{"id":20736,"date":"2025-04-02T14:51:18","date_gmt":"2025-04-02T18:51:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/?post_type=story&#038;p=20736"},"modified":"2025-10-31T12:23:45","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T16:23:45","slug":"building-equitable-cities","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2025\/04\/02\/building-equitable-cities\/","title":{"rendered":"Building equitable cities"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n<iframe allow=\"autoplay *; encrypted-media *; fullscreen *; clipboard-write\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"175\" style=\"border:0;width:100%;max-width:800px;overflow:hidden;background:transparent;\" sandbox=\"allow-forms allow-popups allow-same-origin allow-scripts allow-storage-access-by-user-activation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation\" src=\"https:\/\/embed.podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/what-does-justice-look-like-in-your-city-with\/id1608025510?i=1000701226517\"><\/iframe>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/academics\/undergraduate\/programs\/majors-minors\/geography\/\">Geography<\/a> Professor <a href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/faculty\/profiles\/asha-best\/\">Asha Best<\/a> has lived in a handful of cities across the U.S., Brooklyn, Los Angeles, and Atlanta among them. Experiencing each place\u2019s unique culture, transportation, and education systems has given Best insight into how different cities are designed and how they function. A curiosity to understand this more drives some of her current research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Best, an urbanist who studies mobility and urban informality, is researching how planners and developers can build just cities, where everyone lives equitably. One thing she\u2019s noticed throughout her studies is that there is no common definition of what justice looks like, however.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe often know what injustice looks like in cities, but we don&#8217;t often know what justice looks like. I think that equality is a good start. Do we have equal access to shared resources, and are vital resources distributed in a way that&#8217;s consistent and even \u2014 and I&#8217;m talking about things like water and food and shelter, the basics,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Best believes just cities are ones in which planners and officials address current problems and work to right historical wrongs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI think it&#8217;s about how cities deliver vital resources, discovering who doesn&#8217;t have access to them and how to fix that, and creating a space that&#8217;s livable, where people have dignity,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Challenge. Change.<\/strong> is produced by Melissa Hanson for Clark University. Listen and subscribe on <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/4UuYAjq1d3Hq45cjwxoCNL\">Spotify\u202f<\/a>or\u202f<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/challenge-change\/id1608025510\">Apple Podcasts<\/a>. Find other episodes wherever you listen to podcasts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns alignwide is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-28f84493 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0035-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"students and professor walk on city sidewalk\" class=\"wp-image-20739\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0035-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0035-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0035-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0035-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0035-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0035-1200x800.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Geography Professor Asha Best (left) leads her Urban Ethnography course on a walkabout in Providence, Rhode Island, to practice observation.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0022-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"students and professor walk on city sidewalk\" class=\"wp-image-20738\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0022-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0022-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0022-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0022-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0022-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Urban_Ethnography_Lab_28_MAR_2025-0022-1200x800.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Geography Professor Asha Best leads her Urban Ethnography course on a walkabout in Providence, Rhode Island, to practice observation.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text alignwide is-stacked-on-mobile is-vertically-aligned-center has-gray-400-background-color has-background\" style=\"padding-right:var(--wp--preset--spacing--10);padding-left:var(--wp--preset--spacing--10)\"><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"682\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Humpback-whale-British-Columbia-1024x682.jpg\" alt=\"Humpback whale breaching\" class=\"wp-image-12121 size-full\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Humpback-whale-British-Columbia-1024x682.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Humpback-whale-British-Columbia-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Humpback-whale-British-Columbia-768x511.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Humpback-whale-British-Columbia-1536x1022.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Humpback-whale-British-Columbia-2048x1363.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Humpback-whale-British-Columbia-1200x799.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center has-gray-400-background-color has-background\">More Geography on Challenge. Change.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2023\/11\/16\/utopian-problems\/\">Utopian Visions, Social Values, and Urban Design with Professor Deborah Martin<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2023\/01\/13\/sounding-a-warning\/\">Indigenous Heavy Metal and Whale Song with Professor Max Ritts<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2022\/12\/20\/a-deep-dig-into-the-extractives-industry\/\">The Opportunity and Concern of Extractive Industries with Professor Anthony Bebbington<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Geography Professor Asha Best, an urbanist who studies mobility and urban informality, is researching how planners and developers can build just cities, where everyone lives equitably. But one thing she\u2019s noticed throughout her studies is that there is no common definition of what justice looks like.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":20737,"template":"","meta":{"story_color":"var(--clarku-color-blue)","story_headerImg":20737,"section_label":"Challenge. Change. Podcast","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[225,223,241,245],"displayed_author":[237],"featured":[],"topic":[165,211,176,273,171,299],"class_list":["post-20736","story","type-story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-humanities","category-clark-community","category-environment-sustainability","category-social-sciences","displayed_author-melissa-hanson","topic-geography","topic-geography-faculty","topic-podcast","topic-social-change","topic-social-justice","topic-urban-issues"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.2 (Yoast SEO v27.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Building equitable cities | ClarkU News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2025\/04\/02\/building-equitable-cities\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Building equitable cities\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Geography Professor Asha Best, an urbanist who studies mobility and urban informality, is researching how planners and developers can build just cities, where everyone lives equitably. 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