The CPUL City Toolkit: planning productive urban landscapes for European cities

Cities across the world seek policy guidance, good practice examples and further evidence for the impact of urban agriculture, and its relationship to a viable and sustainable food policy. In Europe, the potential environmental and socio-cultural benefits of introducing productive landscapes into cities are now widely acknowledged, although not (yet) to the extent that they are manifest as essential urban infrastructure. This chapter explores ways in which designers and planners can continue to play a significant role in conceiving, advocating and delivering the integration of sustainable food systems into the urban fabric. The authors will summarise 10 years of design and research work on Continuous Productive Urban Landscape (CPUL), and will review their evolving CPUL City concept in the context of two European cities: Berlin and London. The chapter will focus on the historic lessons, current practices and future strategies learned from these cities and present a first summary of specific proposals for guidance on implementing productive urban landscapes. This guidance – the CPUL City Toolkit – aims to provide an overview of the key steps necessary when planning and implementing urban agriculture as part of coherent productive urban landscape strategies. Four methods of action defining the Toolkit will be introduced: Action U+D (Bottom Up + Top Down), Action VIS (Visualisation), Action IUC (Inventory of Urban Capacity), Action R (Design Research). The chapter concludes with a reflection on the rapidly evolving practice and policy in Berlin and London related to the CPUL City Toolkit, as CPUL components begin to move ‘out of the gallery’ and into everyday urban infrastructure.