The University Alliance Ruhr, ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability and the German Center for Research and Innovation (DWIH) invite you to the second event in our series

COVID-19 and the Future of Our Cities: Green Architecture
Tuesday, July 28, 2020
11:00 AM - 12:00 PM EST

Moderator

Alexander Mirescu
Founder and CEO, RESILIÉNT/CITY
Fellow, World Economic Forum – Healthy Cities and Communities Platform

Speakers

Wolfram Hoefer
Director, Center for Urban Environmental Sustainability
Associate Professor, Department of Landscape Architecture – Rutgers

Josh Radoff
Senior Vice President and Built Ecology Team Lead
WSP USA

Sebastian Schlecht
Architect AKNW
Strategic Management – Dept. of Environment, Traffic and Sports
City of Essen – Green Capital of Europe 2017

Part II: Green Architecture

Unlike any other moment in recent memory, the importance of accessibility to urban green spaces and public realms has taken on new significance. Their proven benefits for improving air quality, storm water management, local economies, and social cohesion have long been documented. But how do we perceive the design phase and implementation of publicly accessible realms in growing cities in a post-COVID-19 world? How do we link public realms to public health strategies? 

The Series

COVID-19 has hit cities particularly hard, some of them harder than others. The extent to which cities have been affected depends on a variety of factors including, first and foremost, the approaches taken to address the outbreak. However, the current pandemic also highlights an urban fabric that is divided along class, gender, race, and income as much as it reveals the vulnerability of supply chains, the strengths and weaknesses of social cohesion in urban neighborhoods, the need for mass transportation alternatives, and the increasingly blurred boundaries between work and residential environments, among others.

Once they reemerge from their lockdowns, what will cities look like in the months and years to come? How do we make our cities more resilient vis-à-vis future pandemics and the consequences of climate change? This series of online conversations brings together urban planners, community leaders as well as experts in fields such as public health, sociology, logistics and transportation to help us understand how COVID-19 will affect how we think about the city of tomorrow.

A video recording of our online conversation can be found on our YouTube channel.