Increased speed in global cities

I am currently sitting in a hotel room in Oslo, restoring mind and body after a lot of urban walking. One of my favorite things to do in cities is to explore the neighborhoods by foot. It gives a perfect opportunity to smell the bakeries, see the shifting architecture, discover interesting people and tune in to the local pace of life.

Each city has its unique pace and in most cities this pace is getting faster. I read a report from British Council which had examined 32 cities around the globe. The researchers had secretly timed pedestrians and found that people are walking 10% more quickly than a decade ago.

Pedestrians along Karl Johans gate today in Oslo, Norway.

The ten fastest cities in the report were:

1. Singapore: 10.55s
2. Copenhagen, Denmark: 10.82s
3. Madrid, Spain: 10.89s
4. Guangzhou, China: 10.94s
5. Dublin, Ireland: 11.03s
6. Curitiba, Brazil: 11.13s
7. Berlin, Germany: 11.16s
8. New York, USA: 12.00s
9. Utrecht, Netherlands: 12.04s
10. Vienna, Austria: 12.06s

The number is the time it took for people to cover 20 meters. Singapore showed an increase by 30%, making it the most frenetic city in the report.

I haven’t been to all of the cities in the list, but the report sounds feasable. People in general have adopted a frenetic pace of life, which is due to a lot of things. For instance, thanks to technology communications are getting faster every day and enforcing the idea that everything must happen now or never.

Relax. Rome wasn’t built in a day.