In January, we asked dozens of MICD alumni mayors and Resource Team members to reflect on what the next decade will bring for cities. We compiled their answers in an article at Common Edge, linked below.
“Rapid change has become the new normal in cities, with technological advances and societal shifts spilling out into the physical realm in unpredictable ways. The people shaping our communities—city leaders, planners, design professionals—are faced with a fundamental challenge: How do you design for an uncertain future? The pace of change we’ve seen over the last decade shows no signs of slowing down, and city leaders struggle to predict what fundamental changes the next 10 years will bring, much less plan for them. Are we walking into the next Roaring Twenties? Or will the decade be Reactionary? Rancorous? Revitalized?
To get at these questions, we asked a select group of mayors and leaders in the allied design fields (architecture, landscape architecture, planning, urban design, transportation planning, real estate development) to reflect on what the next decade will bring for cities. All 44 mayors and 45 design leaders participated in the Mayors’ Institute on City Design last year. Answers ranged from the practical to the alarmist, from the aspirational to the fantastical. Within the 64 responses we receive, five interrelated themes emerged.”