|
Livable Cities is Gaining Momentum!
“Even the White House now embraces an Urban Policy Agenda on Livability of Cities. The country, and the people—especially the children—urgently need these changes”
Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard
Director & Co-Founder, IMCL Council
Read more...
2009 AWARD
for Urban Plazas design at the 47th IMCL Conference in Portland, OR (May 10-14, 2009)
Congratulations to Peter Walker & Partners and the City of Portland Parks & Recreation for creating Jamison Square
Read more...
JOIN US!
At the 48th IMCL Conference (October 17 - 21, 2010) in Charleston, SC to focus on True Urbanism: Planning Healthy, and Child-Friendly Communities.
Read more...
CALL TO ACTION
A neighborhood, town or city is not SUSTAINABLE if it does not SUSTAIN ITS CHILDREN.
Read more...
NEW BOOK
Genius of the European Square
"Genius of the European Square will be of invaluable benefit to every city and to places yet to be designed and developed."
Joseph P. Riley, Jr.
Mayor, City of Charleston, SC
Read more...
NEED A SPEAKER?
Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard, Ph.D.(Arch.), Director, International Making Cities Livable Conferences, is available for:
- Lectures/presentations
- Consultation
- Organizing Conferences & Workshops in your city
Read more...
In 1985, when these conferences began, there was no discussion at other planning or architectural conferences, or even at the League of Cities Conferences about making our cities more "livable". Only the IMCL Conferences focused attention on the importance of making cities livable for children first, the need for public transit, bicycle lanes, and traffic calmed streets, for human scale architecture and mixed use urban fabric, for reviving the city center and creating public places where people could gather for farmers markets, festivals, outdoor cafes and community social life.
By bringing together people of vision from all disciplines at the past 46 IMCL Conferences, by presenting the best examples from Europe and North America, and by honoring cities and civic leaders for their achievements, we rejoice in the fact that these are now common goals for cities all across North America and Australia, as well as in Europe.
Our mission now is to:
- Rebuild community by replacing sprawl with compact, human scale urban fabric
- Recognize and combat the negative impact of our built environment on physical, social and mental health
- Adopt planning and urban design decisions that will make our cities more livable for children and the elderly
- Emphasize ethical land use patterns to reduce extreme economic disparities
- Strengthen compact urban neighborhoods to maintain diversity of ethnic and cultural identity
- Build multifunctional town squares that, like the ancient agora or medieval marketplace, can regenerate civic engagement and democratic participation.
These issues must be resolved in the next twenty years if we are to rediscover the principles of true urbanism, rebuild our cities so that they are ecologically sustainable, and regain communities that are socially sustainable. Please join us in helping to reach these goals! |
“There is no topic more crucial to the well-being of our cities and of our democracy, and no one more qualified to give it the thoughtful attention it deserves.”
