With the Works Festival, Street Performers Festival, Taste of Edmonton, and Cariwest Festival just around the corner, soon Churchill Square will be a hub of summer activity. But it’s not just the festivals that draw in the crowds. Working in City Hall I get a chance to see how Churchill Square is used on a daily basis.

Last week I was photographing the celebrations of National Compost Week at City Hall and I noticed that the square seemed particularly busy. All of the tables alongside City Hall pool were full, there were long line ups at the hot dog stand on the corner across from the Art Gallery of Alberta, and the square was full of people eating lunch, reading, playing basketball, and people watching.

Even though I like the excitement of the summer festivals… there’s always something interesting to see at the Works, I like to see if any of the returning street performers might recycle old jokes, Taste of Edmonton provides a tasty lunch, and my mom is from the Caribbean so I have a special connection to Cariwest… it’s really that every day use of the square that I like best. Maybe it’s because I don’t have to wait for the event to happen, I don’t have to buy tickets or tip anyone, I can just walk right down to the square and find a spot in the sun (or shade depending on my mood) to read or eat lunch, have a meeting with my colleagues, or if I’m feeling particularly athletic, shoot some hoops (one of my women I work with will even play in heels). Even in the cooler months I’ve taken a minute or two to stop in the square to collect my thoughts after a meeting or taken photographs of the sun glinting off of the City Hall pyramid (and I’m not the only one who likes to take pictures in Churchill Square).

Public spaces like Churchill Square are there for citizens to use, so it’s great to see the square bustling with activity on ordinary days when there are no big events or festivals to draw us in. And with gorgeous weather forecasted for the remainder of the week, it’s a perfect time to get outside and visit the City’s public spaces, be it a nearby square or community park. Let the weather serve as your incentive. These places are meant to be gathering places, so find a reason and gather there.

We made it!

After four long years of construction the next major milestone on Edmonton’s road to urban sustainability is just ahead. While City Councillors and local media had a sneak preview last week, the official grand opening of at the new LRT Stations at Southgate and Century Park is scheduled for Saturday, April 24 2010.

Last stop, Century Park! The South LRT extension is the most recent milestone on the City of Edmonton's path to building a more sustainable community.

Everyone is invited to attend the ceremonies at both locations. The Southgate ceremony starts at 10 am on Saturday; Century Park is at 10:30 am. We are closing the northbound lanes of 111th Street temporarily at both stations to accommodate spectators, transit enthusiasts and citizens of all walks of life. After the ceremonies the Edmonton Transit System (ETS) is hosting a community fair at both locations. The more the merrier – please come down and join the party.

Bus service to both locations is available, despite the road closure. Alternatively, take the LRT to South Campus and jump on a shuttle bus to Southgate or Century Park. LRT service is free from 9 am to 6 pm. LRT to Century Park won’t be available until 11 am, after the ceremonies.

Immense Modes (right), a public art project at Southgate Station. The extension from Health Sciences to Southgate and Century Park covers 7.631-kilometres. This will serve communities of southwest Edmonton and provide new connections to business areas like Southgate Mall..

Parking is also available at both venues. At Southgate, the administration at Southgate Centre Mall has graciously offered mall parking – for one day only! – to all patrons of the Southgate grand opening and community fair (please note: LRT parking will not be available at Southgate after April 24). Motorists can park at Southgate, take in the opening ceremony and check out the community fair inside the LRT station pedway and at the Southgate Mall centre food court.

At Century Park, motorists can park at the new temporary Park & Ride lot that’s opening 1,100 new stalls the same day, April 24. After the opening ceremony the ETS Community Fair continues until 5 pm at a nearby pavilion, with entertainment, tours, displays and a mini farmers’ market.

Free LRT service to both new stations begins at 11 am. Partygoers can jump on the train to shuttle back and forth between the parties at Southgate and Century Park, free of charge.

When the South LRT opens in a few days, passengers will be able to ride in the same seat from Clareview to Century Park through a total 15 stations, covering 20 kilometres in 34 minutes!

In the midst of all the merriment we’d do well to remember that four years is a long time to endure a major construction project, as residents, businesses and commuters of the 111th Street corridor can attest. The City of Edmonton owes its gratitude to all the people who put up with major disruptions for such a long time. Their contribution to the successful completion of the South LRT is invaluable. This is their celebration, and a testament to their patience and goodwill.

Continuum, part of a series of sculptures at Century Park Station. Explore the station and check them all out.

