Note: This transcript was exported from the video version of this episode, and it has not been copyedited

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:36:15
Reena Mahajan
I have just decided now that with everything that I do will be the project or be it, a workshop facilitating workshops or, or even, you know, advocacy or activism, whatever it is, it has to move towards better livability and climate resilience and the way to do this, I think, is to bring these, make these topics more understandable, more accessible, so that so that the common people know about it and the practitioners are able to communicate better, amongst each other to actually be able to make this change.

00:00:36:18 - 00:00:58:08
John Simmerman
Hey everyone, welcome to the Active Towns Channel. My name is John Simmerman and that is Reena Mahajan from Paris at Studio DiverCity. We are going to be talking about some of the activities that she has been involved with, over the years, including, how she became radicalized as an advocate for walking and biking and just people oriented places.

00:00:58:10 - 00:01:20:27
John Simmerman
And, no big surprise, becoming a parent is what really radicalized her as an advocate and an activist in this arena. So it's a wonderful conversation. I look forward to sharing it with you. And I really do appreciate you tuning in. And I really appreciate this opportunity to share these messages. If you are enjoying this content here in the Active Towns Channel, please consider supporting my efforts.

00:01:20:27 - 00:01:36:07
John Simmerman
It's easy to do. Just navigate over to active townsfolk. Org click on the support tab at the top of the page. Well, without further ado, let's get right to it with Reena.

00:01:36:09 - 00:01:40:08
John Simmerman
Reena, thank you so much for joining me on the Active Towns Podcast. Welcome.

00:01:40:10 - 00:01:43:19
Reena Mahajan
Thank you for having me, John.

00:01:43:22 - 00:02:00:24
John Simmerman
Yeah, I mean, this is a been a few months in, getting all the schedules, you know, put together because you've been very busy. You've been traveling all over the place. And we're going to talk a little bit about that. But real quickly, I love to give my guests an opportunity just to say a few words about themselves.

00:02:00:27 - 00:02:08:04
John Simmerman
So, what's your 32nd sort of elevator pitch as to who Reena is?

00:02:08:06 - 00:02:34:00
Reena Mahajan
So, I'm an architect, an oven planner, and I'm also an advocate for walkable cities. And, Well, my focus is really to build resilience in cities and in any way I can. So through projects, through workshops, through advocacy, so that we can go towards, move towards people centered and nature based, cities essentially.

00:02:34:03 - 00:02:56:07
John Simmerman
Fantastic. Yeah. And I just, got us over here to a really quick sort of overview, as to, your organization, studio diversity. I love that. I love that name. That's fantastic. So why don't we start off by, introducing, like, where you are located in the world. So where are you joining us from?

00:02:56:10 - 00:03:17:14
Reena Mahajan
Sure. So I'm based in Paris, but, so I have my own practice and studio diversity. This is something I founded, very recently. And, it's, it's it's international. It's not, it's not necessarily located in Paris because I do things, around the world and remotely. So, you know, it is the. Did you notice the logo?

00:03:17:14 - 00:03:26:21
Reena Mahajan
It's, it's a woman walking, you know? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And so tastic. Yeah. I'm based in Paris.

00:03:26:23 - 00:04:06:19
John Simmerman
I love it. Okay. So you're based in Paris? And you've you've been traveling quite a bit, and you've, you know, been working quite a bit, you know, internationally away from, from from there in Paris. And we're going to talk a little bit about, you know, sort of that journey that you, you have had, and you mentioned something there that, you know, your you're, you're based your, your, your background is really in architecture and all that, but you've sort of shifted gears a little bit and you're really focusing in on the transformation of built environments to become more walkable, bikeable, more people oriented places versus car oriented places.

00:04:06:21 - 00:04:15:24
John Simmerman
And, and you have a fabulous, I think, personal story as to how that shift came about. Why don't you share a little bit about that?

00:04:15:27 - 00:04:34:08
Reena Mahajan
Okay, sure. So what I didn't mention was that I, I, I'm from India. I grew up in Delhi. I did my architecture studies there and, I, it just so happened that I, I the first project I worked on was the earliest process in Delhi, which is where you learn French as an international, as a foreign language.

00:04:34:10 - 00:04:54:18
Reena Mahajan
And so, I was working with a French architect. It was just it just so happened. And so I got interested in, in, in learning French. And then I got a scholarship and I went to France, and I studied urban design there. Urban planning. And, Yeah, to be honest, I, I lived in France for several years, and I that's where I trained as an urban planner.

00:04:54:18 - 00:05:24:12
Reena Mahajan
That's why I got my technical expertise and, I was actually just, you know, doing that for many years without questioning it so much. Actually, I love, I still love, I love being an urban planner. I love working with space. I love designing, so, I've been very happy doing that. However, what happened was, yeah. So I was I've been working just just to just elaborate a little bit with different urban planning, firms, integrated urban planning firms in, in, in France.

00:05:24:14 - 00:05:52:29
Reena Mahajan
Essentially, I've been working on eco districts and master planning. Urban design, urban regeneration of and development, anything to do with anything to do with the built environment. But so public spaces, but also housing and urban conditions, project management, things like that. And for a long time, so this was, this was my life until we decided to with, with my husband, we decided to move, to Latin America for a few years.

00:05:53:02 - 00:06:14:12
Reena Mahajan
It was just to just to have a little, just just an experience. It was a conscious decision to to move for a few years. And we had a child and, and the thing is that although, you know, we have been we have been, we have been, as urban planners always talking about sustainable mobility.

00:06:14:19 - 00:06:36:12
Reena Mahajan
And in all of my projects, of course, you know, we we talk about sustainable mobility, we do shared streets and all of that. But it's only when I started walking the streets, you know, with a stroller that I really understood what it's like to suffer as a pedestrian, in a, in a city that is not really made for pedestrians.

00:06:36:15 - 00:06:43:16
Reena Mahajan
And that's most cities, to be honest. And that's where it all started. That's where the advocacy started.

00:06:43:16 - 00:07:18:11
John Simmerman
So yeah. And this is and this is a series of photos that, you know, kind of highlights and illustrates that reality. You know, suddenly you you are a parent and you've got, you know, whether it's the stroller or it's the little one on a bike, you know, you're suddenly like, you have that epiphany, you have a, a paradigm shift, a paradigm change, because it's what's one thing to get around as an adult, as, you know, especially a, an adult with all abilities being able to navigate through a car centric city.

00:07:18:17 - 00:07:45:12
John Simmerman
But it's completely different to be someone who has mobility issues, accessibility issues, and or, a parent, a new parent. All of a sudden, not only are you, you know, dealing with mobility devices like strollers, but you're also dealing with feeling like you have to shepherd this, this tiny little life through a minefield of car centric domination.

00:07:45:14 - 00:07:57:03
John Simmerman
I know that you used to be, active on Twitter. Amex. I used to also. I've left. I've moved over to blue Sky. I'm assuming, you know, Tom flood from, Yes.

00:07:57:08 - 00:07:59:03
Reena Mahajan
He has been very inspiring to me.

