Category: Talks

Canada Cities for People City Planners / Urban Designers Codes, Density & Urban Form Leadership & Decision Making Meet the Urbanists: 21st Century Streets, Roads & Mobility Suburban Cities Talks

Brent Toderian on sustainable mobility

TALK

Brent Toderian, You Tube, 7 September 2018

Prioritisation was the key, this was in the 1997 Transportation Plan, which was a catalyst for – I call it the most important Urban Design Plan we’ve ever done as a city, even though it’s a transportation plan – because that prioritisation, walking first, then cycling, then transit, then goods movement, and then the car, priotirized last, has been the key to all our multi-modal city making. To be clear that is not an anti-car message, we don’t ban the car,  we very rarely have any places where the cars aren’t allowed, but we prioritise them last, in terms of how we think about our infrastructure, our spatial decisions in the city, and that actually works better for everyone – including drivers. 

For more from Brent Toderain click here.

Articles Australia Bring Data City Planners / Urban Designers Meet the Urbanists: 21st Century Smart Cities Talks The Public Realm

Can our Tweets help us build better cities?

ARTICLE

Poppy Johnston, The Fifth Estate, 4 September 2018

By pooling publicly-available data from social media and other unconventional information sources – such as reviews and ratings sites, travel wikis, mapping sites, and event promotion pages – the company is able to depict in real-time the unique social fabric of a neighbourhood.

“We have memories and thoughts about spaces, and it’s that intangible stuff that makes somewhere sticky,” Ms Hartley, who is also the company’s chief innovation officer, told The Fifth Estate.

“It’s traditionally been hard to put data behind this and hard to put a value to it. Determining social value has also been hard because neighbourhoods are in a constant state of change,” she said

To visit Lucinda Hartley and co-founder Jessica Christiansen-Franks’s social analytics platform Neighbourlytics click here. To visit their placemaking consultancy Co-Design Studio click here.

Articles Global Meet the Urbanists: The Canon Physicists Talks Urban Economics Urbanisation

The Science of Sustainable Cities

ARTICLE / TALK

Centre for Liveable Cities, Urban Solutions, July 2018

Underlying the extraordinary complexity and diversity of cities is an approximate simplicity. As a city increases in size, all of its various socioeconomic metrics scale in the same way no matter where you are on the planet. Through analysing data from thousands of cities in different countries, I found that when the size of a city doubles, there is an approximate 15% increase in its socioeconomic outcomes—from income, wealth and number of patents, to crime rate and number of flu cases. This scaling law is valid across the globe, although cities have evolved independently.

To watch Geoffrey West’s 2011 TED Talk click here.

FeaturedArticles Cities for People Journalists Living in the City Meet the Urbanists: 21st Century Social & Economic Inequalities Talks The Public Realm Urban Activism USA

Designing a more inclusive city

ARTICLE

Allison Alrieff, The New York Times, 20 October 2017

“The Arsenal of Exclusion and Inclusion,” a forthcoming book by Tobias Armborst, Daniel D’Oca and Georgeen Theodore, who lead the architecture, planning and research collective Interboro, refers to such things — which include cul-de-sacs, cold water, “No Loitering” signs, the Fair Housing Act — as “weapons.” They are the policies, practices and physical artifacts used by planners, policy makers, developers, real estate brokers, community activists and others to draw, redraw or erase the lines that divide us.

Allison Arieff is the Editorial Director at SPUR and is a columnist for the New York Times.

For Allison Arieff’s twitter feed click here, for her New York Time option piece ‘Automated Vehicles Can’t Save Cities’ click here, and for a New York Times panel discussion on Tactical Urbanism where she was the moderator click here.

For Interboro’s Arsenal of Exclusion and Inclusion click here.

Academics Africa Brazil City Solutions Colombia Korea Leadership & Decision Making Meet the Urbanists: 21st Century Singapore / Malaysia Sustainable Cities Talks Urbanisation USA

The biggest risks facing cities – and some solutions

TALK

Robert Muggah, TED Talk, September 2017

It’s a small opportunity but a golden one: in the next 10 to 20 years, to really start designing in principles of resilience into our cities. There’s not one single way of doing this, but there are a number of ways that are emerging. And I’ve spoken with hundreds of urban planners, development specialists, architects and civic activists, and a number of recurring principles keep coming out. I just want to pass on six.

