Gehl Partners is one of the most reputable urban design firms in the world. They have transformed Google campuses, downtown Santa Monica, and a number of other well-known developments around the globe over the last several decades. Everything they do is through a lens of designing cities for people, not cars. We were fortunate to be joined by both Helle Søholt and Ghigo DiTommaso this episode. Helle is CEO and a founding partner of Gehl. Ghigo leads Gehl's team advising real estate developers on neighborhood strategies, masterplanning, and community engagement. We discussed the history of Gehl, its approach to urban design, and how it is implementing projects in cities all around the world. There are ton of valuable lessons in here for neighborhood developers and urban designers. You can learn more about their work at gehlpeople.com Campfire is produced by Cabin, which is a group of internet friends building a network of modern villages. For more about how to get involved, visit cabin.city today.
Gehl Partners is one of the most reputable urban design firms in the world. They have transformed Google campuses, downtown Santa Monica, and a number of other well-known developments around the globe over the last several decades. Everything they do is through a lens of designing cities for people, not cars.
We were fortunate to be joined by both Helle Søholt and Ghigo DiTommaso this episode. Helle is CEO and a founding partner of Gehl. Ghigo leads Gehl's team advising real estate developers on neighborhood strategies, masterplanning, and community engagement.
We discussed the history of Gehl, its approach to urban design, and how it is implementing projects in cities all around the world. There are ton of valuable lessons in here for neighborhood developers and urban designers. You can learn more about their work at gehlpeople.com
Campfire is produced by Cabin, which is a group of internet friends building a network of modern villages. For more about how to get involved, visit cabin.city today.
Read more about the future of living at futureofliving.substack.com
Twitter:
[00:00:00] Jackson Steger: Hey there, this is Jackson Steger and you're listening to Campfire, a podcast where we interview leaders imagining new ways of living. Our guests are building new cities and other ways to connect for creators, technologists, nomads, remote workers, and more. Today's guests are Helle Soholt and Ghigo DiTomaso.
[00:00:17] Helle is CEO and co founder of Gehl Partners, one of the most reputable urban design firms in the world. Ghigo DiTomaso, who leads Gehl's team advising real estate developers on neighborhood strategies, master planning, and community Well, we're very lucky to have both of them on the show. It was awesome. I felt like I was on cloud nine the entire time I was recording the episode because Yel make cities for people and for the planet, and they use life centered data strategy and design to do so.
[00:00:48] We discussed the history of Gehl, it had been around for over 20 years, its approach to urban design, and how it's implementing this approach in cities all across the world. I also got very [00:01:00] interesting commentary from both of them about how to think about this question of should we be building new cities or improving the ones that we're already using?
[00:01:09] And they both had very polarizing, opinionated, great, eloquent answers. Campfire is produced by Cabin, which is a group of internet friends building a network of modern villages. For more about how to get involved, visit cabin. city today. Really hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did. Cheers. Helle and Ghigo, welcome to Campfire.
[00:01:28] Thank you. Thank you for having us
[00:01:30] . I have a ton of questions for you, and I'm really excited to talk about urban design, neighborhood design, master planning. But I just want to get started by understanding both of you and also Gehl. So, Helle, I'm going to start with you. What does Gehl do both at the granular level, but also what's the broad vision that the firm is pursuing?
[00:01:53] Helle Soholt: Well, thank you so much for inviting us. I'm the CEO and founding partner of Gehl. And we set out [00:02:00] more than 20 years ago to really transform the way that we design cities and neighborhoods. Much more from a lens of humans and the livability and giving room for life in cities and neighborhoods. We do that by focusing on core shared systems, such as public space, mobility, access, urban nature, and really sort of the aspects of life that brings wellbeing into an urban context.
[00:02:32] We've been doing that for more than 20 years now, and our types of clients range from cities, municipalities, but also real estate sector who are really responsible for building, but then also working with foundations on more complex urban issues such as health or wellbeing.
