christine røde

on turns and urban planning.

I know all about making wrong turns. Not metaphoric turns, not some sob story about how I made all the wrong decisions, and now there is no turning back. No, on literally trying to find your way and turning in all the wrong directions.

You see, the streets I’m used to aren’t easily navigable like the ones of most American cities. There is a huge difference between a medieval city layout, and one that was built during the 19th century. Look at the map of a city in the US, and you’ll find that the majority of the streets are straight lines. They meet at 90 degree angles. Chances are that they are named after numbers. They even laid a grid across San Francisco, a city of such steep hills and irregular landscape that a geometric street layout makes little sense. 

I find that a lot of people take it for granted that cities look like this. But the cities that have been in place for more than just a couple of centuries are unique little monsters. The roads follow the landscape, curving by the hillsides. They’re often narrow, originating from a time when making space for automobiles wasn’t a concern, and when living conditions weren’t based on modern standards.

On a Greek island in the middle of the mediterranean ocean is the city of Naxos, set on a steep hillside facing the water. The small city as it stands today took form around 800 BCE, and it’s easy to get lost in it. Not just to be absorbed in its history, but to be literally lost. The streets are sometimes so narrow that two people can pass. It’s formed like a maze, with numerous dead ends and traps that are set up to make you turn the wrong way. But more than just being a clever defense mechanism, the city is so breathtakingly shaped, its curves and crooks an organic reflection of the natural landscape.

Whenever I think of Naxos, I can’t help but to wish that the urban planners of San Francisco had looked there for inspiration. There is nothing organic about drawing a straight line across hill, and neither is it practical.

Of course not every European city is a medieval unescapable nightmare. There are always exceptions. London burned down, allowing for creation of a new, improved building code. In Paris, Haussmann plowed through the existing neighborhoods to create the boulevards that now define the city, in the process leaving thousands homeless and creating a financial crisis. Indeed, cities everywhere saw renovation and modernization, for both the better or worse.

Oslo changed too, but not to the same degree. At its core, it is still based on the same streets that were laid centuries upon centuries ago. They curve, they combine, and they end, often completely arbitrarily. There was never any great fire, nor a great demolition. There are no naming conventions, nor any informative signage. Public transportation might be great, but the very moment you try to bring a car into the city, frustration meets you.

This brings me to the story. I was hungover one morning when I decided that driving to work would be a brilliant idea, as opposed to taking the bus like I usually would. I was already late, and it was a bright mid-summer day with no traffic on the roads, so it seemed like a reasonable thing to do. Work was in the center of Oslo, only 12 miles away, so I figured I would be there within 25 minutes.

Instead, it took me almost two hours. First I missed the recently moved freeway exit in the tunnel, leaving me with no means of getting off for another 4 miles. Getting back to where the old exit would have dropped me off took a good 40 minutes. When I reached that point, I thought the rest would be easy—all I had to do was go directly north-east.

It was not that easy. No accessible grid system took me straight north, then straight east, to where I needed to be. I battled my way through a few roundabouts, choosing to go in the general direction of my destination, only to end up on a one-way street going the opposite way. Soon enough I was back by the roundabouts, and I have it another try. I tried again, and was led to a dead end street, facing a barricade. 

On the other side of it, perpendicular to my street, I saw the street I knew that I needed to be on. 

And so I tried, again and again, to find the way that led there, only to repeatedly end up where I started. I banged my head against the steering wheel, and I repeatedly considering abandoning the car in a ditch and walking the rest of the way.

I made it eventually. I don’t quite remember how, but neither is it particularly relevant. It was only a matter of a few right turns. Yet those are what define my love/hate relationship with the city. It’s an easy place to lose your way—metaphorically too.