Regenerative Urbansism - a Summary

This idea for a literature review of the emerging theoretical and practice arena of what usefully can be called "regenerative urbanism," is worth the larger effort involved. Until then, this short summary and list of key resources will have to suffice.

As 21^st century planning and design accelerate out of the first decade, a variety of emerging ideas and practices in the planning-design-build professions with roots in the 1990s and beyond are coalescing around the theme of living – living cities, living buildings, cities alive, ecocities, biophilic cities—or more generally, living systems. The core concept of this theme and living systems is “regeneration.” Hence, the title regenerative urbanism, planning, design, etc.

These emerging, coalescing trends can be interpreted as laying the foundation for the next step in sustainability planning—a necessary sustainability 'pivot' from a net-negative, “doing-less-harm” mitigation approach or “paradigm” to a net-positive, “doing-good,” regenerative city paradigm. This shift represents a fundamental change not only for the planning-design-build professions, but for society itself. William McDonough and others have been characterizing this shift as one from a 19^th century physics model of society, the economy, etc., to a 21^st century biology model. Although simplistic as stated, and needing further development, this simple brushstroke helps illuminate a new source of understanding, innovation, and solutions with real potential for resolving the daunting, some might say impossible challenges humanity faces.

The posts and resources below provide a quick view into a subset of this emerging new regenerative systems paradigm (go here).