The Charter of public space

The idea of a Charter of Public Space was launched by Pietro Garau, international curator of the Biennial of Public Space. The need for a shared definition of public space was what prompted by he international curator of the Biennial of Public Space to launch in 2013 the idea of a “Charter of Public Space”. A strong push to help turn this concept into reality was the idea, developed in partnership with Marichela Sepe, to present it at a side event during the 2012 World Urban Forum in Naples. During that event, useful inputs were collected. A public-space partnership was also born between INU and UN-Habitat, the main organizer of the Forum. This led to UN-Habitat’s participation in the second Biennial, the signing of an agreement of cooperation with INU, the joint organization of an international Expert Group Meeting on Public Space and Sustainable Urban Development (Rome, January 2014), and INU’s selection as partner in the preparation of a “Global Public Space Toolkit”. The Toolkit, a tool based on the Charter’s three main themes (design, development and management of public spaces) was presented at the 2014 World Urban Forum in Medellin, Colombia. Immediately after the 2012 WUF in Naples, Lucia Lancerin joined the drafting group and provided a fundamental contribution by inserting the Charter’s project in the nation-wide “Journey to Good Practice Municipalities” conceived to involve local governments in the Biennial’s preparatory process.