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Ekundayo Bandele, founder and executive director of Hattiloo Theatre in Memphis, talks about how to build a black creative class and build a city brand.

Mark Wallace, president and CEO, Detroit Riverfront Conservancy, talks about the power of waterfronts to bring cities together.

The Atlanta City Design aspires to live into the “beloved community.”  One of its authors, Ryan Gravel, is an entrepreneur working on ideas about the future of cities. His master’s thesis two decades described the original vision for the Atlanta Beltline

Terez Wilson, an insurance entrepreneur with a college sports background Victoria Young, an attorney with a major law firm, owner of a popular cycling studio, and curator of the Memphis version of Diner en Blanc Sidney Johnson, co-owner of SpinCult and with the Memphis River Parks Partnership Jamal Boddie, Memphis River Parks Partnership and podcaster with a side gig running themed trivia events around town.   These four successful urban professionals call Memphis home.  They are young, African-Americans in a city that is predominantly African-American.  And in America today, that brings challenges, but also opportunity, and our guests talk about both in this frank discussion. 

Henry Turley, CEO of the Henry Turley Company in Memphis and co-developer of the Uptown neighborhood Tanja Mitchell, the original Uptown neighborhood coordinator and now director of community engagement with The Works Joe Cortright, who blogs at cityobservatory.org and is President and principal economists of Impresa, a consulting firm specializing in regional economic analysis, innovation and industry clusters   Its developers set out to create a great neighborhood in Memphis for people with low incomes.  The result was Uptown, that too-rare community in the U.S. attracting people of all incomes.  Why has Uptown succeeded and what can other communities learn? Joe Cortright recaps his latest findings on key city success factors from cityobservatory.org.

Guests: Andre Perry, Fellow in the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings and scholar-in-residence at American University Joe Cortright, who blogs at cityobservatory.org and is President and principal economist of Impresa, a consulting firm specializing in regional economic analysis, innovation and industry clusters   Brookings Fellow Andre Perry has found significant disparity between real estate values in predominantly black neighborhoods compared to predominantly white neighborhoods in the U.S. today, even when their incomes are the same.  Cities Now asks why and what can be done to change it.  Joe Cortright recaps his latest findings on key city success factors from cityobservatory.org.  

Exploring cities, their leadership, their influential stakeholders. Hosted by Carol Coletta, the president and CEO of the Memphis River Parks Partnership.