Week picks #7

FUTURE CITIES LABORATORY

FCL was established by ETH Zurich and Singapore’s National Research Foundation (NRF). It is run under the auspices of the Singapore-ETH Centre for Global Environmental Sustainability (SEC). Collaborating academic partners include the National University of Singapore (NUS), Nanyang Technological University (NTU), and the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL).
The Future Cities Laboratory (FCL) is a transdisciplinary research centre focused on urban sustainability in a global frame. It is the first research programme of the Singapore-ETH Centre for Global Environmental Sustainability (SEC). It is home to a community of over 100 PhD, postdoctoral and Professorial researchers working on diverse themes related to future cities and environmental sustainability.

THE CRYSTAL

The Crystal is a sustainable cities initiative by Siemens that explores how we can create a better future for our cities. It is home to the world's largest exhibition focused on urban sustainability.
As a world-class centre for dialogue, discovery and learning, it reveals the challenges that cities face, and the ways we can reduce their environmental impact using sustainable technologies, many available today.
Based in the Royal Victoria Docks, the centre of London's new Green Enterprise District, the Crystal is a natural home for thought leadership on urban sustainability. It provides a global knowledge hub that helps a diverse range of audiences learn and understand how we can all work to build better cities for ourselves and for future generations.
The Crystal is for everyone who cares about creating a better future for our cities. It inspires a dialogue about a shared sustainable future: how we live in cities, how we struggle with them, how we can make them more attractive, and balance environment, economy and quality of life.

CENTER FOR URBAN SCIENCE & PROGRESS

For the first time in history, more than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas; in just a few more decades, the world's population will exceed 9 billion, 70 percent of whom will live in cities. Enabling those cities to deliver services effectively, efficiently, and sustainably while keeping their citizens safe, healthy, prosperous, and well-informed will be among the most important undertakings in this century.
CUSP will tackle these urban challenges and set the research agenda on the science of cities, educating the next generation of engineers in how to apply that research, bringing innovative ideas to a world market, and creating a new, fast-growing, and indispensible industry—along with the many jobs that go with it.
At the scale at which it will operate, CUSP will generate an entirely new sector in New York City’s economy, placing it at the center of a global stage in this field.
Using cities as a "living laboratories" will be essential to CUSP's research enterprise. We will work with municipal agencies in each of CUSP's partner cities, using their real-world problems to target our research and apply our solutions in real-world settings. In New York, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has already agreed to be our prototype partner in this sphere, giving CUSP’s researchers access to the very specific scientific and engineering challenges the agency faces in the coming years. In so doing, we will create a template for forming similar living laboratory partnerships with other agencies around the globe.

FUTURE CITIES CATAPULT

Catapults are centres of excellence that bridge the gap between business, academia, research and government. They are a powerful new element in the UK economy, helping businesses develop relevant and exciting ideas in receptive and invigorating environments.
By promoting collaboration and knowledge exchange, many progressive businesses and organisations will be able to build new partnerships with reduced risks.  Companies in a wide range of markets will see the Catapults as an invaluable resource to develop their businesses.
Cities are more economically active and have a lower environmental footprint than average, but they are struggling with climate change, changes in population, congestion and pressure on resources. To succeed in the future, new integrated and city-wide solutions are needed.
More than £6.5tn will be invested globally in city infrastructure over the next 10-15 years. The accessible market for integrated city systems is estimated to be £200bn a year by 2030.
The UK has the strength to exploit this market. We have world-leading companies in project management, engineering, architecture, energy and transport systems, communications and the digital economy, finance, legal and insurance. Our ability to bring together the cluster of companies needed to design, finance, risk manage and execute large infrastructure projects makes the UK a major global centre for such projects. The Future Cities Catapult will join business, city governments and academia in a unique collaboration to enable business to develop products and services for the cities of the future.
It will test innovative business solutions in a series of large-scale demonstrator projects, help to put the citizen at the heart of the city by integrating city systems, and take on challenges such as increasing city density without increasing congestion and moving to a low-carbon economy. Update: We are working with interested businesses and groups to plan for the establishment of the Future Cities Catapult. We aim to confirm the scope and vision shortly.

Week picks series features every Friday some initiatives and projects I found or want to highlight on this blog. It will help me to track new findings from community groups, startups or local governments working and delivering solutions relevant to the issues of this blog. I often bookmark them or save them on Tumblr while I wait to use them. Maybe this a good way.