Off the Rails: Megadevelopment and the Future of the City 1 Washington Place, New York, NY 15 October 2019, 6:30 pm It may be time for urbanists to call this "the era of the megadevelopment." Everywhere one turns, a rail-yard is being transformed into a futuristic shopping district, highways are becoming greenways, and pop-up neighborhoods are being accessed through gated, securitized portals. From some perspectives, we are watching utopias take the place of underutilized urban land, while, from others, large-scale development reads as undisguised dystopia. As megadevelopments rise worldwide, often financed by the taxes we pay, we ask: How much was the public involved in determining their outcomes, or in deciding whether a development was necessary at all? How are public benefits integrated into these plans and how beneficial are they in reality? What is the consequence of megadevelopments on democracy, displacement, and the city of the future? Discussants: Zaire Dinzey-Flores, Associate Professor, Department of Latino and Caribbean Studies and the Department of Sociology, Rutgers-New Brunswick Winifred Curran, Professor, Geography, DePaul University Betty Y. Chen, Principal, BYC Projects, and former New York City Planning Commissioner Moderator: Louise Harpman, Professor, NYU Gallatin Arooj Malik Queens College 65-30 Kissena Boulevard Flushing, NY 11367 College Assistant Urban Studies (718)997-5130