[00:02:53] Jackson Steger: And so I want to like dig into that origin story a little bit more.
[00:02:57] So I live in Los Angeles and [00:03:00] I go off into the. Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, which is a project that I know you all worked on. And you've been around for two decades. So I'd be really curious to just hear the origin story of the firm. Like where did you and any other founding partners see the need for something like Gehl?
[00:03:17] And how did you first get it off the ground?
[00:03:20] Helle Soholt: Well, I started the company together with Professor Jan Gehl. Jan actually started his research on human behavior in public space way back in the 1960s. And Jan really reacted on the approach to planning that was very rooted in a modernistic approach to designing cities at the time, where cities needed to be efficient and everything got separated so that we could really make transport systems even more efficient and housing blocks into sort Machines for the living, and we would separate out our places where people would go to [00:04:00] work and create business districts and so forth.
[00:04:03] That was the idea of the city as a knitting machine back in the 1960s. And Jan really reacted that whole approach of modernism and started to research this area of what we have called public life. How do humans actually thrive? How do people behave in urban areas and particularly in public space? And he started that research together with his wife, who was a psychologist.
[00:04:30] So you could say the whole field that we are operating in is actually a little bit of a merger between human psychology and then urban planning. Now, Jan was doing a lot of research and really working as an academic for several decades until his mid sixties. I was a student at Jan's department at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts at the architecture school in Copenhagen.
[00:04:56] And Jan and I got to know each other and we [00:05:00] decided to begin this company together in the year 2000. I was at the very early stages of my career, only being 28 years old. Jan was at his very late part of his career, having been a teacher his entire life. And we really set out to try and show the world that there could be a different approach to planning.
[00:05:25] And we had this long term aspiration that we would actually change the planning paradigm globally towards one that was, Centered around humans and human nature.
[00:05:36] Jackson Steger: 28 year old living in Los AnGehls and not loving the current paradigm of car heaviness here. I can definitely understand the desire to enact that change.
[00:05:46] So thank you for sharing. I'd love to, so this is sort of great overview of Gehl and I'd like to spend the rest of the conversation talking about the day to day in practice, like putting human needs at the center of urban design and [00:06:00] planning. So. Questions for both of you on that, but maybe before I get into those specific questions, it might be helpful for the audience.
[00:06:07] If you could both share what your day to day priorities are in each of your respective roles. So you go, why don't you start and then. Heather, we'll go back to you and then Ghigo, I'll have some follow ups for you.
[00:06:17] Ghigo DiTomasso: Absolutely, Jackson. So, day to day experience for me is very much about applying some of the principles of the Gehl philosophy to projects that are situated in America.
[00:06:31] So, if you will, this is about applying the Gehl methodology to the American context. As you know, the firm was founded in Copenhagen, but soon after, it was subject to vote globally. And there is a great desire to find recipes that are always contest specific. As the person that is helping growing our master planning practice in the Americas, I'm really focused on understanding how American developers can [00:07:00] benefit from leGehl methodology and can actually create thriving, walkable, Places in context that are actually not used to that kind of, you come from Los AnGehls.
[00:07:13] So you understand that well, we have some of our largest project right now in Southern California, and we are advancing urbanism that is all around walkability, finding ways to translate clearly our message. So that can be well received in that context.
[00:07:30] Jackson Steger: Thank you. I have followups for sure. I'm glad to hear you're doing things in Southern California, but first, Hellena, maybe just share a CEO of such a global entity.
[00:07:39] What does your day to day look like?
[00:07:41] Helle Soholt: Yeah, it's interesting because of course my day to day is very focused on, you could say strategy for the company today versus when I started out being much more closer to projects, but I'm still very concerned and involved in the whole model for change. How [00:08:00] do we as a company actually support the overall change needed to really deliver sittings for people globally?
[00:08:08] And we've tried to do that by engaging with different types of sectors, both public sector, the private sector development that Ghigo is talking about, but More and more, I think we've learned that rather than just attacking this problem from a planning lens, we actually need to think much broader than that and find ways to make this also about climate change and sustainability in a much broader sense.
