How Can Cities be a Solution to the problems we are facing today?

Today over half of the world’s population lives in cities, but the cities we live in now are not healthy for people, full of extreme inequalities, decreasing global biodiversity, and ultimately contributing to global warming and climate change. We have forgotten that we are a part of a larger ecosystem and that the health of the environment is crucial to our own health and well-being.

By 2050 it is predicted that 70% of the global population will be living in cities, which means that the cities we live in will have a huge impact on both people and the planet. We need to design our cities to care for people and the natural world by focusing on reducing inequalities, increasing biodiversity, all while combating climate change. Ultimately, we argue designing cities based around the principle of health will address these problems at their roots and turn cities into a place for solutions rather than a place of problems.

We need to design our cities to optimize health for the environment and its inhabitants.