Today, we know cities as shared spaces with the potential to both threaten and promote human health: while urban areas are known to amplify the transmission of epidemics like Ebola, urban residency is also associated with longer, healthier lives. Modern cities encompass a wide ecology of infrastructures, institutions and services that impact health, from access to improved sanitation and early childhood education to the design of buildings and transportation systems. So how has this centuries-long transformation in human settlement affected the mindset surrounding public health research and practice? Urban Public Health is an interdisciplinary collaboration from experts across the globe that approaches the issue of urban health research from a uniquely public health orientation. The carefully crafted and thoughtful chapters in this volume grapple with the complexity of the urban setting as a physical and social space while also providing an abundance of global and local examples of current urban health practices. Urban Public Health is divided into four pragmatic sections which cover core conceptual models of public health and their inequities, methods of urban health research assessment, methods of urban health research analysis and explanation, and ultimately, opportunities for urban health research to inform action through partnership and collaboration, including those which elevate community voices and capacities. An accessible guide for both students and researchers alike, Urban Public Health shines a light on how to understand, measure and change the urban setting so that cities grow, people thrive, and no one is left behind.

"The joint WHO and UN-HABITAT report, Hidden cities: unmasking and overcoming health inequities in urban settings, is being released at a turning point in human history. For the first time ever, the majority of the world's population is living in cities, and this proportion continues to grow. Putting this into numbers, in 1990 fewer than 4 in 10 people lived in urban areas. In 2010, more than half live in cities, and by 2050 this proportion will grow to 7 out of every 10 people. The number of urban residents is growing by nearly 60 million every year. This demographic transition from rural to urban, or urbanization, has far-reaching consequences. Urbanization has been associated with overall shifts in the economy, away from agriculture-based activities and towards mass industry, technology and service. High urban densities have reduced transaction costs, made public spending on infrastructure and services more economically viable, and facilitated generation and diffusion of knowledge, all of which have fuelled economic growth"--Page ix.

In this eye-opening work of economic theory, Jane Jacobs argues that it is cities—not nations—that are the drivers of wealth. Challenging centuries of economic orthodoxy, in Cities and the Wealth of Nations the beloved author contends that healthy cities are constantly evolving to replace imported goods with locally-produced alternatives, spurring a cycle of vibrant economic growth. Intelligently argued and drawing on examples from around the world and across the ages, here Jacobs radically changes the way we view our cities—and our entire economy.

In the United States, some populations suffer from far greater disparities in health than others. Those disparities are caused not only by fundamental differences in health status across segments of the population, but also because of inequities in factors that impact health status, so-called determinants of health. Only part of an individual's health status depends on his or her behavior and choice; community-wide problems like poverty, unemployment, poor education, inadequate housing, poor public transportation, interpersonal violence, and decaying neighborhoods also contribute to health inequities, as well as the historic and ongoing interplay of structures, policies, and norms that shape lives. When these factors are not optimal in a community, it does not mean they are intractable: such inequities can be mitigated by social policies that can shape health in powerful ways. Communities in Action: Pathways to Health Equity seeks to delineate the causes of and the solutions to health inequities in the United States. This report focuses on what communities can do to promote health equity, what actions are needed by the many and varied stakeholders that are part of communities or support them, as well as the root causes and structural barriers that need to be overcome.

One of our great urbanists and one of our great public health experts join forces to reckon with how cities are changing in the face of existential threats the pandemic has only accelerated Cities can make us sick. They always have—diseases spread more easily when more people are close to one another. And disease is hardly the only ill that accompanies urban density. Cities have been demonized as breeding grounds for vice and crime from Sodom and Gomorrah on. But cities have flourished nonetheless because they are humanity’s greatest invention, indispensable engines for creativity, innovation, wealth, and connection, the loom on which the fabric of civilization is woven. But cities now stand at a crossroads. During the global COVID crisis, cities grew silent as people worked from home—if they could work at all. The normal forms of socializing ground to a halt. How permanent are these changes? Advances in digital technology mean that many people can opt out of city life as never before. Will they? Are we on the brink of a post-urban world? City life will survive but individual cities face terrible risks, argue Edward Glaeser and David Cutler, and a wave of urban failure would be absolutely disastrous. In terms of intimacy and inspiration, nothing can replace what cities offer. Great cities have always demanded great management, and our current crisis has exposed fearful gaps in our capacity for good governance. It is possible to drive a city into the ground, pandemic or not. Glaeser and Cutler examine the evolution that is already happening, and describe the possible futures that lie before us: What will distinguish the cities that will flourish from the ones that won’t? In America, they argue, deep inequities in health care and education are a particular blight on the future of our cities; solving them will be the difference between our collective good health and a downward spiral to a much darker place.