[00:08:38] We need to make it a health and well being agenda as well, so that we can tap into those sectors to support this movement. And we needed to be a digital transformation as well that allows people to live and work locally while differing locally. So these larger, [00:09:00] you could say, agendas are really impacting the way that we look at and understand urbanism today.
[00:09:06] Jackson Steger: Thank you for that as well. I'm curious, last week on the show, we had a guest from the Dutch Cycling Embassy, I'm not sure if you're familiar with their work, but Chris shared the details of how once a city wants to work with them, what are the principles of Dutch cycling network design and all this fun stuff, but he did sort of caveat that with He brings people on his clients once they're ready to, because often there are political barriers that stand in the way.
[00:09:37] And so I've lived in Amsterdam, I've lived in Vienna, and I've spent a lot of time in Europe and I'm familiar with the sort of vibrant urbanism and walkable cities that makes Europe so great. But here in the States, that's not as commonplace. And we don't have this same, I think, natural appreciation for walkability all of the time.
[00:09:56] And so, Digo, for you, since you're running [00:10:00] the American part of the Gehl business, how do you view political obstacles that exist for your work and how does that factor into how you choose which clients you take on?
[00:10:11] Ghigo DiTomasso: I would say that, yes, it is true there are some political challenges to what we do in American context, but I also say Jackson that the ties are changing and there is a growing interest.
[00:10:26] And growing, growing desire, not only by the ultimate users of the project that we work in, but actually also by, for example, real estate developers that are building those projects in doing something that is different from business. We have different group of clients that are working on great projects.
[00:10:47] For different reasons. We have, for example, a growing group of what I would call the urbanist developers who are developers that have a deep appreciation for [00:11:00] good urban planning. Maybe they travel to Europe or maybe they have an urban planning education themselves. And they really see as part as their mission to only develop new housing units, new office space, new retail, but actually doing it in a way that is transforming cities.
[00:11:18] So those are the perfect clients from us. And I think year after year, we find that there are more and more groups like that. Small and big. There is, for example, this very interesting group called Kuglesak, that is, As you may be familiar with, trying to build a radically walkable community in Tempe, Arizona.
[00:11:38] We are working with them, not on that side, but on other projects. And there are many other smaller shops, more traditional in the way in which they are funded, that are trying to do this. And then there is another group of clients, which, if you will, looks a little bit more like. You know, the, the usual real estate sector.
[00:11:58] Those are mixed use [00:12:00] developers that are more and more aware of the transformative value of placemaking. So seeing Gehl, someone that can really help them move the needle and do something that will be performing better because there's going to be attractive and interesting place. For their customers. So with this second group of clients, if you will, their bottom line is aligned with the needs of good urbanism.
[00:12:30] So we, we, we see that opportunity for win win and we are then interested to work with any real estate developer that really wants to question the status quo and want to push the envelope and truly understand place value is. Our kind of client is someone we're willing to work with and do great project.
[00:12:50] Helle Soholt: If I could just add to that, Hugo, because when I see you lead the work with our team, I really see value in us [00:13:00] being a kind of bridge builder because we are both working with public sector and private sector. We can actually help bridge the gap between politics and reality and we always try to Approach a development of an area or place from both top down and bottom up at the same time.
[00:13:21] So we try to really help all the stakeholders involved need each other through engagement. And that actually for us means engagement, both with political levels and decision makers, and actually also engage people locally. In every single project. And that is where I can see a lot of value come in. Our clients really value the GIL team and GhigoS team's ability to really care and listen to people locally and understand their needs.
[00:13:55] We gather a lot of data. We call it public life data to support [00:14:00] design. But then we also try to find the narratives, the stories out of this data that can make sense. For the politicians to actually make the right decisions and dare trust that data so that they can trust the process. So I do think that we come with a different approach where for us people is both the ultimate stakeholders who are going to use the plates, but it's also the people who are actually making it happen.
