Monthly Archives: October 2012

London Conference 2012

31 October 2012

On 27 November, a network of influential leaders and policy experts will gather at the Southbank Centre for the London Conference 2012. The conference asks how London can build on the success of the Olympics to ensure it remains a world-class player on a global stage, and how will the urban development of East London ensure jobs and desirable places for London’s people. The event will present a range of policy ideas and solutions for London and the latest global research and intelligence on cities. Speakers include Richard Florida, Lord Richard Rogers, Tony Travers of LSE London and Professor Ricky Burdett of LSE Cities.

For the full programme, visit the website: http://www.londonpolicyconference.com

LSE Cities has been offered a number of volunteering places at the conference. However, as of 1 November 2012, all these places are now taken. Any further names will be added to a reserve list and we’ll be in touch if anyone drops out. If you have any queries please contact Tessa Norton on t.j.norton@lse.ac.uk.

London Conference 2012
Presented by Centre for London and IPPR.

27 November
8.30am – 5.30pm
Southbank Centre, London SE1

Living Dangerously: Vital Politics and Urban Citizenship in Bogotá, Colombia

On 30 October, a seminar with LSE Cities Fellow Austin Zeiderman looked at the social implications of Bogotá’s “zones of high risk” on informal settlements and their inhabitants in the Latin American city. Part of LSE’s research seminar series ‘Cities, Space and Development’, this informal seminar will draw on ethnographic data collected by Zeiderman during his PhD research at Stanford University. The event took place from 4-6pm in in Room 103, Tower 2 on the LSE campus.

You can download a paper based on Zeiderman’s research in Bogotá here, which was recently presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) and the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST) at the Copenhagen Business School, Denmark on 17-20 October, 2012.

FT review: “A breath of fresh air for public spaces”

26 October 2012

Edwin Heathcote, architecture and design critic for the Financial Times, callsTheatrum Mundi / Global Street an “ambitious, unashamedly intellectual, slightly scattershot but also provocative … attempt to grab the debate around the design of public space back from private interests and disinterested bureaucracies. He sees in it “a kind of proto-public space, a forum and a space of stimulation”. Read his full review in the FT on 26 October 2012 here (registration required).

New report on development strategy in the Randstad

The National-Regional Programme for Amsterdam, Almere and Markermeer (RRAAM) is a development, environmental and transportation strategy for the North Wing of the Randstad. The strategy spans housing provision, new jobs, the revitalisation of the lakes and a transportation strategy.

LSE Cities put together an International Panel of Experts, that looked at the existing plans and alternatives in order to assess the programme from a more qualitative and international perspective.

We looked at the following questions:

1. How is the RRAAM programme going to improve the international competitiveness of the region?

2. What type of city will Almere become following new investment in housing, transportation and recreational infrastructure? How will the four developmental alternatives for Almere, help both the region and Almere realise their objectives of excellent living & working conditions, excellent mobility and excellent recreational and ecological infrastructure?

The report of our findings is now available here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cjf3le2icumxtrr/Final-Report.pdf

New research on cities’ impact on human brain presented at World Health Summit

24 October 2012

An interdisciplinary discussion on mental health in cities took place between neuroscientists, psychiatrists and urban specialists at the World Health Summit in Berlin on 21 October 2012. Jointly organised by the Alfred Herrhausen Society, LSE Cities and the World Health Summit, new research by the Central Institute of Mental Health in Mannheim, the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at CCM, Charité, Berlin and LSE Cities was presented at a major international conference on public health and global well-being sponsored by the governments of Germany and France. Leading neuroscientists and researchers Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg and Andreas Heinz joined LSE Cities’ Ricky Burdett and Charité’s Mazda Adli to present new data on the effects of cities on the human brain that describe the social and spatial determinants of mental health in cities across the world. For more information see the www.worldhealthsummit.org

Theatrum Mundi public conference: Presence and Absence in the City

11 October 2012

On 12 October 2012, Columbia University’s Committee on Global Thought and New York University will co-host ‘Presence and Absence in the City’, the first public conference of the Theatrum Mundi / Global Street project.

Five panel sessions – ‘State of the Street’, ‘Technological Space’, ‘The Global Street’, ‘The Trade of Ideas and Goods: From Artifacts to Citizenship’ and ‘Theatrical Space’ will explore the difference between presence and absence in the city.

Through theoretical conversations and discussions on real life projects the conference hopes to instigate new thinking about public space via our specialist panel of architects, town planners, artists, designers and social researchers.

The conference runs from 9:30am – 6:00pm EDT at Columbia University, Morningside Campus, Wood Auditorium, Avery Hall. This event is free and open to the public. It will also be live streamed at arch.columbia.edu and the Twitter hashtag is #wood101210.

For more information, visit the Theatrum Mundi website.

This event is co-sponsored by Saskia Sassen & Richard Sennett | A Committee on Global Thought Conference | Supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation | Co-sponsored by GSAPP and New York University.

“The rights nations give, cities easily take away” – Professor Richard Sennett on Occupy, one year on

One year on, Professor Richard Sennett reflects on the Occupy movements and the nature of public space. What is their legacy? Professor Sennett argues that the movement “dramatised questions about public space — who owns it? who can use it? — and provided some surprising answers”. He argues that the Occupiers not only changed the terms of debate about the current economic crisis, they also challenged urbanists to think about the city in new ways.

You can read the full piece over on the LSE Politics blog.

6th Urban Research and Knowledge Symposium in Barcelona

10 October 2012

Under the banner of “Rethinking Cities: Framing the Future”, the 6th Urban Research and Knowledge Symposium (URKS6) took place in Barcelona from 8-10 October. Professors Ricky Burdett and Saskia Sassen contributed to a plenary discussion on the role of cities and urban development in addressing the needs and aspirations of the bottom billion, and identified promising practices and initiatives that cities can undertake to achieve spatial, economic, and social inclusion. LSE Cities Researcher Dr Antoine Paccoud also presented research from last year’s Urban Age conferences emphasising the influence of the built environment on metropolitan health outcomes. The three-day Symposium, organized by The World Bank in partnership with the City of Barcelona, seeks to contribute and inform policy choices that can help policymakers manage potential economic efficiency, environmental sustainability and social equity tradeoffs associated with urbanisation. The event was webcast live, and presentations and proceedings will be made available at www.rethinkingcities.org.

New Going Green edition launched at Global Green Growth Forum

9 October 2012

On 9 October, Philipp Rode, Executive Director, LSE Cities, and Graham Floater, Visiting Senior Fellow, LSE Cities, have launched a new edition of our report Going Green: How cities are leading the next economy (The 3GF Copenhagen edition) at the Global Green Growth Forum (3GF) in Copenhagen. The report provides an up-to-date overview on the experiences of how cities around the world are making the transition to the green economy. Read the full report.