James Pyo

There are obvious reasons we don’t take just anything on social media at face value. Otherwise, we’d believe COVID-19 was created in a lab, vaccines can give your child autism, and lots of other theories on an endless list of bullshit.

Now these conspiracy theorists are trying to hijack a subject area near and dear to my heart, city planning. More specifically, the 15-minute neighbourhood, a tried and tested concept to create compact, accessible communities where daily needs are within a 15-minute walk or bike ride, somehow became the latest controversial topic on social media. The theory (not backed by any credible references) twists the discussion on this concept by claiming it is a government conspiracy to trap people within a confined area.

For your reference, I’ve shared one of the videos (below) which has gone viral on Tiktok. It makes unverified claims that the 15-minute concept for Mississauga’s Cooksville neighbourhood will confine residents within their area and limit their travels outside to 100 trips per year and be charged $56 each time exceeded. My initial thoughts were as follows: First off, why does this woman look like she’s 12 years old? Does she have any professional experience or education in planning? What are her sources? For all I know, she’s just yet another person with nothing better to do but post made-up theories on the internet. As well, I follow Mississauga Council very closely yet never heard a thing that validates anything she says.

The consensus among those who actually study the built environment is that the 15-minute city rather offers numerous benefits, especially to those without a driver’s licence or a car. As someone who lives in Toronto’s Annex neighbourhood, a 15-minute neighbourhood itself, I appreciate having the world at my doorsteps with the luxury of car-free mobility, as opposed to being isolated in car-dependent places in the outskirts. Over the past half-decade, there’s been a paradigm shift in how we envision our built environment, from auto-oriented places for fast cars with no regard for public safety, social equity or climate change towards smaller-scale concepts like the walkable, 15-minute city, largely due to years of advocacy from Jane Jacobs, John Sewell and other urban critics. It took us a long time for us to get here. Let’s not undo it.