Author: Susan Llewelyn Leach

  • When the waters are rising…

    Kiribati’s former president Anote Tong faces climate change head on and sees hope, even as islands become an early warning system for the international community. For the island nations of the South Pacific, climate change is a reality that is already causing people to migrate. The rise in sea level has made some low-lying islands […]

  • How to improve Europe’s haphazard recovery of plastic waste

    How to improve Europe’s haphazard recovery of plastic waste

    Inconsistency, confusion and lack of common standards all contribute to low recovery, but the solutions are many and would push Europe quickly toward circular economics. When you finish a yogurt, do throw the plastic pot in the trash or the recycle bin? For some cities the pot is trash, for others it’s recyclable, and for […]

  • A young mayor tackles one of Europe’s most polluted capitals

    A young mayor tackles one of Europe’s most polluted capitals

    As mayor of Tirana, Albania, Erion Veliaj has introduced alternatives modes of transport to the city’s traffic-clogged streets and made the public a full partner in the process. Tirana’s colorful buildings — Wikimedia Commons At a roundtable on walkable and cyclable cities at the Smart City Expo World Congress in Barcelona this week, Erion Veliaj, the mayor of […]

  • Peterborough: a City Shaping Its Own DNA

    Peterborough: a City Shaping Its Own DNA

    Peterborough may not be the first city that pops to mind when one thinks of smart. The press tends to play up the big names like London, Paris and New York. But the smartest cities around the world are sometimes below the radar, transforming their economies with little fanfare. Peterborough’s profile is rising, however. Last November, […]

  • Barcelona’s Illegal Street Vendors Form Union to Defend Their Rights

    Barcelona’s Illegal Street Vendors Form Union to Defend Their Rights

    Illegal street vendors across Barcelona’s tourist districts last week created their own union to negotiate with city officials. New leftist Mayor Ada Colau has welcomed the move.

  • Barcelona wins five more years of MWC despite new mayor wobble

    Barcelona wins five more years of MWC despite new mayor wobble

    There’s nothing like continuity. Today, the GSMA announced that the Mobile World Congress — the world’s largest gathering of all things mobile — had extended its contract with Barcelona until 2023. It’s a measure of the city’s success in organizing a smoothly-run event attracting increasingly bigger crowds over the past 10 years that the GSMA should sign a new […]

  • Tourism: Barcelona’s Cautionary Tale

    “This is not a city to live in. It’s a theme park like Prague or Venice where’s there’s no local life left.” That’s the comment of long-time resident Picart in the new documentary, “Bye Bye Barcelona,” lamenting the rise of mass tourism and how it has transformed his city. In the past decade, Barcelona has […]