On Halloween my girlfriend and I made up our faces to resemble the walking dead and set out for the Tour Eiffel. After walking along the Seine and under the tower we headed to the Champ de Mars, the long green mall that lies immediately to the tower’s southeast.
Someone had removed a section of a black metal fence that cordoned off the green. About 20 people had entered through the opening. Once inside they clustered on the lawn, sitting on blankets in groups of two or three. Someone dribbled a soccer ball. A guy selling wine and champagne by the bottle made the rounds.
We entered, found a soft patch of grass, and unpacked a baguette, some aged Gouda and a bottle of Cotes de Rhone that we had in our backpack. We opened the wine and toasted a lovely night, with the tower looming over our right shoulders, illuminated in amber and flashing thousands of sparkly lights.
About four-fifths of our way through the wine, a police officer approached. At first we thought he was busting us for drinking in public. But we realized he was shooing us off the lawn. Other police had fanned out and were doing the same to the others.
Of course we complied. We gathered our things, headed out and continued to walk along the gravel pathway that lines the green.
Later I realized that together with the other merrymakers we had hacked the city. We conformed a public space to one that accommodated us.
We who use cities confront similar challenges daily. How does your city feel? How would you like to engage with it?
Street skaters hack their environment. Citizens are using publicly available data and computer code to solve challenges relevant to their neighborhoods. Pedestrians forge pathways in parks regardless of whether the park’s planner placed a path in that spot.
At PopTech in October I heard Helen Marriage, co-director of the London-based design firm, Artichoke, talk about the large-scale urban spectacles she produces. “A city isn’t just for toil, trade and traffic, it exists for people,” said Marriage. “The rules of our cities are not somebody else’s rules – they’re our rules, and we can change them, briefly, or forever.”