00:07:59:03 - 00:08:22:25
John Simmerman
Yeah. So he's been very inspiring. He's been on the channel a couple times and he tells that story. Is that what kind of prompted him to become an advocate slash activist? Shifting gears and, you know, kind of his previous work was being an auto advertising person and creative person in the auto industry, and it completely radicalized him being a parent.

00:08:22:27 - 00:08:41:19
Reena Mahajan
Yeah, absolutely. I his story really resonates with me. And actually, if you go back to the previous photo, you know, when you see it in the previous one, and when you see this, you see you see, Uruguay is supposed to be a really laid back place, and Montevideo especially supposed to be really laid back city. And it is in many ways.

00:08:41:21 - 00:09:18:27
Reena Mahajan
But you can pop your car wherever you like and with complete immunity. And as long as you're not inconveniencing another driver, it's really not a problem. This is what I just I never thought about this before. And now you can go back to the next one. And, you know, this is when my child is older. And it it was so important for me to just have him work and not always hold his hand and say, be careful, you know, and that's why I'm blocking, you know, this very impatient driver, because the whole burden of what, what I realized was that and I realized this as a mother, but as an urban planner, I

00:09:18:27 - 00:09:40:10
Reena Mahajan
realized the way the the the corners, you know, so smooth and the whole burden of responsibility for safety, it falls completely on the pedestrians because, you know, the drivers approach at full speed. There's nothing stopping them physically on the street. And so, so here I am, you know, physically blocking, my child. And so this is, you know, torn flat story.

00:09:40:13 - 00:10:01:05
Reena Mahajan
Although he was working in the car industry, I was not. But there are many, many, many times when, as an urban planner, when I spoke to, you know, developers and, and promoters and builders and when I said, well, you know, why don't we try and have a more compact setting so that people are not dependent on the car?

00:10:01:07 - 00:10:20:12
Reena Mahajan
You know, they would simply just say because they have they have the power, you see, and they would just say, well, no, you know, we need two cars per home. Our, our clients want this back. And, you know, I've been doing this for such a long time working with, working, on projects that actually we call sustainable.

00:10:20:12 - 00:10:40:04
Reena Mahajan
And I'm, I'm, I'm proud to have worked in, in with firms who have done their best. But at one point I realized that, well, you know, we are calling these projects sustainable, but we're actually building on, we're destroying farmland and then calling these projects sustainable. And we're actually contributing to this urban sprawl. And this is what you see here.

00:10:40:04 - 00:11:03:00
Reena Mahajan
So that was my husband, you know, navigating the streets with the stroller. This is the. Yeah. And, and this is where, now all of these photos were really that I used on Twitter for impact. This photo shows this is the main. This is the most emblematic public space in the city of Montevideo. This is a Rambla.

00:11:03:02 - 00:11:34:16
Reena Mahajan
Not not a lot of people know that. It's actually one of the longest sidewalks, continuous sidewalks in the world. It's 23km of waterfront. And despite that, it's mostly a highway. You know, I would call this a place. A lot of people challenged me on that, saying, no, it's not a motorway, okay? Because you have traffic lights, but the priority is for people to be able to go from their homes in the suburb to the city center or the old town where you have most of the offices and this photo, you know a lot is wrong with this photo.

00:11:34:16 - 00:11:57:21
Reena Mahajan
You can see that that spectacular beach, which is right, you know, very important beach in the cities is completely cut off from one of the most important and beautiful parks, in the city. But, Gerardo, through this, what I call a motorway, you know, and just look at all these parked cars. This is all part of my campaign in Montevideo that I.

00:11:57:21 - 00:12:26:09
Reena Mahajan
I started very organically. I just started tweeting every day, about my observations. And what I did was not just. It wasn't just ranting, you know, I would make observations and I would reason and, I would, use data and statistic. So, for example, the data I used with this photo when I, when I used it on, on social media, was that half the people in the city, half the people in Montevideo, own cars and the rest don't.

00:12:26:09 - 00:12:44:03
Reena Mahajan
And the majority of women in, in the city of Montevideo use public transport to move around. And so who do all these car parked cars belong to? When you start looking at a city like this, you start to understand some of the patterns. You start to understand what is wrong with the city and when you see it like that.

00:12:44:09 - 00:13:06:17
Reena Mahajan
So who owns these cars? It's basically upper class, men, you know, and and then what does it mean? And then and then I analyzed parking. Of course, this was with the help of Donald Shoup. So I was very inspired by all of these, urban thinkers, you know, but inspired by, by his work on, On Parking, I would say using these photos that parking destroys destination.

00:13:06:19 - 00:13:26:08
Reena Mahajan
Parking makes it boring to to walk. And so, you know, it's just a vicious, vicious cycle. And then people buy more and more cars, and then you destroy more and more places. And so just on this one photo, you know, I could go on and on and on. What about flash floods? You know, when when it rains, you have flash floods, the urban heat island effect.

00:13:26:11 - 00:13:55:08
Reena Mahajan
And so for me, just the birth of my child and the experience in the city led me to think to think a lot about these issues. And I came to the conclusion that, the, the problem in cities and the, the main problem that we have today in cities is car culture and is the fact that that cars are responsible, for most of the problems that we have in the city beat urban heat island effect, bathtub and sprawl.

00:13:55:10 - 00:14:17:24
Reena Mahajan
Be it, you know, then there's the whole gender aspect is that autonomy for children that is destroyed when we have car dependent, societies and, and just, you know, this statement which I use often is that, car dependent cities, they can never, ever be be feminist. You know, because it's the we perpetuate a male domination.

00:14:17:24 - 00:14:29:07
Reena Mahajan
So there's so much to say on this. And so I used a lot of, means, to convey this thought. And I did it through social media, through cartoons.

00:14:29:10 - 00:14:56:22
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And we'll get to some of your cartoons in just a moment. But I want to I want to come back to this overhead shot here of this sort of this rumble, look of of this. And you had mentioned that, you know, it, it's cutting communities off and it's cutting people off. And one of the things that pops out right away is how few opportunities, you, you have to be able to get from, like, say, if you are over in that park and you want to go to the beach.

00:14:56:24 - 00:15:25:26
John Simmerman
And so, you know, what ends up happening is you have situations like this where there is an opportunity to get across, you know, this. You're you're trying to get across these multi-lane motorways as you're calling them. I like to call them disparagingly auto sewers because they're just, you know, it's it's ridiculous. In my mind that we would have these, these beautiful activity assets in these beautiful settings.

00:15:25:28 - 00:15:40:05
John Simmerman
And then we say, well, gee, what's the highest and best use of this space? Public space. Oh, I know, let's run thousands of cars past it at high speeds. Not not a not a good combination.

00:15:40:07 - 00:16:05:13
Reena Mahajan
That's an auto. So, you know, it's very good that you have this photo right after that photo because I would often use it to show where. So if most of the parking spaces are owned by middle class or upper middle class men, then where are all the women and where are the children? Well, they're here if you're trying to cross the street and, with great difficulty, because I can tell you that I used to live in one of those buildings that you can see across.