First: cities need a plan and a strategy to implement it. I mean, it sounds crazy, but the vast majority of world cities don’t actually have a plan or a vision. 

Second: you’ve got to go green. Cities are already leading global decarbonization efforts.

Third: invest in integrated and multi-use solutions. The most successful cities are those that are going to invest in solutions that don’t solve just one problem, but that solve multiple problems.

Next, fourth: build densely but also sustainably. The death of all cities is the sprawl. Cities need to know how to build resiliently, but also in a way that’s inclusive.

Fifth: steal. The smartest cities are nicking, pilfering, stealing, left, right and center. They don’t have time to waste.

And finally: work in global coalitions. You know, there are more than 200 inner-city coalitions in the world today. There are more city coalitions than there are coalitions for nation-states.

To learn more about Robert Muggah, his work on evidence based urban policy and data visualisations, visit the Igarapé Institute here and SecDev here.

(New) Traditional Cities City Planners / Urban Designers City Solutions Meet the Urbanists: 21st Century Streets, Roads & Mobility Sustainable Cities Talks The Public Realm

7 principles for building better cities

TALK

Peter Calthorpe, TED, April 2017

So there are seven principles that have now been adopted by the highest levels in the Chinese government, and they’re moving to implement them. And they’re simple, and they are globally, I think, universal principles.

One is to preserve the natural environment, the history and the critical agriculture.

Second is mix. Mixed use is popular, but when I say mixed, I mean mixed incomes, mixed age groups as well as mixed-land use.

Walk. There’s no great city that you don’t enjoy walking in. You don’t go there. The places you go on vacation are places you can walk. Why not make it everywhere?

Bike is the most efficient means of transportation we know. China has now adopted policies that put six meters of bike lane on every street. They’re serious about getting back to their biking history.

Complicated planner-ese here: connect. It’s a street network that allows many routes instead of singular routes and provides many kinds of streets instead of just one.

Ride. We have to invest more in transit. There’s no silver bullet. Autonomous vehicles are not going to solve this for us. As a matter of fact, they’re going to generate more traffic, more VMT, than the alternative.

And focus. We have a hierarchy of the city based on transit rather than the old armature of freeways.

It’s a big paradigm shift, but those two things have to get reconnected in ways that really shape the structure of the city.

To visit Calthorpe Associates website click here.

Driving Internet Companies Talks USA

Uber’s plan to get more people into fewer cars

TALK

Travis Kalanick, Ted Talk, February 2016

Now, in China everything is supersized, and so we’re doing 15 million uberPOOL trips per month, that’s 500,000 per day. And of course we’re seeing that exponential growth happen. In fact, we’re seeing it in LA, too. And when I talk to my team, we don’t talk about, “Hey, well, 100,000 people carpooling every week and we’re done.” How do we get that to a million? And in China, well, that could be several million.

To read Jarrett Walker‘s response in City Lab to Uber’s (and other tech “disruptors” of transportation) approach to public transport click here.

Cities / Countries Cities for People City Planners / Urban Designers Denmark Film Makers Global Meet the Urbanists: 21st Century Ranked Cities Streets, Roads & Mobility Talks The Public Realm

The Life-Sized City

TALK

Mikael Colville-Andersen, TED TALK, 27 Oct 2015

It’s all about the people in the Life-Sized City. The people are the main priority, not the machines, not the cult of big, the people. Everything else is secondary. Amazing people populate our cities, like The Lulu. The Lulu is not a consumer, she’s not a statistic, she’s not a number. She’s an amazing little human. Don’t measure her, don’t calculate how much money we’re going to make off of her in the course of her life. How much the cult of big is going to earn of this little statistical person. No. You know what you do? You design the city around her as your baseline. You reduce the number of cars, you reduce pollution, you create more green spaces, you build bicycle infrastructure, safe bicycle infrastructure, so that she can ride her bike, because that is all this kids wants to do. (Apart from eating ice-cream … ) You design for her, for the The Lulus of our world. You design for the citizens of the city, every single one of them, all of them apply here. It’s time to hack it back.