Who makes our cities, and what part do everyday users have in the design of cities? This book powerfully shows that city-making is a social process and examines the close relationship between the social and physical shaping of urban environments. With cities taking a growing share of the global population, urban forms and urban experience are crucial for understanding social injustice, economic inequality and environmental challenges. Current processes of urbanization too often contribute to intensifying these problems; cities, likewise, will be central to the solutions to such problems. Focusing on a range of cities in developed and developing contexts, Cities by Design highlights major aspects of contemporary urbanization: urban growth, density and sustainability; inequality, segregation and diversity; informality, environment and infrastructure. Offering keen insights into how the shaping of our cities is shaping our lives, Cities by Design provides a critical exploration of key issues and debates that will be invaluable to students and scholars in sociology and geography, environmental and urban studies, architecture, urban design and planning.

In every city, the urban spaces that form the public realm—ranging from city streets, neighborhood squares, and parks to public facilities such as libraries and markets—account for about one-third of the city’s total land area, on average. Despite this significance, the potential for these public-space assets—typically owned and managed by local governments—to transform urban life and city functioning is often overlooked for many reasons: other pressing city priorities arising from rapid urbanization, poor urban planning, and financial constraints. The resulting degradation of public spaces into congested, vehicle-centric, and polluted places often becomes a liability, creating a downward spiral that leads to a continuous drain on public resources and exacerbating various city problems. In contrast, the cities that invest in the creation of human-centered, environmentally sustainable, economically vibrant, and socially inclusive places—in partnership with government entities, communities, and other private stakeholders—perform better. They implement smart and sustainable strategies across their public space asset life cycles to yield returns on investment far exceeding monetary costs, ultimately enhancing city livability, resilience, and competitiveness. The Hidden Wealth of Cities: Creating, Financing, and Managing Public Spaces discusses the complexities that surround the creation and management of successful public spaces and draws on the analyses and experiences from city case studies from around the globe. This book identifies—through the lens of asset management—a rich palette of creative and innovative strategies that every city can undertake to plan, finance, and manage both government-owned and privately owned public spaces.

In the twentieth century, the urban settings of the wealthy nations were largely associated with opportunity, accumulation of wealth, and better health than their rural counterparts. In the twenty-first century, demographic changes, globalization, and climate change are having important health consequences on wealthy nations and especially on low- and middle-income countries. The increasing concentration of poverty and significant inequalities between urban neighborhoods and the physical and social environments in cities are important determinants of population health. In this important new book, experts identify the priority problems and outline solutions that can generate and sustain healthy urban environments. Foreword by Michael H. Bloomberg Contributors include: Sue Atkinson, John G. Bartlett, Angela Beaton, Karl Brown, Pamela Ligouri Bunker, Robert J. Bunker, Scott Burris, Waleska Teixeira Caiffa, Roel A. Coutinho, Manuel Carballo, Ruth Colagiuri, Beatriz de Faria Leao, Amélia Augusta de Lima Friche, Alex Ezeh, Geoff Green, Claudio Giulliano da Costa Octavio Gómez-Dantés, Ruth Finkelstein, Julio Frenk, Nicholas Freudenberg, Fu Hua, Sandro Galea, Ticia Gerber, Carola Hein, Catherine Hull, Tord Kjellstrom, Jacob Kumaresan, Catherine Ronald Labonté, Stephen Leeder, Godfrey Mbarauku, Gordon McGranahan, Patricia Monge, Mark R. Montgomery, Martin Mulenga, Ana Luiza Nabuco, Julie Netherland, Ndioro Ndiaye, Rougui Ndiaye-Coïc, Kalala Ngalamulume, Danielle Ompad, Stipe Oreskovic, Ariel Pablos-Méndez, Jonathan Parkinson, Fernando Augusto Proietti, Thomas C. Quinn, Carlos E. Restrepo, Kevin J. Robinson, Jonathan M. Samet, David Satterthwaite, Richard H. Schneider, Ted Schrecker, Elliott Sclar, Maria Steenland, Agis Tsouros, Arnoud P. Verhoeff, Nicole Volavka-Close, Michael Ward, Vanessa Watson, Rae Zimmerman.

By the turn of the century, more than half the world's population will live in urban areas. This rapid pace of urbanization is forcing a rethinking of development priorities, and this book explores some of those initiatives.