00:16:05:15 - 00:16:26:01
Reena Mahajan
And, in order to cross the road, it would take me. And I'm not exaggerating. It would take me a little over 15 minutes and well under 20 minutes. I made it. Why? Because I must walk to a traffic intersection now without my child, I would have just run across. No problem. But you know, with a stroller, you don't want to take the risk.

00:16:26:01 - 00:16:54:14
Reena Mahajan
So you walked in a traffic intersection, and then you wait for the traffic light. And often the traffic light was yeah, it was up to ten minutes sometimes. So of course, you know, this was absolutely prioritizing the cart car traffic. And when I put it down in these tweets, it it resonated with a lot of people. It really did make an impact because this is people's lives, you know, and the kind of, people, people don't expect to be treated well, in the streets.

00:16:54:14 - 00:17:07:04
Reena Mahajan
They don't have this expectation. So for me, when you start talking about it, then people start to think and then they're like, well, yeah, you know, why is it like that? You know, why do I have to waste my time, crossing the road. So, yeah.

00:17:07:06 - 00:17:30:20
John Simmerman
So you live in Paris now, and Paris, of course, has been going through magnificent changes over the past decade, decade and a half and a half. You lived in Paris, then you moved down to y. And, And then now you're back in Paris and you just returned to Paris back in 2023. Is that when you return.

00:17:30:22 - 00:17:31:04
Reena Mahajan
In 20.

00:17:31:05 - 00:17:58:25
John Simmerman
23? So you spent the pandemic down in, in, in in Uruguay. Yeah. Yeah. Well so one of the, the wonderful things that's happening in Paris right now, I mean obviously the cycle networks are expanding and, the mayor is really trying to tame some of the, the, the, the, the really the impact and the dominance that motor vehicles have over that.

00:17:59:00 - 00:18:19:00
John Simmerman
But one of the things that I enjoyed, from my last visit this past summer, was documenting some of the school streets. And so I think it's a it's a good, good thing to, to focus a little bit on, on the powerful and positive school streets program there in Uruguay. Oh, wait. Never mind.

00:18:19:02 - 00:18:38:09
Reena Mahajan
So yeah, this is how it is. This is how it is. This is how it is. This is how it is in most parts of the world, cars actually compete with. This is how I don't let census, compete with children and with nature, with biodiversity, with all of these things in in cities. This is a scene outside, School Street.

00:18:38:09 - 00:18:57:20
Reena Mahajan
So essentially what this means is that the city council is prioritizing the rights of these drivers over the rights of all. It's not even the rights of the children, but the safety of the children, as well. And so all of this, I documented all of this in Montevideo, and now I'm living in Paris. I can see the contrast.

00:18:57:22 - 00:19:17:15
Reena Mahajan
I think that, what Anne Hidalgo, the the mayor of Paris has done is absolutely phenomenal. I have seen the change because I was away for five years, and I came back to a city that is just so much better for pedestrians, for cyclists. I see parents, you know, taking their children on, on bikes. That's what I do as well.

00:19:17:15 - 00:19:41:06
Reena Mahajan
We are always either walking or cycling in the city. So there's, a couple of things, I think that Paris and and Barcelona and a lot of cities, in Europe and elsewhere in the world, are thinking of two things that, people are working on, at least, you know, mayors who, who have understood what needs to be done are working on, to improve livability.

00:19:41:09 - 00:20:11:14
Reena Mahajan
This is through a kind of feminist lens. So to improve mobility for everyone and to cities, more climate resilience. So when you have a School of Streets program in which you, you know, remove the parked cars or reduce them and, you don't change much. So you have an entire network of streets, you just take one street, and in that street you, cut off the car traffic, you remove some of that asphalt and you allow for water to to seep in.

00:20:11:15 - 00:20:52:10
Reena Mahajan
You allow for some nature, biodiversity, you allow for children to play. And it's not just for the children. This makes multi generational multifunctional spaces where everybody can come and it becomes better for the whole city. So school Streets program has done that, improved livability and improved climate resilience. They also have schools courtyards scheme which is called the Oasis program in which they have because most of the playgrounds earlier in Paris and still most of them are just, you know, razing or asphalt y, so that maintenance will be easy and so that children would not be, bothered with the thorns and, you know, problems.

00:20:52:10 - 00:21:10:20
Reena Mahajan
So just to make things simple, but today, people, you know, have realized that what we can't we can't live like this, and we have problems, you know, with Urban Heat Island and, and the, the floods and everything. And so now we are also changing the school courtyard. So there's a lot of good work happening in Paris and of course, with bike lanes.

00:21:10:23 - 00:21:31:19
Reena Mahajan
I think during Covid, as you mentioned, all these pop up lanes came up. And we know that, you know, when you have the infrastructure, the the cyclists come. And so I think that give confidence to to the city leaders. And since then we've had, it's not perfect, you know, it's not Amsterdam, but it's improving. Every is improving every day.

00:21:31:22 - 00:22:09:01
John Simmerman
Well, even Amsterdam is not perfect. So, it's and that's one of the things that I think is really important. And I try to highlight, on the Active Towns channel is that there is no such thing as the perfect city. We're all in these different journeys trying to to become a little bit better. And, and it's it's interesting to you, I had alluded to it earlier about your career trajectory and, and you had talked about how, yeah, you previously you were working with these other firms and you were looking at designing these communities really from the ground up and oftentimes greenfield types of developments.

00:22:09:07 - 00:22:30:14
John Simmerman
Now you've shifted gears and are really focusing in on trying to transform existing environments and transforming and, and maybe finding ways to decreased car dependance and, do some paving and climate resilience and water, you know, and all these types of things. And we will we will get to that and talk a little bit more about that, that detail.

00:22:30:14 - 00:22:49:21
John Simmerman
But I want to go back to back to Uruguay and some of the work that you were doing there, because you mentioned it earlier in terms of the campaign. Now, here you are. You're a young parent. You're you're, you know, you're in Uruguay and you're like, suddenly this is slapping you across the face and you're like, okay, what do I do?

00:22:49:21 - 00:23:18:23
John Simmerman
Well, I'm going to start drawing some cartoons. That's what they do. And so you you've got this campaign that you're doing. And thank you very much for translating this, and bringing up to speed because, yeah, you start to highlight this and you put, put this into a social media campaign. Take it away. Talk a little bit about, this, this campaign and the work that you were doing and, and how it resonated with some of the local residents and some of the locals there.

00:23:18:29 - 00:23:26:23
John Simmerman
Because obviously, when you're doing a social media campaign in your blasting it out on Twitter, it goes worldwide very, very quickly.

00:23:26:25 - 00:23:56:12
Reena Mahajan
Yes. I believe that's how we probably connected on, on social media as well. So I had no plan, no agenda, no funding, no project. I just had inspiration, I was driven, I was moved, it was personal to me. And, my child slept a lot, and, you know, I was so that that was a year where you can call it a sabbatical or, maternity leave or or whatever you may call it.

00:23:56:14 - 00:24:20:18
Reena Mahajan
I had a younger baby. I was walking him a lot. And so when I was sitting in roadside cafes, I would observe these impatient drivers. And I started having these conversations. And then I had my iPad, and I thought, all right, let's let's try something. So, for example, in this, in this, graphic, you know, I'm at a corner which says Esquina Peligroso dangerous crossing.

