Can we Quake-Proof a City?

An ambitious plan for the 69-acre Regent Park neighborhood is disrupting entrenched notions of class, race and religion, at a time when concerns over income inequality and immigration are growing.

Hospitals in the United States spend over $340 billion on health services, but with those funds, they could also help the numerous neighborhoods struggling with poverty. The Democracy Collaborative is a research center that helps hospitals link up with local institutions to encourage job growth, buy regionally produced food, and reinvest into their local economy.

Despite advancements in technology in most sectors of life leading to an increase to access of information about practically anything, little is still known about the ocean and its behavioral patterns. Liquid Robotics – a Silicon Valley-based company – is trying to change that. Engineers here have created the "Wave Glider," which essentially acts as a router within the ocean powered by wave energy and solar panels. This invention can transmit data on tectonic activity that has the potential to predict tsunamis.

In a rapidly gentrifying Mexico City neighborhood, two artists refurbished an icon and set up an altar for Santa Mari La Juaricua, a saint to protect residents from eviction. The saint raises awareness and acts as a reminder about housing issues and the icon has been taken up by the residents and has been used in processions and protests.

The Central African Republic is rife with political problems including the lack of a health system, proving problematic for a country where Ebola runs a constant risk. Despite the challenges, the Catholic Scouts Association has stepped up to create and implement programs that aim to "promote vaccination, check out rumors about Ebola, carry messages between rival military factions and more."

Police departments across the United States are implementing strategies and reforms in response to the growing number of unsolved criminal cases. With cold cases often linked to declined trust in police and the undermining of wellbeing in, typically urban, neighborhoods, these reforms are seeking to reverse course.

The city council of Minneapolis has successfully reached out to its constituents and responded to their concerns regarding the housing crisis by enacting the Minneapolis 2040 plan which outlines 100 sustainable solutions to mitigate the threat of urban density. Several progressive city council members have worked toward the goal of providing more affordable housing by creating coalitions and proactively gathering citizen input. Subsequently, affordable housing was the main issue in the latest city elections. The plan rewrites the residential zoning laws to allow multi-family homes in any part of the city.

In 1970 Cyclone Bhola hit Bangladesh. It killed up to 500,000 people. Since then, the country has revamped its emergency disaster preparedness through a multipronged process, reducing its cyclone-related deaths by 100 fold. Now, the country collects weather data from more than 50 weather stations. The data is sent to mitigation committees which dispense the info to people through various methods: radio, text messages, and even doorknocking. The country also has a volunteer program with 76,000 volunteers and increased the number of multi-purpose shelters from 44 in 1970 to 512 in 1991.

The Kansas City Streetcar provides fare-free transportation for residents, which helps to get them downtown and promote more economic development. The fare-free streetcar also makes transit more equitable by removing barriers for low-income passengers and improving mobility for people with disabilities.

The Office of Heat Response and Mitigation works to address the urban heat effect caused by intense summer temperatures. The Office has worked on several practices like coating streets and surfaces in light-colored, water-based asphalt treatments that reflect sunlight and absorb less heat than standard pavement. So far, 100 miles of residential roads have been covered in the treatment and roads with the treatment have an average surface temperature that is 10.5 to 12 degrees Fahrenheit lower than traditional asphalt.