Shrink the City

The 15-Minute Urban Experiment and the Cities of the Future

By: Natalie Whittle

Narrated by: Lorna Bennett

Cities define the lives of all those who call them home: where we go, how we get there, how we spend our time. But what if we rethink the ways we plan, live in, and move around our cities? What if we didn't need a car to reach the grocery store? What if we could get back the time we would have spent commuting and put it to other uses?

In this fascinating, carefully researched and reported book, longtime Financial Times journalist Natalie Whittle investigates the 15-minute city idea-its pros, cons, and its potential to revolutionize modern living.

From Paris, Melbourne, and Rotterdam to Charlotte, North Carolina, and Tempe, Arizona, cities worldwide are being guided by the 15-minute city's ideals-with varying results. By looking at these examples, Whittle considers:

- what really happens when a city expands bike lanes and pedestrian areas-and disincentivizes long commutes

- which approaches to building affordable housing are actually effective

- how neighborhoods of varying wealth are affected by 15-minute city policies

This timely book serves as a call to reflect on our cities and neighborhoods-and it outfits us with insights on how to make them more sustainable, safe, and welcoming.

©2021, 2024 Natalie Whittle (P)2024 Tantor

Critic reviews

"This book and the movement it describes are only necessary because, for almost a full century, logic was turned on its head, and the perverse ideals of distance and speed replaced those of proximity and access. Shrink the City is a lovely and useful guidebook to bring our civilization back to a scale at which it will stop stinking so badly." ---Jeff Speck, city planner and author of Walkable City