00:24:20:21 - 00:24:39:18
Reena Mahajan
And at that dangerous crossing, there's a car that is parked on the pavement. And so, so, you know, I'm like, well, what am I supposed to do? You know, I have to get back, get down on the road and go through this, you know, dangerous crossing. And so I, I post online saying, look, there's a car on the street and, you know, there's a problem in Montevideo.

00:24:39:18 - 00:24:56:08
Reena Mahajan
We have a problem with pavement parking. It's not okay. And so, you know, a lot of people are, this is just a pushback because, like, you have a lot of time on your hands, and these are just. This is just the first world problems and this and that. And so, yeah, I just put it out there, you know, I did nothing.

00:24:56:08 - 00:25:24:21
Reena Mahajan
I just I just put out the situation. So, you know, when there is a problem like this, people think this is a frivolous matter and is it. And we had conversations about that. My as I started making these cartoons, I started developing a goal. You can say I realized that the problem is not technical, it's cultural. And and I realized that the solution is therefore, also cultural.

00:25:24:21 - 00:25:46:01
Reena Mahajan
So there were two, objects that I had. I wanted to push for textural change, and I wanted to do that here, and I wanted to push for push the local authorities to make some changes in their policy and in their design. These were my objectives as the, social media campaign started gaining traction. So this is,

00:25:46:04 - 00:26:17:03
Reena Mahajan
Yeah. Thank you for for displaying this because, this is very important. This is a very important, turning point for me. Because I, I analyzed it a lot. I analyzed what I call a car culture. I mean, we all called it that, but I analyzed it a lot, and I made this a pyramid, on the basis of the rape culture pyramid, which is very famous, which you can actually, you know, find online easily, the rape culture pyramid that says that this is a sociological concept.

00:26:17:05 - 00:26:35:22
Reena Mahajan
You know, rape exists in a culture. If you support the culture, you're not going to be able to solve this problem. So similarly, I came to the conclusion that the culture that we live in, in which we have what we call, you know, accidents, road, road crashes and problems, it exists. It doesn't exist in a vacuum.

00:26:35:22 - 00:26:56:12
Reena Mahajan
It exists in a culture where at the bottom of the pyramid, we allow for a lot of things which we consider in your innocuous, for example, we have, narrow pavements. We think that's okay. We tell children, you know, outside is dangerous. We accept that the road is dangerous. The road should be like our living room, its main public space.

00:26:56:12 - 00:27:20:21
Reena Mahajan
You know, the streets and we say we are okay with the fact that those are dangerous. We are okay with very high speeds, in cities inside the city as well. We are okay with speeds that are like 40, 50, in many cities around the world. When we know that by reducing speed, you can, improve safety for pedestrians, still, we are not going to do it.

00:27:20:23 - 00:27:42:24
Reena Mahajan
Things like, Yeah, we accept urban sprawl, because when you have urban sprawl, you have more cars. And, you know, so it's all related. We accept, what else? Yeah. Bigger and bigger cars today. It is proven we have statistics that show that data that shows that as the car sizes are increasing, as we have more SUVs and pickup trucks, we are having more and more pedestrian deaths.

00:27:42:27 - 00:28:07:23
Reena Mahajan
But we still accept. So all of these things that come at the bottom of the of the pyramid is what I call normalization of car culture. And then you have the other steps. And then at the end of this top of the pyramid, you have, you know, you have road deaths. And so my, my thinking is if you don't if you change the culture, you are going to improve road safety.

00:28:07:25 - 00:28:11:07
Reena Mahajan
And you're going to improve, life in cities.

00:28:11:10 - 00:28:43:09
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And it really is I think a great way to illustrate that too, is like you, you have this normalization of these sort of base behaviors of, oh, it's normal for us to be able to just park her car wherever we want. And how dare you take the time to, like, talk about this? You know, and what's interesting, too, is that you had mentioned that you were putting it out there and you were hoping to increase awareness and start a dialog.

00:28:43:12 - 00:29:23:21
John Simmerman
But it is kind of funny to to see just how quickly people will, will go right to, will zoom back out here. So we can see this will go right back to just that response of, of of like criticizing that response of like blaming and the response of saying, well, you know, you know, what an ungrateful foreigner or why do we, you know, it's like, wait, let's have a let's, let's actually think about this and have a dialog because this is uncomfortable and unsafe for everyone, whether you, you know.

00:29:23:23 - 00:29:24:06
John Simmerman
Yeah.

00:29:24:06 - 00:29:41:18
Reena Mahajan
So do we. They did. And, I was I was very touched by some of the responses, some of the support. It was it was mixed. Of course. You know, there were people I mean, it's Twitter after all. Of course there were people who said, oh, well, you know, you should go back to India where, you know, you have power on the streets.

00:29:41:18 - 00:29:48:18
Reena Mahajan
And and so then I responded saying, yes, yes, in India that was a secret. But but in Uruguay the was a secret, you know.

00:29:48:24 - 00:29:50:22
John Simmerman
So there, you know.

00:29:50:24 - 00:30:09:21
Reena Mahajan
We had some interesting conversations. I didn't mind, to be honest. I understood that that's how it is. I would just always get a straightforward response. And, I didn't know anybody in the country before that. And as I did this, I also I learned Spanish, you know, and I improve my Spanish, through this, through this, campaign.

00:30:09:24 - 00:30:16:17
Reena Mahajan
And over time, would you like to know then how what happened? Or would you like to, maybe go through some more cartoons? I don't know.

00:30:16:17 - 00:30:39:27
John Simmerman
What I, what I wanted to do in this next image is, is bring us to, you know, the, the rape culture, car culture. Right. Okay. That you have here, because some people may not understand and and be aware of, of the victim blaming that takes place between rape, rape culture and car culture. Although you mentioned it when we were looking at the pyramids.

00:30:39:27 - 00:30:45:28
John Simmerman
So this is the nice, graphic that you put together, the cartoon that you put together that kind of talks about that.

00:30:46:01 - 00:31:15:14
Reena Mahajan
Yeah. That's true. So I did this. I did this in Uruguay, and I used it again in France very recently when, there was cyclist that was actually killed by, and, and shockingly, even in Paris after the incident, the a lot of conversations were around how cyclists they don't respect any rules. Which is, which is true to a certain extent, but it was shocking for me that this conversation happened after the death of the of the of the cyclist.

00:31:15:21 - 00:31:32:24
Reena Mahajan
And that's when I pulled this out, actually. Then I put this out in French and, and so this cartoon has, has, has kind of made the rounds everywhere because this is something common that I have noticed, where every time there is a, there is, and I'll say it like that, an accident, you know, that's another conversation.

00:31:32:26 - 00:31:56:19
Reena Mahajan
But, time there is there is, road, deaths or, or an accident immediately the questions will go towards so, you know, where was the person walking, what time was it or were they walking on the pavement? Was the cyclist, you know, wearing a helmet? All kinds of questions about the the conditions of the of the victim, but not so much about who was driving.

