The Urbanist
Monocle’s guide to better cities. Explore urban innovation, cutting-edge infrastructure, and compact living with insights from planners, architects, and city leaders.
Latest Episodes
Icons and iconoclasts
Icons and iconoclasts: do cities need popular icons to unite them? What of the cities that have none? We visit Madrid, Vienna, Sydney, London and Lisbon to find out.
The Build Report
Build: The Urbanist reports from the Bilbao Urban Innovation and Leadership Dialogues conference, hosted by the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMFUS).
Number wars
Number wars: whether it’s securing the right prefix for your phone number or naming a business according to the trendiest postcode – why do we care so much about our city digits?
Peace and quiet
Peace and quiet: how do we find a little calm in the big, loud city. From a fruitless hunt in the construction capital of Shanghai to an ode to mindfulness with meditation expert Andy Puddicombe. Plus, the wristwatch that could change your life.
Exploring trains
Trains: we explore the history of trains in cities in locations such as Beirut, Buenos Aires, Sydney, LA and New York. Plus, a love story that unfolded from London to Paris on the Eurostar.
Weather
Weather: how an oyster can help protect a city from hurricane damage, we look at Vancouver’s wet-weather architecture slip-up, and meet a very enthusiastic weatherman, to learn how the oncoming forecast affects all elements of urban life.
Documenting the city
Documenting the city: how we record our urban areas, from the museum curator with a collection you can’t display to a documentary film that’s both fantasy and fiction, along with maps, photographs, audio and more – what sides of the city are we trying to preserve and create through documenting…
The missing and the unbuilt
The unbuilt: we speak to the City of London’s former planning officer about how to say “no” to those who want to build, find out why residents are thankful that Lisbon doesn’t have a new airport and look at China’s metro lines to nowhere – now headed somewhere.
City eccentrics
Oddballs: Why a city that accepts its eccentrics wins out, featuring the Parisian toilet attendant (and self-styled dame), the Sydney transgender bubble-bike rider and Rio’s own Batman who are all helping add to a healthy metropolis.
Pairing cities
Twinned: the idea of pairing cities is more than half-a-century old and arose with the best of intentions – to make everything feel a bit friendlier in the wake of a world war. But is the gesture outdated? What does Tucson really have in common with Almaty?