[00:14:29] And we try to work at both levels.
[00:14:31] Jackson Steger: I love that duality of the data and the stories. And I also love that cul de sac is a client. We've had someone from the founding team of cul de sac on the show and love what Ryan's doing and what Phil Levin has done both in Arizona and hopefully beyond. I'm curious to unpack the Gehl secret sauce a little bit and understand How one really puts human needs at the center of urban design and planning.
[00:14:57] So beyond the like data [00:15:00] collection and the stories, which I want to go deep into as well, but what are the common principles that you find yourselves implementing across your portfolio of work, whether it's public sector or private sector, whether it's the U S or somewhere else, what are the principles that maybe.
[00:15:16] Jan originally researched Helle that helped inform how you launched the firm and what has been consistent across all of the projects that Gael touches.
[00:15:25] Helle Soholt: Well, we try to really research how life and form support each other. So we would always try to find solutions where buildings and public spaces and the design of the environment can actually help people make better decisions.
[00:15:45] Social connections with one another, where programming can actually help generations come together in a neighborhood. And that actually boils down to the way buildings have to be opened up rather [00:16:00] than being closed, how we design for shared spaces and not just private spaces, how we make sure that we overlay different programs or activities.
[00:16:11] You could say functions in a neighborhood or in a, in a space or even down to a building so that we can make sure that different people at different times of day, week, and year have a likelihood of actually meeting and building relationships in an area. And then trying to also make a city compact enough or a neighborhood dense and compact enough to actually be supportive of more people.
[00:16:40] Shared spaces and systems such as lively walkable streets or a public transportation network, or, or even a park nearby. We need a certain density to actually support some of those systems that people are dependent on, even down to like local [00:17:00] grocery shops where you have easy access to healthy food and things like that.
[00:17:04] So. It's a lot about bringing more eggs into the same basket, so to speak, and try to, at the same time, not make a place large at the same time, that it becomes out of human scale. So, buildings should not be too tall, and spaces should not be too wide, and that's all the case when you start. Piling more programs together in the same neighborhood, you start getting bigger and bulkier and bulkier buildings and spaces, but it's quite the opposite that we need because we need cities that have a human scale that supports people actually connecting with one another.
[00:17:49] So if you look at it as a party, most people don't want to go to parties where there's just a huge, massive space. People like going to the kitchen at a [00:18:00] private home where all the drinks are being made, or whatever, trying to, to understand those human logics in how to best support relationships.
[00:18:10] Jackson Steger: I love that analogy.
[00:18:11] I'm going to steal that I'm sure in the future at the next time I'm talking about human scale cities. You mentioned this sort of duality of the data and the stories. And on your website, you write about how y'all uses empirical analysis. To understand the built environment and design longterm solutions for.
[00:18:29] People, places, and, and the planet. And so, Hugo, maybe you could share an example of the kind of empirical analysis you're currently doing with a stateside client and what data are you looking at, how are you analyzing it, and then what are some of those stories that you're, you're pulling out alongside it?
[00:18:47] Ghigo DiTomasso: Yes, absolutely. Gael started to be interested in collecting data about public life from inception of the firm. And before that, Young Gehl as an academic had done it [00:19:00] for many decades. We continue to do it. We are very interested in understanding patterns of public life in every project in which we, that means understanding how people move through space, where they're coming from, where they're going, what they do when eventually they decide to stay, to lingo.
[00:19:18] What kind of activities they engage with and what position they take with respect to the making of the space, but also with respect to this is a kind of study that has never been really done in urbanism and it is actually illuminating so much about the way in which spaces can be or should. So we continue to begin our projects by.
[00:19:42] Doing what we call a public life health check. And that is understanding how, at the moment, people are moving through space, using the space. And from that, we identify a series of stories, as you say, because the data can be very qualitative, that really tell [00:20:00] what the place is. want to be or tell what are some of the unmet needs of its user and which way we can move toward a design that really responds to those unmet needs.