00:31:56:19 - 00:32:05:02
Reena Mahajan
And one often says, the car crashed into the, the, the cyclist and not the driver. Right. And,

00:32:05:04 - 00:32:35:24
John Simmerman
Well, and and I'll jump in to say too, that one of the things that we're really honing in on now, and Tom flood, you know, talks about this a lot, too, is is also taking a step back even further back and saying, let's not even blame the driver necessarily. Let's let's focus in on the system that is creating that cultural dynamic of drive everywhere for everything as fast as possible, and being able to park everywhere.

00:32:35:27 - 00:33:00:22
John Simmerman
Let's let's get to, you know, the core issue. And, Professor Wes Marshall and I had this discussion, you know, after he published his most recent book, killed by a traffic Engineer, is really focusing in on the root problem. And that's what's so encouraging about what is transforming in Paris is that the mayor has been really, really dedicated at changing the built environment.

00:33:00:25 - 00:33:20:01
John Simmerman
Now, even though you can change the built environment, doesn't mean that you're going to have instantaneous cultural change. And that's what's it you're experiencing in this situation with the fatality of of this person who was on a bike? I don't even want to call him a cyclist. It's just a person on a bike.

00:33:20:03 - 00:33:20:22
Reena Mahajan
Exactly.

00:33:20:29 - 00:33:33:01
John Simmerman
And and I think that that's one of the things that, that we have to really realize is that a change is hard and it's really, really hard to do. Yeah, it takes time.

00:33:33:03 - 00:33:53:07
Reena Mahajan
And policy change, I think, can change, culture slowly. It takes time. It's messy. But, absolutely. And I think it's, it's, it's a combination of things, you know, it's not it's not just one thing or the other. We need a change in the built environment, but the change in the built environment will happen with two things.

00:33:53:07 - 00:34:09:24
Reena Mahajan
I just come to that image, but I just. I just had a thought, and I want to share this with you because, I was in India and somebody and I asked this question actually do an official saying, why are we still building more lanes and why are we still doing this when we know now that this is not the way forward and this is not going to to help?

00:34:09:27 - 00:34:38:21
Reena Mahajan
And he simply answered, he said, it's a demand. You know, people want this. And so the, the the leadership actually unfortunately doesn't change until the people start demanding. But if the leadership change changes and there is change in the in the street design because that also comes with leadership is the leaders and the it's they who, who, who mandate and who will validate these projects and who ask the urban planners, you know, okay, you know, we want the streets to look like this.

00:34:38:29 - 00:34:49:27
Reena Mahajan
It's it's it has to, you know, once it starts like this, you know, it can be a little bit bottom up and a little bit top down. And it kind of meets. And that's how we have change in cities. So yeah, you.

00:34:49:29 - 00:35:23:00
John Simmerman
And we'll go we'll go back to, to, to that diagram. But something that you said is really, really important there. And that brings us back to the foundation of this pyramid of the normalization. And that is if we're going to be successful about this, we really do need to grow the tent. We need to really enhance awareness of the overall populace so that, you know, those leaders of the cities, like the leader in the city in, in, in, in India that you were talking with where they're saying, no, you don't understand.

00:35:23:00 - 00:35:51:00
John Simmerman
The demand is for more car lanes. Well, we have to counter that. And the only way we can counter that is to increase awareness that this type of dynamic exists. And they need to be able to understand that, no, we don't just have to accept the normalization that cars should have free reign over every square inch of our public realm and, in and get people in other words, really grow that momentum and movement.

00:35:51:07 - 00:36:00:10
John Simmerman
So the elected officials feel like, oh, my constituents, what they really want are safe places, not necessarily to drive fast everywhere all the time.

00:36:00:12 - 00:36:21:17
Reena Mahajan
Yeah, absolutely. And so and and that is where I think walking is something that is so underestimated. And I'm really glad that people are talking about it more and more because it's really the building block of it's really it's really something that can bring it all together. And that is why actually my, my, my firm, you know, see the diversity?

00:36:21:17 - 00:36:51:17
Reena Mahajan
The sub line is, urban planning for walkable communities. I insist on, on, on walking because I feel it brings all of these factors together. So, you know, when in a city for a city's metabolism to really thrive, you know, if, if your streets are walkable, it means that if you have, you know, for example, in India, the person I was talking with, you know, they have this major public private partnership, they have that metros that they are building.

00:36:51:19 - 00:37:11:25
Reena Mahajan
But the one thing that is going to make those metros work is that if you can walk to the metros because, you know, human beings, we walk and and for a thriving, urban environment, you and like I was saying, you know, for urban, environment to, to to thrive, you need to have walkable streets, because that is a sign of good, local economy.

00:37:12:00 - 00:37:35:13
Reena Mahajan
It's a sign that, well, there is nature in the streets, that there is water and there is, biodiversity. And all of those things kind of come together when we prioritize walking. And so in this, in this, cartoon. Yeah. You, you know, it's when I was asking that pedestrians should have priority because this is what is important for the city, you know, is the the drivers.

00:37:35:13 - 00:37:41:12
Reena Mahajan
We have a lot of, well, they're very entitled, you know, oftentimes. And so I just made a comment on that.

00:37:41:14 - 00:38:13:18
John Simmerman
Yeah. What I love to do with the active Towns channel and the movement here is to really frame this too, as, as, active mobility systems where people have the ability to walk, bike, stroll, roll, you know, it's and and I always view riding a bike differently than, than a lot of people in North America. A lot of people in North America view cycling as you know, those cyclists are cycling.

00:38:13:21 - 00:38:41:15
John Simmerman
And why are we doing things for them? I view it more as pedestrian. Plus I take more of a sort of a Dutch approach at realizing that, understanding that most people have a limited distance in which they can walk. You know, the typical walk shed is somewhere around 800m to 1000m, and then you're like, okay, if it's longer than that, I'm going to start thinking about another way of of taking this journey.

00:38:41:18 - 00:39:24:20
John Simmerman
And that's where the Dutch system really thrives quite well, is they have those overlapping redundant mobility networks of a walking network, a cycling network, a motor vehicle network, a transit network. And you have that, that ability of having mobility choice, which is really, really important. So I always try to to say that when we talk about a walkable city, and I had this discussion with Jeff Speck as well, especially as he reflected on his ten year anniversary to his book Walkable City, is he realized that one of the biggest changes that he needed to make when he read, when he wrote the additional 100 pages to that book, was he didn't give enough credit

00:39:24:20 - 00:39:49:06
John Simmerman
to the power of the bicycle to be able to extend one's reach, in a city. And so he really talks about how there's a synergistic relationship between what a walkable city is and what a bikeable city is, and making sure that, you know, we're we're doing what we can to understand that the streets should first and foremost have priority of of people walking.

00:39:49:08 - 00:40:14:03
John Simmerman
And also, you know, people on mobility devices like wheelchairs and mobility scooters and things of that nature. And in many cases, especially with some of our older cities. And you talk about this too, with sidewalks and pavements, is that oftentimes in many locations, in many locales, the the sidewalks, the pavements are the responsibility of the landowner and not necessarily the municipality.

