 6368818 E-mail:tessa.armour@espoo.fi Website:https://www.espoo.fi/en/sustainable-development
Name of the organisation(s): Parkly Oy Type of organisation: Company First name of representative: Päivi Last name of representative: Raivio Gender: Female Nationality: Finland Function: Urban designer Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Maria01, Mechelininkatu 23 LH4 Town: Helsinki Postal code: 00100 Country: Finland Direct Tel:+358 50 4668312 E-mail:paivi.raivio@helloparkly.com Website:https://helloparkly.com/
URL:https://www.instagram.com/espooesbo/?hl=en Social media handle and associated hashtag(s): @espooesbo #SustainableEspoo #NewKera #KestäväEspoo #UusiKera #Keranhallit #KeraNewStreet #KeranUusiKatu
URL:https://twitter.com/EspooEsbo Social media handle and associated hashtag(s): @espooesbo #SustainableEspoo #NewKera #KestäväEspoo #UusiKera #Keranhallit #KeraNewStreet
URL:https://www.facebook.com/espoonkaupunki/?locale=fi_FI Social media handle and associated hashtag(s): @Espoon kaupunki - Esbo stad - City of Espoo #SustainableEspoo #NewKera #KestäväEspoo #UusiKera #Keranhallit #KeraNewStreet
The challenges of the 21st century bring unseen challenges into urban development. This has an impact on our streets, too. Pedestrian and bicycle mobility need an increasing amount of space, but the fight against climate change, changes in weather patterns as well as biodiversity loss also require us to react.
Could the answer be hiding in abandoned warehouses, graffiti, wide open concrete fields and empty factories? You’d be surprised.
In the summer of 2022, on a 40-metre stretch of concrete ending in an old loading dock, the Kera New Street piloted how the streets of the future could look and feel like. Through this platform, we explored how a street can be more than just a route for people and goods to pass through, but also a social space where citizens can connect with each other, green corridors are built, and renewable energy is produced.
To that end, the street entrance was built out of recycled wood, and over the course of a hot week in June, the construction area was filled with street paintings, wood-structured green walls with benches, and planting troughs 3D-printed out of concrete. The aim was to show how a people-centered street of the future could look like. The intervention had the desired effect: even while under construction, the street became a hotspot where people were hanging out, skateboarding and interacting with strangers. Pedestrians, cyclists and critters all shared the street, where there were no speed limits, but “incentives to slow down” painted on the road.
The street was co-created and built in Espoo, Kera, a former logistics area that is being transformed into a sustainable, circular neighborhood that functions as a testbed for sustainable pilots and solutions. The Kera New Street also acted as a platform for experiments: it presented new technologies, spaces for lingering and playing, ways to integrate farming and culture into urban environments, solutions to enhance biodiversity and ways of experimentation and co-creation.
sense of belonging
future street
resilience
smart sustainable cities
co-creation
The context for the project comes from Espoo’s goal to put the United Nations sustainable development goals into action by 2025 as well as reaching carbon neutrality locally by 2030. In this frame, the Kera New Street pilot project envisions what a street of the future could look and feel like – how to focus on people and nature both in the design process and in the actual urban environment? What are our streets like in a world where the SDGs are a reality?
Ecological, social, economic and cultural sustainability are all at the heart of the project, as the whole pilot was set out to explore ways to answer the multifaceted sustainability challenges of the 21st century. Reducing emissions? Let’s make our streets from recycled, circular and low-carbon materials – Kera New Street used recycled wood and concrete made of industrial waste streams. Combating biodiversity loss and unexpected weather patterns? Let’s create more space for runoff waters, permeable surfaces, trees and animals – Kera New Street experimented with green walls, urban trees and edible gardens. Adapting to uncertainty? Let’s open our urban environments and streets for more co-operation and the experimentation of neutral, circular and sustainable solutions and ideas – Kera New Street was co-created and made for citizens, different NGO’s, research institutions and companies alike, for everyone to explore and experiment with their own solutions.
The Kera New Street exemplifies how our future streets are multifunctional, variable and resilient environments that can be easily scaled and adapted to different conditions. Experimenting with and questioning our current urban environments are wonderful ways to boost the sustainability goals: by experimenting we can support change in operating methods and sustainable everyday choices, which at its best leads to emission reductions, new innovations, increased communality, learning and well-being.
