A Conversation with HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan

Mon, 13 May 2013 17:30:51 GMT

In a talk at MIT on May 7, 2013, Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Shaun Donovan called for a new wave of creative urban planning to help cities evolve during a time of economic hardship.

Center for Advanced Urbanism

Wed, 13 Feb 2013 08:05:58 GMT

The Center for Advanced Urbanism (CAU) provides a home for faculty interested in collaborative research projects that will engage student participation.

The Center for Advanced Urbanism

Tue, 12 Feb 2013 18:35:14 GMT

The CAU is committed to fostering a rigorous design culture for the large scale

Chris Zegras: Tackling transportation issues around the world

Wed, 12 Sep 2012 20:30:16 GMT

The associate professor of transportation and urban planning builds tools that help designers make cities cleaner and greener.

USI South Asia Matchmaking Conference: Day 2, Panel 3

Sat, 18 Aug 2012 07:08:10 GMT

On July 18th and 19th, J-PAL hosted the first regional matchmaking conference for its Urban Services Initiative (USI) at Colombo, Sri Lanka. The Colombo conference brought together researchers and practitioners active in urban service delivery (particularly water, sanitation, and hygiene) throughout South Asia. The aim of the conference was to stimulate discussion on innovative micro-solutions to the need for better urban public services, and what collaboration opportunities might exist between the researchers and practitioners.

On day two of the conference four different panels of implementing partners made presentations on their programs that might fit with USI. This video features the third panel: Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), Solid Waste Collection and Handling (SWaCH) & Pune Municipal Corporation, Satark Nagrik Sangathan (SNS), Centre for Advocacy and Research (CFAR), Janaagraha Center for Citizenship and Democracy, and Veolia Water India

USI South Asia Matchmaking Conference: Day 2, Panel 4

Sat, 18 Aug 2012 07:08:10 GMT

On day two of the conference four different panels of implementing partners made presentations on their programs that might fit with USI. This video features the fourth panel: Lumanti, Network of Women Water Professionals (NetWwater) Sri Lanka, National Water Supply and Drainage Board, UNICEF Sri Lanka, and DFID Bangladesh

USI South Asia Matchmaking Conference: Keynote Address

Fri, 17 Aug 2012 17:30:13 GMT

The keynote address is delivered by the Hon’ble Minister of Water Supply and Drainage, Mr. Dinesh Gunawardena.

USI South Asia Matchmaking Conference: Day 2, Panel 1

Thu, 16 Aug 2012 20:30:19 GMT

On day two of the conference four different panels of implementing partners made presentations on their programs that might fit with USI. This video features the first panel: BRAC Development Institute, BRAC Social Innovation Lab, BRAC, WaterAid Bangladesh, Urban Partnerships for Poverty Reduction (UPPR), and 3ie

USI South Asia Matchmaking Conference: Day 2, Panel 2

Thu, 16 Aug 2012 20:30:18 GMT

On day two of the conference four different panels of implementing partners made presentations on their programs that might fit with USI. This video features the second panel: Quicksand, Feedback Foundation, Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation, Sulabh International, and Urban Local Bodies Department (Government of Haryana)

USI South Asia Matchmaking Conference: Key issues related to randomized evaluation

Thu, 16 Aug 2012 17:30:23 GMT

In this video Raymond Guiteras breaks down the key issues related to randomized evaluation by starting with the question WHY evaluate?

USI South Asia Matchmaking Conference: Public Goods, Location Choice and the Voting Decisions of the Urban Poor

Tue, 07 Aug 2012 17:30:11 GMT

In this first video, Anjali Bhardwaj (Founder, Satark Nagrik Sangathan) and Rohini Pande (Mohammed Kamal Professor of Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School) discuss public goods, location choice and the voting decisions of the urban poor.

Crossroads 2012: Managing Resource — Constrained Supply Chains

Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:04:14 GMT

Dr. Randy Kirchain, Principal Research Scientist, MIT Material Systems Lab (MIT MSL)
MIT MSL is working with industry to identify the materials supply constraints and price fluctuations that could impact the future viability of businesses. Dr. Kirchain will explain how companies can use supply/demand simulations and scenario planning to develop strategies for managing resource-related disruptions and maintaining competitiveness.

