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Events
Andrew Light Speaker Tour in Europe May 14, 2013 / Berlin, Germany; Brussels, BelgiumGMF Senior Fellow Andrew Light participated in a speaking tour in Europe to discuss opportunities for transatlantic cooperation on climate and energy policy in the second Obama administration.
In this podcast, GMF Vice President of Programs Ivan Vejvoda discusses last month's historic agreement to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia.
Anchor Elaine Reyes speaks with Andrew Small, Transatlantic Fellow of the Asia Program for the German Marshall Fund, about Beijing's potential role in brokering peace between Israel and Palestine
Events
Virginia benefits from Stuttgart’s regional developement experience August 08, 2006 / Washington, DC
On Tuesday, August 8, GMF Washington’s Comparative Domestic Policy program hosted a luncheon entitled “Different Structures – Similar Problems: Transatlantic City-to-City Learning.” The discussion focused on the partnership between Northern Virginia in the United States and the Stuttgart Region in Germany. In 2000, Mark Gibb, Executive Director of the Northern Virginia Regional Commission, chose the two areas due to their geographical and population similarities.
The focus of Gibb’s presentation centered on the benefits derived from Northern Virginia city-to-city connection with Stuttgart. There has been much enthusiasm from both sides to continue exporting the lessons learned, adding to the momentum that kept the exchange running for the past five years. Gibb noted several tangible examples of how these ideas have manifested themselves in his region.
After seeing the projects in Stuttgart, Virginian officials decided to extend Metro to Tyson’s Corner using the same underground building techniques used on the other side of the Atlantic. The car sharing programs in Virginia are also a direct result of this partnership. Fairfax County implemented “traffic pillows” and an ever-increasing number of roundabouts to help with traffic calming programs, developments first seen in Europe by Northern Virginia’s elected officials. Northern Virginia is also hiring German engineers to help with this type of planning.
Other programs have been adopted in the Northern Virginia region, as well. Residents are seeing “green” rooftops in the area, which is slowly becoming mandatory for new construction. Towns are planning more pedestrian-oriented communities, in addition to the storm water management projects that are deriving much of their structure from what was seen in the Stuttgart Region. Issues of air flow were first seen on the initial study tour to Germany and since then, the Department of Homeland Security has begun to consider these ideas as a way to make cities safer from possible terrorist attacks. Reston, VA, also now uses 3-D imaging for project planning, a practice seen in Stuttgart.
