On Thursday, November 9th, Alan Lewis, a Planning Associate Director based in SOM’s San Francisco office, spoke at the 2017 Guangzhou International Design Forum in China. The event brings practitioners together to discuss architectural design, sustainable design, and other topics as they relate to Guangzhou, a historic city in the country’s North River Delta. Lewis’ presentation was titled, “Authoring the Planet’s Future: A City Design Challenge.”
Lewis discussed a series of projects in the Pearl River Delta designed by SOM’s City Design Practice, including the Guangzhou Pearl River 100 Vision Plan. He stressed the importance of visionary leadership in the face of population growth, increasing environmental decline, and the mixed impacts of technologies, automation, and artificial intelligence on our global urban network.
The forum was organized by the Guangzhou Municipal People’s Government and the Guangzhou Housing and Urban-Rural Construction Committee, and supported by the Urban Environment Design Magazine. The goal of the annual event is to gather insights for the future development of Guangzhou.