Regional and Urban Design Committee

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Who we are

The Regional and Urban Design Committee (RUDC) aims to improve the quality of the regional and urban environment by promoting excellence in design, planning, and public policy in the built environment. This will be achieved through its member and public education, in concert with allied community and professional groups. Join us!

2024 Symposium

The 2024 symposium will be held in Indianapolis, IN in November. Stay tuned for dates and location. Registration will open in July.

2023 RUDC Symposium

The RUDC Symposium, held in Washington, DC October 19-20, covered emerging trends, theories, and technologies that are shaping the future of regional and urban design. Watch the engaging highlight and speaker videos >.

Immigration fuels the revitalization of cities

  • 1.  Immigration fuels the revitalization of cities

    Posted 11-30-2015 06:10 PM

    Immigration Fuels Urban Revitalization

    That the US is a nation of immigrants is a truism. In the grand arc of history it applies for most nations, for migration is as old as humanity itself.
    Migration is fundamentally the story of the human race from its origins to the present. Migration is an integral aspect of life on this planet. People move to survive. They move in search of food. They move away from danger and death. They move towards opportunities for life. Migration is tied to the human spirit, which seeks adventure, pursues dreams, and finds reasons to hope even in the most adverse circumstances.  The Ethics of Migration and Immigration: Key Questions for Policy Makers, A Briefing Paper by Lynette M. Parker

     
    Immigration density map

    The self-image of America sees this country as the "melting pot" in contrast to especially the nations of the Old World which are seen as homogeneous places with a population made up of one race, one culture, where it is not necessary to bring different cultures under one roof. This view may have been relatively correct for good parts of the 19th or 20th century, but it is not anymore.

    The pattern of immigration and lower crime nonetheless goes against popular stereotypes, which may explain the angry initial reaction to the idea. Among the public, policy-makers, and many academics, a common expectation is that the concentration of immigrants and the influx of foreigners drive up disorder and crime because of the assumed propensities of these groups to commit crimes and settle in poor, presumably disorganized communities. This belief is so pervasive that the concentration of Latinos in a neighborhood strongly predicts perceptions of disorder, regardless of the neighborhood’s actual amount of disorder or the rate of reported violence. Nonetheless, whatever people think, increases in immigration are correlated with less violence, and first-generation immigrants tend to be less violent than those born in America, particularly when they live in neighborhoods with high numbers of other immigrants. (The American Prospect)

    The notion of a nation-state that can close its borders, and in which those who live within, have special rights similar to property owners is historically much more recent than migration itself and founded on similar notions that were common for city states in antiquity and fiefdoms of the middle ages. Today the feuding between the city states of Sparta and Athens seems quaint and extremely provincial even though it represents a well-known narrative of history we learn in school. Today we think of Greece as a small country certainly unified in.....Read full article

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    Klaus Philipsen FAIA
    Archplan Inc. Philipsen Architects
    Baltimore MD
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