When the majority of Kera’s industrial functions were shut down or transferred elsewhere in the 2010’s, the district was left with several empty and declining spaces. On the other hand, with good connections to the neighboring districts and cities, Kera provided an accessible location for urban regeneration and possibilities for creating safe and inspiring urban environments – and an ideal location for the Kera New Street project.
As a platform, the Kera New Street easily transformed into an oasis of urban culture; where one can experiment and experience, something that is made together and where creativity knows no boundaries. The street worked as a platform e.g. for workshops, flea markets, urban farming and small music festivals. In addition, green infrastructure and nature-based solutions brought diverse life and colour to the street. But even more importantly, it was a place that brought people together and could feel ownership of whilst creating a sense of community.
The street itself consisted of innovations brought on site by no less than eight different companies. The main focus point and entrance being the circular pavilion, a wooden structure built fully from pieces recycled from a nearby bridge construction site. Seating was included in many forms – crushed concrete made into sofas, park benches that were skateable as well, boxes that had various local plants and small trees planted in the middle and a green stop – an eco-friendly green solution bringing liveliness to outdoor spaces in town – consisting of a rainwater harvesting system, edible local plants and seating shaded by greenery. 3D-printed planting boxes made from low-carbon concrete and wall structures made from recycled building parts completed the set up.
Right from the start, the Kera New Street project emphasized involvement, co-creation and accessibility as starting points for the streets of the future. On the 40-metre stretch of street, loitering, skating and organizing your own events has not only been allowed, but also encouraged. All accessible, multisensory and along the public transport route.
Instead of actively forbidding activities, the citizens were encouraged to use and develop the street. They were told not to ask for permission but to organise activities, events and use the space in a flexible way as the streets belong to all of us. Local urban activists were involved in creating the environment and experience of the street, such as the opening event and end of summer street party in cooperation with the city of Espoo.
Numbers were painted on the Kera New Street not to imitate speed limits, but rather as ‘incentives to slow down’. 5 km/h for play areas, 20 km/h for block streets. Not to chase cars away from the street but to create balance between different space users. On pedestrian streets, children set the pace, while on larger streets, the lanes are shared by bicycles and cars.
The project design and execution paid careful attention to inclusivity and different sensory experiences – it was critical to make sure that the street could be a place for everyone to see, touch, experience and explore. The idea was that future streets are places of meeting and activities for people of all ages regardless of culture, ability, social standing or religion – the Kera New Street explored this through workshops as well as creating diverse places for stopping, lingering, sitting around, playing and having fun. Everything, of course, free of charge, as streets belong to everyone. And to keep it that way, principles of a safe space were enforced.
The Kera New Street is both a physical and a conceptual platform for citizen involvement: how can citizens use the streets in different and diverse ways, and how could asking the question “What are our streets like in 2030, 2050, 2100?” stir conversations and new meanings for our streets and their future? The street in front of your home is your closest environment, which needs to have space for hanging out, games and play as well. Some people enjoy street parties, while some appreciate sheltered places to sit. The street spaces of the future could be more human and smaller in scale than current ones. When necessary, street spaces could and perhaps should also change quickly.
We paired up with the local university of applied sciences Metropolia for an innovation course of 10 study credits, where students formed multidisciplinary groups to design a concept based on the Kera New Street. The concept needed to be able to be modified and adapted to a variety of different streets once the future district gets built. The students created concepts that had a sense of community through urban street design – making shared spaces and areas for the residents focusing on space in between apartment blocks. They looked into solutions for the city to be enjoyed year-round, making going outside nice in summer and winter alike, both experience-as temperature-wise. But they found that the biggest part of the identity of a city comes from its people, so giving the people the opportunity to participate is the main aspect. Including communal halls and cooperative spaces and creating areas with their own feel and identity was a way to include this. They designed spaces that put nature & people first and enabled use in different ways at different times of the year and day. Including students and freeing them from the constraints of the physical world, rules and regulations gave us out-of-the-box, fresh and innovative solutions as well as inspiration towards sustainable future streets.
