How should a forgotten neighborhood in a rapidly sprawling tropical city serve as a model project for a newly created urban planning department?
Panama’s first urban regeneration plan leverages cultural resources with the introduction of a new light rail line. The centrally located Calidonia neighborhood is the site of the 1916 international exposition celebrating the construction of the Panama Canal. Adjacent to a UNESCO World Heritage Site and Panama’s Cinta Costera waterfront park. The vision charts a path for the “next 100 years,” honoring the cultural heritage of the 1916 Panama Expo and laying the groundwork for a transit-oriented, walkable neighborhood in the heart of the rapidly growing metropolitan region.
Services included professional planning, technical assistance, and organizational capacity development, which resulted in new professional practices for the city’s newly created urban planning department. Several prototypical participatory planning exercises were used to advance a federal directive to devolve land-use planning powers from the federal to municipal governments. Client: World Bank Group & Municipality of Panama City, Panama, 2013-2018.