Medellin Hosting Cities For Life: Global Urbanism Symposium Featuring Experts From 5 Continents – Exclusive Interview

This week, the city of Medellin held the pre-event kickoff for the upcoming Cities For Life Global Meeting 2015, to take place this August 31 to September 1^st in Plaza Mayor, the city’s flagship convention center. Cities for Life will bring more than 40 experts from around the world in to discuss urban planning, mobility, design, social inclusion, governance and security. The event features many notable guests, and will be headlined by political theorist Benjamin R. Barber, and urbanist Carlos Moreno.

Medellin’s Mayor Anibal Gaviria at the Cities for Life launch press conference

“I have had the privilege of being invited to many city forums in the last months and years…it’s clear that we have something to say, and thanks to God, we have leadership and we are proud, but we have a lot to listen to, and to learn. That is what we want to do here with others: To show what we have done with pride, but also to receive what we can learn from others, and that is a lot,” said Medellin’s Mayor Anibal Gaviria at the launch press conference.

“Medellin needs to continue being more and more a ‘port of humans’ that arrive, a port of knowledge and discussion and that is what we want to do specifically in this case, with the discussion over urban knowledge, focused on this proposal that we have established, that is ‘Cities for Life.’ If a city is not for life, then what is it for?” added Gaviria.

The meeting proposes to strengthen cities’ abilities to solve challenges they face by creating an environment of open innovation and participation by academics, civil society, the private sector, and governments. During the meeting, six experts will describe issues regarding topics like mobility, urban planning and design, social development, environment, government, and security. These experts will define a specific challenge which will require multiple solution proposals. Later, representatives from participating innovative cities will present their success stories leading up to a co-creation session during which they will explore causes and possible solutions in order to give a set of recommendations.

Finance Colombia’s Loren Moss recently sat down with  Ruta N’s director, Juan Camilo Quintero to gain insight into the launch and purpose of Cities for Life, why Medellin, and why now?

Finance Colombia: How was the concept for Cities for Life born?

Ruta N’s director, Juan Camilo Quintero

Juan Camilo Quintero: When we won the “Most Innovative City in the World” award, we took the decision to create five programs. The first program, that is the nucleus, is the Medellinnovation Pact that seeks to have in 2018, 2% of the city’s economic output in investment in science, technology, and innovation. Today we are at 0.78% so we want to be at 2%, to be in the highest levels of Latin America.

Two is an Innovation Festival that we do every year in September. Three is the Innovation District, which is where we are located, and we have already opened the public solicitation process for the second Ruta N Complex. We are going to make a complex similar to this one a block from here.

Three is a platform of citizen co-creation, of open innovation, where the citizens with the challenges that we have, do more than criticize, but offer ideas and solutions. This platform we call “Mi Medellín,” it’s operating and very unique in the nation.

The last point, we decided to connect ourselves with the world. We are very convinced that the challenges that Medellin and the world are not resolved only closed up within cities, but through a grand connectivity, because probably the solutions that Medellin faces have already been solved in other parts of the world.

So, Cities for Life, what it seeks is to bring the best experiences of innovation from other parts of the world and share them in a solid and collaborative manner. So we will have the event the 31^st of August to the 1^st of September. We already have confirmed around 76 cities, a little more than 40 mayors, and we are going to have themed salons: Security, Mobility, Environment, Innovation, where we will present specific cases, and on the second day, we will have a co-creation session where experts take a problem and try to formulate a solution, so the representatives of the mayors will learn the methodology.

So the platform is that we will gather the best cases, and then those cases can be shared with the world and generate an interaction with other cities.

Finance Colombia: So the idea is an interchange of ideas between the various mayors that will be in attendance. How is that different than the United Nations municipal meeting that was held here last year. How is the goal different this time?

Juan Camilo Quintero: Yes, there are two points. One, the cases here are very focused, and two, the theme of co-creation, with a methodology of resolution of the problems that we are presented with.

We will send back the methodologies with those cities, so that they can learn how to co-create, and how to develop a resolution to problems; we already have nine universities allied with us in the world that are working on problems. For example, in Cuenca in Ecuador, there is a university that will analyze a problem that is put into the platform and return with a possible solution to the problem with a specific, dedicated methodology.

Finance Colombia: This is focused on public sector officials such as mayors, or is it also public-private sector collaboration?

Juan Camilo Quintero: Initially it is public, because we are convinced that the way innovation is generated in businesses, we also can do that in cities. So the bet at this point is on how the cities start to learn from other experiences, and how to start to implement at a higher velocity, using that collective knowledge.

So the bet at this point is on how the cities start to learn from other experiences, and how to start to implement at a higher velocity, using that collective knowledge. – Juan Camilo Quintero

Finance Colombia: So this will be like ‘smart cities’?

Juan Camilo Quintero: In some measure. For example, Elizabeth Glazer—she is the director of the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice in New York City and is going to present about how they reduced mobile phone thefts in New York utilizing technology and specific campaigns; that is a global problem, mobile phone theft.

Finance Colombia: Yes, certainly.

Juan Camilo Quintero: They will present the theme of digital inclusion that when one is walking the streets of New York, you pass a point and your cellular automatically gets what promotions are available, what restaurants are nearby, many cases.

Finance Colombia: Proximity marketing, how interesting.

