Thoughts on the importance of a meso perspective: The “Plattform Produktives Stadtgrün”

Invited to contribute to a book section on Berlin, Katrin Bohn thinks about the importance of a middle ground between the big pressing macro questions of climate change and the micro spaces of individual food system activities. She writes: ‘Judging by the realities of environmental degradation, traditional urban planning has failed. Concerns of experts have not been sufficiently acknowledged. It requires a middle ground—a meso perspective—to better enable conversation between the various urban stakeholders and bring about widely supported and lasting change. How can this be initiated? In a time of social media, the author proposes to look at a recently developed tool for information, communication, networking, and—ultimately—urban planning’.
Bohn uses the Plattform Produktives Stadtgrün [Plattform Productive Urban Green], a Berlin-based interactive online tool developed in a collaboration between the local council, local community gardeners and external experts, including Katrin, to illustrate such a meso perspective.
The book Urban Open Space + is edited by Carolin Mees and published by Jovis. Subtitled Strategies inbetween architecture and open space planning, the bi-lingual publication (English/German) explores ‘commonly used and designed open spaces [as] anchor points in the city and a possible response to the consequences of urbanization and climate change, as well as to the presence of social and cultural differences’.