Jackie Sturm, VP and GM of Global Sourcing & Procurement, Intel Corporation
How to verify that a supply chain is conflict free –free of minerals mined in countries that violate human rights, for example – is a major issue for many companies. Jackie Sturm will share Intel’s plans to be conflict-free by 2013. The processes Intel has developed for assessing the upstream supply chain and working with suppliers to track and verify materials sources offer valuable lessons for maintaining the integrity of company operations.

Dr. Daniel Navaresse, Global Director Energy & Fluids, Anheuser-Busch InBev
A-B InBev is at the forefront of efforts to improve the management of water resources across the end-to-end supply chain. Dr Navaresse will explain the company's strategy, and how it is developing better ways to mitigate water-related risks in the extended supply chain.

Crossroads 2012: Supply Chains in Transition: The Driving Forces of Change
June 28, 2012 - 08:00am - 05:00pm EDT
Stata Center (Building 32-123)

The growth of megacities, projected shortages of vital human and natural resources, and a dramatic increase in the amount of market data available to companies, are some of the major forces that will reshape supply chain management over the next five to 10 years. Many enterprises are not prepared for these developments.

Crossroads 2012 convened leading experts from MIT and the business community to discuss the impact of these changes on companies and the supply chain profession.

Learn more at http://ctl.mit.edu/events/crossroads_2012

Crossroads 2012: Megacities and Sustainability

Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:04:14 GMT

Megacities — cities with a population of at least 10 million people — are growing in size and number, and are expected to account for about 20 percent of world GDP within a decade.

Crossroads 2012: Mining Digital Data for Actionable Strategies

Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:04:14 GMT

Both the number and range of electronic data sources available to businesses are increasing at a phenomenal rate.

Crossroads 2012: Talent Management That Supports Global Growth

Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:04:14 GMT

Doug Cooper shares some of the challenges and solutions for managing global supply chain talent, with a special focus on overseas assignments.

Crossroads 2012: Welcome & Overview

Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:04:14 GMT

Jim Rice, MIT CTL

Crossroads 2012: Supply Chains in Transition: The Driving Forces of Change
June 28, 2012 - 08:00am - 05:00pm EDT
Stata Center (Building 32-123)

The growth of megacities, projected shortages of vital human and natural resources, and a dramatic increase in the amount of market data available to companies, are some of the major forces that will reshape supply chain management over the next five to 10 years. Many enterprises are not prepared for these developments.

Crossroads 2012 convened leading experts from MIT and the business community to discuss the impact of these changes on companies and the supply chain profession.

Learn more at http://ctl.mit.edu/events/crossroads_2012

SENSEable cities

Sat, 12 May 2012 07:03:14 GMT

Assaf Biderman, co-director of the MIT SENSEable City Laboratory, discusses his lab's work.

Biderman: "Live Singapore" Project

Wed, 09 May 2012 20:30:10 GMT

Assaf Biderman - "Live Singapore" Project

Assaf Biderman teaches at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he is the Associate Director of the SENSEable City Laboratory, a research group that explores the "real- time city" by studying the increasing deployment of sensors and networked hand-held electronics, as well as their relationship to the built environment.

At the 2006 Venice Biennale, the group revealed the world's first city-scale dynamic maps, describing the movement of pedestrians, busses, and taxis in real-time. In preparation for the 2009 U.N. Summit on Climate change in Copenhagen, the lab developed a hybrid bicycle wheel which captures the energy of braking to give riders an extra push.

Biderman's work focuses on engaging city administrations and industry members worldwide to explore how pressing issues in urbanization are being impacted by a wave of new distributed technologies, and how these can be harnessed to create a more sustainable future living in urban environments.

Biderman: Copenhagen Digital Bike Project

Wed, 09 May 2012 20:30:10 GMT

Assaf Biderman - Copenhagen Digital Bike Project

Assaf Biderman teaches at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he is the Associate Director of the SENSEable City Laboratory, a research group that explores the "real- time city" by studying the increasing deployment of sensors and networked hand-held electronics, as well as their relationship to the built environment.

