Book excerpt: A groundbreaking exploration of the most promising new ideas for creating the sustainable cities of tomorrow The culmination of a four-year collaborative research project undertaken by leading UK universities, in partnership with city authorities, prominent architecture firms, and major international consultants, Retrofitting Cities for Tomorrow's World explores the theoretical and practical aspects of the transition towards sustainability in the built environment that will occur in the years ahead. The emphasis throughout is on emerging systems innovations and bold new ways of imagining and re-imagining urban retrofitting, set within the context of ‘futures-based’ thinking. The concept of urban retrofitting has gained prominence within both the research and policy arenas in recent years. While cities are often viewed as a source of environmental stress and resource depletion they are also hubs of learning and innovation offering enormous potential for scaling up technological responses. But city-level action will require a major shift in thinking and a scaling up of positive responses to climate change and the associated threats of environmental and social degradation. Clearly the time has come for a more coordinated, planned, and strategic approach that will allow cities to transition to a sustainable future. This book summarizes many of the best new ideas currently in play on how to achieve those goals. Reviews the most promising ideas for how to approach planning and coordinating a more sustainable urban future by 2050 through retrofitting existing structures Explores how cities need to govern for urban retrofit and how future urban transitions and pathways can be managed, modeled and navigated Offers inter-disciplinary insights from international contributors from both the academic and professional spheres Develops a rigorous conceptual framework for analyzing existing challenges and fostering innovative ways of addressing those challenges Retrofitting Cities for Tomorrow's World is must-reading for academic researchers, including postgraduates insustainability, urban planning, environmental studies, economics, among other fields. It is also an important source of fresh ideas and inspiration for town planners, developers, policy advisors, and consultants working within the field of sustainability, energy, and the urban environment.