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CROSSTALK
How can local governments retain and plant trees on private lands—a primer
The future sustainability and liveability of cities in many bioregions will depend on retaining established trees, and on planting new trees, including on private lands. While retaining and planting trees in public space has become a familiar feature in many cities, the role of private land areas in a city’s ambitious plans to retain and increase the number of trees...
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ESSAY
CROSSTALK
On Paschal Mysteries, Primates and Conflagration: Notre Dame and the Ecological Disenfranchisement of Western Civilization
I was vacationing in Florida, taking advantage of Spring Break, and Easter week, writing and reading and escaping the administrivia that accompanies the end of the spring semester when I saw a short report on the television behind the bar at the local pub. It was Notre Dame. It was burning. I never miss a chance to visit this cathedral...
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GLOBAL
ROUNDTABLE
What I mean when I talk about collaboration. What is a specific experience collaborating on a project with someone from a different discipline or “way of knowing”?
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REVIEWS
REACTIONS
Imagining Future Cities in an Age of Ecological Change
The guidelines of the prompt were very simple. Stories had to be set in a city in the distant future (i.e. in or near the year 2099), be 1,000 words or less, and have as significant plot points both nature and people. With this framework The Nature of Cities launched a short story contest in 2018, and by the time...
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Lakes as Urban Classrooms | Reflections on the case of Rachenahalli Lake, Bangalore (2015-2018)
Civic engagement by the Jaimitra trust, and various civic organisations involved in conserving Rachenahalli Lake, was to create a space expected to help alleviate the stresses of living in an urban jungle, and break away from the infamous legacy tied to the images of highly polluted, frothing and aflame lakes of Bangalore.This article argues that using lakes as classrooms can...
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Reclamation and Mining: A Dangerous Fight for Sustainability in the Philippines
The Philippines has repeatedly taken blows causing environmental degradation. Last month, a dead whale was found with 40 kilograms of plastic in its stomach. In the same month, Metro Manila experienced a water crisis, affecting millions, and increasing risks in sanitation and waste management. In relation to this, protests have been held to oppose a planned dam that would affect environmentally...
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A Tribute to U.S. Congressman John Dingell – A Conservation Hero
U.S. Congressman John D. Dingell, Jr. passed away on February 7th at the age of 92. He may be best known as the longest-serving member of the U.S. House of Representatives in history—serving 59 years and being reelected 29 times, an unparalleled leader of health care—presiding over the passage of Medicare, introducing a national health care bill at the start...
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Crows of Vancouver: The Middle Way Between Biophobia and Biophilia
One of Metro Vancouver’s greatest spectacles is its twice daily crow migration that occurs every dawn and dusk, 365 days a year. Whatever your view or choice of description—crow-maggedon, crow stampede, crow-pocalypse—it is an impressive sight. Clans (or murders) of crows from all sections of the coast trickle in, like tributaries in a watershed of families and groups all destined...
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RECENT ROUNDTABLES...
Our goal is to empower cities to plan for a positive natural future. What is one specific action that should be taken to achieve this goal?
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SCIENCE &
TOOLS
Setting Priorities with the Human Footprint, or Why I Am an Urban Conservationist
A frequent refrain in conservation is that we must prioritize. A cottage industry of conservation biologists, among whom I count myself, has risen to plan conservation and set priorities. And in nearly all of the hundreds...
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PEOPLE &
COMMUNITITES
Great Cities Grow from Great Spaces and Listening to their Citizens
A review of: Eyes on the Street: The Life of Jane Jacobs, by Robert Kaniglel. 2016. Knopf. 512 pages. Buy the book. Garden Legacy, by Mary Louise Mossy Christovich and Roulhac Bunkley Toledano, with a foreword by S. Frederick Starr. 2016. The Historic New Orleans Collection. 268 pages. Buy the book. Ecocities Illustrated: the easily built visionary future of Richard Register, by Richard Register....
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PLACE &
DESIGN
Rethinking Cities as Vulnerable Ecosystems
Cities are dynamic complex adaptive systems. They are a network of systems interacting and exchanging flows of energy, information, and materials, held together by a set of rules, based on millennia of ecological change and more recent governance structures. Dominant narratives and practices describe cities as human systems that are separate from regional (or rural) ecosystems. After all, cities can...
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ART &
AWARENESS
Three Case Studies in Re-wilding: Models and Methods for Other Cities to Consider
Re-wilding is a new area of interest in landscape architecture concerned with making landscapes that are as close to the original ecology of a place as possible. Not limited to only planting installations, re-wilded landscapes can also exist to attract, reconstitute and/or re-introduce wildlife to heighten biodiversity. Given the emergence of environmental issues at the scale of the planet, the...
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