00:40:14:05 - 00:40:43:27
John Simmerman
And so the, the conditions of, of those facilities vary a great deal. They get in disrepair, they get blocked, etc.. And one of the things that I've noticed over documenting, over the last 15 years in, in Europe is how many people in wheelchairs and mobility devices will prefer to use the safe and protected and segregated cycle paths because they are more consistent and smoother.

00:40:44:00 - 00:41:03:14
John Simmerman
And being able to do that. And again, I'm spending a lot of time in the Netherlands, so I'm seeing sort of the best of the best in terms of, of, rolling stock in terms of, cycle networks and all of that. But I am seeing improvements there in Paris as well, is more and more people are gaining pedestrian.

00:41:03:14 - 00:41:08:17
John Simmerman
Plus they're able to roll on those protected and separated cycle paths is absolutely.

00:41:08:17 - 00:41:32:21
Reena Mahajan
I mean, you you said it. You know, you use the word network a lot. And, I think when I see and when most people, you know, when we say walkable and, you know, it's just things have to work in a network. Nobody's going to walk the whole city. But from any point to any point, you know, if you're able to walk it and if you are able to, then, you know, use your body, you know, use wheels.

00:41:32:21 - 00:41:48:21
Reena Mahajan
You, like you said, you know, pedestrian. Plus, I like it. It's it's about having agency in a city and to be able to, to move from any place to any place and then to join these bigger networks, you see. And and here we end up having, we have what we call, you know, we have the metropolitan scale.

00:41:48:21 - 00:42:06:18
Reena Mahajan
We have the big things that are happening in the city, the big box, big, networks of you know, let's say metros and busses. But what makes daily life is what happens from where you are. How do you get to those? And you know, do you have confidence to get out of your house? And, and this is the same thing.

00:42:06:18 - 00:42:17:27
Reena Mahajan
And this actually applies not only to people but also to certain animals and insects. It's it's all things that work in networks. And we need to make sure that these links are there, you know.

00:42:17:29 - 00:42:52:05
John Simmerman
Yeah. Yeah. You know, you mentioned about the feminist city and and and appreciating the fact, especially there in Uruguay, the, the, the vast majority of the people who are quote unquote, forced to walk are oftentimes the children, women and children. And, this particular slide here says, do purple crossing solve the gender problem? But the question mark, I don't know the answer to that, but I did notice that there's these beautiful purple flowering trees in the in the background of this, too.

00:42:52:06 - 00:42:57:06
John Simmerman
So, is that a jacaranda tree?

00:42:57:09 - 00:42:58:22
Reena Mahajan
I'm not sure. I'm not.

00:42:58:23 - 00:43:16:14
John Simmerman
Sure. It's very familiar to me because we had jacaranda. Yeah, we had jacaranda in Spain. When I was down in Seville and same thing. It was just, you know, beautiful to to see that talk a little bit about this, this treatment and the reason why you included this slide.

00:43:16:16 - 00:43:38:09
Reena Mahajan
So this is the the main parliament building in, in Uruguay, in Montevideo. And it's got a huge roundabout. It's, it's you can see it's located in a roundabout. I mean I'm, I'm calling it that. They wouldn't call it a roundabout. It's roads. But it essentially was like a traffic island. And you can see the number of cars.

00:43:38:09 - 00:44:08:06
Reena Mahajan
It's multi-lane, I don't even know is really, really huge. So to cross it is a challenge, of course. And, and so on Women's Day, they painted the zebra crossing purple. And, you know, we are home in a city and they are feminist in many ways, you know, you know, very little, I have to say, they have a lot of great, laws and, you know, a lot of things, really, I really support them on that.

00:44:08:09 - 00:44:29:07
Reena Mahajan
But, but in terms of, you know, in terms of this being, feminist, I question that, of course, you know, because I said, well, you know, it's not going to make it easy for an old woman to cross the street just because it's purple. And that's why I made the point that, you know, if you remain car dependent, you can never claim to be feminist because of so and so.

00:44:29:13 - 00:44:33:09
Reena Mahajan
Is that the reasons that I gave you? Yeah.

00:44:33:11 - 00:44:40:11
John Simmerman
But but it's it's but it's pretty paint. Come on. Rina.

00:44:40:14 - 00:45:00:10
Reena Mahajan
And, you know, this means that a lot of people don't necessarily make. Is that when, when the only way to live once you have a certain income, let's say the only acceptable place to live in is it's a suburb outside in in a home, where you are obliged to sit in a car, just even to go and buy bread.

00:45:00:12 - 00:45:16:20
Reena Mahajan
It basically. What does it mean? It means that if you then, you know, it requires a kind of family system, you know, husband, wife, two children and then maybe you can function with your two cars. You know what happens when you separate, you know, how are you supposed to manage your lifestyle? What happens if you lose your job?

00:45:16:20 - 00:45:36:16
Reena Mahajan
You know who's going to pay for the petrol. So, you know, and women often get isolated in these settings because, you know, if, if, if the male has a better job and a better paying job, then once they have children, you know, who drives the children everywhere to all the activities, who gives up their job, you know, so it has far reaching consequences.

00:45:36:16 - 00:45:44:05
Reena Mahajan
You know, the discard culture, the living, which, it wasn't something that I, I, I developed, you know, as I was developing my campaign.

00:45:44:07 - 00:45:57:24
John Simmerman
Yeah. And this, this particular cartoon here, the elephant in the room, sort of, highlights that. Why don't you walk us through this and and even, even kind of describe it a little bit for the listening only audience, too.

00:45:57:27 - 00:46:17:24
Reena Mahajan
Sure. So it's, it's, it's a cartoon in which, the two people, you know, from the city, city officials, gender debate, you know, they're having a debate and they're, they're talking about why, why there is no investment for the city. Why is it that people are leaving the city and going to move in the suburbs?

00:46:17:27 - 00:46:38:03
Reena Mahajan
Why aren't we having, you know, all the mosques coming and investing, in the in the city center. And then there's an elephant in the room, and this big elephant, and where I've written on the elephant, that. Well, you have a deteriorated public realm, so people don't want to leave where their children are not safe, where there are no places to, to play.

00:46:38:05 - 00:46:54:27
Reena Mahajan
I just remembered, you know, looking at that previous image, is that any time you have a park in order to get there, it's a nightmare. So you have parks that you drive to get to those parks. Which is why I think that in a city for daily life to function, you have to be able to walk. Otherwise you are just living in.

00:46:55:00 - 00:47:11:04
Reena Mahajan
You have several bubbles that are connected with cars and that's how you you move. And only few people have those that power. Then to move around in the city. The others are powerless. And so yeah. So you have degraded public ground air pollution, noise pollution, unsafe streets, all of these things are what I call the elephant in the room.

00:47:11:12 - 00:47:29:18
Reena Mahajan
And the city is in a state. It's not in a it's not in the right state for people to want to raise their children. If they have a choice. Those who don't have a choice, a choice, but those who have choice don't want to live in this kind of city. So they live in the suburb, and then they buy more cars, and then they make the city more unsafe.

00:47:29:18 - 00:47:33:23
Reena Mahajan
And so it's the vicious cycle, right, of bad.

