Let's Talk About Cities podcast

Let's Talk About Cities #10 — The Dogma of Urban Density

We're told that denser cities are better for the environment, for the economy, even for our happiness. But is that the whole story? On this episode of Let's Talk About Cities we dive into the debate about urban density and add nuance to dogma.

Let's Talk About Cities #9 — The City and the Countryside

In this episode we’ll take a deeper dive into the countryside and its relation to the city. An overview of city and countryside through the lens of urbanization is given, reports and research on the topic are presented, definitions and differences of terms used are explained and renewed interest for countryside within architectural discourse is examined before future outlooks are considered.

Urban Planning, Politics, ArchitectureStudio Incontro8 August 2023City, Countryside, Rural, Development, Politics

Let's Talk About Cities #8 – Car-free Zones

As we already talked about in episode #4 about Ecologically Sustainable Planning, Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris, aims to transform the capital into a 15-minute city in which nobody takes longer than 15 minutes to get to work or take their children to school. Along with this goal, it has now been decided that the city center of Paris should be free from private cars by 2024. The proposed area stretches out over 4 arrondissements.

Urban Planning, Politics, ArchitectureStudio Incontro6 March 2022Car-free, Mobility, Transport, Paris, Brussels, Pontevedra, Urban PlanningComment

Let's Talk About Cities #7 – Participatory Planning

In the first episode of 2022 we’ll talk about participatory planning; why it’s relevant, its benefits and its potential risks and obstacles. We trace a shift from top-down to more democratic planning processes and discuss examples.

Let's Talk About Cities #6 - Self-initiated Housing

In today's episode, we will talk about self-initiated housing, starting by trying to find a definition, giving some historical background information and exploring the different motives why people engage in projects like that. We will discuss the different ownership and financing models and also go into detail with one self-initiated housing project that was realized in Vienna in 2015, LiSA.

We will also discuss self-initiated housing more critically and explore why its not available to many.

Urban Planning, Politics, ArchitectureStudio Incontro28 November 2021Baugruppen, Urban Planning, Architecture, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Freiburg, Tübingen, Hamburg, ViennaComment

Let's Talk About Cities #5 – Interview: Santosh Ketham Kumar

Today’s episode is an interview we made with Santosh Kumar, a practicing architect, educator and researcher. He is the founder of the studio “Ketham's Atelier Architects” and the NGO Thinking Hand.

Architecture, Politics, Urban PlanningStudio Incontro31 October 2021Interview, Flooding, Architecture, EducationComment

Let's Talk About Cities #4 – Ecologically Sustainable Planning

In today's episode we’ll talk about ecologically sustainable planning - an important issue in the context of climate change as cities consume about 80% of all energy produced and in 2030 are prognosed to emit 74% of greenhouse gases.

Let's Talk About Cities #3 – Red Vienna

In this episode, we will talk about Red Vienna, starting by giving some historical background information and introducing the at the time revolutionary ideas that were implemented and are still relevant today. Furthermore, we will discuss how the projects were financed and also go into detail with the Karl-Marx-Hof as a well-known example for municipal housing in Vienna that still shapes the cityscape today.

Architecture, Politics, Urban PlanningMattias Kallin29 August 2021Vienna, Politics, Social Democracy, Civil War, Housing, Urban PlanningComment

Let's Talk About Cities #2 – AirBnB and Its Discontents

In this post and podcast we discuss AirBnB: Its origins, success story and effects on cities where it is particularly prevalent. We link it to mass tourism and discuss that phenomenon in its own right and mention some possible solutions to the conflicts that can arise between locals and tourists.

Let's Talk About Cities #1 – Gentrification

In this post and the accompanying podcast episode, we delve deeper into the stages of gentrification and discuss some possible measures that can be taken to deal with its effects.