A new article appearing in the September issue of The Urbanist by Petra Todorovich addresses the role of megaregions in a national infrastructure plan and stresses the importance of regional cooperation around issues such as high-speed rail, large scale water infrastructure, and reviving regional economies. The article argues that a national infrastructure strategy that emanates solely from Washington would be deeply unpopular.  However, one that is built on collaboration between states and regions and identifies the needed investments for a more productive economy, healthy environment and inclusive society, is critical to address the country's current and future infrastructure needs. The article cites precedents, both historic and current, of megaregion-scale cooperation to address shared challenges and discusses how this national infrastructure strategy could take shape at the federal level. Click here to read the full article.

The Texas Triangle Megaregion faces many challenges similar to other fast-growing megaregions around the country. Rapid growth in population and diversity is expected in the coming decades that will put increasing pressures on natural resources and infrastructure.

A report released recently by the University of Texas at Austin School of Architecture provides an overview of how the region may address these challenges; included is a brief history of the major cities within the megaregion.

To view the full report please click here.

It has been more than fifty years since the signing of the National Interstate and Defense Highway Act, which created a network of highways that tied the nation together. Today, America faces a new set of challenges and is in need of a new vision for our transportation system. Transportation for America, a broad coalition representing a range of local and national interests focused on modernizing the nation's transportation system, released The Route to Reform: Blueprint for a 21st Century Federal Transportation Program, a detailed plan for maintaining and expanding the nations transportation system.
 
In this "Blueprint", the coalition offers four main recommendations for the upcoming transportation authorization bill:

• Develop a New National Transportation Vision with Objectives and Accountability for Meeting Performance Targets.
• Restructure Federal Transportation Programs and Funding to Support the New National Transportation Vision and Objectives.
• Reform Transportation Agencies and the Decision-making Process.
• Revise Transportation Finance So We Can Pay for Needed Investments.

This document serves as T4 America's proposal for the policies and financing structures necessary to achieve real transformational change in America's transportation system
 
Download full blueprint (PDF 4.9MB)
 
Download Executive Summary (PDF 3.1MB)

Veracruz, 261 miles due east of Mexico City, is Mexico's most populous metropolitan region on the Gulf Coast.   It is also where the first confirmed case of the swine flu epidemic occurred.  As the death toll increased and we faced a potential pandemic, the Mexican health system struggled to monitor and contain the spread of the virus, and treat the ill.

Urban challenges such as these are the subject of the timely volume Century of the City - No Time to Lose, recently published by the Rockefeller Foundation, the result of its Global Urban Summit held in July 2007.  The Summit provided a platform for the examination of key infrastructure and planning issues as they relate to the growth of urban regions around the world--including in the United States and the Global South.  Topics covered in Century of the City include Urban Health; Financing Water, Transportation and Shelter; and Climate Change Resilience in the Global South, and America 2050; U.S. Transportation Challenges; and U.S. Metros: Building Blocks of America's Prosperity. 

You may order up to 2 free copies of the book from the Rockefeller Foundation here.

The graduate students at the Toulon School of Urban Studies and Planning at Portland State University have released their latest study of the Cascadia Megaregion, "Ecolopolis," which presents a vision for coordination and sustainable economic development in the Vancouver-Seattle-Portland megaregion. Building on two previous studies, the report includes a detailed sector-based economic analysis and recommendations for further strengthening Cascadia's economic "competencies" in areas of green building and architecture, creative services, agriculture and food production and high tech. It also makes recommendations for protecting Cascadia's renowned environmental heritage and reputation for sustainability, while improving flows and connections within the megaregion.

Download the Report.

The Brookings Institution's Metropolitan Policy Program released a report this month titled "Mountain Megas: America's Newest Metropolitan Places and a Federal Partnership to Help Them Prosper".  The report was introduced in conjunction with a luncheon in Denver on July 22nd that brought leaders from the Intermountain West to discuss economic, social, and environmental challenges in five emerging metropolitan areas: Wasatch Front, Utah; Las Vegas, Nevada; Sun Corridor, Arizona; Northern New Mexico, New Mexico, and the Front Range, Colorado. 

As part of its Blueprint for American Prosperity initiative, the Brookings report calls for the federal government to provide leadership and support as these urbanized and rapdily changing areas emerge and expand. In addition, the report comes in anticipation of the upcoming Democratic Convention in Denver.  Local leaders and officials are hopeful the presidential candidates and elections will make these emerging trends and challenges a national priority.  As one of the fastest growing regions in the country, the study suggests that these swing states represent a "new new West" that is urban, and require new and reformed federal-state-local partnerships.  Moreover, the research recommends that these collaborations should be issue focused, namely: transportation, infrastructure, innovation, immigration, and climate change. 

The event was attended by Jon Huntsman, Gov. of Utah; Bill Ritter, Jr., Gov. of Colorado, and John Hickenlooper, Mayor, City of Denver.  For a copy of the executive summary of the report, please click here.     

Photo: "Mountain Megas: America's Newest Metropolitan Places and a Federal Partnership to Help Them Prosper", July, 2008.

 

The Morrison Institute for Public Policy at Arizona State University released a report in May titled, Megapolitan: Arizona's Sun Corridor. The study examines growth challenges in one of the nation's most rapidly growing regions: the Tucson-Phoenix corridor. Poised to double in population from 5 million to 10 million by 2050, the region will grapple with the environmental challenges of accommodating rapid population growth in a fragile desert environment. Ensuring an adequate drinking water supply and mitigating urban heat island effect without the use of increased vegetation (which requires additional water) are two big challenges. Urban form is another important consideration; detached single family homes are by far the preferred development type in this region, but their proliferation will contribute to sprawled development and make transit options less viable.

The changing demographic and economic environment in the corridor is prompting researchers and leaders to think about how the corridor can one day become a significant economic, technological and cultural center, while growing in a sustainable way. At a recent workshop sponsored by the Sonoran Institute and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, planners considered the implications of this emerging megapolitan region with the report's authors and local transportation and community leaders.

This collection by features essays by Edward Glaeser, "Do Regional Economies Need Regional Coordination?" and Saskia Sassen, "Megaregions: Benefits Beyond Sharing Trains and Parking Lots?" and discussion summaries from the February 9, 2007 conference, with comments by Sassen, Glaeser, Robert Yaro, Paul Krugman and Kip Bergstrom.

The full report can be downloaded from the Policy Research Institute for the Region website.