FUTURES OF CITIES. PRICIPLES CONGRESS COMPETITION

The question of the futures of cities is extremely topical. Everybody is commenting on the fact that 2007 marked the transition to an urban world, where now more than half of the world's population inhabits urban environments.This is concurrent with a blurring of the line between the disciplines of architecture and urban planning. Many of the world's leading archtects have gone from creating iconic buildings to engaging in the industry of designing entire cities. But what about the emerging voices in the field? What we have here is their response to the principles, congress program and competition brief forwarded in conjunction with the 51st IFHP World Congress, IFHP Student Congress and IFHP Ranko Radovic Student Competition focusing on the future of cities, under the subtitle of impacts:indicators:implementations. This publication constitutes a fresh and significant contribution to the debate concerning future sustainable urban development. Pivotal to this are the 193 competition entries by architecture students from all over the world, submitted to the Ranko Radovic Student Competition, and the 14 young Danish and international studios, who presented their work at the Student Congress. The first section Principles addresses the "Copenhagen Agenda for Sustainable City Governance - IO Principles", authored Monday Morning, and launched on the occasion of the Futures of Cities events. The Congress section offers a survey of the studios profiled at the Student Congress. The third section Competition is a publication of the award winning contributions to the IFHP Ranko Radovic Student Competition. The projects are shown in drawing, model photographs together with quotes and articles commenting on the solutions for a more sustainable urban future. Accompanying the printed matter is a DVD with short 4 minute film developed with the Squint/ Opera Ltd, animating the many issues and ideas for the Future of Cities.