For more from Mikael Colville-Andersen, visit his urban design company Copenhagenize click here, for their ‘Bicycle Friendly City Index’ click here, for their short film series ‘Top Ten Design Elements That Make Copenhagen Bicycle-Friendly’ click here and for The Guardian article ‘Copenhagenize your city: the case for urban cycling in 12 graphs’ click here.

Activists Australia City Solutions Events & Festivals Retail Talks Tools Websites

Renew Newcastle

WEBSITE

Renew Newcastle

Since 2008, Renew Newcastle has been connecting people with vacant spaces, supporting a community of creative entrepreneurs who bring life, interest and activity into under utilised neighbourhoods. Partnering with those who share the vision of giving back to their community.

What makes a good Renew Newcastle project?

  • It adds life to the city
  • It is unique
  • It has a high degree of professionalism or a very clear idea
  • It is ongoing
  • It is ready
  • It has the support of the property owner

How long does Renew Newcastle have properties for?

Renew Newcastle’s default license agreement is based on accessing the property on a rolling 30 day basis. That means Property Owners can give 30 days notice at any time should they receive a commercial offer or need to proceed with development. This enables the property owner to provide the property without sacrificing the potential commercial returns and is one of the key reasons why properties are made available so cheaply.

To watch Marcus Wesbury’s speak about creative cities and the Renew Newcastle model click here, for his book Creating Cities click here, and for tools to create your own Renew project click here.

Bring Data Data Analyst Talks USA

Making data mean more through storytelling

TALK

Ben Wellington, Ted Broadway, 20 April 2015

So I consider those to be making impact as well … To do that, once again, I think you really need to think about some of the things about storytelling, like Connect with People, Try to Convey one Idea, Keep it Simple and Explore the Things You Know Best.

For more of Ben Wellington’s quantitative analysis of NYC Open Data click here.

Academics Africa Brazil Colombia Mega Cities Talks Urbanisation

How to protect fast growing cities from failing

TALK

Robert Muggah, TED Talk, October 2014

So urban geographers and demographers, they tell us that it’s not necessarily the size or even the density of cities that predicts violence, no. Tokyo, with 35 million people, is one of the largest, and some might say safest, urban metropolises in the world. No, it’s the speed of urbanization that matters. I call this turbo-urbanization, and it’s one of the key drivers of fragility.

When you think about the incredible expansion of these cities, and you think about turbo-urbanization, think about Karachi. Karachi was about 500,000 people in 1947, a hustling, bustling city. Today, it’s 21 million people, and apart from accounting for three quarters of Pakistan’s GDP, it’s also one of the most violent cities in South Asia. Dhaka, Lagos, Kinshasa, these cities are now 40 times larger than they were in the 1950s.

To learn more about Robert Muggah, his work on evidence based urban policy and data visualisations, visit the Igarapé Institute here and SecDev here.

Activists Talks Urban Activism

It’s our city. Let’s fix it.

TALK

Alessandra Orofino, TED, October 2014

Well, I believe that if we want to changewhat our cities look like,then we really have to changethe decision-making processesthat have given us the results that we have right now.We need a participation revolution,and we need it fast.

Cities for People City Planners / Urban Designers Community Meet the Urbanists: 21st Century Talks The Public Realm USA

Charles Montgomery talks “Happy City” with Mark Gorton

TALK

Mark Gorton, Street Films, 22 April 2014

We know that for much of the history of urban planning and architecture the people who build our cities, who build public spaces, who create buildings and city systems, often they will tell us they are building for our happiness, it’s the end goal of everything all of us do anyway, except they rarely provide evidence to demonstrate that they are making us happier with their creations. So I found this very curious, and looking at the last couple of decades of terrific work being done in neuroscience, behavioural economics and psychology, we’re actually starting to gain some evidence that tells us a little bit of the effect of the urban system on our our own well being, on how we feel and how we treat other people.

For see Charles Montgomery’s book Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design on Good Reads click here.