But the South LRT is also the product of a massive amount of work. So the City of Edmonton also thanks the hundreds of consultants and contractors who built the South LRT, and the taxpayers of Canada, Alberta and Edmonton for making their work possible.

Bottom line: the South LRT belongs to Edmontonians. Please use it. In 2007 the complete 7.6 km extension was projected to double LRT weekday ridership in Edmonton from 50,000 daily riders to 100,000. We are on track to meet that goal; help us get there.

Regular LRT service to Century Park begins Sunday, April 25 2010.

As a recent newcomer to the city, I initially viewed Edmonton as another large city where individuals are lost in the large population and my community came from my network of family and friends scattered throughout the city and province.  A large city can be very overwhelming to someone who grew up in a small farming community in northern Alberta.  Up north it is quite common to know all your neighbors, and the sense of community and personal belonging is quite strong when it is on a smaller scale.  I didn’t think it was possible to experience those same feelings in a larger city, until I started volunteering for Next Gen and partnering with the Edmonton Federation of Community Leagues.

The city as a whole is large and sprawling, but when you start dividing it into 150 regions or leagues, you suddenly realize that it is very much like a patchwork quilt of smaller communities and local neighborhoods.  You realize that although you may not be able to make a huge difference in the city as a whole, you can certainly make a difference in your local community league and in your own backyard.  Edmonton was the first city in Canada to establish a community based organization, with the first one forming in 1917.  These leagues are the history of Edmonton and the people who formed them did it with passion and dedication to their local communities.  Our generation needs to continue building these communities.

NextGen held its first Community Challenge event back in July 2009 over 50 interested young people meet with 30 seasoned community league executives. The session facilitated by the NextGen Special Projects Committee and the Edmonton Federation of Community Leagues.

The Edmonton Community Challenge, a grassroots event currently in the works for June 2010, was an idea that came about from that very concept.  How do we empower and encourage our generation to make a difference in their own backyard and their local community?  Next Gen and the EFCL partnered up in 2009 and a new idea was born – a fun event, open to all ages, that would reward participants for their participation, civic pride, and their desire to do some good for the local community.  Getting to know your neighbors, having fun with your family and friends, contributing to a local charity, and winning a cash prize for your community league for a community project – how many more incentives do we need?

Discussion during the July 2009 event was focused around helping leagues become more welcoming and more engaged with people under 40 - a target demographic identified by leagues last year.

Teams of all ages representing a number of Community Leagues throughout the City of Edmonton will participate in a month long challenge to win a cash prize that will directly benefit their Community League.  The events will take place throughout the month of June 2010, and will include a Neighborhood Cleanup on June 5, 24 Hour Bike Tune Up on June 12, and a Canned Food Sculpture Competition on June 26.  Points will be awarded to teams based on criteria established for each event. The winner will be announced on July 1, at the Canada Day celebrations in Churchill Square.

How can you get involved?  The first step is to encourage your community league to participate and organize a team.  The second step, tell your friends, family, coworkers, local barista or postman and rally the troops!  We will be launching a new website within the next week, so keep checking NextGen’s website for more details.

First of all, apologies for the big gap between posts. Getting all the information from paper into electronic form has taken much longer than anyone expected. Our working group is having a bit of a shake-up. Some of our volunteers are no longer able to offer the amount of time they had previously, so we’re moving slowly (but we’re still moving). We have all the notes you all wrote on the tables entered now, but it’s taking a while to get everything organized. I hope I will have more for you next week.

Secondly, thank you to everyone who provided feedback on the first Engage: Your City Your Voice event through our surveys, over twitter, and in the comments on my last post. Your feedback is important as we build Engage into a series of events.
And because your feedback is so important, I’ll take this post to share with you some of the themes that came out of your feedback and how the working group is planning to move forward.

photo credit: mastermaq

Generally speaking, the majority of the feedback we received was quite positive.  It’s very apparent that you think discussion is important and you want to participate in your city, and you think that Engage: Your City, Your Voice is a good way to do that. That’s exciting for me because it means there’s a large group of people out there who want to contribute to making the city better.

There were, of course, constructive criticisms and the working group is taking them very seriously. There were 4 big things that stood out amongst the feedback. And as with all feedback, there were good and bad comments on each.

1. Venue: Opinion was pretty evenly split on City Hall as a venue for this type of event. Lots of you really love City Hall and thought it was an inspiring place to hold the event, especially given the topics. The other half thought the space was too large and too loud for good discussion.

