It is hardly news that COVID-19 is changing our cities: ghost business districts, a collapse in tourism, less traffic, increased online deliveries. Nor is it a surprise that much of the creative sector is struggling with the extended shutdown. Global audiences are staying at home, producers are paralyzed, new launches are risky, and investors are scarce. But amongst all this, … [Read more...] about Culture on Every Corner: The Opportunity for Cities in the COVID-era
10 reasons why Heerenstraat Festival is not just a festival
Heerenstraat Festival is a place of encounter to celebrate the living heritage of Paramaribo’s city center. The first edition of the Festival took place between September 30th and October 6th 2019 on the streets of Paramaribo’s city center, a World Heritage Site (WHS). The IDB in coordination with the Ministry of Education and Culture of Suriname partnered with The Back Lot … [Read more...] about 10 reasons why Heerenstraat Festival is not just a festival
Urban experiments in historic downtowns: Local identity and innovation for a more sustainable cultural heritage
Why pursue urban experiments in historic downtowns? It might seem counterintuitive picking the most consolidated areas of the city for experiments. However, the historic downtowns often face obsolescence processes that translate into decay, abandonment, overcrowding, or underuse[1]. Urban experimentation breaks the inertia of such longstanding processes, transforming the … [Read more...] about Urban experiments in historic downtowns: Local identity and innovation for a more sustainable cultural heritage
Adaptive reuse: historic practices during a crisis
COVID-19 has been advancing rapidly and disrupting our daily lives. The virus has demanded to use our creativity to convert spaces and host temporarily new emergency uses. As many of us stay home adapting our own house as office, school, nursery and/or nursing, key stakeholders in our cities are working to contain the pandemic and converting even iconic sites, adapting them in … [Read more...] about Adaptive reuse: historic practices during a crisis
Behind the scenes: Big Data analysis for public policy
In the previous blog Analyzing and improving access to culture we told the story of the Pase Cultural program evaluation. Behind that story is an open code tool that was key in analyzing the big, complex datasets generated by the program. The tool, called Georeferenced Program Evaluation (GPE), was designed for detailed geospatial analysis to measure the effectiveness of a … [Read more...] about Behind the scenes: Big Data analysis for public policy