12 TED Talks for Planners

Alex Steffen: The shareable future of cities
How can cities help save the future? Alex Steffen shows some neighborhood-based green projects that expand our access to things we want and need, while reducing the time we spend in cars.



Paul Romer: The world's first charter city?
In 2009, Paul Romer unveiled the idea for a "charter city", a new kind of city with rules that favor democracy and trade. He tells the story of how such a city might just happen in Honduras.

Robin Chase on Zipcar and her next big idea
Robin Chase founded Zipcar, the world’s biggest car-sharing business. That was one of her smaller ideas. Here she travels much farther, contemplating road-pricing schemes that will shake up our driving habits and a mesh network vast as the Interstate.

Carolyn Steel: How food shapes our cities
Every day, in a city the size of London, 30 million meals are served. But where does all the food come from? Architect Carolyn Steel discusses the daily miracle of feeding a city, and shows how ancient food routes shaped the modern world.



Stewart Brand proclaims four environmental 'heresies'
The man who helped usher in the environmental movement in the 1960s and '70s has been rethinking his positions on cities, nuclear power, genetic modification and geo-engineering. This talk at the US State Department is a foretaste of his major new book, sure to provoke widespread debate.

James Kunstler dissects suburbia
In James Howard Kunstler's view, public spaces should be inspired centers of civic life and the physical manifestation of the common good. Instead, he argues, what we have in America is a nation of places not worth caring about.



Coming later: 12 more TEDx Talks about urban planning from local TED conferences.