00:47:33:26 - 00:48:04:07
John Simmerman
Yeah. And then that brings us back around to, you know, when we do have that tipping point of of either the community coming up to, to articulate to city leaders that this is what we want. We want a, a more delightful city. Let's use Paris as an example. I was there in 2015 when, when mayor Bill de algo, pushed forth to have her very first car free city.

00:48:04:09 - 00:48:23:19
John Simmerman
And so I was there on the very first car free day on, I think it was September 26th or September 27th, on the very first car free day on that Sunday. And I was there specifically to document, you know, that experience. And so I was filming, you know, the Champs-Élysées with no cars and just people taking over the spaces.

00:48:23:21 - 00:48:55:00
John Simmerman
And I like to and part of one of the quotes that she had in the, in lead up to that is that, you know, we have a problem when our beloved city, in our beloved city, we can't even see the Eiffel Tower through the smog. You know, this is this is a terrible situation. And so at some point in time, either it has to bubble up from from the bottom, you know, a bottom up revolution, or it has to come from the top or both, is what I say is we need strong leadership of people who can articulate a vision.

00:48:55:03 - 00:49:20:21
John Simmerman
And, Mayor Hill Dargol certainly, continued from the previous mayor having done some pretty, you know, strategic things as well. And then she just doubled down and she went further into trying to create a more people oriented city, because without it. Yeah. I mean, if you just turn your cities over to the car, we know what the result is.

00:49:20:23 - 00:49:33:20
John Simmerman
It's it's not a very good thing. And that's exactly what the dynamic of the elephant in the room of people saying, well, yeah, we're then if it doesn't, if we don't have the perception that this is a good place to raise children, we're going to leave.

00:49:33:22 - 00:49:51:20
Reena Mahajan
Exactly. And you say we know it, but I'm not so sure, you know, because, as in who is the we. Exactly. They're not they're not many people who actually understand this. And this is why I think that today, you know, when you see a top down, bottom bottom up, both are important. But essentially who is making cities?

00:49:51:20 - 00:50:23:13
Reena Mahajan
So the one realization that I have come to after almost two decades of working in this field is that until and unless urban planning principles are understood, it's timely, because I was actually saying that until and unless urban planning principles are made simple to understand, for the general public, but also between urban practitioners, until we are just able to have normal conversations about how we should move, how we should live, what are the important things in life?

00:50:23:13 - 00:50:45:05
Reena Mahajan
Everybody wants well-being, right? Everybody wants. So this is the shocking part that most people, if you ask them today, most people are in favor of, climate action. Most people are in favor of child cities and most people are in favor or a lot of people are in favor of a more feminist outlook to, you know, more cities that are more inclusive.

00:50:45:05 - 00:51:11:16
Reena Mahajan
Let's just say most people say yes to those things. What they don't understand is that car centric development is not going to let us down that path. And so to make that clear, I think there are a lot of things that are so basic. For example, you know, should we keep adding car lanes to our streets, you know, or, you know, does reducing speed actually reduce the, travel time?

00:51:11:16 - 00:51:44:01
Reena Mahajan
Not necessarily. So there are a lot of things that I think are not impossible for people to understand. And because we spend so much time in traffic, I think it is of interest to people. And so, you know, you mentioned a very interesting book about, traffic engineering. And I think that this profession, urban planning, first and foremost, I think somewhere is blocked or urban design is blocked by traffic and transport planning, which often in most cities, the the departments are siloed.

00:51:44:03 - 00:52:07:19
Reena Mahajan
And so if you don't have a say on transportation, you can't really you can work on urban design and smaller at a smaller scale, but you can't change, the way the city functions. And so transport is, is something that is kind of out of reach. Most people, even if you have good ideas, you can't do anything about it because it's and it's a very powerful department in most, cities around the world.

00:52:07:22 - 00:52:25:04
Reena Mahajan
And so even if you have good ideas, there's really not much you can do until you change the way things function. And so for that, for that. But who is who are the people who are making these systems? After all, it's it's you and I. It's the people, it's leaders. It's it's it's all of us. It's the schools and the universities, you know, how are we teaching engineering?

00:52:25:04 - 00:52:49:29
Reena Mahajan
How are we teaching transport? So my conclusion, you know, through all of these experiences that I have had and today my focus is actually to bring these urban planning principles from the domain of technical expertise and to be able to talk about these things in layman's term, to give it a kind of broad spectrum appeal. So everybody can talk about these things and everybody can have a say in how our cities should be.

00:52:50:02 - 00:53:20:06
Reena Mahajan
And so to this graphic, I tried to explain the difference between transport and mobility and the need to today really talk about mobility, as you were saying, you know, active mobility networks in how people move. And so transport about if transport is about moving vehicles, then mobility is about moving people. If transport is about moving from point A to point B, and the time that in between these two points is lost, mobility is about enjoying that time.

00:53:20:06 - 00:53:38:12
Reena Mahajan
It's actually a it can be a social and cultural experience. For example, when you're on a bike, you know, you can have a social experience, a cultural experience, a sports experience, you know, you can be fit simply because you're moving from place to place. If you go for a walk, if you walk to your office, you have good thoughts.

00:53:38:12 - 00:54:09:25
Reena Mahajan
For children. It is so important for their mental, well-being, for their, physical well-being, even for academic performance. You know, it's so important walking, cycling, moving your body. And then if transport is, all about efficiency, then the mobility is about well-being, and it's about, social justice. It can be about identity if transport is about, the world of engineers, then mobility is about multi lateral approaches.

00:54:09:25 - 00:54:17:06
Reena Mahajan
And so this is what I was saying. So we need to take it out from the world of engineers and bring it out, you know to people so that everybody can have a say.

00:54:17:12 - 00:54:55:19
John Simmerman
We need to have this sort of multilateral approach. And interestingly enough that's exactly what Professor West Marshall talks about in his book, killed by a Traffic Engineer. Is that really we need our education system of our engineers to be, much more multidisciplinary. We need more people who have, backgrounds in, in a variety of different areas, including public health, like my background, social, areas and, and social workers and people who really understand many of the dynamics that you identify here, like wellbeing and social justice and things of that nature.

00:54:55:22 - 00:55:21:04
John Simmerman
So I think you're you're spot on with that and with that concept of mobility, we're talking about accessibility. We need people to have access to the things that are special in life, where we're not cutting off the beach, that beautiful Rambla from the people by this massive, you know, motorway and auto sewers. So accessibility is so incredibly important.

00:55:21:07 - 00:55:39:09
Reena Mahajan
There is no reason why we should accept anything that doesn't seem logical. Just because you haven't understood something about how systems work, or someone might say to you, well, you don't know, policy works like this, or the city's laws are like that. If they don't make sense, we should be able to question them and say, well, that doesn't make sense.

00:55:39:14 - 00:55:45:05
Reena Mahajan
Let's change those laws, you know, so that we can have a better looking city and a better feeling city. Yeah.

00:55:45:05 - 00:55:58:12
John Simmerman
That's me. Yeah. Apps. Absolutely. You know, without a doubt, that's one of the most important things. Is there anything that we haven't yet discussed that you want to leave the audience with?

