My Story - From Transport Planning to Regenerative Streets
A life of connection and meaning, at a pace that I can enjoy. That’s the kind of life that I value. Lately it’s become tangible as my ‘professional’ interest - in streets for people - collides with my personal life. I have realised that what I am looking for has been there for the taking. Prioritising my health and relationships and learning that what matters to me also matters to a lot of people, has led me to embrace the world on my doorstep.
“…when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you achieve it.”
I wasn’t always tracking toward the kind of life that felt aligned. Embracing parenthood changed my life. It made me dependent on other people for support and for shared experience in a way I’d worked hard to be immune from. It also gave me the reckoning I needed to take my life’s purpose into my own hands.
Since becoming a mother, I spend a significant portion of my days out and about. I am on a first-name basis with the staff at local cafés and the library. My friends became those parents who I regularly encountered out and about. These incidental friendships were invaluable to me, and my daughter. And yet they seemed fragile. Limited were the people who regularly chose, or had the option, to travel by foot. People moved away. I moved away. I felt loss, and I realised the vulnerability of community bonds to proximity. Because when a playdate needs to be scheduled, it’s another thing on the to-do list in our already busy lives. In a similar way, many streets were devoid of people. This retreat into our private lives is an opportunity missed to expand our perspective, to enjoy discussing topics from different points of view and to normalise a wider spectrum of cultures and values.
Waiting for the bus stop with my first daughter in a stroller while holidaying in Adelaide
A few years into motherhood, I realised that the overwhelm and frustration I often felt was a manifestation of climate anxiety. That, in the words of Blanche Verlie, whose research, cited in Rebecca Huntley’s book How to Talk About Climate Change in a Way That Makes a Difference, explores students sentiments about climate change, I felt “caught between knowledge about climate change and the pressure to ignore it and strive for individual success within a society driven by fossil fuel consumption.”. Charged with someone other than myself to care for, I had to pay attention to this anxiety as it was affecting my health and my ability to parent. With a lot of help, I gave myself permission to step out of the script I was following. I realised, somewhat sheepishly, that I could not work for a sustainable world if I was not sustaining my health. That’s when I realised that individual and collective health were linked; and that the word that better described a future worth striving for was not sustainable but regenerative. One that nourishes its lifeforms, is self-reinforcing by design.
What if I lived within my limits? Might living within my limits hold the key to achieving my purpose?
Prior to motherhood, I was a transport planner. I was interested in the ways that our streets and our transport options affect our health - both individually and collectively. Becoming a mother gave me a new appreciation of the importance of community. My mission had never been clearer: to find a way to reclaim the streets as the place we go to find community and cultivate the future we want.
In 2024, six-months pregnant with my second child, I stepped out of a salaried job to start a business. I tried many things in pursuit of solving my mission question. For a long time, I was approaching the problem through the lens of a practitioner. I was trying to create change from the top-down. It was hard work. At the same time I was finding it difficult to speak about what I do with the people in my life - friends, neighbours, family. This became my focus. Translating streets for people into an experience that the people whose friendship mattered to me could relate to. So, I swapped knowledge for questions. I started to find new vocabulary for the value of streets. I swapped evidence and rational arguments for values. I realised that the former deprived people of agency while the latter sparked joy and conversation. As I prioritised my wellbeing and curiosity and spent more time outside, in the streets, talking to neighbours and making new friends, I realised that was where change would happen. That the desire for connection, freedom, abundance and joy; to see nature thrive and to feel safe and included in the world beyond our doorstep was near universal. What, then, was stopping us?
A street that is paved without trees, radiating heat, often without a footpath either side of heavy traffic-laden roads is not exactly an enticement to most people. In a world that actively competes for our attention, some overheated asphalted is hardly a hook. Sometimes streets can be so inaccessible and unsafe that even the most adventurous cannot or will not frequent them.
What was there to do?
I started to experiment. I prioritised being offline and being present. Three things have stood out as the actions I can take - that we can all take - to bring streets to life.
1. Start a conversation - Ask people what community means to them, what it means to enjoy the public realm, about nature, about differences, about the future.
2. Enjoy the street - throw a party, research verge-planting guidelines, organise walks together
3. Cultivate reciprocity and abundance - Swap skills, meals, seedlings and tools.
It has come as something of a surprise that the same actions that can transform my street are also transforming my life. I am experiencing less haste, more joy and connection and a sense of abundance. I am excited to share with you stories of these experiments - and those of others who are bringing their own streets to life in inspiring ways - and show what’s possible when our streets are full of life.