For the Love of Our Cities: The Love Affair Between People and Their Places

Peter Kageyama

Kick off the Carolinas’ Meeting with Peter Kageyama. The mutual love affair between people and their place is one of the most powerful influences in our lives, yet rarely thought of in terms of a relationship. As cities begin thinking of themselves as engaged in a relationship with their citizens, and citizens begin to consider their emotional connections with their places, we open new possibilities in community, social and economic development by including the most powerful of motivators—the human heart—in our toolkit of city-making.

Acceleration: Five Forces Forging Real Estate’s Future 

Linda Isaacson & Deborah Weinswig

In a Fireside Chat, Linda Isaacson of First American Title and Deborah Weinswig of Fung Global Retail & Technology will discuss how change is occurring in society and business at an ever-accelerating pace. How can the physical world of real estate adapt to an ever-shifting, virtual world of bits and bytes? Our panel of real estate experts will examine five forces (Demographic Polarization, Digitization, Globalization, Urbanization and Socialization) that will reshape our buildings and landscape in the near term—today, the only constant is change.

Where We Want to Live

Ryan Gravel AICP, LEEP AP

Close out the Carolinas’ Meeting with Ryan Gravel of Sixpitch. After decades of sprawl, many American city and suburban residents struggle with issues related to traffic (and its accompanying challenges for our health and productivity), divided neighborhoods, and a non-walkable life. Urban designer Ryan Gravel makes a case for how we can change this. Cities have the capacity to create a healthier, more satisfying way of life by remodeling and augmenting their infrastructure in ways that connect neighborhoods and communities. Gravel came up with a way to do just that in his hometown with the Atlanta Beltline project. It connects 40 diverse Atlanta neighborhoods to city schools, shopping districts, and public parks, and has already seen a huge payoff in real estate development and local business revenue.

In Where We Want to Live, Gravel presents an exciting blueprint for revitalizing cities to make them places where we truly want to live.