Utopias in the green The post-urban era?

 

Fifty-five percent of Germans live in rural areas. For around 45 million people here, the countryside is far more than just “nature” and “local recreation”. It is their home. It is where they live and work. Some have had their roots here for generations, others have newly settled here. Attractive living environments, one would think, merely looking at the numbers. In reality, however, these areas face an existential threat. They are degenerating to places where deaths outnumber births. Because doctors, schools, a wide range of educational opportunities or infrastructure are lacking. Never mind basic necessities in walking distance, (a variety of) cultural offers or at least a cinema in close proximity. Not even high-speed Internet has arrived everywhere. Rural areas hardly stand a chance against the draw of big cities, particularly among young people.

In this context, urban and rural areas would seem to be antagonists. Or they are at least often expressed as a contradiction in future forecasts. And, yet, things are starting to change. In fact, rural life is finding ever greater appeal in urban spheres. Because the cities are getting fuller, more crowded, and, above all, more and more expensive every year. But there are also plenty of other reasons: the air quality due to particulate matter and nitrogen oxides, noise pollution from traffic, and lacking environmental compensation, for example. And not everyone enjoys the prevailing anonymity that accompanies living in a prefabricated residential building. It’s no wonder there was a negative migration balance in major German cities for the first time as far back as 2014. A trend that recently has surely been exacerbated by the pandemic. The hustle and bustle, variety, vibrant life with lots of casual meetings – everything that used to make cities attractive, along with job and educational opportunities – has now made them “hotspots”.

CONTEMPORARY CONSUMERS WITH CONTEMPORARY NEEDS

Small towns and villages are more popular with Germans than they have been in decades. And that’s not just because most people can only afford more space, more nature, an office, and their own room for every household member outside the big cities. “There is also a greater desire to go back to the roots, to seek authenticity; an appreciation of ecological and artisanal production; but, above all, people are searching for community and solidarity,” Christoph Stelzer observes. It’s just one of the reasons he firmly believes that we can reinvent rural life. “The time to revitalise villages as the backbone of rural regions is now. This may be our last chance to pick the right path at the fork between wonderful peace and eerie silence,” the retail expert predicts. For him, it’s a matter of reviving the ancient myth of the town square. The Agora 4.0., a place for personal contact that can be easily accessed by everyone, a place where emotions, ideas, services and goods are exchanged. Where newly settled urban inhabitants and families going back generations, young and older people, can bridge independence, individuality and community, and also convenience and experience. The agency’s managing director is convinced that “Only when town centres become the centre of life again will they be revived. After all, only life attracts more life, meaning people. Everyone has experienced this on a smaller scale, for example when you have a choice between buying your Sunday breakfast rolls at an empty or a busy bakery.”

There are plenty of old, vacant walls for fresh ideas in rural regions. Smithies, mills, monasteries and manors, relics of bygone cultures, in need of renovation and to date hardly saleable. But also the near-derelict factories, schools, hospitals, and even prefabricated buildings. It is these structures and not random new ones that offer spiritual resonance and space for new impulses and concepts, away from semi-detached and single-family homes. We now need proactive mayors, local councils, urban planners, architects, retired factory owners and carpenters, well-intentioned sponsors, and inhabitants of every age to join forces and give these rural communities back what they have lost over the years. A lively and dynamic quarter that is open to everyone. One in the here and now that is to be filled with modern, hybrid and fluid housing, working, retail and service offers. Focus is placed on innovative formats with relevance for the inhabitants. “After all, renaissance still means to experiment with ideas and approaches,” says Christoph Stelzer.

SUBURBAN HOTSPOTS WITH INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS

With a Mediterranean-style open market hall, for example, to improve the basic local supply and as a low-threshold place for contact, for dialogue, and for sustainable consumption. Naturally, this includes a range of meats and sausages, preserves, dairy products, wines and juices, fruit and vegetables, and also fresh baked goods that allows regional producers to directly bring their artisan (organic) products right from the farm and bakery to local tables. Elderly citizens should, of course, have the opportunity to order the goods by phone with a delivery service. It also includes small stands, or spaces, with selected offers for big and little people. Things that can actually only be found in the city or ordered online: high-quality natural cosmetics, jewellery, selected toys and stationery items, gifts or fashion and home accessories, for example. Or rare tea, coffee and cocoa blends, and handmade chocolate. Experiments are allowed and even desired because whatever is popular is possible. Especially whatever departs from mass-produced goods. And there is much more to Agora 4.0 than just individual, local retail formats. Multigenerational meeting points with a variety of offers of reading afternoons for children, homework assistance, computer tutoring for seniors, health services or a repair cafe, for example. Also, the little bookshop and newsagent that runs the parcel counter and the cafe with the reading corner. Or leasable coworking spaces or new-work concepts for locals and the entire region, and for guests seeking relaxation. But it’s also about temporarily leasable spaces for associations and art, culture, sharing-caring formats. Flexible and/or jointly usable (retail) spaces, for example, for temporary pop-up projects that open up entirely new opportunities for small entrepreneurs, art and craftspeople, freelancers or DIY communities. And that ensure that the arteries of the town centre remain agile and exciting. A place in flow, but above all, a centre that fulfils multifarious needs and, beyond the core function of local supply, gives people the opportunity to make interesting contacts beyond their own four walls – simply because this is where life happens.

“Urban-inspired living qualities with (digital) connection, diversity, cosmopolitanism and creativity no longer have to be the monopoly of large cities. In people’s minds, global and regional identities have long ceased to be a contradiction. On the contrary, they complement each other. So why not in physical locations as well?” the retail expert explains his approach. “After all, fewer and fewer people are going to be content with lacking supply, regardless of what kind, or with just the basic necessities.” Because regardless of whether people want their own garden, lots of space or nature surrounding them – in their minds, the new rural living ideal is seldom planned as merely a residential project or even bedroom community in the new housing estate. That’s why we need more than just closeness to nature or digitalisation with a stable Internet connection to bring rural areas to new life. Above all, we need people with ideas. People willing to creatively fill the regions. Communal visionaries and dedicated individuals who know how to inspire others. Only when the multifaceted triad of housing, work and living is in harmony, will the comeback of the village be successful in the long run. Rural areas have lots of opportunities for this – they just need to be recognised, driven and implemented by courageous pioneers.