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"About the Metropolitan Policy Program Created in 1996, the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program provides decision makers with timely trend analysis, cutting-edge research and policy ideas for improving the health and prosperity of cities and metropolitan areas. The program is based on a simple premise: The United States is a metropolitan nation. Metropolitan areas are home to 83 percent of the U.S. population, 85 percent of the nation's jobs and 92 percent of all college graduates. They are our hubs of research and innovation, our centers of human capital, and our gateways of trade and immigration. They are, in short, the drivers of our economy, and American competitiveness depends on their vitality. "

About the Metropolitan Policy Program Created in 1996, the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program provides decision makers with timely trend analysis, cutting-edge research and policy ideas for improving the health and prosperity of cities and metropolitan areas. The program is based on a simple premise: The United States is a metropolitan nation. Metropolitan areas are home to 83 percent of the U.S. population, 85 percent of the nation's jobs and 92 percent of all college graduates. They are our hubs of research and innovation, our centers of human capital, and our gateways of trade and immigration. They are, in short, the drivers of our economy, and American competitiveness depends on their vitality.

In his just-released Planet of Cities, Shlomo Angel argues that urban policy-makers and planners must do more to meet the challenge of urbanization. Angel, who is a member of the Urbanization Project at New York University and who conducted his research as a visiting fellow at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, provides a detailed, data-driven analysis filled with maps of world urbanization patterns, as well as charts and tables documenting the challenges facing global cities. He took time out from his busy schedule to talk to Atlantic Cities about the key challenges facing our increasingly urban world.

THIS blog often makes the argument that Britain's planning laws all too often restrict and prevent investment which might create economic growth. It is worth remembering occasionally that things were once much worse. For proof of that, see this fascinating post on Birmingham's economy in the 1950s and 1960s, by Henry Overman, of the LSE's Spatial Economics Research Centre. It's worth reading the whole thing, but a cut down version of the post is copied below:

Hot spots is an Economist Intelligence Unit research programme, commissioned by Citigroup, which ranks the competitiveness of 120 of the world's major cities. The Economist Intelligence Unit bears sole responsibility for the content of this report. The Economist Intelligence Unit's editorial team built the Index, conducted the analysis and wrote the report. The findings and views expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsor. Our research drew on two main initiatives: A unique Index that compares 120 of the world's major urban agglomerations across eight distinct categories of competitiveness and 31 individual indicators. These cities collectively represent about 29% of the global economy, with a combined GDP of US$20.24tr. A detailed note on definitions and methodology is provided in the appendix. We conducted in-depth interviews with ten city experts, mayors and corporate executives, to get their insights on city competitiveness.

But the question remains: How exactly - in what ways and through which channels - does density make our cities more productive? That's where a recent study published in the Journal of Regional Science breaks new ground. Conducted by economists Jaison Abel of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Ishita Dey of the University of Georgia, and Todd Gabe of the University of Maine, the study provides new evidence of the relationships between density, human capital, and urban productivity. It uses detailed statistical models to gauge more precisely the effects of density and human capital, separately and together, on productivity of more than 350 metro areas.

The report "Innovation and the City" [PDF] is an important addition to our knowledge of urban policy innovation. It summarizes the results of a six-month research effort by policy researchers at New York University's Wagner School of Public Service and the New York-based Center for an Urban Future. The research team interviewed over 200 experts (including our own Emily Badger) and surveyed more than 120 policy innovations. (I should disclose here that I am Global Research Professor for the NYU School of Continuing and Professional Studies).