Building Better Cities
Kate Gasparro - Urban Development & Sustainable Infrastructure Expert
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About This Podcast
Welcome to Building Better Cities, the podcast where we explore the evolving landscape of urban development and the crucial role that infrastructure and real estate investments play in shaping our communities.
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Recent Episodes
From extraction to regeneration: place-based development in Appalachia with Steven Baumgartner
For decades, communities across Appalachia have watched jobs disappear, resources drain, and local wealth flow outward. But in Morganton, North Carolina, a nonprofit called The Industrial Commons has…
The climate goals are clear. The infrastructure spending isn't. (with Adie Tomer and Ben Swedberg)
California has record levels of federal infrastructure funding and some of the most ambitious climate goals in the country. But why are transportation emissions still rising? In this episode of…
Overcoming friction to build regenerative cities with Eric Corey Freed
If we know how to build healthier, more sustainable and regenerative buildings, why do so few of them actually get built?This conversation focuses on the execution gap holding cities, developers, and…
What it really takes to save a downtown with Mayor White of Greenville, SC
Downtowns across the country are struggling after COVID — with empty storefronts, declining foot traffic, and major uncertainty about the future of office districts and city centers.In this episode…
Replay: Can rebuilding for resilience make insurance affordable? (with Alisa Valderrama)
One year ago, the Los Angeles wildfires made one thing unmistakably clear: climate risk is no longer peripheral to urban life — it is a defining condition for many cities. The loss of thousands of…
How mission-driven development pencils on Chicago’s South Side — with Byron Brazier
How do you make mission-driven development pencil in a neighborhood shaped by decades of disinvestment?In this episode of Building Better Cities, host Kate Gasparro sits down with J. Byron Brazier,…
The housing system is broken- can upzoning save it? (with Ben Metcalf)
Why is housing so expensive — and what are states doing about it? Well... California has passed SB 79 to spur transit-oriented development. This upzoning will leverage infrastructure investments to…
Replay: How urban design fosters stronger communities with Dr. Andrew Sonta
When the Building Better Cities podcast launched just over a year ago, we set out to explore how we design and deliver the infrastructure and buildings that shape our lives.So this week, Kate is…
Tulsa's bold model for restorative development with Ashley Philippsen and Dr. Lana Turner-Addison
More than a century after the Tulsa Race Massacre devastated Black Wall Street, the land where that thriving community once stood is again shaping Tulsa’s future. The 56 acres of Kirkpatrick Heights…
The battle over Penn Station's redevelopment with Claire Read
Penn Station has long been more than just a transit hub — it’s a mirror of New York itself: ambitious, messy, and perpetually under construction. Decades after the original station opened, financial…
Building a net-zero neighborhood for the future with Matt Grocoff
In Ann Arbor, Michigan, a bold experiment in community building is underway. Veridian at County Farm is a 14-acre net-zero neighborhood redefining what sustainable living can look like.In this…
From vacancy to vertical village and beyond with Todd Richardson
In 2017, a long-vacant Sears distribution center on Cleveland Street in Memphis was reborn as Crosstown Concourse—a “vertical urban village.” The 1.5 million square foot behemoth is now home to…
Shaping vibrant neighborhoods with infill development with Shruti Shankar and Roberto Jenkins
Big visions for our cities often start with ambitious master plans—20-acre sites, sweeping infrastructure, and promises of transformation. But as exciting as they sound, these projects can struggle…
The public realm and the resistance of placemaking with Aaron Paley
What happens when you close off miles of city streets to cars—and open them up to people instead? In Los Angeles, that question gave rise to CicLAvia, a now-iconic open streets event that has…
Who rebuilds LA? Planning post-fire recovery with Dr. Minjee Kim
When disaster strikes, it reveals not just the vulnerabilities in our built environment—but also the opportunity to rebuild with more intention. In the wake of the devastating LA wildfires earlier…
How purple states foster consensus and build with Brian Regli
Abundance is about the promise of building more, more effectively. But getting there requires more than big laws—it takes local capacity, political will, and the ability to turn ambition into…
The Implementation Era: building beyond the big bills with Zach Kolodin
Between 2021 and 2024, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act approved nearly $2 trillion in public investments. These investments were allocated to repair…
Detroit's new model for scaling urban innovation with Kevin Mull
Many high-profile smart city projects have missed the mark—not because the technology didn’t work, but because the process left people behind. That’s why a new model is emerging—one grounded in…
Scaling value and resilience through district utility systems with Daniel Hansen
What if entire neighborhoods shared integrated infrastructure—cutting costs, boosting performance, and unlocking real climate resilience?That’s the promise of district utility systems: shared…
Catalyzing urban change through institutional impact with Alex Feldman
How do you turn institutional ambition into a catalyst for community change? This week on Building Better Cities, host Kate Gasparro sits down with Alex Feldman of U3 Advisors, a firm working at the…
Frequently Asked Questions
Building Better Cities has published 32 episodes since September 2024, covering topics in Science, Social Sciences.
Building Better Cities is currently highly active with new episodes every 2 weeks. Average episode length is 31m.
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