Biderman: Seattle Digital Garbage Project

Wed, 09 May 2012 20:30:10 GMT

Assaf Biderman - Seattle Digital Garbage Project

Assaf Biderman teaches at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he is the Associate Director of the SENSEable City Laboratory, a research group that explores the "real- time city" by studying the increasing deployment of sensors and networked hand-held electronics, as well as their relationship to the built environment.

DUSP IDG Conference 2012 - Keynote Address: Antanas Mockus

Tue, 01 May 2012 07:03:04 GMT

The 2012 MIT DUSP International Development Conference
April 6, 2012
Keynote speaker: Dr. Antanas Mockus

Dr. Antanas Mockus’ life has traversed between academia and the public sector in his native Colombia. He studied mathematics at Dijon University in France and received a Masters in Philosophy at the National University of Colombia. He has received two doctorates honoris causa, from Paris VIII University and the National University of Colombia (UNAL), of which he was also president. He has been a visiting professor and researcher at Harvard University and Nuffield College and authored or co-authored several academic articles and books. In the public realm, he has served as mayor of Bogotá two times and has been a presidential candidate twice. He is largely responsible for the transformation in both the quality and equality of life that now exists in Bogota through unconventional policies that sought to change citizen culture, which he calls “Citizen Culture Methodology’. He is currently president of Corpovisionarios, a non-profit think tank and action center that performs research, provides advisory services and designs and implements policies that make possible voluntary changes on collective behaviors.

DUSP IDG Conference 2012 - Panel 3: MIT's Interdisciplinary Approach to Development

Tue, 01 May 2012 07:03:04 GMT

The 2012 MIT DUSP International Development Conference
April 6, 2012
Panel 3: MIT's Interdisciplinary Approach to Development

The international development eco-system at MIT. In examining the interdisciplinary approaches to development, what is nature and composition of the international development eco-system at MIT? This panel discussion will bring together key institutional actors involved with international development within MIT, including the: Center for International Studies (CIS), MIT Science and Technology Initiative (MISTI), MIT Energy Initiative (EI), Legatum Center, Public Service Center (PSC), and Development through Dialog, Design, and Dissemination (D-Lab). The panel will explore the actors within this internal ecosystem to identify their roles and contributions to interdisciplinary international development and the internationalization of education at MIT. What is DUSP's perspective and contribution to this international development eco-system? What is the desired impact on development practice and scholarship?

Moderator: Bish Sanyal, MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning
Victor Grau Serrat, MIT Development Lab (D-Lab)
Chappell Lawson, MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives (MISTI)
Iqbal Quadir, MIT Legatum Center for Development & Entrepreneurship
Laura Sampath, MIT International Development Initiative
Sally Susnowitz, MIT Public Service Center
John Tirman, MIT Center for International Studies

DUSP IDG Conference 2012 - Panel 4: IDG Foundation to Future

Tue, 01 May 2012 07:03:04 GMT

The 2012 MIT DUSP International Development Conference
April 6, 2012
Panel 4: IDG Foundation to Future

With the evolution of international development in the last several decades, how are these changes are being reflected in the way that development scholars and practitioners are educated. This panel brings together DUSP doctoral alums who are currently professors in urban planning and international development departments in top ranking US universities. These alums will reflect on their experience at DUSP, discuss if and how the field has evolved over the years. What are some of the primary debates, challenges, and innovations being identified in the field and in their work? How are practitioners being prepared to address multi-scalar development challenges? In light of the previous panel discussions, are there major gaps that are not being adequately addressed or need to be addressed in more deeply interdisciplinary ways?

Moderator: Judith Tendler, MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning
Arturo Ardila-Gomez, World Bank
Vinit Mukhija, University of California, Los Angeles
Aya Okada, Nagoya University, Japan
Paul Smoke, New York University
Smita Srinivas, Columbia University

DUSP IDG Conference 2012 - Panel 1: The Evolving Int'l Development Landscape (part 2)

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 20:30:09 GMT

The 2012 MIT DUSP International Development Conference
April 6, 2012
Panel 1: The Evolving Int'l Development Landscape (part 2)

The international development landscape is evolving in ways that impact how development is conceived and implemented around the world. This panel brings together representatives from development finance and knowledge producing institutions to discuss the how these changes are evolving both institutionally and on the ground. International institutions are evolving and restructuring their partnerships with developing countries, shifting their focus from the national to the municipal scale, even moving from traditional financing to innovative knowledge sharing and production, including the facilitation of South-South exchange. Yet some of the persistent development challenges remain, and their urgency is more immediate with rapid urbanization in much of the developing world, the ongoing deficits in basic services for the informal poor, the impacts of human-induced natural disasters, and more. How is knowledge shared between these international institutions and among developing countries, especially in an era when many middle-income countries are financing their own development and even translating their resources and knowledge to lower-income countries?

