Glaeser on The Happiness of Cities

Ed Glaeser has recently delivered an interesting talk at LSE about happiness and cities.

ps. On a similar topic, here is a great paper discussing well-being and transport.

The Economic Future of British Cities

Prof Henry Overman (SERC / LSE) gave a very interesting lecture a couple of weeks ago. The lecture was titled 'The Economic Future of British Cities: What should Urban Policy Do?'

He addressed several issues such as migration, housing, skilled workforce, labor productivity and regional wage disparities, to name a few.

You can download both the lecture and the slides here. You may also go further into Overman's writings on SERC blog - Part I, Part II.

MRU short videos on Migration

Tyler Cowen and Alex Tabarrok (from MR Blog) have a few excellent short videos on Migration as a part of their Development Economics course at the Marginal Revolution University.

This one is about internal migration in China.

Other MRU videos on Migration you should check:

1. Basic Facts about Migration
2. Wage Gains from Immigration
3. Remittances
4. Is there a Brain Drain?
5. Wage Effects in the U.S.
6. Internal Chinese Migration

Podcast List updated

I have just updated the Podcasts list on the right column of this blog. Take a look.

• Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS/Oxford)
  
  
• Demographic Trends and Problems of the Modern World, by Prof David Coleman (Oxford)
  
  
• Environmental and Urban Economics Lectures, by Prof Matthew E. Kahn (UCLA)
  
  
• International Migration Institute (Oxford)
  
  
• LSE Public Lectures and Events
  
  
• More or Less: Behind the Stats (Tim Harford)
  
  
• Science Magazine Podcast
  
  
• Shift: Stories Behind the Stats (CBC radio)
  
  
• The Global Lab (UCL)
  
  
• Transport Studies Unit (Oxford)

The invention of GPS

He starts talking about the GPS invention at 12:10.

Assorted Links

1. Population Association of America (PAA) on the elimination of the American Community Survey
   
2. Prof. Michael Sandel will be in London for a public lecture at St. Paul's Cathedral on next Wednesday (I have just received my ticket!)
   
3. Intellectuals go to the beach: Albert S. (funny pictures)
   
4. Dramatic Differences in Childbearing by Age in U.S., Japan, and South Korea
   
5. Mind the Map: Inspiring art, design and cartography (exhibition at the London Transport Museum)
   
6. Dramatic Changes on London Streets in the Congestion Pricing Era
   
7. A good post on population density at Bostonography

Population density in the Greater Boston area 2010.

The Naked City public lecture

Renowned sociologist Sharon Zukin discussed her latest book at LSE "The Naked City: the death and life of authentic urban places"

Replay: Counterintuitive trues about urban transport

Enrique Peñalosa (former mayor of Bogotá) presented a pleasant lecture at LSE titled: “Politics, Power, Cities”. Listen to podcast here (approx 91 min).

Here are some interesting snippets (They might look obvious to some of you. But do they look obvious to you mayor?)

• What creates traffic is not the number of cars, is the number of trips and the length of trips.
  
• Mobility and Traffic Jams are total different problems that require different solutions. Reducing car use is different than solving Traffic Jams.
  
• To solve Traffic Jams is, in fact, to facilitate car use.
  
• The only way to solve Mobility is with public transport. This will solve Mobility but not Traffic Jams.
  
• The only way to solve Traffic Jams is restricting car use. And the most obvious way to restrict car us is restrict parking.
  
• To park is not a Constitutional right anywhere.
  
• For public transport the most important thing is Density.

*ps. I agree with these statements ("counterintuitive trues" as said Peñalosa). And I don't think they contradict the ideia of polycentric cities.

*ps2. He didn't say much (nothing) about land use... I missed that.

Recommended Podcasts

We are opening a new session on the right column of this blog with ‘recommended Podcasts’. 

I usually listen to them on my daily walking commute to my work place or I do it as I wash the dishes  it helps keeping me away from marital problem 

I will start the session recommending two podcasts:

• Shift: Stories Behind the Stats from CBC Radio (rss or itunes) - this one it focuses on the front lines of demographic change.
  
