The Century of Cities

The Century of Cities welcomes Sanjay Shukla, Managing Director of the National Housing Bank of India, as part of our special miniseries in collaboration with UN-Habitat. Sanjay explores a critical question: if the need for housing is clear, why does finance remain out of reach for millions? As cities grow, he suggests that solving the housing crisis depends as much on transforming financial syste...

The Century of Cities welcomes back Edgar Pieterse, Founding Director of the African Centre for Cities and Co-Chair of the African Mayoral Leadership Initiative, as part of our special miniseries in collaboration with UN-Habitat. As Africa becomes the world's fastest urbanizing region, Edgar examines one of the defining questions of this century: can the continent transform unprecedented urban gro...

Jonathan Reckford, CEO of Habitat for Humanity International, joins The Century of Cities as part of our special miniseries in collaboration with UN-Habitat. Building on conversations emerging from World Urban Forum 13 in Baku, Jonathan reflects on a world where rapid urbanization, climate pressures, migration, and rising construction costs have combined to create a housing crisis affecting cities...

Anaclaudia Rossbach, Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) at the Under-Secretary-General level and the very first guest on The Century of Cities, returns to explore why housing has become one of the defining tests of urban leadership in the 21st century. Drawing on insights from World Urban Forum 13 in Baku and the newly launched World Cities Report 202...

Meric Gertler, former President of the University of Toronto and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at the School of Cities, joins The Century of Cities to reflect on the remarkable evolution of cities and the institutions that help shape them. He recalls a time when cities were widely viewed as unmanageable, financially strained, and in decline, before emerging as globally recognized engines of i...

Ruchita Bansal, urban planner, founder of SheCity India, and host of The Human Cities Podcast, joins The Century of Cities to explore how cities are often designed around a narrow idea of who urban life is meant to serve. Reflecting on India's rapid urban transformation, she argues that much of urban planning still defaults to the able-bodied male commuter, leaving women, caregivers, migrants, and...

Marc Canal, Senior Fellow at the McKinsey Global Institute and co-author of A Century of Plenty, joins The Century of Cities to explore why cities have been among the greatest engines of human progress. From divided and economically uncertain cities to today's global hubs of talent, innovation, and culture, Marc explains how density, connectivity, and urbanization accelerated prosperity, productiv...

Marta Foresti, Founder and CEO of LAGO Collective and Chair of the Global Creative Economy Council, joins The Century of Cities to explore the evolving relationship between cities, creativity, migration, and growth. Reflecting on her upbringing in Milan and her work across Europe and Africa, Marta traces the shift from car-dominated, exclusionary cities toward more open and creative urban environm...

The Century of Cities welcomes András Szörényi, Senior Policy Advisor at Global Cities Hub, to explore how cities are becoming increasingly influential actors in global cooperation. Drawing on his diplomatic career, András reflects on the shift from traditional city-to-city partnerships to today's networks of multi-level and multi-stakeholder collaboration. From climate adaptation and migration to...

Cristina Bueti, Counsellor on Smart Sustainable Cities, AI-enabled Citiverse & Virtual worlds at International Telecommunication Union, joins The Century of Cities to explore a new phase of urban intelligence. She traces the shift from cities that once operated without real-time awareness to systems that can now sense, learn, and adapt. Yet even as cities solve major challenges, they remain expose...

The Century of Cities welcomes Marie Lam - Frendo, Partner and Chief Strategy Officer at Meridiam, to explore how infrastructure has shifted from simply enabling growth to shaping resilience, inclusion, and long-term prosperity. She reflects on the move from car-led, output-driven cities to a new urban era where people, technology, energy, mobility, and nature must operate as one connected system....

J. Byron Brazier, lead developer of Woodlawn Central, joins The Century of Cities to share a powerful model for building cities with communities, not around them. Rooted in Chicago's South Side and shaped by a legacy of civil rights leadership, Byron reflects on how cities have moved from an era defined by human connection and hard-won social progress to one shaped by technology, design, and globa...

