Oslo, a City of Farmers?

It's been a busy summer, inching my way into Oslo's seemingly young scene surrounding the topics of urban development, design, and planning. At a 'urban and local development' conference a few months ago, a politician from Bergen challenged the room with an accusation that Oslo has never been urban. Local rivalry between Bergen (Norway's second city with its rich Hanseatic trade history) and Oslo aside, I have noticed repeats of this sentiment echoing with Oslo being called a "city of farmers" or even "accidentally urban."

These terms typically come under critical views of Oslo's development progress and the city's sometimes seemlingly inconsistent plans for the future. Densification and sustainability but everyone needs a parking place for their car and buildings shouldn't be placed too close together. Sometimes it does seem that many Oslo-ites aren't quite sure how to handle the mass of people coming into the city - neither in day-to-day life (read: Justin Bieber concert cripples downtown traffic) nor in planning for future growth. With Oslo being one of the fastest growing cities in Europe, it's an exciting time to be here.

The "city of farmers" analogy is one that has stuck with me this summer - not in the negative way the comment was perhaps first intended, but rather in wondering what it means to bring farmers into a city. I've been preoccupied with the stewardship of land - the connect between people and places, something that I often find lacking in urbanity. Farmers have the tradition and history of stewarding land, so I wonder if there is something in the mentality that could be collectively motivated in the city. Perhaps following this line of thought, an American artist here, Amy Franceschini, has succeeded in starting a provoking urban gardening project in the midst of infrastructure and construction - 'Herligheten'. I braved the awkwardly signed road detours and chain link fences and managed to find the entrance to it on my bicycle during last month's 'open Bjørvika' day.

The garden lies at the base of vent towers going down to the traffic tunnel below.

Proximity to Bjørvika, one of Oslo's main development zones on the fjord front.

There are 100 plot boxes in total, not many people were working them this day.

...but, things were growing! 

Traffic machine vs. Human machine

I took a walk down to Oslo's ever-developing neighborhood of Bjørvika the other day - primarily to get some pictures of the de-constructing of the Bispelokket "trafikkmaskin." Literally called a "traffic machine" in Norwegian, it was a series of stacked rotaries that handled the highway seeking traffic along the Oslo fjord over the last 40 to 50 years. Not unlike the Big Dig project in Boston, this raised construction has been replaced with a traffic tunnel, so its demolition has been planned as a part of this new neighborhood development that is meant to connect the Opera district with the rest of the city.

The pedestrian and automobile routes to, around, and from this current construction site continues to perplex Oslo residents. People are rerouted on a daily basis, with a variety of signage that describes the circuitous at best detours. I found myself somewhat amused at the physical effort currently required of a pedestrian to make a simple loop around the new neighborhood. It all began with the need to cross a road, which is no longer just a road but a multi-lane rotary.

And then the solution for it..

The ramp and bridge to the left crosses the rotary directly to the front.

 It seems that we've gone from ramping cars out of the way overhead in the traffic machine, to this solution I am naming the human machine - ramping pedestrians up and over traffic. Of course the resulting view gives an interesting perspective on the otherwise un-crossable road.

Eventually on the other side I came to the site of the old Bispelokket - where not much of it is still intact.

Behind the Opera this and other construction has taken over for the time being. Pedestrians who are typically put first on Norwegian roadways are channeled between concrete barriers and reminded to watch for turning traffic. 

The sign here says "Careful! Does the car see you?"

Traffic to be crossed between the Opera plaza and the next pedestrian bridge.

View over old Bispelokket site from Opera's pedestrian bridge.

These aspects of planning and engineering the movement of traffic and humans in machines brings the 1920s German movie Metropolis to mind. There is something particular dystopian about development, especially while it is underway. It is difficult to look at this site today and imagine that in the future it is to be a progressive pedestrian friendly neighborhood that will magically connect the new buildings along the fjord to the existing urban fabric behind the train tracks. 

The plaza in front of the Opera currently stands as a pedestrian friendly island amidst chaos.

More photos from this site here.