Pablo Aguilar believes a new type of collaboration can help border cities across the world work together on shared challenges A proposed multicity bike trail being discussed by leaders in Matamoros, Mexico, and Brownsville, Texas, which would link into a larger trail system proposed for the Lower Rio Grande, presents a vision for cross-border collaboration at odds with this year?s political dialogue.
And according to many city officials and planners involved in the effort, which held a meeting in Brownsville last Friday, the possibility of creating a "conurban" space?a legal framework that allows for closer collaboration between the two cities?sets up a way of working together that might impact border regions around the world. "We have different regulations in Brownsville and Matamoros, and urban planning with different visions, but we also have the same problems," says Pablo Aguilar, who runs the Mexican think tank the National Urban Jurisprudence Association, an organization which has helped facilitate the collaboration between the two cities.
Aguilar, who is working to refine the conurban concept, will present the plans and collaboration at the UN Habitat IIIConference in Quito, Ecuador, this October, a gathering of urban planners from across the globe. He believes this type of collaboration?which helps cut through bureaucratic barriers?can work for border towns and cities across the globe, and facilitate more collaboration ove...