From an urban planning perspective, epidemics historically have always left their traces in our cities. Now COVID-19 joins a long list of infectious diseases – such as the Spanish flu of 1918 in New York and Mexico City or the Ebola epidemic in West Africa in 2014.
CityLab has talked to Michele Acuto, Professor of Global Urban Politics at the University of Melbourne, about the intersections of urban planning and public health in the age of digitalization and globalization.
As the central importance of mobility to issues such as equity, climate impact and health is increasingly recognised, sustainable urban transport is becoming ever more relevant throughout the world. In Latin America and the Caribbean in particular, there are multiple urban mobility challenges to be addressed, requiring implementation of effective policies and innovative ideas. This publication will explore challenges and opportunities specific to the Latin American context, with the aim of providing guidance on how to improve mobility conditions for the region’s urban residents and contribute to sustainability targets.
Many cities in the Latin American region have been pioneers in the implementation of environmental measures and policies, as well as in resilience building and adaptation of their territories to the incre- asing effects of climate change. Planning for the future is key for the well-being of our communities, and we need to continue working with and for them in order to mitigate and adapt to the impact that climate change will continue to have on our territories in the coming decades.
This peer-learning note summarizes good practices of Latin American cities with a focus on four different thematic areas: risk assessment, comprehensive planning, finance, and citizen engagement. The practices were discussed during our ConnectiveCities peer-learning event hosted by the city of Niteroi, Brazil between November 26-28, 2019.
More information:
• Read the Peer Learning Note 26 about Climate Resilience and Urban Development in English, Spanish, or Portuguese.
• Short documentation with all presentations and pictures of the events
Urban planning and design shape the environment around us – and that environment, in turn, shapes how we live, work, play, move, and rest.
Cities have historically been planned and designed for men and by men. They tend to reflect traditional gender roles and gendered division of labor. In general, cities work better for heterosexual, able-bodied, cisgender men than they do for women, girls, sexual and gender minorities, and people with disabilities.
The Handbook for Gender-Inclusive Urban Planning and Design seeks to respond to these urgent questions: how might we design and plan cities that work well for everyone? What would such a city look like, and how would we go about creating it? By showing why to incorporate gender inclusion into urban planning and design it sets out practical approaches, activities, and design guidelines that show how to do this.
The report, launched at the 10th World Urban Forum, reviews the evidence around learning through play and the impact that city and urban environments have on children’s access to play and ultimately, their overall development.
Play is increasingly being recognised as the engine of optimal child development, future happiness and achievement. Modern play has become a multi-dimensional, multilayered experience, where narratives and characters flow easily between different play-spaces. From virtual, online and augmented life-worlds into the physical domain and back again, play has become a seamless set of interlinked experiences and opportunities for learning and pleasure.
It is therefore imperative that we design and build cities that meet the needs of children: seeking their input during the design process, providing them with access to play and education, and facilitating their social and cultural interactions.
To better understand the complexity of play in cities and support the design of play-based interventions for children optimal development the report offers a first-of-its-kind Urban Play Framework. The Urban Play Framework assesses four Dimensions
critical to ensure a play-friendly environment for optimal childhood development: they focus on children’s needs, time and opportunity to play, the support and facilitation that enable Learning through Play, and the socio-cultural and urban systems that contribute to play in cities.
Power and informality interact in complex ways in urban shelter provision. This briefing is based on a study of three East African cities: Nairobi, Hawassa and Mogadishu. The three-year research project studied both financial constraints to accessing land or housing and non- financial constraints such as discrimination on the basis of identity. Our findings underline the importance of knowing who has power within the housing and land markets. Power does not just derive from wealth; politicians, traditional leaders, gatekeepers and others exercise influence in these markets. A person’s identity — and income — impacts the extent to which they can navigate these power structures, and the formal and informal systems that govern access to shelter. Governments and international donors need to improve the lives of the urban poor: notably with low-income, regulated rental schemes; slum-upgrading and affordable finance.
In many developing cities, connectivity is undermined by limited infrastructure and weak public transport systems. If people and goods are unable to move easily across a city, firms get locked into small-scale unproductive activities, and people cannot access basic goods and services.
Policymakers face difficult trade-offs in improving systems of mobility, both in addressing growing demands for private transport, and in investing in public transport links in a city. Learning from the experiences of cities across the world facing these challenges offers some key lessons for effective infrastructure investment and smart regulation to meet growing demands for transport.
The leaders of 14 of the world’s most ambitious and successful sustainable transport cities explain why they are taking action, what they are implementing, the approaches they are taking, and their advice for other cities. Their intension is to inspire and support more cities to show the same leadership. The actions showcased range from expansion and electrification of mass transit, to restrictions on polluting vehicles and improved conditions for pedestrians and cyclists. All the cities featured are signatories to the C40 Green and Healthy (Fossil Fuel Free) Streets declaration.
Cities must ensure universal access to safe, reliable, and affordable sanitation so that all urban residents can lead productive, healthy, and thriving lives. New analysis of 15 cities in the global South shows that on average, 62 percent of sewage and fecal sludge is unsafely managed somewhere along the sanitation service chain.
Global monitoring efforts have resulted in an underestimation of the urban sanitation crisis and the risks to public health, the economy, and the environment. New data and analysis at the city and sub-city level is needed to galvanize action.
Sewers are convenient, safe, sanitary, and work well in dense urban environments and in multistory buildings. From the perspective of the household, sewer connections and services are often less expensive than on-site sanitation options.
In the absence of universal access to sewers, cities need to find an optimal combination of off-site and on-site sanitation options. On-site sanitation systems place enormous responsibility on households and private providers, and thus require strong government capacity to regulate and enforce sanitation standards to ensure public health and safety.
Citywide upgrading of informal settlements can improve low-income households’ access to urban sanitation. City governments should work with community organizations, nongovernmental organizations, and federations to improve and extend sanitation to informal settlements and address affordability.
The report draws attention to the trend of isolated technologies – such as electric vehicles, for example – being over-promoted. The obvious idea is to cut greenhouse-gas emissions, but that will only happen if the electric power used is generated by renewable means, which often is not the case. Moreover, the authors warn that it is not healthy to reduce the diversity in the means of transport. While appreciating the progress made in some areas, the SuM4All report insists that the need for a fundamental, systemic transformation is not being met.
The report proposes a list of the most relevant policies for making transport systems sustainable. It offers no blueprint, because each country must take action according to its specific situation. However, SuM4All presents various instruments in four toolboxes:
