By Kate Torgovnick May and Thu-Huong Ha In the past 30 years, 300 million people in China have left rural areas and moved to cities. Which means that a lot of thinking about the future of cities is happening here. At the TEDCity 2.0 Salon — an event held in Chengdu, China, on November 12, in […]
Imagine a city skyline — a jagged line of peaks, drops and plateaus — all filled with rooftop farms. This is the dream of Roman Gaus, CEO of UrbanFarmers, which aims to turn city roof space into a place to grow fresh food and even raise fish. Gaus has contributed an essay to the new […]
Do city people really like to share more? Emily Badger of The Atlantic Cities suggests a new and fascinating phenomenon in urban areas — that city dwellers are moving toward a culture of shared ownership of everything from cars to power tools. Badger shares this thought in an essay from the new TED Book City […]
In the 1950s, 3 out of every 10 people on the planet lived in a city. Today, that ratio has nearly doubled — and the United Nations projects that by 2050, nearly 7 in 10 people will live in urban settings. Our population is gravitating towards cities, and this shift is creating amazing opportunities as […]
As the world’s population expands toward 10 billion people within the next 50 years, urban citizens face an unprecedented opportunity to build more vibrant, just and inclusive urban centers. Because we know that cities are powered by people, and people enable change, TED responded to the rapidly changing urban landscape by granting the 2012 TED Prize to […]
The world’s cities are on pace to balloon from 3.6 billion inhabitants today to more than 6 billion by midcentury. As a result, we face both a dire emergency and a tremendous opportunity. At their best, our modern cities are hubs of human connection, fountains of creativity and exemplars of green living. Yet at the […]
In the next 30 years, two-thirds of our planet’s population will live in cities. Have you ever tried to envision the cities of the future? Cities are enlivened by people, and people enable change. So today, we are launching our redesigned website TheCity2.org, a gathering place for all urban denizens to share stories, videos, ideas […]
Mexico City is home to nearly 9 million people. The 8th largest city economy in the world, Mexico City is bursting with energy, vibrancy and color. But at the same time, it is also facing a health crisis. Diabetes has crept up to become the leading cause of preventable death in Mexico — with about […]
Tech geek and entrepreneur Faisal Chohan builds online solutions and services with social value — including Pakreport, which crowdsourced disaster-mapping in response to Pakistan’s 2010 floods. His latest project, Saaf Pindi, won a $10,000 grant from TED’s City 2.0 initiative to map poor sewerage infrastructure in urban Pakistan, seeking solutions to the global sanitation problem. Tell […]
The Klong Toey Community Lantern — a community space in the oldest and largest of Bangkok’s slums — was built very quickly. Not quite as quickly as shown in this three-minute timelapse video, but construction for the project took just three weeks thanks to the help of the community. But while construction went fast, Norwegian […]
Too many people know the situation — you’re walking down the street, enjoying a cup of coffee and minding your own business, when a string of words curls through the air and smacks you in the face. Sometimes it’s lewd language that feels so upsetting; sometimes the words could be perceived as a compliment in […]
Updated: new deadline! [ted id=1429] Inspired by today’s TEDTalk from Eduardo Paes, the mayor of Rio? Share your own idea for leading your city into the future, and apply for a $10,000 award to help make it happen! If you have a bold, creative project for your city, apply for one of ten (10) $10,000 […]
This year’s TED Prize is the first ever given to an idea: The City 2.0. And instead of giving the $100,000 prize to one big idea, it’s divided in 10 blocks of $10,000 each, to help seed 10 projects in cities around the world. Onstage right now at TEDxSummit, five TEDx organizers are sharing their […]
Why would 80 designers, technologists and business strategists give up their holiday weekend to collaborate with strangers on a pro bono project? Mostly because of Bryan Stevenson’s inspirational TEDTalk. When longtime TEDsters Christopher Ireland, Mary Anne Masterson and Nathan Shedroff heard Bryan at TED2012 in Long Beach, they did more than applaud. They contacted the […]
[vimeo http://vimeo.com/38292386 w=525&h=294] Watch Theo Jemison’s video of artist Kiel Johnson’s installation “Everyone’s an Architect” at TEDActive 2012. See how the project grows throughout the week, with dozens of collaborators stopping by or spending long hours to help build Johnson’s charming cardboard city — lit up with LEDs powered by human foot traffic and a […]
This powerful wish asks us all to build the city that the future needs. Visit theCity2.Org to join in. Here’s the full text of this inspiring wish: I am the crucible of the future. I am where humanity will either flourish or fade. I am being built and rebuilt every day. I am inevitable. But […]