Curated Book on Urban Design

A close friend lent me the book Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design by Charles Montgomery after a lengthy policy conversation. He told me I needed to read it; he was right. You should read it, too!

Note that Happy City is not written by social scientists so the objective of the book is not to prove or disprove a hypothesis. I loved and recommend Happy City because it is an exercise in out-of-the-box thinking. It is a catalyst for innovative problem-solving. It provides case studies of cities across the world, told as stories, and patched together for a wholistic and human-centered approach to the complex challenges of urban areas. Happy City highlights the successes of Vancouver, Canada, Bogota, Colombia, Siena, Italy, and Paris, France, and it uses history and exceptional scholarship to make arguments about what makes a city great and how to improve the quality of life for all city residents.

“And what are our needs for happiness?... We need to walk, just as birds need to fly. We need to be around other people. We need beauty. We need contact with nature. And most of all, we need not to be excluded. We need to feel some sort of equality." (pg. 6)

Montgomery introduces concepts like challenged thriving (pg. 37), the relationship between happiness, economists, and urban design, unintended negative consequences of urban sprawl (beyond the damage to the environment!), and on page 111 Montgomery references a relevant psychological study at the University of Rochester. 

We spend so much time reading about the challenges of the City of Rochester and perhaps you find yourselves talking about those challenges in your networks. Consider reading Happy City to catalyze more creative thought about what urban transformation could look like.

Consider Happy City for your brain food - it's high quality nutrition for healthy thought! 

Source: Montgomery, C. (2013). Happy city: Transforming our lives through urban design. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York.

Curated article: When Neighbors Choose…

Next City published an article on August 6th, 2024 that gives an interesting example of community-led grantmaking. Community members are making decisions about programming, and the money follows. See “When Neighbors Choose How To Spend Philanthropic When Neighbors Choose How To Spend Philanthropic Dollars.”

The story is about the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia, a neighborhood hit hard by the opioid epidemic. This case study is a very interesting example of how neighborhoods can drive their own revitalization, and of a new dynamic with philanthropy. 

Food for thought!

Representative Data

On May 7, 2024, the Brookings Institution published commentary on the federal government’s updates to standards for defining race and ethnic categories across government agencies. The commentary is quick to note that standards are still not perfect: Identifying information falls far short of inclusivity. 

In addition to learning about policy updates, the Brookings commentary is an important reminder of the challenges, nuances, and technicalities of representative data. 

Our Community Indicators dashboard uses Census data and data from New York State agencies, all of which have wrestled with these issues. As we note in the Community Indicators section, we know that the racial/ethnic categories may not feel like a direct representation of your racial/ethnic identity and, for some, may not feel empowering. We hope to make bigger strides toward more expansive and inclusive terminology.