The working group thought City Hall was a great venue, especially for our first event, but we are planning to try different venues around the city in an effort to try and reach different groups of people.

2. Accessibility: Nearly everyone who provided feedback was glad the venue was easily accessible by public transportation.
The working group will definitely keep this in mind as we book spaces for future events.

3. Audience: Some people felt the audience or participants were not diverse enough. A number of people felt that this was the same general group of fairly privileged people providing opinions on inner city issues and homelessness without including homeless people and people from lower income neighbourhoods.

Part of the reason the working group wants to try different venues is to try to reach different groups of people. We will also try other ways of getting the word out about our events to engage with a more diverse crowd.

4. Facilitation: There were mixed reviews on this as well, but generally the comments agree that we need to have better trained facilitators to make these events meaningful for everyone that attends.

Our facilitators are volunteers and have varying experience with facilitation, but the working group will prepare them better for future events.

Thank you all again for coming out to Engage: Your City, Your Voice – Life in the Urban Core. I hope you’ll continue to attend our future events (including the upcoming Community Challenge, there will be a post about this from Tegan next week) and bring your passion and enthusiasm for Edmonton.

Just as Lyndia promised in her post a few weeks ago, members of the City of Edmonton Youth Council are going to start blogging. I’ll be the first to post about my experiences with the Youth Council, in particular about my position as Youth Council Chair and how I work with the General Assembly.

Although the majority of the Youth Council’s work is done in separate subcommittees (which will be discussed in later posts), the heart of the City of Edmonton Youth Council (CEYC) is the General Assembly (GA). The General Assembly is made up of all the members of CEYC (currently about 35 volunteers) who meet the first Wednesday of every month to hear updates from the Exec about the goings-on of the different subcommittees, as well as participate in social events and/or educational presentations and discuss issues concerning the GA as a whole.

MC for the Streets Speak mural series event at City Hall, February 16. 2010.

Contrary to what you might expect, as Chair I do not manage the agenda of the GA meetings. Rather, the meetings are run by a speaker chosen from the GA, a position that is rotated to a new GA member every month.

At first glance, the role of Youth Council Chair seems to be straightforward. In practise, however, the position of chair is rather open-ended. When I first ran for Chair in the summer of 2009, I was aware of the position’s official duties, which included planning and coordinating executive meetings as well as providing leadership for the Youth Council as a whole.

I soon found, however, that it was up to me to decide exactly what ‘providing leadership’ meant. The previous CEYC Chair had chosen to focus on heading the Homelessness Subcommittee. I however, felt that it was more important to allow my excellent executive to complete their tasks as they saw fit. I thus have chosen to provide a supporting role, sitting on three of our six subcommittees.

CEYC Transportation Subcommittee

And therein lies the most important duty of the Chair, in my opinion: regardless of the level of direct control the Chair chooses in exert in any given subcommittee, it is absolutely essential for the Chair to provide support and direction for the Youth Council as a whole. This can range from providing feedback for the executive to fulfilling the duties of the paid Coordinator when he or she is unavailable. This year, I felt that it was critical that CEYC improve the overall participation and attendance of the GA. This is a responsibility shared by the entire executive but the Chair needs to be especially aware of any problems facing CEYC at any given time. As the head of the City of Edmonton Youth Council, the position of Chair is absolutely vital.

Accepting the Youth Week 2009 Proclamation from Councillor Iveson

It has been an absolute pleasure to serve as the Chair of the City of Edmonton Youth Council so far, and I look forward to the rest of my term!

Nobody expects to see this train.

LRT on 111th Street travels the median of the roadway

Sure, there’s been construction in the middle of 111^th Street in south Edmonton for years, wreaking all kinds of traffic havoc for motorists and pedestrians alike. With a project of this magnitude, with perpetual traffic detours and delays, everybody knew something big was coming. But now that it’s here, the South LRT is catching people by surprise.

You see it in drivers’ faces as the train cruises down the roadway median, zipping between vehicles on 111^th Street. Drivers do a double-take, eyes wide, when they see a train fly past at 70 km/h, where no train used to be.

Right now it’s just commissioning, which is the comprehensive testing process for new LRT. The trains, the electrical systems, the signalization… everything’s got to be running smoothly, perfectly, before the South LRT can safely open to public service on April 25^th, 2010.

We’re getting there. New commissioning tests are completed every day. Which means from now on, trains are moving on the South LRT tracks, in perpetuity. Anyone crossing 111^th Street needs to know that trains are there.

