The Value of Time

Where does the time go? It’s drained or bolstered by our built environment. It’s also a mechanism we don’t look much into considering that it’s often undervalued as a planning principle. How long does it take to get somewhere? What does that mean for the rest of your day? How does that impact your stress levels and well being?

Something interesting brought up in Chris and Melissa Bruntlett’s recent book Women Changing Cities is time poverty; the idea that you have too many tasks or responsibilities and not enough time such that health is impacted. One solution to this is planning with time in mind. Making sure transportation networks are fast and efficient, locating care infrastructure close to other areas of need, and scheduling life in a helpful way.

Barcelona in fact does focus on these policies and even has a Time Policy Agreement and a time policy officer that coordinates across city departments. And it allows for more holistic thinking about gender equity and unpaid and valuable care work that under girds the world’s economy.

And many of you are likely to be astonished at how much free care labor backs up the economics of life. Melissa and Chris’ book cites an amazing stat from a 2020 Oxfam report on India which states that unpaid care work amounts to 19 trillion rupees ($205B) per year from 3 billion hours of time.

Of course because of the switch to Daylight Savings last weekend time is on our minds. But perhaps time is even more valuable to cities than we really know.

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