World class sustainable cities vital for future generation

KUALA LUMPUR (Sept 9): There must be continuous effort to bring together ideas and best practices on what makes cities sustainable as places to live and work for our future generation, said organising chairman of the 8th International Conference on World Class Sustainable Cities 2016 (WCSC) Chan Kin Meng.

Chan was speaking at the official opening of the event yesterday.

Themed “City Spaces, Public Spaces”, it was chosen with the objective of increasing public spaces in the city of Kuala Lumpur through alternate initiatives such as private-public partnerships that collaborate with and engage the residents and end users of KL city.

“The future generation of our society will inherit this [KL] city. It is only appropriate that the WCSC platform facilitates the sharing of best practices and ideas for the growth of our city which include the views of the young citizens of KL,” said Chan.

“The WCSC impact has gone beyond KL and the Klang Valley. Indeed, more and more local councils have sent their representatives to benefit from the sharing of ideas at this conference,” he added.

More than 500 participants showed up at the event, including city officials, town planners, residents’ associations, professional consultants and property developers.

“There is no denying that the future of our country is urban. Already, 71% of the nation’s population lived in cities in 2010, and it is projected that 80% of our population or 27.3 million people will be living in urban areas by 2025. The unprecedented growth in urban population will mean that the right strategies and actions need to be in place if we are to have cities and towns that cater to the needs of the people,” said deputy minister of Federal Territories Datuk Loga Bala Mohan who officiated the event.

The 8th WCSC series is jointly organised by the Real Estate and Housing Developers’ Association Malaysia, Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur (Rehda KL), the Malaysian Institute of Planners (MIP) and the Malaysian Institute of Architects (PAM).

Among the speakers who shared their knowledge on international best practices and case studies from other world class cities during the event were New York City commissioner of department of parks and recreations Mitchell J Silver, Queensland University of Technology principal of Byrne Urban Design and Architecture Professor John Byrne and Focus Architects and Urban Planners director Mohd Nazam Md Kassim.

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This story first appeared in TheEdgeProperty.com pullout on Sept 9, 2016, which comes with The Edge Financial Daily every Friday. Download TheEdgeProperty.com pullout here for free.