The Kera development project brought together several local actors from citizens to organisations and businesses. The Kera New Street concept is a result of a multi-disciplinary design and urban planning as well as benchmarking, learnings and experiences of other national and international urban development sites. This pilot environment is a platform for new innovative services and products that promote circular economy, sustainable buildings and construction as well as biodiversity, created and developed by different locally and regionally operating companies.
As a way of working, co-creating the future street has benefited all: the Kera New Street has hosted several citizen-led workshops and urban activism (e.g. by the local Kera-collective, ranging from insect hotel workshops to flea markets and street parties), it transformed a declining space into a creative urban environment for citizens to enjoy and experience; businesses were able to develop, test and provide their own sustainable solutions in co-operation with each other and the civil society, and the city could implement its sustainability goals. Building an active and functioning test site for new ideas and experiments has only been possible because of extensive co-operation with citizens and stakeholders. In turn, having opportunities to experiment is a prerequisite for sustainable, well-functioning and accessible neighborhoods.
The project was implemented in interdisciplinary co-operation between stakeholders from different fields of sustainability, companies and civil society as well as a public sector and an educational institution. A trio of an architect, Pekka Pakkanen, an urban designer, Päivi Raivio and a multi-thinker, Kimmo Rönkä, were in charge of creating the concept and designing the structures for the street. Eight circular companies (Hyperion, Kompan, Spolia Design, Innogreen, Parkly, Spotti, Planetary Architecture and Rönkä Experience) brought their knowledge and technology to be presented on the street. Parkly was also responsible for the coordination of the project. Through the presented solutions, the visitors could learn about the circularity in built environment as well as see a glimpse of possibilities of the futuristic use of space.
Kera’s regional development is guided by a steering group which has a representation from the leading operators in the field of sustainability in built environment and smart city development, such as Climate Leadership Coalition and Nokia. Discussion and brainstorming for the Kera New Street project has been held in the group’s meetings between the members and the designers.
The New Street in Kera was implemented by The City of Espoo center of excellence for sustainable development, which consists of a multi-disciplinary team of 30 professionals in the fields of urban sustainablity, nature, circular economy, energy, mobility and digitalisation.
Beside studying the future solutions, the goal was to create and offer a platform for people and nature as well as encounters and doing things together. Here the local NGO, Kera-collective, played an essential role. The collective used the street as an arena for local events which included activities such as a flea market, music gigs and workshops. For instance, Kera’s street party gathered over 2000 visitors to learn about the future solutions, circularity and meet local companies.
- A physical, scalable and relatively quick transformation of a 40-metre stretch of concrete ending in an old loading dock into a lively urban playground and a demonstration of what our future streets could be like
- The street has played host to a variety of local, regional and international guests and was able to reach more than 2500 visitors – more than 2500 people, including local residents, decision-makers, companies and international visitors, who came to test, get to know and play with the ideas and elements of the Kera New Street
- A dozen events and workshops for citizens and companies about and on the Kera New Street, including dance and insect hotel workshops, design workshops and music events
- The Kera New Street as an innovation platform: ideas from eight different companies operating in the field of circular economy and around 27 enabled innovations, e.g. 3D printed concrete with a low carbon recipe replacing cement with mining waste and modular seating encouraging pollinators and biodiversity
- The Kera New Street generated a challenge-based course and educational cooperation with Finland's largest university of applied sciences, Metropolia: 2 student groups and 2 concepts for further developing the future street
- Discussions and opinion letters about the future of our streets, sparked by the Kera New Street, in different urban development seminars as well as e.g. in Finland’s largest newspaper Helsingin Sanomat
The former logistics area of Kera is being developed into a sustainable residential area of the future and a testbed for various pilots. For one such pilot we set out to envision what a street of the future focusing on people could look like in Kera.
There are already streets with meaning, such as boulevards and main streets, but majority of contemporary streets are generally considered to be no more than routes for people and goods to pass through. We set out to create something unique and special. Whereas different projects have reclaimed streets and public spaces, we wanted to go beyond this. The Kera district is used as a platform to test solutions promoting urban sustainability and The New Street is no different. Together the street invoked nearly 30 different innovations ranging from a new way to join together pieces of recycled wood to a playhouse made entirely of recycled materials.
