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Smart cities, digital cities, virtual cities, connected cities. Are these just trendy buzzwords? Perhaps. But these types of cities are supported by the infrastructure that is more than bricks and mortar.
These cities are smart (thoughtful, people-centric), digital (driven by data acquisition, measured, analyzed and sometimes exchanged) and virtual (experiential). And, as a result, they are... Read more
Whether or not diversity is a good thing is still a topic of much debate. Though many businesses tout the benefits of diversity, American political scientist Robert Putnam holds that diversity causes people to hunker down, creating mistrust in communities.
Empirical investigations into how diversity affects communities are too few and far between to provide any definitive answer to the... Read more
On a recent holiday in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, I couldn’t resist thinking about these countries’ economic potential and ongoing policy challenges. After all, in 2005, my Goldman Sachs colleagues and I had listed Vietnam as one of the Next Eleven (N-11) – all countries with the potential to become important economies during this century.
Vietnam reported that its real (inflation-adjusted)... Read more
The Challenges
Imagine, if you will, a Category 3 hurricane roiling up the East Coast and making a direct hit on Southern New England – the biggest storm to hit the area since the hurricanes of 1939 and 1954. The Northeast corridor interstate transportation system, which was built after 1954, would be knocked out. The grid from Boston to New York and up to the borders of New Hampshire and Vermont... Read more
I rescued over 140 people during my four summers as a lifeguard in San Clemente, California, from frightened children being carried out to sea in riptides to marines pounded with ten-foot waves.
We now have kids growing up in cities that increasingly flood, whose drinking water is salinated, and who are getting hit with hundred-year storms every year. We don’t need to tell them that the problems... Read more
A push to green and clean Kigali is moving ahead - though not everyone is happy
KIGALI - In the rainy season, water used to pour into Dativa Nyiramajyambere's house on a cheap plot of land in the Kigali suburb of Rugenge. Outside her home, a half-metre-wide hole in the pavement gathered rubbish.
But in 2009, Kigali's leaders decided to start demolishing slums in the capital's poor suburbs – those... Read more
POSITION: Consultant (CIC) REFERENCE NO.: 2018/UNU/IAS/CIC/RA/40 LOCATION: Tokyo, Japan Timezone: UTC 0 CLOSING DATE: Open until position is filled
Organizational Unit: UNU Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability (UNU-IAS)
About the United Nations University (UNU)
For the past four decades, UNU has been a go-to think tank for impartial research on the pressing global problems of human... Read more
The challenges of urbanization, particularly rising inequality and environmental degradation, are symptoms of a larger deficit to respect all people and the environment in cities. Only when all social and environmental dimensions are recognized and prioritised, will urbanization become a positive transformative force.
The Cross-Cutting Report 2017 demonstrates the achievements of UN-Habitat’s... Read more
The Planning Law Assessment Framework is a self-assessment tool to be used during focus groups to identify strengths and weakness of an urban planning system. The Planning Law Assessment Framework looks at all the laws, regulations, and decrees applicable in a city, enacted at different levels. It takes into account only black letter law, but will stimulate the discussion on the eventual... Read more
Singapore has been ranked top among 100 global cities surveyed for their advanced mobility systems in a report by management consultancy firm Arthur D Little.
Released at the UITP Asia-Pacific Assembly in Taipei, the third edition of the firm’s Future of Mobility study and updated Urban Mobility Index analyses the ability of cities to adapt to growing demand, technological advancement and... Read more