By the year 2050, two-thirds of the global population will live in cities. This situation raises questions about how cities will have to learn to adapt and overcome many challenges, including climate change, migration, digital equity, affordable housing, among others to become resilient and responsive ecosystems. In Fall 2019, I was invited to CityLab D.C., a gathering of innovative leaders across all aspects of civic life to discuss the bold ideas and strategies that are making a transformative impact on communities around the world.
CityLab is a celebration of urban life bringing together mayors from around the world, along with policymakers and business leaders, artists, academics, and activists to discuss some of the biggest challenges and opportunities in cities around the globe. The conference presented many discussions focused on affordable housing, climate and sustainability, economic mobility, the use of technology and design to innovate urban spaces and government. The event is organized by The Aspen Institute, an education and policy studies organization based in Washington, DC, The Atlantic, which was founded in 1857 and today is one of the fastest-growing media platforms in the industry, and Bloomberg Philanthropies, which invests in 510 cities and 129 countries around the world to ensure better, longer lives for the greatest number of people.
Following welcome remarks by Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, Mayor Bloomberg was interviewed about “Cities as Catalysts,” highlighting the leading role cities and their ideas play in driving innovation to address the unmet needs of residents. Among the topics and guest speakers were Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr of Freetown, Sierra Leone, Jimmie Fails, Lead Actor of the critically acclaimed film “The Last Black Man in San Francisco”, Maria Vassilakou, Former Deputy Mayor, City of Vienna, Austria, who discussed designing a city for everyone, and David Grohl from Nirvana and the Foo Fighters, who talked about the relation between cities, music, and identity, something he documented in this HBO series, Sonic Highways.
Each speaker had compelling stories about the power of resilience, innovation, and leadership in the success of implementing creative solutions for today’s biggest problems in cities.
In a country that boasts one of the world’s highest literacy rates, the arrival of the new central library in Helsinki last year was a kind of moon-landing-like moment of national bonding. The €98 million facility, whose opening in December 2018 marked the centenary of Finnish independence, has since been widely celebrated internationally as a model reimagining of these critical pieces of social infrastructure. The central library is built to serve as a kind of citizenship factory, a space for old and new residents to learn about the world, the city, and each other.
Viennese lawmaker Maria Vassilakou explained why the Austrian capital ranks so high on quality-of-life rankings, despite its rapidly growing population. “A livable city is a city where people live because they want to, not because they have to,” said Vassilakou, the city’s former deputy mayor. That translates into an emphasis on children and families, and making sure that the city can accommodate their needs: “A city that is good for children is good for everybody.”
Those needs are growing: Vienna, a city of about 2 million, is adding about 25,000 new residents annually, and adds about 13,000 new units of housing to accommodate them. “We have to build a small town each and every year,” Vassilakou told the audience. But unlike in many North American cities, population growth isn’t coming in the form of suburban-style sprawl and an unaffordable central city, thanks to strict land-use codes and serious government subsidies for housing. About half the city is reserved for green space, she said, and 62 percent of the population, including a broad middle class, lives in social housing.
The housing part of Vienna’s livability story is complemented by another important factor—the ease and affordability of transportation. More than 73 percent of the city’s daily mobility needs are covered by modes outside of private cars.
Bloomberg Philanthropies and the OECD released a report and interactive map showing where cities are growing their innovation capacity and what they’re doing with it. The map is intended to help track investments being made into the work as well as the corresponding benefits for people and quality of life that grow out of those investments. It lays out key areas influencing city innovation: strategy and approaches, staffing and structure, data use and management, and evaluation. The report, which is based on a survey of more than 80 international cities, determined that the ability to innovate depends primarily on bold leadership, skilled staff and a strong focus on data as it applies to targeting outcomes plus also measuring progress.
The stories and insights shared during CityLab emphasized some of the tentpoles of successful government innovation work, including creating a culture that enables experimentation, having dedicated staffers in city hall willing to work on innovation, embracing human-centered design, and striving for inclusive, equitable communities. Overall, one principle is clear, that the most important innovation is happening at the local level and that global impact can be achieved when cities share solutions.
Just as CityLab, the Urban Future Lab’s mission is to take action through research, data advocacy, and citizen agency in response to ongoing global, ecological, and economic challenges, and to identify conditions of human and environmental inequality, transcending them as we advance social and civic innovation design.
— Dr. Alberto Gomez
Photo Credits: City of Helsinki; CC R Arno – Wikimedia Commons; Andreas Lindinger – Vienncouver.com