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Fifth Global Summit: Urban Design Planning — Strengthening Social Cohesion

Publication Date:

20/12/2024

Content Type:

Event Reports

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Cape Townclimate resilience#Fifth Global SummitSocial CohesionUrban Design & Planning

— 7 minutes reading time

Introduction

On 3 – 5 December 2024, the Strong Cities Network held its Fifth Global Summit in Cape Town (South Africa), bringing together more than 140 participants, including 60 mayors and governors, as well as city officials, practitioners and partners from more than 90 cities and 40 countries around the world. The Summit included mayoral conversations, thematic parallel sessions and tabletop exercises – providing city officials from diverse contexts with opportunities to share and learn from city-led innovations and approaches to prevent and respond to hate, extremism and polarisation, and maintain social cohesion amid global crises.

Co-hosted by Strong Cities and ICLEI, this session focused on how cities can promote social cohesion – and contribute to the prevention of hate, extremism and polarisation – through inclusive and participatory urban planning, development and management approaches. It builds on a new Strong Cities policy brief, which highlights city-led strategies and practices from diverse geographies aimed at embedding equity, inclusion and sustainability into urban planning processes. The session included a ‘photo walk’, with participants analysing and discussing images depicting various urban dynamics and challenges. This exercise provided a platform for exploring diverse lived experiences and their implications for city planning. The session concluded with a panel discussion featuring city leaders, planners and experts, who shared practical examples, challenges and strategies for strengthening social cohesion through urban design.

Featured Speakers

• Peter Odima, Minister for Lands Housing Physical Planning and Urban Development, Busia County Government (Kenya)
• Jakub Tomalkiewicz, Director of the Urban Planning Department, City of Ostrów Wielkopolski (Poland)
• Kate Nelson, Director of Community Partnerships, City of Boise (Idaho, USA)
• Jorge Garza, Associate Director, Communities Building Belonging, Tamarick Institute (Canada)
• Tiago Damasceno, Architect and Project Manager, Violence Prevention through Urban Upgrading, Cape Town (South Africa)
• Khaled Jacobs, Urban Designer and Director, Jakupa Architects and Urban Designers, Cape Town (South Africa)  

Photo Walk Reflections

In pairs and small groups, participants selected a picture from the ‘photo walk’ and discussed how the experiences of the people they saw portrayed are formed by their urban environments. The discussions highlighted the importance of understanding local contexts and the everyday realities faced by different communities. The ‘photo walk’ underscored the need for urban planning to reflect the lived experiences of residents and highlighted how inclusive design can help address systemic challenges facing a city.

Physical Spaces and Challenges for Social Cohesion

Participants noted how rapid urbanisation, fuelled by population growth, climate change and migration, is contributing to segregation, distrust and inequality. Khaled Jacobs, Urban Designer and Director, Jakupa Architects and Urban Designers, Cape Town (South Africa), shared how the rapid expansion of informal settlements in his city often outpaces planning efforts, leading to fragmented urban environments. He pointed to an example where an informal settlement doubled in size over a single weekend after a public meeting announced a potential housing project. This phenomenon underscores the scale and speed of informal urbanisation forcing urban planners to contend with balancing immediate needs while ensuring sustainable long-term solutions for growing populations. 

Kate Nelson, Director of Community Partnerships, City of Boise (Idaho, USA), added that urban growth, combined with increasing climate-related challenges like wildfires, has exacerbated housing pressures and strained existing infrastructure, with the city needing to add more than 2,700 housing units annually to meet current demands. Similarly, Peter Odima, Minister for Lands Housing Physical Planning and Urban Development, Busia County Government (Kenya), underscored the challenge of ensuring that physical infrastructure, such as roads and drainage systems, are meeting the needs of growing populations, adding that infrastructure deficits, particularly in rural areas, can hinder economic opportunities and limit access to essential services. Tiago Damasceno, Architect and Project Manager, Violence Prevention through Urban Upgrading, Cape Town (South Africa) added that addressing this lack of equitable access to basic public services and opportunities close to where people reside is essential for social cohesion because economic and social disparities perpetuate cycles of violence and exclusion.

Urban design often has an end goal: something is designed, built and completed. But we need to transcend this and think how urban design becomes urban management, allowing the relationships between the community and the municipality continue to develop long after a project ends.

