Social media regenerating public spaces : The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Cairo

Abstract

In an era characterised by intensive digital and virtual practices, people assumed the end of public spaces. This belief was emphasised with the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Cairo public spaces, ironically, increased in popularity with the closure of all semi-public and semi-private spaces. Egyptians started using them to practise their daily needs of socialising and exercising, benefiting from the new characteristics offered by them during the lockdown period. This paper examines how social media virtual space regenerates the physical public space, aspiring to alter the understanding of public space and public life dialectics. The methodology relies on documenting changes in the public space during the pandemic, via a mixed approach of virtual and physical methods to comprehend the relation between social media users’ online activity and public space users’ offline activity, highlighting the strong correlation between the virtual and physical spaces. The authors conclude with recommendations for tangible and intangible public space policies, based on the socio-spatial implications of COVID-19, to help prepare communities, policymakers, planners and government agencies to organise, respond and work together during the current and future pandemics.