Moderator: Peter Houtzager, Institute of Development Studies
John Briscoe, Harvard University
Nora Libertun de Duren, Inter American Development Bank
Liz McKeon, formerly Ford Foundation and USAID
Jill Pike, Millennium Challenge Corporation
Chris Williams, UN HABITAT

DUSP IDG Conference 2012 - Panel 2: Social Movements and Development

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 20:30:09 GMT

The 2012 MIT DUSP International Development Conference
April 6, 2012
Panel 2: Social Movements and Development

A more inclusive, people-centered approach to projects and programs often eludes the financial and political flows of developmental institutions. Local, national, and international social movements are presenting new challenges to institutional arrangements at each of these scales. This panel is an attempt to understand what is significant about different types of social movements for the ways in which formal institutions engage with issues of urban development. What opportunities and challenges do these movements pose for ordinary poor people? What is leading institutions to build deeper engagements with social movements, especially those with a grassroots, community base? What potentials and pitfalls exist for these partnerships? How can these movements and partnerships be understood through academic research agendas? And can social movements develop alternative methods of development practice that can meet the extent of the challenges of urban poverty?

Moderator: Robert Buckley, The New School
Tim Campbell, The Urban Age Institute
Martha Chen, Harvard Kennedy School/ WIEGO
William Cobbett, Cities Alliance
Celine D’Cruz, Slum/Shack Dwellers International

Daily Patterns of Human Activities in the City

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 17:30:11 GMT

This is an animation visualizing the movement and activities (differentiated by nine colors in the legend) of the surveyed individuals in the Chicago metropolitan area for an average weekday in 2008.

Data source: Chicago Travel Tracker Household Travel Inventory (2008).
Reference: Jiang, S., J. Ferreira, and M. González. 2012. Clustering Daily Patterns of Human Activities in the City. Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery. (Forthcoming)

China Urban Development Discussion Series - Urbanization: Regional & Spatial Transformation in China

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 07:03:18 GMT

April 18, 1-2.30 PM, Room 9-354 | Speaker: Weiping Wu
Urbanization: Regional & Spatial Transformation | Discussant: Amy Glasmeier

Dr. Weiping Wu is a professor of urban and environmental policy and planning, and a senior fellow in the Center for Emerging Market Enterprises at The Fletcher School at Tufts University. She is an editor of the Journal of Planning Education and Research, and a visiting Zijiang Chair Professor at East China Normal University in Shanghai. Previously, she was a consultant to the World Bank, and a fellow in the Public Intellectuals Program of the National Committee on United States-China Relations. Her research is concerned with how migration affects the socio-spatial reconfiguration of cities, how planning and policy influence cities’ economic vitality and infrastructure building, and how higher education transfers knowledge and innovation to industry. The National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Education, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, and World Bank have provided funding support for her research. She has (co)authored and co-edited four books, and will be publishing a new book titled The Chinese City (Routledge).

Topic:

China’s cities are home to 10 percent of the world’s population today. They display unprecedented dynamism under the country’s surging economic power. Although China’s urban transformation is in some ways comparable to what industrialized countries have gone through in the past, the outcomes – particular patterns of development, the nature of urbanism, interactions between urban and rural – necessarily are quite different. This presentation will focus on two aspects: how rapid urbanization has reconfigured the urban system across regions and urban space across social strata. How might reform policies and inter-city economic competition change the urban system? What are the key dimensions of disparity within and across cities? An overarching theme points to increasing double divide in urban China.

China Urban Development Discussion Series in Spring 2012 is cosponsored by: Department of Urban Studies and Planning in the MIT School of Architecture + Planning, MIT Graduate Student Life Grants, and MIT Graduate Student Council. For more information, please visit our website . Our seminars are free and open to the public.