Things have changed at 111^th Street intersections between 23^rd Avenue and 61^st Avenue. The intersections are wider; new traffic signs, signals and gates are operational; tracks are running through the middle, and trains are starting to move on those tracks. Drivers and pedestrians are beginning to interact with trains.

With all the changes, commissioning wrapping up and trains starting to roll, the main question for the City is how to keep South LRT intersections safe. Specifically, what can the City do to prevent four types of collisions: train/car, train/pedestrian, car/car, and car/pedestrian?

South LRT intersections include several safety features

Designing and building the intersections to be as safe as possible is one answer. Spreading the word about traffic safety is another. But no solution is foolproof, in part because every solution is pinned to the underlying fact that no government can control all the actions of its citizens.

When it comes to traffic, people break the law. If they did not – if every person who ever came into contact with the South LRT always obeyed every traffic bylaw to 100 percent accuracy – there would almost never be any collisions. But people make mistakes. The best their government can do is to try to minimize the frequency and consequence of those mistakes.

Safety features at each South LRT intersection help to achieve this goal. So does the City’s TraXSafe program that teaches how to stay safe around LRT. Public safety is a shared responsibility, though, so a return to defensive driving and safety fundamentals is the best measure any citizen can take.

It will take time for people to grow accustomed to the changes at South LRT intersections. So take the time. Be patient. Go slow. Everyone will get where they need to go, safely, if we all take a little extra time to watch out for each other.

For more information visit the City’s TraXSafe program at www.edmonton.ca/traxsafe

The cameras are in place, participants will soon be starting to arrive at the Art Gallery of Alberta (and online) for the Open City Workshop.

Join the LIVE  (bilingual)WEBCAST here. We will be broadcasting all day, so check out the video feed or if you’re participating remotely you can also join our chat room to get involved in the conversation. You can also follow the conversation on twitter with the #yegdatag #openyeg hashtag

UPDATE: We are working hard to get the video archive of the panel up soon. So stay tuned.

Workshop Agenda

9:30 – 10:00 am Registration
10:00 am – 12:00 pm Morning session and activities featuring panel discussion
12:00 – 12:45 pm Lunch (provided on-site)
12:45 – 4:00 pm Afternoon session featuring collaborative break-outs

With over 160 people registered today is sure to be a day full of interesting conversation on the topic of open government, the City’s Open Data initiative.

We’ll also be joining up with the Gov. 2.0 Camp in New England over our lunch hour. Great minds think alike.

It’s been quite a journey for me these past few months. I’ve had the pleasure of working with some amazing and dedicated colleagues organizing the November 21 Open Data Workshop and building the Open Data Catalogue.  Shortly after that workshop and release of the data catalogue, fellow blogger Ashley and I had the good fortune of attending and being inspired by CityCamp in Chicago. Since then I’ve been working with even more of my colleagues on the next steps, including the upcoming March 6th Open City Workshop.

The majority of participants in last year’s Open Data Workshop were from Edmonton’s technology community. And like the bulletin board systems that predated today’s internet, these early adopters helped explore this new ground. But in order for these concepts to thrive, the value they represent needs to find a home in the minds of a broader collection of individuals and leaders in the community, academia, private sector and the public service. Even more importantly, we need representatives from all of these groups together: talking, collaborating and sharing insights and ideas.

Open Data Workshop participants brainstorm ideas about the principles of open data.

Government 2.0 isn’t about brandishing technology like a panacea, nor does it constitute simply pushing government services onto the web. With any successful technology, it will evolve with time until it becomes effectively invisible until, for example, we try to lock our car door with the keys still inside.

So what does that have to do with government?  Let’s take an icy intersection as an example. How many drivers (or their ABS systems) on a given winter day discover the dangers of a particular strip of black ice for themselves? What if you instructed your vehicle’s ABS computer to share the where and when of the incident with a common, open system, one that belongs to the public? Cars coming by later could then warn their drivers, or maybe display a caution symbol on in-car navigation systems. Just as importantly, as this information comes in, it becomes possible to very quickly and accurately pinpoint trouble spots as they form.

The first steps towards this would (were I to wager a guess) involve some imperfect data, perhaps drawn from traffic volume and accident rates, and the initial applications of it will probably only be available as web or mobile applications on phones belonging to tech-savvy early adopters, it would be some time before this might appear as a “no-tech-skill required” feature in vehicles and navigation systems.

