The Future of Cities: Dense or Dispersed?

Saturday, 15 February 2014: 8:30 AM-11:30 AM
Grand Ballroom A (Hyatt Regency Chicago)
United Nations indicates that almost 200,000 people are urbanizing on this planet every day. This means we, as a global species, need to build a new or expanded city of a million inhabitants every week. The question becomes: Where do these new urban dwellers go in the dense, vertical city or the dispersed, horizontal city? There are many that believe that the sustainability benefits of increased density in cities (e.g., better land use, reduction of suburban infrastructure, reduced vehicle travel time, etc.) are considerable. However there are implications to this—not least the social implications of people living and working in denser proximity. This panel brings together professionals with varied perspectives—architects, urban planners, engineers, and social scientists—to fully present and then debate the issues.
Organizer:
Antony Wood, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
Co-organizers:
Daniel Safarik, Illinois Institute of Technology
and John Ronan, Illinois Institute of Technology
Speakers:
Wiel Arets, Illinois Institute of Technology
The City of the Future: What Will It Be?
William F. Baker, Skidmore, Owings and Merrill
The Case for Density
Francesca Birks, Arup
Drivers of Change
Saskia Sassen, Columbia University
Urbanizing Technology
Virginia Parks, University of Chicago
Urban Form, Job Access, and Economic Mobility