Just to name a few more innovations made on or for the Kera New Street:
- Streets as spaces that are used in different ways in different seasons and times of day. The Kera pilot street is full of light street equipment that can be moved in and out as necessary.
- Modular seating, that included bright coloration and a mix of flowering plants to attract pollinators as well as trees for shade.
- A circular pavilion with reused timber from a bridge building site, surplus material from the wood industry and glass elements salvaged from demolition sites. The structure can be dismantled and moved to a new site.
- 3D printed architectural facade panels from low carbon concrete.
- A movable and skateable granite bench.
- Procurement methods for temporary pilot solutions – how the pieces and materials can be kept in circulation as long as possible.
The final Kera New Street was a result of joint labour of the city of Espoo, the design team, eight local companies and active citizens. It included:
- Market dialogues with several stakeholders to define different needs and ideas
- Innovative procurement process by the City of Espoo for a sustainable street design
- Benchmarking European and national solutions, seminars and case studies
- Combining the most interesting elements into a unique sustainable concept
- Concept co-creation by a multi-disciplinary team
- Round table discussions with local companies, citizens and innovators to find the most suitable solutions for presenting and potential for the most impact
- Sourcing circular and reusable materials from local construction and demolition sites
- Construction work that required new technology and innovative solutions to bring the new street to life
- Launching and opening the Kera New Street for events, workshops and continued co-creation
- Before winter snowfall the elements were transferred to their new sites and uses – nothing was demolished and wasted
- Continuing the development of the concept with Metropolia University of Applied Sciences
- Presenting the concept on various platforms and continuous communication
- Dialogue about the possibilities about the use of public space and streets for future needs through the Kera New Street case study
The Kera New Street, just like streets and public spaces in general, mostly addresses local needs and ideas, but its solutions and methodologies are nationally and globally relevant and scalable. Since the final design and the content of the innovative solution is dependent on the input from the participatory process, replicating the concept may result in unique solutions and offer new business opportunities when replicated or transferred.
- The methodologies and processes for co-creating and implementing a similar project can be easily adjusted to different contexts, though it does require a change of perspective in the way that the city works. Transforming our streets into a platform or a testbed requires giving up a centralized approach to urban development: it requires a service dominant operating model, distributed networks, shared capabilities and being agile and open for new suggestions – as well as failure. The replicable methodologies include most of the abovementioned ways of working, including an innovative procurement process, market dialogues, communications, workshops and events.
- Most of the technologies and products created for the Kera New Street were designed to be replicable and transferable, meaning that e.g. they are easy to move around or that they can be disassembled and reassembled in a new location.
- The overall learnings and key ideas of the project can also be implemented in any public space design process and regulations – from including more circular materials in the physical construction of the space to the overall redistribution of street space.
The challenges that the climate crisis, biodiversity loss and war in Europe bring are affecting us all. A need for a just green transition is more relevant than ever: the urban environment must build resilience as well as regenerate biodiversity whilst cater for citizens health and wellbeing. These are not challenges to be solved alone, but in cooperation across international borders.
Kera is an old industrial district in the city of Espoo, one of the four municipalities that make up the Helsinki metropolitan area. Espoo is a growing city that is at the forefront of smart solutions and innovation in Finland and has set ambitious goals for being carbon neutral by 2030. Developing Kera into a circular carbon neutral district is one of the main goals of the Espoo city strategy. For reaching the ambitious carbon neutrality goals it is crucial to have sustainable and smart traffic and mobility solutions.
The street of the future in Kera is a pilot project intended to provoke and seek new ideas from people visiting Kera. The City of Espoo is developing the Kera area as an international example of circularity, where residents will be able to make sustainable choices in their everyday lives. In addition, biologically diverse cities and communities are more likely to contain a greater number of species, enabling them to be more resistant to extreme climatic events.
In Kera, we want to create a place where various operators can test and develop these sustainable solutions for the global challenges faced by cities. The street pilot is an excellent example of how a city can serve as a platform for testing new solutions. The Kera New Street also serves as a showcase for companies developing various sustainable urban solutions. Companies can develop the urban solutions of the future, which we hope will be replicated in other parts of Espoo – and the world. Through active development work, we can increase our handprint – a positive environmental and societal impact.