Tiago Damasceno, Architect and Project Manager, Violence Prevention through Urban Upgrading (South Africa)

Participatory and Inclusive Governance

Building trust through inclusive governance was a key theme of this session. Jakub Tomalkiewicz, Director of the Urban Planning Department, City of Ostrów Wielkopolski (Poland), highlighted that participatory councils, including for youth, seniors and women, can enable communities to shape urban development, building a shared sense of responsibility and belonging. By providing a structured way to capture and integrate diverse community perspectives, urban planning can effectively align with and meet residents’ needs. Jorge Garza, Associate Director, Communities Building Belonging, Tamarick Institute (Canada) further underscored the importance of urban planners identifying, engaging and leveraging existing community assets from the outset to foster collaboration and long-term trust, which are foundational for successful urban development. Peter Odima shared how participatory planning transformed resistance into collaboration in Busia County (Kenya). There, residents co-designed infrastructure projects and the city was able to implement bold changes with public buy-in, demonstrating the power of inclusive governance to foster trust and transparency.

Balancing Growth and Sustainability

Sustainability and climate resilience were prioritised by cities grappling with rapid growth and environmental challenges. Kate Nelson shared how, in Boise (Idaho, USA), zoning reforms and green initiatives, such as planting 100,000 trees and ensuring access to parks, had enhanced urban liveability while addressing climate risks like wildfires; this reflecting the city’s commitment to creating urban environments that balance development with ecological preservation. Khalied Jacobs added that in rapidly urbanising contexts, such as Cape Town, long-term solutions must address the needs of future generations without compromising environmental sustainability.

To do this, some cities have had to take drastic and transformative measures. Peter Odima (Busia County, Kenya) reflected on his government’s decision to demolish poorly planned areas in Busia to make way for better infrastructure, including roads and drainage systems, which unlocked economic opportunities for the wider community. This approach illustrated how decisive action can yield transformative benefits when paired with and preceded by public engagement. Similarly, Tiago Damasceno explained that his work in Cape Town involved co-designing urban spaces with community input, ensuring that infrastructure upgrades addressed local needs while fostering a sense of ownership.

The most important thing in our profession as urban planners is to stay as close as possible to our citizens because without people we can’t really speak about cities. Cities are people, and for me, the most important thing is to create public spaces collaboratively with communities and to provide not just for their basic needs, but to give them hope, and to make their dreams come true.

Jakub Tomalkiewicz, Director of the Urban Planning Department,
City of Ostrów Wielkopolski (Poland)

Next Steps

Strong Cities will continue to expand its support for cities on how urban design and planning can strengthen social cohesion. In January 2025, under our Global Crises, Local Impacts Initiative, we will be hosting a webinar focused on urban design and planning, the first of a series of virtual and in-person events.

Practices shared during the Fifth Global Summit, including this session, will be captured and integrated into the Strong Cities Online Resource Hub, which houses a library of living guides and toolkits on mayoral leadership and city-led action to prevent and respond to hate, extremism and polarisation. Strong Cities will continue to work with cities across its global network and beyond to help address key prevention-relevant needs and amplify their efforts.

Further Resources

See our new policy brief on this topic:

• Creating Safe, Cohesive and Resilient Cities through Urban Planning & Design: Ten Considerations for Mayors and Local Governments, Strong Cities Network, December 2024

Other Strong Cities policy briefs and resources:

• City-Led Prevention of Hate, Extremism and Polarisation: Leveraging Local Youth Councils, Strong Cities Network, December 2024
• City-Led Youth Engagement in Addressing Hate, Extremism and Polarisation: Ten Recommendations for Cities, Strong Cities Network, December 2024
• Countering Hate Speech in Times of Crisis: Considerations for Mayors and Local Governments, Strong Cities Network, December 2024
• Creating Safe, Cohesive and Resilient Cities through Urban Planning & Design: Ten Considerations for Mayors and Local Governments, Strong Cities Network, December 2024
• National-Local Cooperation: A Pillar of City-Led Prevention of Hate, Extremism and Polarisation – A Practice Update, Strong Cities Network, December 2024
• A Guide for Cities: Preventing Hate, Extremism & Polarisation, Strong Cities Network, updated 2024
• A Guide for Mayors: Preventing and Responding to Hate, Extremism & Polarisation, Strong Cities Network, updated 2024
• A Guide for City-Led Response, Strong Cities Network, May 2024
• City Spotlights Library, Strong Cities Network

Donors & Partners

The Fifth Global Summit was made possible with generous support from the European Union, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, Public Safety Canada, the US Department of State and the City of Cape Town. 

The views expressed in this session report do not necessarily reflect those of all Strong Cities Network members, the Management Unit or Summit sponsors and partners. 

Contact Information 

For more information about the Fifth Global Summit or the Strong Cities Network, please contact [email protected].

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