Ami Kotecha, Co-Founder and Group President at Amro Partners, joins The Century of Cities to trace the evolution of cities through the lens of migration, capital, and lived experience. Reflecting on her upbringing in Mumbai and her work across European markets, she describes the shift from cities shaped by scarcity and informality to today's global urban economies, where growth has been powered by...

Lisette van Doorn, Former Chief Executive at Urban Land Institute Europe, joins The Century of Cities to explore how real estate has shifted from a local, owner-led activity to a global, highly financialized industry, and what that means for cities. Drawing on more than two decades of experience, she reflects on how global capital and new investment models have reshaped the built environment, unlo...

The Century of Cities welcomes Sowmya Parthasarathy, an Architect and Urban Designer leading Arup's Masterplanning and Urban Design team in London, who examines how city planning has shifted from centralized, top-down systems toward more people-centred and regenerative approaches. Drawing on her experience in 1980s New Delhi and her work across the UK, US, Middle East, and India, she reflects on h...

The Century of Cities welcomes Chris Fair, futurist and President & CEO of Resonance, who explores how cities are moving beyond a single model of the "global city" toward more divergent forms of urban development. Drawing on decades of research and the evaluation of hundreds of cities worldwide, he reflects on how places once shaped by globalization are now differentiating through culture, governa...

In this episode of The Century of Cities, Rohit T. Aggarwala, Commissioner of NYC Environmental Protection and former Chief Climate Officer, reflects on a century of urban change through the lens of New York's environmental, infrastructural, and governance evolution. He traces the city's trajectory from the fiscal and environmental crises of the late twentieth century to its present condition, mar...

Mairi Spowage, Director at Fraser of Allander Institute, joins The Century of Cities to reflect on how Scotland's cities have evolved through industrial decline, sectoral booms, and structural economic change. She traces the divergent trajectories of places like Glasgow and Aberdeen, explaining how shifts toward service and knowledge-based economies have brought new opportunities alongside persist...

The Century of Cities welcomes Tim Williams, Cities Lead at Grimshaw and a leading voice in global urban strategy, to explore how cities move through cycles of growth, decline, and reinvention. Drawing on his upbringing in the South Wales Valleys and years advising governments in the UK and Australia, Tim reflects on the shift from industrial cities built on extraction to contemporary urban econom...

Alice Charles, Director, Cities, Planning & Design at Arup, joins The Century of Cities from Dublin to reflect on how Irish cities, and cities globally, have evolved. Grounded in a career spanning regeneration, infrastructure, and global urban systems, Alice traces Ireland's shift from economic stagnation and brain drain to foreign direct investment, car-led growth, and today's housing and governa...

The Century of Cities welcomes Andrew Carter, Chief Executive of Centre for Cities, who reflects on how UK cities have evolved, and why uneven progress still defines the urban landscape. He traces the shift from industrial decline and urban decay to a renewed belief in cities as drivers of economic growth, powered by the knowledge economy and higher education. Andrew emphasizes that this revival w...

Carlos Moreno, a scientist, urban planner, and professor internationally recognized for developing the concept of the 15-minute city, joins The Century of Cities to reflect on how urban life is being reshaped by climate urgency, digital transformation, and changing patterns of daily living. He explains why proximity-based urbanism is not about a fixed number of minutes, but about identifying essen...

Season 2 of The Century of Cities continues with part two of our in-depth conversation with Michael Storper, one of the world's leading economic geographers. In this episode, Michael turns his focus to governance, institutions, and the hard trade-offs shaping urban futures in the United States and Europe. Drawing on comparative insights from California, the Bay Area, Los Angeles, and major Europea...

Season 2 of The Century of Cities begins with part one of a two-part conversation with Michael Storper, one of the world's leading economic geographers. Holding appointments at UCLA and the London School of Economics, Michael brings a long-term perspective to how cities evolve across distinct economic eras. He reflects on why many of today's most prosperous cities once faced deep decline, and why...

The Century of Cities celebrates our 100th guest as we welcome Lord Norman Foster, one of the world's most influential architects and Founder and Executive Chairman of Foster + Partners. Drawing on six decades of practice, he traces the shift from gritty, industrial cities to cleaner, safer, and more mobile urban environments, shaped by digital technology, new forms of mobility, and changing patte...