  
• Transport Studies Unit Podcasts by Oxford University (rss or itunes)*

* by the way, you might enjoy this seminar by Professor Robert Cervero (UC Berkeley): Mobility, place-making, and economic competitiveness 

(seminar review, screencast and presentation slides)

The Laws of Migration illustrated

Waldo Tobler presents a three-minute short talk about Ravenstein (the author behind (the Laws of Migration, 1885).

(via Michael Batty)

Urban Africa

• Edgar Pieterse (African Centre for Cities at the University of Cape Town) talks about African Urbanism at LSE - available as youtube video or mp3.
  .

• Mapless Map: Urban populations living in slums (via maptd). If anyone knows where to find data on Africa urbanization, please let us know!

[image credit: Riccardo Pravettoni - UNEP/GRID-Arendal]

The death of distance and the rise of cities

Glaeser gave this lecture on November 13, 2008, at LSE. This event marked the launch of the Spatial Economics Research Centre.

He starts talking about this apparent paradox "The death of distance and the rise of cities" (audio only). In this lecture he tackles regional policy and declining cities, urban sprawl, urban environment and gas emissions, density, affordable housing and all other trending topics in urban studies you should be aware of.

Seminars on Population Studies at Cedeplar

Cedeplar (Center for Regional Development and Planning) is one of the main institutes for demographic and economic research in Brazil.

The Institute is holding a seminar on Current Issues and Frontiers in Demographic Methods, on 13 June 2011. The event is in honour of Professor Jose Alberto de Carvalho, who is certainly one of the greatest Brazilian demographers.

The seminar will be followed on 14 and 15 June by the International Seminar on New Challenges in Population and Development, jointly organized with the IUSSP Scientific Panel on New Challenges in Population and Development.

Both seminars will be broadcast live by Cedeplar on 13-14-15 June (see schedules above: Brazil Eastern Time = GMT-3) Click Here for the live video feed.

For more detailed information, click here.

I congratulate Cedeplar for holding this event. We (Brazilian demographers) thank Prof. Zé Alberto for his work!

Assorted Links

• The Brookings Papers are now entirely open access (via Freakonomics. Hat Tip: MR)
  
  
• Glaeser on Minority Populations Grow in the USA
  
  
• Edgar Pieterse on African Urbanism (at LSE public lectures) - YouTube or mp3.
  
  
• Call for papers: Urbanisation, internal migrations and demographic behaviour (Hat Tip: Ricardo Ojima)
  Deadline for submission: 1st May 2011
  
  
• Urban hierarchy of the United States over time (1790-2000) via Kelso’s Corner. [interesting paths: Chicago, Detroit, LA, Baltimore, St. Louis, Houston and NY]

Glaeser at LSE

Professor Glaeser presented a lecture at LSE promoting his new book "Triumph of the City". Listen to podcast here (approx 60 min). You can watch here a short and funny interview with Glaeser at the Daily Show promoting the book.

It's all about agglomeration, agglomeration, agglomeration, but not too much.

Counterintuitive trues about urban transport

Enrique Peñalosa (former mayor of Bogotá) presented a pleasant lecture at LSE titled: “Politics, Power, Cities”. Listen to podcast here (approx 91 min).

Here are some interesting snippets (They might look obvious to some of you. But do they look obvious to you mayor?)

• What creates traffic is not the number of cars, is the number of trips and the length of trips.
  
  
• Mobility and Traffic Jams are total different problems that require different solutions. Reducing car use is different than solving Traffic Jams.
  
  
• To solve Traffic Jams is, in fact, to facilitate car use.
  
  
• The only way to solve Mobility is with public transport. This will solve Mobility but not Traffic Jams.
  
  
• The only way to solve Traffic Jams is restricting car use. And the most obvious way to restrict car us is restrict parking.
  
  
• To park is not a Constitutional right anywhere.
  
  
• For public transport the most important thing is Density.

*ps. I agree with these statements ("counterintuitive trues" as said Peñalosa). And I don't think they contradict the ideia of polycentric cities.

*ps2. He didn't say much (nothing) about land use... I missed that.