But Government 2.0 is more than just improving traffic safety and other services. Sure, these sorts of solutions and innovations would emerge, and principles of “openness” help to remove a lot of the barriers, but I like to think of it as the enabler of this sort of idea and vision. The example above is just my own idea, I haven’t yet vetted it, so maybe it’s not even a good idea. But it’s safe to say I’m not alone in this, there are many more ideas both good and bad out there in the community. Sharing our ideas with others and getting their feedback allows us to discern the great from the good, discover if others have the same sorts of ideas, and then perhaps move from concept to reality.

In sum, the way I look at it, what an Open City really does is enables the community and its members to: 1) bring their ideas together and share them, 2) to develop and build on those ideas, drawing out the best and most visionary of them, and 3) take part in making those ideas a reality. Government then, is the platform that enables this to happen, it always has been, but now we have new approaches and new tools to bring us closer to that reality. These are not easy problems, and there are no perfect solutions to any of them, but we’re taking steps.  Open Data, for example, speaks primarily to #3, enabling those with technological inclinations to bring new ideas to life. With time, some of those technical barriers will fall, but I believe there are other possibilities to enable more of the population to work together towards initiatives like open data and open gov.

Despite the number of laptops present at the planning sessions for the Open City workshop the event on March 6th will be an inclusive conversation that doesn't focus on technology alone.

This Open City Workshop (which I think you’ll find is a bit different from what you might expect from a government run event) is just one way we’re working towards sharing and developing ideas together, and maybe more possibilities will emerge from it. I know I have more ideas to share, I hope you do too.

So what does an Open City mean to you? Come to the Art Gallery of Alberta on March 6 (or participate online) and let us all know!

The contents of this post are licensed under a Creative Commons Licence.

Recently, I had the opportunity to attend a lecture at City Hall by Richard Heinberg, an award-winning author and educator. Heinberg, who hails from the Post Carbon Institute in Santa Rosa California, is a futurist and leading international commentator on Peak Oil. He is the first speaker in the City of Edmonton’s Distinguisher Speaker Series that will help inform The Way We Green, Edmonton’s new environmental strategic plan. Heinberg’s topic was peak oil and how this trend could impact Edmonton’s future.

Part 1

So what is peak oil?

Peak oil occurs when new discoveries of economically viable oil deposits and related production begin to decline over time. In his presentation, Heinberg said the US used to be the world’s foremost oil producer. But oil production in the States peaked in 1970 and has been in decline ever since. A similar trend is happening world wide. As Heinberg explained: “Global oil production falls when loss of output from countries declining exceeds gains from those expanding.” In other words, one barrel of oil is now being discovered for every five being consumed and world oil production has been flat since 2005.

Part 2

On the day of Heinberg’s lecture, the Wall Street Journal reported: “A shortage of oil could be a real problem for the world within a fairly short period of time.”

Part 3

Could this shortage of oil affect Edmonton? Surely we have a huge supply nearby in the oil sands? Well, this is where things can get complicated. The costs of mining and extraction from the oil sands are significantly higher than those with conventional oil. Heinberg added another twist in that it is not only the quantity of oil produced that constitutes a challenge but the cost.

Part 4

He explained how the supply of oil affects our economy and how our standard of living is related to a narrow crude oil ‘price band’. If prices are too high, the economy slows down, for example, the cost of air travel and food production increases. If prices are too low, investment decreases and economic expansion is limited and the building of our infrastructure diminishes.

Part 5

Richard Heinberg suggested that we view fossil fuels not as an end point but as a bridge to a future of renewable energies and that we plan and act proactively while we still have the opportunity to do so.

Part 6

In the coming months, we will be posting updates on the main City website (The Way We Green) and on the Transforming Edmonton Blog, including more videos from our speakers’ series and reporting on the progress of Way we Green planning process.

Pecha Kucha pronounced pe-cha-ku-cha (with the same emphasis on every syllable) has been an ongoing (and somewhat un-pronounceable) event for almost two years. Edmonton’s NextGen Commitee hosted the first Pecha Kucha in Western Canada back in May of 2008 (Vancouver and Calgary followed soon afterwards with their own events).

