The International Society of City and Regional Planners (ISOCARP) wishes to join UN-Habitat, as part of the United nations System,  and the global sustainability community in celebrating the 10th World Cities Day (WCD) on 31 October, marking the closure of Urban October.

This year, the Global Observance of World Cities Day, is under the theme Youth leading climate and local action for cities. Young people advocate for bolder steps and actions to tackle climate crisis in our cities. It will draw attention on how we can capture these bold ideas and ambitious targets and turn them into achievements. The key event takes places in Alexandria, Egypt, only a few days before the opening of the 12^th World Urban Forum in Cairo, Egypt.

The shock of the coronavirus pandemic compounded by the climate and biodiversity crises has been so profound that some have even questioned the idea of the city as such. Perhaps we are closer to a new definition of the city than we realise. It might be one that is not based on the physical concepts related to urban form (density, centrality, concentration) but is more oriented towards urban flows, social aspirations and environmental constraints. Polycentric structure and local communities are gaining attention. The newly popular concept of the ’15 min city’ — living, working, shopping, socialising locally — is being adopted by some city councils. Technology driven de-carbonisation is now widely accepted as a strategic objective and is being implemented beyond only pilot projects in many countries. Even economic de-growth is on the table, although we still need to explain how this scenario can be reconciled with current economic regimes and the needs of the developing nations. Since many years, the Annual World Planning Congresses of ISOCARP explores the concepts of Resilience and Adaptation, and how they both push for and stem from new spatial configurations of urban form and urban infrastructure, most recently with a new focus on ‘Regenerative New Cities’ (First International ISOCARP Conference for New Cities in New Clark City, The Philippines, September 2024), and mot latterly at our 60^th World Planning Congress in Siena, earlier this month.

We enthusiastically join UN-Habitat in its call for “Youth leading climate and local action for cities”, as well as support its broader agenda of: “reducing poverty; ensuring basic services and livelihoods; the provision of accessible, affordable and adequate housing; investing in infrastructure; upgrading informal settlements; and managing ecosystems.” While we embrace and encourage meaningful engagement of youth in climate-resilience urban and territorial planning, we also advocate a more holistic intergenerational equity paradigm shift by an age-based approach in all territorial planning processes and its outputs (policies, plans and designs), combined with a resource-based approach in planning that ensures equal access to resources for current and future generations.