Juan Camilo Quintero: And in this forum, there will also be input for Habitat 3, because the mayors will sign a declaration on the Cities of the Future. Because we say that the future will correspond more to cities than to countries, because this is where the most strategic decisions are being made, where the habitants accumulate, and there are many books: The Triumph Of The City, If Mayors Ruled The World… There are various authors on the subject so what many think, our mayor included, is that we should come up with a multilateral bank for cities to finance municipal projects.

Finance Colombia:  Ah, so like an IDB or World Bank, but for cities?

Juan Camilo Quintero: Including that, there is talk about a “United Nations of Cities.”

Cities For Life Global Meeting Medellin 2015 is a co creation ecosystem led by the mayor’s office and Ruta N in cooperation with ACI Medellin, and has the support and participation of the World Bank, United Nations Human Settlements Program, UN-Habitat, The Interamerican Development Bank (IDB), the Ibero-American Center for Strategic Urban Development (CIDEU), Colombia Lider, EAFIT Social, Inspira Lab, and Isvimed.

Confirmed international and local experts who will be in Medellin during CITIES FOR LIFE Global Meeting 2015.

MOBILITY

• Claudia Restrepo Montoya, Metro de Medellin CEO, Medellin (Colombia)
• Constanza Gómez Mont, Director of PIDES Innovación, Mexico DF (Mexico)
• Sarika Panda Bhatt, Manager – Cities And Transport, World Resources Institute (WRI), Nueva Delhi (India)
• Steffen Becker, Chief Design Officer at Dotopen, Barcelona (Spain)
• Suresh V. Garimella, Executive Vice President of Research and Partnerships, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN (USA)

URBAN PLANNING AND DESIGN

• Carlo Ratti, Director of the MIT Senseable City Lab, Cambridge, MA (USA)
• Carlos Moreno, Professor and urban expert, Paris (France)
• Eduarda La Rocque, President of the Instituto Pereira Passos, Rio de Janeiro (Brazil)
• Jorge Pérez Jaramillo, Director of the Administrative Planning Department of the Medellin Mayor’s Office, Medellin (Colombia)
• Juan Esteban Calle Restrepo, Manager of Empresas Públicas de Medellín, Medellin (Colombia)
• Juan Felipe Arboleda, Director of Inspira Lab, Medellin (Colombia)
• Margarita Ángel Bernal, CEO Urban Development Company- EDU, Medellin (Colombia)
• Nidhi Gulati, Project Associate PPS, New York (USA)
• Zulma Bolívar, President of Instituto Metropolitano de Urbanismo Taller Caracas (IMUTC), Caracas (Venezuela)

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

• Carlos Francisco Portinho, Secretário Municipal de Habitação – SMH, Rio de Janeiro (Brazil)
• Domenico Di Siena, Founder and Director of Urbano Humano, London (United Kingdom)
• Jeff Merritt, Director of Innovation, New York City, New York (USA)
• Marina Klemensiewicz, Secretary of Habitat and Inclusion of Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires (Argentina)
• Minerva Tantoco, Chief Technology Officer, New York City, New York (USA)
• Paul Howard, Senior Director of Knowledge Exchange, Community Solutions, New York (USA)

ENVIRONMENT

• Antonio Vargas del Valle, Manager of Parques del Río, Medellin (Colombia)
• Suresh V. Garimella, Executive Vice President of Research and Partnerships, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN (USA)

GOVERNMENT

• Benjamin R. Barber, Political theorist and author of If Mayors Ruled the World, New York (USA)
• Esteve Almirall Mezquita, Director of the IIK-CIC Center of Innovation in Cities, at ESADE Business & Law School, Barcelona (Spain)
• Jessica Colaco, Director of Partnerships and Community at iHub Nairobi, Nairobi (Kenia)
• Juan Camilo Quintero Medina, Executive Director of Ruta N, Medellin (Colombia)
• Miguel Aristizábal Londoño, Open Innovation Coordinator, Ruta N, Medellin (Colombia)
• Nicole Neditch, Directora Senior de Prácticas de Gobierno, Code for America, San Francisco (USA)
• Rudi Borrmann, Director of Innovation and Open Government of the City of Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires (Argentina)
• Taichi Goto, President of Region Works LLC and Executive Adviser of Fukuoka Directive Council, Fukuoka (Japan)

SECURITY

• Elizabeth Glazer, Director of the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice, New York (USA)
• Gunso Kim, Chair of Board at Daumsoft, Inc., Seoul (South Korea)
• Karen Volker, Director of Cure Violence, Washington, D.C. (USA)
• Luis Fernando Suárez Vélez, Secretary Deputy Mayor of Governability, Security, and Citizen Services, Medellin (Colombia)
• Paulo Roberto Xavier de Moraes, Executive Secretary of Human Rights in the Prefecture of Recife, Recife (Brazil).

SPECIAL GUESTS

• Lionel J. Beaulieu, Director, Purdue Center for Regional Development, West Lafayette, IN (USA)
• Maravillas Rojo Torrecilla, Director of CIDEU, Barcelona (Spain)
• Pedro Acebillo Marín, Coordinator of CIDEU, Barcelona (Spain)
• Pilar Conesa, CEO Anteverti & Smart City Expo World Congress Curator, Barcelona (Spain)
• Ronnie Araneda, General Coordinator of Cuenca Ciudad Digital, Cuencua (Ecuador)

For an updated list of guests, visit: https://citiesfor.life/speakers-spa/. Finance Colombia will also be on hand, reporting live from the event.