The million-dollar question, however, is how these cities’ future development plans are going to be financed. One of the best routes forward—and all of the 2020 Global Sustainability Centers seem to understand this—is for cities to cooperate with the businesses operating within their borders. This benefits both parties; businesses drive their revenue through partnerships, and cities tap local resources to improve their quality of life. In fact, this concept is almost necessary to give any legitimacy to a city’s sustainability program.
Only American City to crack the top 10 of large cities is NYC; only in mid-sized cities is Portland. Leaving out Dallas was clearly appropriate an oversight.
Also of note, that despite China’s best efforts at humongo-cities from scratch eco-cities, not one showed up on the list. Perhaps that zero in categories of free media/speech and transparency/justice had a little sump’n sump’n to do with that.
I had never heard of Ethisphere before, but it looks like a pretty good, knowledgeable/progressive AND pragmatic source.
