The health concerns that dominate public submissions to the parliamentary inquiry into WestConnex are a reminder that papering over such issues comes back to haunt governments.
A Townsville City Deal was signed two years ago and the city is now one of Queensland’s ten leaders on smart city performance.
Lukas Coch/AAP
How smart are our cities now? In Queensland, a study of all 78 local government areas reveals major gaps between the ten leading the way in becoming smart cities and the rest of the state.
In recent years, Detroit has demolished thousands of abandoned homes annually.
AP Photo/Carlos Osorio
By the time a building is abandoned and falls into disrepair, its community is already suffering. Michigan scholars suggest it’s time to plan for structures’ end of life before they even go up.
About 56% of Kenya’s urban population currently lives in a slum.
Shutterstock/John Wollwerth
The rental housing market in Nairobi’s informal settlements offers its tenant households a perverse market outcome of higher prices for lower quality products
Significant investment in public transport is essential to ensure the Central City CBD can handle the predicted growth in commuting trips.
Dean Lewins/AAP
Central City 2048 proposes one new rail line, three metro lines and almost 300,000 extra jobs for the new CBD, one of three proposed for metropolitan Sydney. Clearly, the investment needed is massive.
Parramatta has been designated as the central CBD of three future city centres in the Greater Sydney region.
haireena/Shutterstock
The Greater Sydney metropolis is envisaged as having three CBDs by mid-century, but an assessment of the proposed Central City around Parramatta shows how much work is needed to make that a reality.
Wittelsbacherplatz, June 2018, Munich, Germany.
Image: Christian Tietz
What exactly is the ‘built environment’?And is the term the best way to frame what we’re trying to achieve today?
Traffic crosses over the Lions Gate Bridge from North Vancouver into Vancouver, B.C., in July 2015. Canada is increasingly becoming a suburban nation, with more people living in car-dependent suburbs.THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck
It’s easy to over-estimate crowding and traffic in highly visible downtown cores and underestimate the vast growth happening in the suburban edges of our metropolitan regions.
Brasília was designed to be a just and inclusive city, but it still failed. Can Egypt’s new capital avoid the same mistakes?
Electric scooters could solve the ‘last mile’ problem of urban transport if operators learn from the mistakes that plagued the introduction of dockless bikes.
CrowdSpark/AAP
Shared electric scooters appeal as a way to cover that awkward distance between public transport stops and your destination. But first e-scooter operators must solve the littering and dumping problem.
Many US cities are investing in bike infrastructure and shade trees. Properly located, these additions can make streets cooler, cleaner and safer for all users – even those who drive.
Calgary beat out Vancouver on this year’s most livable city index issued by the Economist magazine.
Flickr
Vancouver lost out to Calgary as Canada’s most livable city this year. Why? Is it the high cost of housing or is it the city’s ‘neighbourhood first’ method that sometimes creates business instability?
In poorer communities, shared spaces tend to be poorly maintained and utilitarian.
from shutterstock.com
We wear our surroundings like a cloak. Lower-income communities often live in environments that discourage healthy, outdoor activities. This perpetuates their poorer health and traps them in poverty.
With only two years to go until the Tokyo Olympics, is there enough time to plan for the heat?
Kimimisa Mayama/AAP
Athletes and spectators are likely to encounter dangerously hot temperatures when Tokyo hosts the 2020 Olympic games. With two years to go, there’s still time to take protective measures.
If vintage city design used to trap women in suburbia, what’s the modern city looking like?
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In the 1970s, a young urban planning professor, Dolores Hayden, believed that city design was the key to unlocking patriarchal structures that trapped women in the home. How much has the city changed?
Most of Australia’s population is concentrated in big cities like Sydney and Melbourne.
from shutterstock.com
Planners have long tried to determine the ideal city size, and ideas have evolved with changing circumstances. But a good city depends more on the way it’s managed than on how many people it holds.
Cities were once considered a source of many problems. But that vision has changed over the last generation.
Graeme Roy
Our current celebration of cities is a big shift from the past generation when cities were seen to contain all of our problems. Should we believe the hype? Are the new ideas equally problematic?
Mature trees have horizontal branches that are attractive to wildlife and birds.
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The ecological value of old trees is irreplaceable for native Australian fauna. Identifying and preserving these trees in cities through smarter planning strategies is important for local wildlife.