[00:20:14] This work is especially relevant when we work in urban infill projects, when we work in existing consolidated downtown contexts, but actually is important also for projects where we start From scratch, even if in urbanism, you never start from scratch. But even in projects where we have a site that is ready for a full redevelopment, we often go and study the public life of places that are thriving in the same metropolitan region to understand some of the recipes that make for good public life in that particular context.
[00:20:54] From there, we, we identify what are some of the elements that people in that context are [00:21:00] looking for. And we ask ourselves if there is a way to instill the same characteristics in the project that we're working.
[00:21:07] Jackson Steger: And any examples of stories that you've found while doing these sort of preparing early stages that have dramatically changed how you worked with a specific client?
[00:21:17] Any stories from either a stateside project or, uh, Hellen, any from the last 20 years that really transformed how a project came together?
[00:21:26] Helle Soholt: Yeah, we started out all the way back in 2007, 8, 9 to as advisors to the, to the city of New York, working with Jeanette Savikhan, Transport Commissioner and Amanda Burden, Planning Commissioner and really engaged with the communities.
[00:21:43] in New York and gather this, this data to really showcase on the back of some tactical experiments, transforming Times Square into an actual square and carving out those stories to really prove, you can [00:22:00] say to the politicians that new locals were starting to use their public spaces in different ways and showcase that we could actually transform behaviors.
[00:22:11] On an everyday basis, and due to those stories that we could carve out and the data that we could provide, the politicians actually did dare to take the decision to make some of these transformations permanent. This type of thinking is what have, I think, impacted, uh, a lot of the thinking around tactile urban projects across the U.
[00:22:34] S. since then, and I think many cities have learned. How to use Dean's local experiments as a way of scaling up programs for mobility, for biking, for park
[00:22:46] Ghigo DiTomasso: and health programs. The unquestionable story that emerged from the New York project that really What was instrumental in building consensus around the transformation was that [00:23:00] 90 percent of the space of the square before our project was occupied by cars, but cars were actually moving just 10 percent of the people through that space.
[00:23:12] 10 percent of the same space was occupied by people, but those people represented 90 percent of the throughput, plus itself. So that simple, you know, math was so self evident. So bringing that data up and telling that story was really a way to show that a change was not only necessary, but absolutely urgent.
[00:23:36] We continue to do the same kind of analysis, as I was saying, and try to bring the same kind of insight. We are working right now with the City of Austin that is engaging in a very ambitious project of investment in public transit, which is going to be fantastic for the city that needs it so much, especially given the growth.
[00:23:59] [00:24:00] And that we were brought in, in the project together with UN studio and HKS and our role was very much giving a voice to people's needs in a project like this so that the project can not only be well structured from an engineering perspective, but can really respond to the necessities and the desires.
[00:24:26] of the day to day lives of people. So we embarked on this ethnographic research about what people want in their day to day life and which holistic way this transportation system can really respond to some of those needs. We think that large infrastructural projects, especially in the U. S., We need more and more of this kind of work, and it has been certainly a very fruitful collaboration for us with the public institution in America.
[00:24:55] Jackson Steger: Hey, I'm so glad to hear you have mentioned Jeanette's name. If you look right here, I can [00:25:00] see her book, A Street Fight, is right there, and her stories have moved me, and I'm glad that that same story is influencing Austin, which I also have a deep connection to and appreciation for. I might come back to some more GehlF specific questions, but I want to make sure to also, because of both of your expertise.
[00:25:18] Get your thoughts on some broader questions too, as it pertains to the future of cities. So Saudi Arabia right now is developing these NEOM projects in the Middle East. California forever is a recently proposed new city between San Francisco and Sacramento. Honduras is growing prospero on the island of Roatan.
[00:25:41] There's plenty of new city experiments across Africa. How do you react to all these different new city experiments and Are there any, it doesn't have to be any of the ones I mentioned, are there any new city projects that get you particularly excited, whether you're working with them or not?