00:55:58:15 - 00:56:04:27
Reena Mahajan
I think you had, an image that showed those four, themes, perhaps go back to that. Yeah, let's.

00:56:05:01 - 00:56:07:12
John Simmerman
Let's let's go back to this, this little image here.

00:56:07:16 - 00:56:23:09
Reena Mahajan
So. Well, as I was doing my, my campaign, you know, through this campaign, I got to know a lot of people in the city. And then they asked me to, do a course for the Council of Architecture in, in Montevideo. And that is where I started this. But now, now this is one of my, my goals.

00:56:23:09 - 00:57:00:23
Reena Mahajan
You know, as I was saying, I, I started, a capacitacion course, you can call it, there were four themes, you know, gender or gender sensitive urban design, sustainable mobility, water sensitive urban design and, density in nature. Or you can call it images, density, compactness and understanding density in relation to nature and the the reason I did this was because I wanted to devise a course where, different urban practitioners could actually communicate with each other.

00:57:00:23 - 00:57:20:28
Reena Mahajan
So it was a course that actually could be attended even by children, or it could be attended by anybody or anybody in the field of, of all kinds of urban planners and, I did this because I think this is exactly what I was saying. I think that today the biggest challenge is to make a change in the status quo.

00:57:21:02 - 00:57:51:13
Reena Mahajan
Things are to stuck, and they are stuck because we have been doing this for decades. Certain ways of doing urban planning in cities, including the tendering process, including, I mean, everything from policy to design. And like I said, you know, to the culture that we live in, and in order to change that, I think that we really need to bring down these concepts and be able to talk about these concepts, get them out of their, silos.

00:57:51:16 - 00:58:11:22
Reena Mahajan
And so it was very interesting to see some municipal officials, attended this course. And it was interesting to see, you know, there was a mayor, you know, and he was talking about, you know, gender. And then there was a hydrology that was then doing, learning about sustainable mobility. And the traffic engineer was learning about density.

00:58:11:24 - 00:58:48:16
Reena Mahajan
And this is so simple and so important and this is part of the change, I think that that we need and which is why today. So as I said, I am very attached to to my profession and to working with, you know, to be on the design board. So I haven't given that up. But I have just decided now that with everything that I do will be the project or be it, a workshop facilitating workshops or or even, you know, advocacy or activism, whatever it is, it has to move towards better livability and climate resilience.

00:58:48:16 - 00:59:21:02
Reena Mahajan
And the way to do this, I think, is to bring these, make these topics more understandable, more accessible, so that more so that the common people know about it and the practitioners are able to communicate better, amongst each other to actually be able to make this change. So I just wanted to to mention that because I have worked hard on this and, to, to to bring these technical, topics, out from, you know, that that expertise and to be able to talk about these things.

00:59:21:04 - 00:59:23:14
Reena Mahajan
And so yeah, working on that.

00:59:23:16 - 00:59:58:18
John Simmerman
And here's the landing page for your website, studio diversity.com. Fantastic. I think that this is so exciting and so encouraging. The transformation and the evolution that you went through, similar to Tom Flood's story, you know, sort of getting radicalized by becoming a parent and then really focusing in on, on transforming our built environment, transforming our cities, paving them.

00:59:58:20 - 01:00:27:00
John Simmerman
Let's, let's, you know, think about all of these different dynamics, but not necessarily just doing what is easy, which is the easy way is just, you know, do a greenfield development. You know, the easy thing is, you know, the New Urbanism concept of let's build, you know, a walkable, bikeable, friendly place from the ground up. But then oftentimes that ends up being this island out in the middle of of car dependency.

01:00:27:02 - 01:00:55:11
John Simmerman
And so that's one of the biggest challenges that we have when, you know, as a new urbanist and as a member of seeing you, we're constantly dealing with that battle of, okay, we need to balance because there is plenty of opportunity if we can gain the support and gain that momentum and, and really backstop strong leaders with the support of their constituents to be able to re articulate and bring these cities back around.

01:00:55:15 - 01:01:16:03
John Simmerman
You had mentioned in, in Uruguay that there was this this concept, the a culture of of of cars. And it was all about cars and it's almost like car worship to, to this because it's, it's like so ingrained. But I mean, we, we don't have to go very, very far back. I mean, 120 years ago, the cars didn't exist there.

01:01:16:06 - 01:01:29:25
John Simmerman
And so there's there's rich history in so many places that were in place before the automobile. So really what we're doing is we're transforming them back into people oriented places.

01:01:29:28 - 01:01:50:25
Reena Mahajan
Absolutely. If you scroll a little bit, if I may ask you to scroll. Yes. So there you go. So that is my, that is my mission statement. You know, a world where people centered and nature based cities, they replace car centric urban sprawl. This has been a very difficult decision for me because a lot of the work is in greenfield development today.

01:01:50:27 - 01:02:06:13
Reena Mahajan
But there came a point in my life where I realized that, I need to focus on urban regeneration, and I cannot keep building, on, on, on, on natural land and saying that I'm doing sustainable urban planning and so.

01:02:06:15 - 01:02:13:29
John Simmerman
Well, yeah, you're clearly you're clearly a glutton for punishment. This is much harder to do that you want to use.

01:02:13:29 - 01:02:30:19
Reena Mahajan
Much more gratifying. And now when I, when I what I feel I have a voice and what I, what I am designing, what I'm working on is also what I am preaching. And so I am at peace with myself. And I feel really happy, you know, to be in this space and confident. Yeah.

01:02:30:21 - 01:02:39:13
John Simmerman
And I am really, really happy that we had this opportunity to chat and, introduce you and studio diversity.

01:02:39:15 - 01:02:40:01
Reena Mahajan
To.

01:02:40:04 - 01:02:41:03
John Simmerman
The world.

01:02:41:05 - 01:02:45:10
Reena Mahajan
To me. And, and for having this conversation, John, I really appreciate it.

01:02:45:14 - 01:03:00:09
John Simmerman
And thank you all so much for tuning in. I hope you enjoyed this episode with Rena. If you did, please give it a thumbs up. Leave a comment down below and share it with a friend. And if you haven't done so already, be honored to have you! Subscribe to the channel. Just click on that subscription button down below and ring that notification bell.

01:03:00:13 - 01:03:25:22
John Simmerman
And again, if you're enjoying this content here on the Active Towns Channel, please consider supporting my efforts by becoming an Active Towns Ambassador. Super easy to do. Just navigate over to active towns. Georgie. Click on the support tab at the top of the page and other several different options, including becoming a Patreon supporter. Patrons do get early and and free access to all my video content, so there is that extra bonus and benefit.

01:03:25:25 - 01:03:43:04
John Simmerman
Again, thank you so much for tuning in. I really do appreciate it means so much to me. And until next year, this is John signing off by wishing you much activity, health and happiness. Cheers. And again, sending a huge thank you out to all my Active Towns Ambassadors supporting the channel on Patreon. Buy me a coffee YouTube.

01:03:43:04 - 01:03:51:28
John Simmerman
Super! Thanks! As well as making contributions to the non profit, every little bit adds up and it's much appreciated. Thank you all so much.