China Urban Development Discussion Series: Challenges of Urban Energy Planning in China

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 07:03:18 GMT

March 14, 5:30-7 PM, Room 9-354 | Speaker: Stephen Hammer
Challenges of Urban Energy Planning in China | Discussant: Karen R Polenske

Dr. Stephen Hammer is a Lecturer in Energy Planning at MIT DUSP. Dr. Hammer also serves as co-Director of the Urban Climate Change Research Network, an international consortium of researchers focused on climate change science, mitigation, and adaptation at the urban scale. Prior to joining MIT, he taught at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, where he founded and directed the Urban Energy Program. Dr. Hammer consults internationally on urban energy and climate policy issues to a range of public, private, and NGO clients. He recently served as lead author on the OECD’s new report on urban green growth, and has supported OECD green growth research missions in the US and in China. Dr. Hammer also served as an advisor to the World Bank on efforts to promote energy efficiency in developing country cities, including the development of the TRACE system (Tool for Rapid Assessment of City Energy). During 2009-2010, Dr. Hammer led the Energy Smart Cities Initiative, a Beijing-based program providing energy and climate policy training to more than 250 local government officials and state-owned enterprise managers from around China, a project carried out in collaboration with the National Training Center for Mayors of China. Dr. Hammer is a member of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's Energy Policy Task Force, and serves as a reviewer for a variety of academic journals, including Local Environment and Energy Policy. Dr. Hammer holds a PhD degree from the London School of Economics, an MPP from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and a B.S. from the University of California at Davis.

Topic:

In January 2012, China's urban population surpassed that of rural areas for the first time in the country's history. Rapid urbanization trends greatly exacerbate China's energy challenges. After a decades-long boom of economic growth, China has now become the world's largest energy consumer. With an ambition to upgrade its economic structure and to respond to energy depletion and natural environment deterioration, China's central government has started initiating stricter requirements and restrictions on provincial and local governments in order to achieve energy conservation and emission reduction. In the 12th five-year plan, China has mandated a 16% decrease of energy consumption per unit of GDP by 2015 from its 2010 level. Delivering this change won’t be easy, however, for a variety of institutional, market, and behavioral reasons. Please join us in the lecture for more perspectives and insights on this topic.

Simulating Bus Rapid Transit Scenarios in Chicago, IL

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 07:03:18 GMT

Simulating Bus Rapid Transit Scenarios on Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, IL.

Modeled by Shan Jiang and recorded by Shan Jiang and Mikel Murga in 2007.

China Urban Development Discussion Series - Sustaining Personal Mobility in Urbanizing China

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 20:30:10 GMT

April 4, 12.30-2 PM, Room 9-354 | Speaker: Jiawen Yang
Sustaining Personal Mobility in Urbanizing China | Discussant: Joseph Ferreira

China's massive population, high density and fast economic development produce huge demand for transportation investment. For now, megacities in China are congested by cars, choked with air pollutants and constrained by housing affordability. How to sustain city and regional mobility in the ever-expanding and high-density megacities or megaregions are utmost challenges calling for innovative solutions. Will it be effective to add fixed guideway transit to the pre-existing regional highway network? How might the interest of city governments, provincial governments and central government fit each other and shape a large-scale railway investment strategy? What is its implication for future personal mobility? Please join us in the lecture for more perspectives and insights on this topic.

China Urban Development Discussion Series: Making the Clean Energy City in China

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 14:30:10 GMT

March 21, 2012
Speaker: Prof. Dennis Frenchman & Prof. Christopher Zegras, MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning; Discussant: Prof. Ralph Gakenheimer, MIT DUSP

The Chinese urban landscape is being dramatically transformed through rapid urbanization, changing standards of living, and a massive shift to private motorized transportation. These changes are inducing cities to consume ever more energy in the face of decreasing supplies. The speakers present advances from an ongoing research project, focused on the city of Jinan, that attempts to confront the Chinese urban energy challenge by intervening at the scale of neighborhoods, commercial districts, and real estate projects - the fundamental building blocks of urban growth. The work takes a life-cycle energy use perspective and integrates empirical evidence, urban design studios, and an assessment tool, the "Energy Pro-forma", which enables urban designers and developers to estimate the net energy use implied in urban development proposals. The ultimate goal is to not only help designers and developers create more energy efficient urban projects, but also to facilitate the creation of new public policies and standards for neighborhood energy performance for application at the local and national levels.