[00:25:59] Helle Soholt: I'm actually [00:26:00] quite critical of new towns or new cities.
[00:26:03] If it means building on virgin land, I think even though the world needs a massive urbanization, and we will have millions of people working or moving towards the urban force, I I do think that we have a massive task in front of us to just build on the infrastructure we already have. And we should build sustainably and within the planetary boundaries of the world and our planet.
[00:26:34] We actually need to get much more out of the investments and the infrastructure that we already have. So we need to find new technologies to transform. Other than just building new, we have to find technologies to circulate and to reuse and to use natural materials at a scale we haven't seen so far, [00:27:00] only 2 to 5 percent of the European built environment is, is actually circular at the moment.
[00:27:08] So we need a massive technology transformation in how we build cities. So while we are looking into that challenge, we, at the same time, we need to make sure that those cities and communities are actually making people healthier, making people socially connected and not further isolating and putting more fuels on the fire, uh, on, on loneliness and all these other issues that we see in our societies today.
[00:27:41] We believe that we can do that by actually making our current cities greener, we can make our current cities much more healthy by daring to invest in, in green and social infrastructure in our cities. And I've just come from another [00:28:00] meeting actually where we have a project right now with a lot of other health experts, community development experts.
[00:28:06] public officials, where we are defining what social infrastructure actually is, how we can plan for it, and how we can scale it up. Because that's actually the green and social and digital infrastructure that we need in cities is going to be the future of this planet.
[00:28:25] Jackson Steger: I love that answer and strong pushback on the premise of the question.
[00:28:29] Would you mind sharing what some of the digital, green and social infrastructure technologies are that you think will drive this change that we need?
[00:28:39] Helle Soholt: We have an R& D team within Gehl where we are exploring new digital tools for public engagement. For example, I think we need new democratic processes where people can actually engage in the local development of their own neighborhood and city.
[00:28:57] We need new technologies implemented [00:29:00] within public space that can actually deal with change of public space towards climate adaptation. Um, need to plant much, much more green, uh, in our cities to actually know what temperatures, and that's also good for us humans because most people actually have lower stress levels if they have access to nature right outside the core.
[00:29:24] We've known that for decades when it comes to. To development of hospitals that if people can actually see green, they have a high likelihood of getting better sooner. These are sort of systemic changes that are needed at quite a rapid pace now. So quite honestly, we don't have time to build new towns on virgin land.
[00:29:46] We have a task to do within the
[00:29:49] Ghigo DiTomasso: cities that we already have. I would add, Jackson, you mentioned in the very beginning of this interview, Recording what we can learn from urban history. Urban history is millennia old and [00:30:00] told us quite a bit about different experiments of cities built from scratch. That said, I, I want to say, you know, you mentioned some specific project, the New York project, the California Forever project, the Prospero project.
[00:30:13] There are some differences between these projects, which I think it would be fair to highlight. The California project, the California Forever project, and the third place, To Home For Me. It is an interesting one, has many of the liabilities that Hela has described, and you cannot underestimate what those are.
[00:30:35] At the same time, it is initiated by very savvy urbanists that have had a momental role in shaping the urbanism of the Bay Area, as you know, the Directorate of Planning for that project is the, is the former, as an intern, C. S. Spurr. It was very interesting. That is a very influential research institute in, uh, in San [00:31:00] Francisco and it's kind of spurring an interesting conversation about centrism.
[00:31:04] So yes, building cities on Virgin land is never a good idea. Shall the Bay Area address some of the issues that is tackled when it comes to lack of housing by strengthening and furthering its polycentric system? Yes, that should be the case. It was interesting to see that the California Forever Project brought.
