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The Challenge
1373 followers
How might we restore vibrancy in cities and regions facing economic decline?
Congratulationsto all our contributors!
Mission #1
Explore Vibrancy
Share your definition of what vibrancy looks like where you live.
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Mission #2
Share Stories
Tell us about the cities and communities you know are currently struggling or in the process of revitalising.
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Mission #3
Get Active
Take some time to get active and explore your own community – then report back what you learned.
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Mission #4
Collect Insights
Interview someone living in a struggling city or region to learn more.
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Mission #5
Surprise Us
Got an Inspiration that doesn't fit the other Missions?
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Inspiration
The Inspiration phase has ended – head over to our current phase to join our efforts. Also be sure to watch our challenge video and check out the incredible list of collective inspirations we sourced during the first phase.
Featured Inspiration
Soup Detroit
This is a great way to bring any community together and to get them to collectively decide on actions they want to take place within their community to create jobs and to improve their surroundings. $5 for Soup, Salad, Bread, and a VOTE! Submitted by: Narbeh Dereghishian MISSION #5: Surprise Us
Mission #2
Share Stories
Boomerang Cities
Aside from Detroit there are two other cities that have experienced sweeping economic and industrial declines. Turin, Italy is the home of Fiat, which struggled for years, and Youngstown, Ohio which felt the impact of reduced steel production.
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Campbell Frey
December 05, 2011
07:54PM |
Mission #1
Explore Vibrancy
Diverse Vibrancy!
India is the diverse country with different culture, communities, festivals.Not only the traditional festivals bring the vibrancy but also traditions, culture and mainly people bring vibrancy to India.
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Gauravi Chaudhari
December 05, 2011
07:36PM |
Mission #3
Get Active
"Hello City? It's me, Lisa"
I had known about the [Murmur] project for a while, but I finally took a Saturday to stroll around and find the green, ear-shaped signs. Through my mobile phone, I called the local number on the sign and, for the first time, listened to my city.
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Lisa Torjman
December 05, 2011
07:30PM |
Mission #5
Surprise Us
Expanding how we measure urban vibrancy
There is a growing interest in using GIS technology to visualize successful transformation of our cities. What can expanding the formal indicators we use to measure the health/vibrancy of our cities can teach us?
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Alicia Riley
December 05, 2011
07:23PM |
Mission #2
Share Stories
Mixed-Use Redevelopments Attract New Startups and Help New Haven Transform
A 60-acre complex of vacant firearms factories is redeveloped for bioscience companies and is transforming a once-dangerous neighborhood into a place for living, work, and play.
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Dan Schier
December 05, 2011
04:14AM |
Mission #1
Explore Vibrancy
Living Machines in Polluted Rivers
Living Machines are floating gardens that consist of plants that clean and restore polluted waterways and sewage systems.
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Hannah Strange
December 01, 2011
01:34AM |
Mission #2
Share Stories
Visit the buildings you've always wanted to visit!
Open House London happens once a year - the doors to nearly all of London's fantastic buildings (known and unknown) are opened to the public!
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Louise Wilson
November 15, 2011
06:51PM |
Mission #1
Explore Vibrancy
Start a community store
From a story in the New York Times: A town in upstate NY created its own department store: residents of Saranac Lake did something unusual: they decided to raise capital to open their own department store.
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Whitney Quesenbery
November 13, 2011
06:53PM |
Mission #5
Surprise Us
Contagion - Nothing spread like ... vibration?
And what if vibration was something that we all had inside us and could come to light once in contact with another person in vibration?
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Jean-Luc Alfonsi
November 16, 2011
02:04PM |
Mission #2
Share Stories
Detroit Works Project
The Detroit Works Project is an evolving roadmap in which residents can have their say to create a shared, achievable vision for the city. How are residents using this site? How can it be improved (if needed)? Can we build on this?
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Charlotte Fliegner
November 17, 2011
10:34AM |
Mission #5
Surprise Us
Avatar metaphor
I was inspired by the quote from my last post: "We need to design environment where people are able to live, work, love, build, dream. We need to design it together as citizens of our own city. All social spaces must be socially constructed."
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Vladimir Melnikov
December 03, 2011
02:48PM |
Mission #1
Explore Vibrancy
Clear Village
Clear Village is an international non-profit based in London that develops processes to solve problems for sustainable community development. They involve both community members and experts from different fields to organize workshops in communities.
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Cansu Akarsu
November 10, 2011
01:41PM |
Mission #2
Share Stories
Revitalizing Bertie County: Studio H
Studio H is a high school design/build curriculum for rural community benefit. It provides college credit, a summer job, and a hands-on opportunity to build real-world projects for the community.
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Sarah Fathallah
November 08, 2011
09:42PM |
Mission #4
Collect Insights
Tokyo
“…there are always little gaps, holes, places that can be transformed into small oases.”
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Vladimir Melnikov
November 18, 2011
01:20PM |
Mission #2
Share Stories
Pittsburgh's Urban Prairie
Pittsburgh, like many rust-belt cities, is looking at a dismal fate for many of it's historic neighborhoods. For decades, as industrial jobs vanish and people move away, these neighborhoods have been facing demise. It's time to change all that.
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Lauren Capo
November 30, 2011
02:14AM |
Mission #1
Explore Vibrancy
School for Women empowerment.
In Basauri next to Bilbao, is the 1st school for womens empowerment. The project started in 2003 with the city councils help, with the necesity to create a new place of knowledge and participation for women living in the same city.
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Alex Filiatreau
December 03, 2011
10:18PM |
Mission #5
Surprise Us
Public Giving in Ancient Jewish Law
In the Jewish Scriptures (to Christian groups, the Old Testament) there's ancient laws about how to support the poor better. Though Detroit isn't agrarian, how could these ideas inspire the community toward reciprocity and responsibility?
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Nathan Akers
December 03, 2011
04:07AM |
Mission #2
Share Stories
Megacity Traffic: Lagos, Nigeria
Traffic in Lagos, Nigeria is pretty nuts. If you live on the Mainland, it can take you 3+ hours to get to work on Lagos Island (with good weather!). A daily commute can involve numerous forms of transportation -- walking, buses, taxis, motorcycles.
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Julia
December 05, 2011
05:26PM |
Mission #1
Explore Vibrancy
Cheap is an Opportunity
The Motor City has 33,529 vacant houses. To most of the country, that's 33,529 reasons to wring its hands over What To Do About Detroit. To young architects, it's a GOLD MINE!!!
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James McBennett
November 09, 2011
02:13AM |
Mission #2
Share Stories
Grand Rapids Personal Music Video/Street Party Defies Negative Critics
This lipdub video was created as an official response to the Newsweek article calling Grand Rapids a "dying city." The city countered critics with a music video that displayed a beautiful tour of the city, and the vibrant characters who live there.
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Mei Hsieh
December 01, 2011
12:54AM |
