Event

Soundings Panel: Our Future: Walkable Urbanism

For decades, the American Dream has been defined by two markers: the suburb and the automobile. Though planners and environmentalists have worked to redefine that vision for years, the economy has recently produced a confluence of factors, the rising cost of oil and the declining value of suburban homes, among them, that have ordinary citizens rethinking this archetypical image of American prosperity. In this forum, Brookings Institution fellow Christopher B. Leinberger, strategist, developer, teacher and author of The Option of Urbanism; Bruce Agnew, Director of the Cascadia Center; and Alex Steffen, Executive Editor of Worldchanging, along with other panelists, will discuss ways to create walkable urban centers, encourage transit, and curtail suburban sprawl. They will discuss federal policy leadership; our ongoing work locally; and the opportunities for architects, developers, and preservationists to think creatively about current regulations and to formulate possibilities for policy change. Tonight's panel is the first in a new series, the Thought Leaders Discussion Panel on the Built Environment, sponsored by Island Press and Town Hall Seattle.