[00:31:26] To the attentions, uh, urbanists in the area, that there are several sites across the area that are, that have already some kind of rail connection, in many cases industrial rail, former industrial rail connection. It could be used for a new poles of density and intensity. Which we dearly we, so I'm following the California Forever debate, and I see all of the limitations, but I also see this kind of new emergence of a debate on densification that that project had brought to [00:32:00] the fore, and that has been, uh, quite interesting and lead somewhere.
[00:32:05] Helle Soholt: Yeah, I'm, I'm also thinking that Jackson, all the change that we've seen on how people live and work since Covid is rapidly changing. What we need at a local level. So this decentralized growth model that we're talking about, Ghigo is interesting because it's actually potentially pulling towards the people centric community model that Gehl is actually really savoring.
[00:32:37] You know, I think we might actually be moving towards a more Holy centric localism, where we have communities that can cater for people who want to work and live locally, and being globally connected still to work in the ways that we do in a modern society, but [00:33:00] still developing And supporting and also further enhancing the existing infrastructures that we have so that we can actually build better public infrastructure, better spaces, better schools, better transport, better access to green and so forth and and mixing those functions in a way that can actually make people thrive.
[00:33:23] Jackson Steger: You stole the question out of my mouth. I first just appreciate the nuance and the balance that both of you brought to my previous question. And yeah, I was gonna piggyback on what you had said about loneliness and how like here with Cabin we see this massive growth of digital nomads who have this amazing privilege of being able to work and see so much of the world, but at the same time feel less connected than ever before.
[00:33:50] And so really great to hear The focus on different local areas is how we can develop the connection between folks, like what are, what are ways that [00:34:00] local cities can build infrastructure to accommodate a more nomadic group of people without also sacrificing what makes that city unique to its own culture and rootedness?
[00:34:14] Helle Soholt: That's a difficult question. I think. Even though there is a growing number of people who are able to use technology to eat global donuts and work from many different places in the world, I think I genuinely believe, and we can also see that through our research, that as human beings, as human nature, we also need each other.
[00:34:41] We need other people to thrive and That cannot only be relationships that are virtual and digital. We need to actually touch and feel and feel embraced and connected to other people. [00:35:00] And that happens in place. And that's why it is incredibly important to design places that talk to that inner side of us as human beings.
[00:35:14] And it's not just this modern thing that we can just, uh, quickly glance over and hop to the next place. So, as urban designers, we have an obligation to try and understand what is the local nature of each place we go to, so that we can create a platform for belonging. And that's not going to be the same answer in every place.
[00:35:40] Then we wouldn't have actually. Created and understood the, the local character of that particular neighborhood. So in each place, our methods are helping us to engage with the community, learn from those stories, learn from those local behaviors so that the [00:36:00] design response that we come up with can be uniquely situated within that place.
[00:36:05] And hopefully we can make people belong. And our belief is that if local people belong. Visitors will belong to, because we are attracted as human beings to something that is authentic, something that is unique and something that is derived out of a place and a certain context. So if we can make that happen, it can also fit the digital nomads that needs place and needs other people as much as everyone else.
[00:36:39] Jackson Steger: I can't think of a better note to end the podcast on than that. Of course, there's a thousand more questions that I would love to ask you, but maybe we'll just have to do a second take. I mean, for example, like there's all sorts of things on micromobility that we could talk about or what you've done with Google or a thousand other examples of, I think, interesting conversation threads we could have [00:37:00] taken, but I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that each of you provided in the time we had for folks who really loved this episode.
[00:37:09] And want to learn more about Gehl or just otherwise become more engaged or urbanist developers, where should we send them?
[00:37:18] Helle Soholt: You should send them to Gehlpeople. com and you are always welcome to reach out to Ghigo and I directly, all visitors in real places, such as San Francisco or New York, Ghigo is placed in San Francisco and I'm based and working out of Copenhagen, so always welcome to reach out.
[00:37:40] Jackson Steger: Thank you both so much for coming, and I'm excited to keep following the very important work that you're both leading.
[00:37:46] Helle Soholt: Thanks so much, Jackson. Been a pleasure.[00:38:00]
[00:38:06]