Sudeshna Chatterjee

Program Director - Sustainable Cities and Transport

Bio

Sudeshna Chatterjee is the Program Director for Sustainable Cities and Transport at WRI India. Sudeshna’s work at WRI focuses on overseeing and participating in high-quality research and publications across diverse strands of work within sustainable cities and transport including urban resilience, transit-oriented development (TOD), public transport, public space, land development, air pollution, electric mobility, hydrogen, economic geography, and India’s urbanization trends. She also undertakes some independent research.

Sudeshna brings nearly twenty years of experience as an urbanist, urban planner, designer, researcher, evaluator, and educator. She has always seen her role as a bridge-builder between the communities of knowledge and practice intersecting research (evidence generation and evaluation), planning (evidence-based planning and design of built environments for people and environment-friendly cities), teaching, and capacity-building. Sudeshna has mapped, monitored, and evaluated complex urban policies and programs across the world and served as international research lead on multi-country projects that included countries such as Bangladesh, Belize, Brazil, India, Japan, Lebanon, Nepal, Philippines, Spain, Sweden, Syria, Thailand, Turkey, USA, and Vietnam. Sudeshna co-led the first corporate evaluation of UNICEF’s Work on Children in Cities for UNICEF Headquarters, New York, by mapping UNICEF’s urban programming in 72 countries and conducting detailed case studies of different models that are representative of best practices of key urban programming approaches. Most recently, Sudeshna led the UN system-wide effort for developing Global Principles and Guidance on Public Space for Children as an international consultant to UNICEF, WHO, and UN-Habitat.

Sudeshna has successfully built and ran a non-profit organization as well as managed a design and planning practice while offering her services as an international consultant. Besides research, she has led large-scale urban planning and design projects with a strong focus on inclusion and sustainability. She wrote the urban design guidelines for a new greenfield capital city in India, Naya Raipur, and worked with multiple stakeholders including local urban development authorities to build consensus, secure approval, and build capacity on urban planning and design to deliver on the vision of a caring, inclusive city. She has also worked on citywide street improvement projects as well as multi-modal integration around metro stations in New Delhi.

Sudeshna holds a Ph.D. in Community and Environmental Design from North Carolina State University, USA, a master’s in Urban Design from the School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi, and a bachelor’s in Architecture from Jadavpur University, Kolkata. She has authored books, articles, policy briefs, development reports, editorials, blogs on topics related to equity and inclusion; urbanization, planning, and the environment; urban governance; urban childhoods and child-friendly cities; public space, adequate housing, and slum upgrading; community and child-centered climate adaption, coping and resilience. Sudeshna is a sought-after keynote speaker on urban issues and has lectured widely in the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, Sweden, and several other European countries. She serves on the editorial board of the Journal of e-Planning Research and the international journal of Children, Youth, and Environments. She is also a member of the global executive board of the International Play Association.

A staunch advocate of children’s rights and a good listener, Sudeshna loves traveling, cinema, eclectic cuisine, and a good book to curl up within a well-lit corner with a green view. She lives in New Delhi with her husband and son.

Blogs

Bringing Nature to Children in Disadvantaged Urban Communities
by Sudeshna Chatterjee, Deepti Talpade e Louise Chawla - November 21, 2024
A version of this blog was originally published on 14th November 2024 on the International Institute for Environment and Development website. Nature, when combined with the enthusiasm and creativity of children, can transform inner-city wastelands into spaces for people. Nearby trees, parks, gardens, green schoolyards and other urban green spaces are not just ‘nice to have’; they are ‘need to have’ resources for health and wellbeing. This is also the message of a recent UNICEF report.
Differential Vulnerability and its Importance in Resilience Planning
by Sudeshna Chatterjee, Ike Uri e Lubaina Rangwala - February 26, 2024
India is the seventh most climate-vulnerable country in the world, with nine of its states among the top 50 most vulnerable regions globally. The country's cities are at the forefront of the climate crisis with more than
Measuring Urbanization: Why India Needs to Re-think its Methodology
by Sudeshna Chatterjee, Raj Bhagat Palanichamy, Rejeet Mathews e Shahena Khan - August 08, 2023
This blog delves into the definition and measure of ‘urban’ in India to discuss the methodological gaps in existing definitions. It also looks at the advantages and limitations of a global method endorsed by the UN Statistical Commission for the delineation of urban, peri-urban and rural areas.

Earlier this year, India surpassed China to become the most populous country in the

Making Big Ideas Happen™

Menu

You are here

Sudeshna Chatterjee

Bringing Nature to Children in Disadvantaged Urban Communities

Differential Vulnerability and its Importance in Resilience Planning

Measuring Urbanization: Why India Needs to Re-think its Methodology

Climate Resilient Cities: Assessing Differential Vulnerability to Climate Hazards in Urban India

Stay Connected