NEW CLARK City — The New Clark City is hosting the 60th World Planning Congress (WPC60) starting yesterday to 13 September, drawing hundreds of urban planners, architects, engineers, property developers and academics here.

According to the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA), the WPC60 gathers planners, architects and enthusiasts for this congress geared towards urban, regional and environmental planning.

Organized by the International Society of City and Regional Planners (ISOCARP), the WPC60 will be held alongside the 1st International Conference on New Cities-Planning New Regenerative Cities.

The Provincial Government of Tarlac (PGT) led by Gov. Susan A. Yap, and the Local Organizing Committee led by Philippine Planner and ISOCARP-member EnP Haydee Jacklyn M. Quintana Malubay will host the event.

New Clark City Tarlac is the ideal venue for this theme, rising in a former military base from the literal ashes of Mount Pinatubo.

An established global non-governmental organization founded in 1965 and based in the Hague, ISOCARP is a network of professional urban planners from 90+ countries. Its main event, the annual WPC addresses traditional planning issues through rigorously selected technical papers. In its Diamond year, the WPC opens in NCC Tarlac and closes this October in Siena, Italy.

While WPC is long established, the Planning New Regenerative Cities conference is a world first after many years of deliberation, focusing on challenges facing “new” (regenerative) cities and their relationship with nature.

New Clark City Tarlac is the ideal venue for this theme, rising in a former military base from the literal ashes of Mount Pinatubo. Foreign and national delegates can fly into an award-winning international airport, attend sessions at iconic structures created for the 30th SEA Games in 2019, and stroll along the River Park for post-sessions programs against a stunning backdrop of mountains, sunrise and sunset.

Over the conference’s four days, keynote speakers include Dr. Arsenio M. Balisacan, National Economic and Development Authority secretary, the country’s planning authority; Anacláudia C. Rossbach, executive director for UN Habitat; Sylvester Wong, vice president at AECom Asia Pacific, which formulated the masterplan for NCC Tarlac; Guy Castelaine Perry, VP for Urban Planning and Design at McKinsey; and Ann Forsyth, of the Harvard Graduate School of Design, among many others. Several other international experts from UN Habitat and other planning and development organizations are set to participate in panels, debates, knowledge-sharing and capacity-building.