Western Canada's first Pecha Kucha Night was held in Edmonton on May 1, 2008

Pecha Kucha, (for all those wondering out there in the great Edmonton yonder) simply means chitchat in Japanese. The first Pecha Kucha was held in Tokyo in 2003 and now can be found in over 170 cities worldwide. It’s a night that brings presenters on the creative forefront in from various design fields from the same city together to share, discuss and debate with the public. The catch, is that the powerpoint presentation format is limited to 20 slides, 20 seconds a slide in order to avert the “death by powerpoint” doldrums.

The crowd at the first Pecha Kucha watch introductory greetings from Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham of Klein Dytham architecture, creators of Pecha Kucha.

The mandate of Next Gen is to develop the opportunity for the voice of young people to be heard and take an active role in the development of our community, a perfect fit with the concept offered by Pecha Kucha. It’s an evening out that gets people talking and increases their awareness that there are many creative ways to get involved in the development of their city.

Former Next Gen Committee member and Pecha Kucha organizer, Elicia Elliot explained, “The ability to make partnerships between different groups of designers from photographers to architects and the public is something that would not normally happen without an event like Pecha Kucha.”

Presenter Aidan Rowe at the second Pecha Kucha Night held at the Trans-Alta Arts Barn, Sept. 2008

So far, there have been six Pecha Kuchas to date, with a seventh on the way. Each on has their own unique theme, venue, audience size and attendees who are always keen to provide what they loved, hated and were impartial to. They do this through the Next Gen follow up survey posted on edmontonnextgen.ca and the fast #pkn hash tagging fingers plugged in though Twitter during the events.

Presenter Tobias Olivia at Pecha Kucha 3 speaks about the University of Alberta's Student Design Association.

All Pecha Kucha events have featured performances from local talent. Pecha Kucha 3 featured DJ Jaycie Jayce of Shout Out Out.

Notable Pucha Kucha moments to date include Pecha Kucha 4, which was held while the City of Edmonton was hosting the ICLEI World Congress on Sustainability during June of 2009.

Pecha Kucha 4 was held during the ICLEI World Congress.Numerous Congress delegates made a point of stopping in to see the presentations that focused on the theme of sustainability.

The opportunity meant Next Gen organizers were able to use the same facilities as the congress and capitalize on the meeting of  the international association of municipal governments from 57 countries. The Congress has held at the Shaw Conference Centre and due to the large size of the facilities NextGen was able to invite a crowd of 600 to this third installment of Pecha Kucha. In the end, there were more than 600 participants and  50 ICLEI delegates who spent the evening exchanging ideas abou the concept of sustainability across many different professions.

photo credit: dave.cournoyer

Pecha Kucha 5 was able to build on the success of Pecha Kucha 4 and was held at the equally impressive Myer Howerwitz Theatre thanks to the support of the University of Alberta Art’s Alumni.

photo credit: mastermaq

Presenters have been able to capture the changing mood and the eclectic mix that is Edmonton’s hard working populace. From land development project managers, industrial designers, volunteers, art and design students, graphic designers, photographers, social activists, architects, public art directors who always find a way their own way to incorporate each unique Pecha Kucha design related theme into their 6 minutes and 40 seconds in front of the crowd.

The open invitation for presentations gets a good number of submissions, but the Next Gen crew is always on the lookout for more Edmontonians to share with others what they are up to through a Pecha Kucha night.

Design is always the underlying concept for Pecha Kucha nights, but inevitably some presentations tend towards  self-promotion or pure abstraction that can make the audience shake their heads. Six Pecha Kuchas in, it seems the best presentations are those that use humour, odd segways and references to share an awareness of projects that are underway in the city or brewing below the surface of people who live, work (and play) in our northern city.

Pecha Kucha 6 was held at McDougall Church. There were over 450 people in attendance. This evening sparked a lot of spirited comments from the audience, many who shared their thoughts online.

Not all Pecha Kucha events have a theme. Pecha Kucha 6 was slightly obscure (Psst... It's a Secret) which led to some interesting interpretations by presenters (some more successful than others).

The beauty of Pecha Kucha comes from the fact that an industrial design student can jump up on stage after a much accomplished land developer, and both are equally subject to the sharp, no holds barred commentary of the audience. But that commentary is the point of Pecha Kucha. These presentations are meant to inspire chitchat about ideas that will help motivate us, out of inspiration or frustration, to create a better city.

For more info on Pecha Kucha Night in Edmonton visit: www.pecha-kucha.org/night/edmonton/
If you’re interested in presenting at PKN 7, please email: nextgen@edmonton.ca for the info on how to submit a presentation.

You can also see more images from all of our Pecha Kucha events in the NextGen flickr pool.