Tactical Urbanism: Lessons Learned, Charging Ahead Featuring Eliza Harris

Tactical Urbanism, the increasingly lauded movement of “short term action, long term change,” is all the rage among progressive urban Millennials. And that’s a good thing. Empowering incremental physical improvement turns community planning into an ongoing, participatory citizen exercise — in ways that everyday community meetings cannot. But like any trend fueled by the power of social media and online collaboration, Tactical Urbanism’s base is, in large parts, defined by the young. One of our Placemaking Wishes for 2013 was that these ideas will further transcend their origin, becoming more widely embraced with more demographic segments taking ownership of them — if not directly then at least in terms of recognition and support. Why? Because they make solid economic, environmental and social sense, that’s why. And that’s no small feat.

A year after our last Tactical Urbanism webinar with Mike Lydon, Eliza Harris will let us know whether or not we got our wishes. If the temporary cycling networks and plazas of NYC or the chair-bombing of Miami generated sufficient understanding of both value capture and urban livability to instill permanent change from the usual bureaucratic process. And judging by the Build a Better Block reports that the public works projects that used to take five to ten years are now getting done in half the time, we’re thinking that she’ll have some good news.

Eliza Harris is an urban planner with Canin Associates in Orlando FL. She is a board member of the Congress for the New Urbanism, former chair of the Next Generation of New Urbanists, and blogger on my [urban] generation. Follow Eliza on Twitter here.

This event carries one hour CNUa credit.