A More Walkable Downtown Phoenix

[az_daniel]

There is a quote from a book i once read that has stuck with me: "The success of a built environment in the southwest can be judged by how well it deals with extreme amounts of sun."

Shade is the single most important thing we can do from a design standpoint to improve the city's streets and outdoor spaces for comfortable human use. That can be done with trees, compact buildings, narrower streets, art, structural shade, etc - but in any form, any place that is not shady will simply be a place that no one wants to spend any time. that means less economic activity, fewer eyes on the street, more traffic, etc.