Emerging technologies will have profound impacts on the urban experience in coming years, with the potential to bring wholesale changes to everything from urban form to mobility and e-commerce. Technology is an integral component of how we plan our cities of the future, creating a host of promising opportunities and daunting challenges. This session will provide a broad overview of the major implications of key emerging technologies unfolding in cities and a framework for understanding urban design and development connections to them.  Hosted by Communities by Design (CxD).

Course expires 12/17/2025

In recent years, the climate crisis has placed decarbonization at the top of the urban agenda. While cities across the world have created climate action plans and pledged ambitious emission reductions, recent research has revealed that many jurisdictions are struggling to develop implementation strategies to meet those targets. This session will identify some of the common gaps in current city approaches and highlight innovative work happening at the local level that may provide broader guidance to community decarbonization strategies across the country. Participants will gain an understanding of the current context for this work and promising practices that may inform they own work. Hosted by Communities by Design (CxD).

Course expires 12/17/2025

The community contexts in which we work today are defined overwhelmingly by pervading public mistrust, conflict and controversy, and community opposition. Our urban crises – climate, housing, equitable development - are forcing quick action to avoid catastrophe. Controversy, community opposition and legal challenges pose significant and costly burdens to achieving our collective goals. This session will provide an overview of the key challenges in the field of public participation today. It will identify core components of healthy processes that can lead to more successful community outcomes with broad community support. The session will address technique selection, as well as tools, resources and networks where participants can develop skills in public participation. Hosted by Communities by Design (CxD).

Course expires 12/17/2025

Professional dialogues about urbanism are often held back by their own toxic jargon, but Carlos Moreno’s framing of the “15-Minute City” has delivered a publicly accessible concept that has gained global traction in recent years. Cities all over the world have begun devising strategies with the framework in mind. Urban design plays a key role in moving this idea from concept to reality, with significant implications for climate action and equitable development. Designing more compact cities can cut our carbon emissions by an estimated 25 percent. This session will feature real-world applied settings for the 15-Minute City with lessons learned for other jurisdictions seeking to mobilize action for more sustainable urbanism. Hosted by Communities by Design (CxD).

Course expires 12/17/2025

When the design assistance team program was created in the 1960s, it pioneered participatory approaches to city building. Over five decades later, the program has established a track record of urban innovation and change that has influenced cities all over the world. Learn how the DAT program has employed one of the most powerful methodologies for urban innovation in the field today – and how its component parts have been adapted and deployed globally for urban transformations. Hosted by Communities by Design (CxD).

Course expires on 12/17/2025

Over the past half-century, our development policies and practices have led to segregated communities with starkly disparate realities. This trend is creating a society with vast inequalities and institutionalizing these inequalities into the very fabric of American society. Our cities today are struggling to recalibrate our approaches to growth and development so that everyone can participate and share in its benefits. This session will highlight perspectives from community leaders working on the frontlines of anti-displacement and equitable development efforts. It will feature initiatives to heal divides and repair the urban fabric to create more equitable communities. The session will share practical lessons learned from a range of diverse experiences in major American cities that can provide guidance to other community practitioners, designers and civic leaders. Hosted by Communities by Design (CxD). 

Course expires 12/17/2025