Interview: Edward Glaeser Makes the Case for Cities

Harvard's Edward Glaeser was in Milwaukee in November to speak at the Marburg Lecture at Marquette University. In a post by Marquette University on Medium, Stephen Filmanowicz of Marquette Business interviews Glaeser ona range of specific topics related to urbanism.

The article starts with background on Glaeser and his ideas about urbanization before getting into the interview. Once the Q&A begins, the subjects range from the benefits of density to Sun Belt "superstars" like Charlotte, Austin, and the research triangle in North Carolina to zoning decisions in famously dense cities like New York City, Chicago, and Vancouver.

As an example of the ranging topics of the long interview, here is Glaeser providing an overview of the contemporary urbanization discussion in Milwaukee:

"I think there’s room to move a little more towards Minneapolis, particularly on the education front. I wish I had gotten off the plane and heard more discussion about how we can fix the charter school initiative that was started during the Norquist years, and a little less about the arena, right? Or for that matter, light rail … The difference between a Minneapolis and a Detroit is the skills of the population. It’s not the train. How useful is the monorail in Detroit?"