Read more about the 2012 China Urban Development Discussion Series: http://dusp.mit.edu/cud/cud_series.html

2012 CDD Forum - Jill Desimini, "Value in Vacancy: Landscape and the Shrinking City"

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 17:30:11 GMT

2012 CDD Forum: Shrinking Cities

Jill Desimini is a landscape architect and an Assistant Professor of Landscape Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Her research focuses on landscape strategies for shrinking cities in North America. The work attempts to re-frame the normative dialogue surrounding population loss towards a productive outcome. Prior to joining the GSD, she was a senior associate at Stoss Landscape Urbanism. She holds MLA and MArch degrees from the University of Pennsylvania.

The Relaxed Zone Overlay: A Planning and Zoning Tool for Smart Shrinkage

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 17:30:07 GMT

2012 CDD Forum: Shrinking Cities

The Relaxed Zone Overlay: A Planning and Zoning Tool for Smart Shrinkage; Justin Hollander (3/5/12)

Justin Hollander, PhD, AICP is an Assistant Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning at Tufts University and a Research Scientist at the George Perkins Marsh Institute at Clark University. He is the author of Sunburnt Cities: The Great Recession, Depopulation and
Urban Planning in the American Sunbelt (Routledge, 2011) and two other books examining the challenges of planning for post-industrial, shrinking cities.

When Life Gives You Lemons: Informal and Bottom-Up Urbanism

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 17:30:07 GMT

2012 CDD Forum: Shrinking Cities

When Life Gives You Lemons: Informal and Bottom-Up Urbanism; Daniel D'Oca (2/21/12)

Daniel D’Oca is an urban planner, educator, and curator who specializes in the politics of the contemporary built environment in America. He is Design Critic in Urban Planning and Design at the Harvard Design School, and Principal and co-founder of Interboro Partners, a New York-based architecture, planning, and research firm that has won many awards for its innovative projects, including: the MoMA PS1 Young Architects Program, the Architectural League’s Emerging Voices and Young Architects Awards, and the New Practices Award from
the AIA New York Chapter. Interboro’s forthcoming book, The Arsenal of Exclusion & Inclusion, will be published by Actar in 2012.

BLOSSOMS - The Geometry of Parabolic Sand Dunes (Arabic)

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 08:03:20 GMT

This lesson sheds some light on the problem of the movement of sand and introduce students to basic knowledge about this issue.

The City Car

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 18:30:07 GMT

Conversation with Ryan Chin, Research Associate and PhD candidate at the MIT Media Lab, about the CityCar electric automobile.

Reinventing the City @ MIT: Urban Ecology

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 19:59:19 GMT

Annette Kim: Urban Planning + Art Practice?

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 19:14:02 GMT

On November 30, 2011, over 50 professors and students from RISD, MIT, and Harvard met to hear about Dr. Annette Kim's latest research project and to discuss how to bring about greater synergies between the visual design and social science research ends of urban planning. SLAB: sidewalk laboratory is her research project that employs critical cartography to unveil greater knowledge about this important public space and to propose changes in planning paradigms. The case presented focuses on Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam's rich sidewalk life and advocates for street vendors.

Annette M. Kim is associate professor of international development at the Department of Urban Studies and Planning. She has a masters degree in visual studies and a Ph.D. in city and regional planning from UC Berkeley.

Cities and the Future of Entertainment

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 15:45:53 GMT

Reinventing the City @ MIT: Economics and the Sustainable City

Fri, 04 Nov 2011 19:17:41 GMT

Economics and the Sustainable City
Thursday, November 3, 2011, 5:00-7:00pm
MIT 3-133

Three urban economists discuss how economic principles will help cities to create a smaller environmental footprint.

David Albouy, Assistant Professor of Economics, University of Michigan; Faculty Research Fellow, National Bureau of Economic Research; and Research Associate at the Office of Tax Policy Research
Nathaniel Baum-Snow, Assistant Professor of Economics, Brown University
Matthew E. Kahn, Professor, Institute of the Environment, Department of Public Policy, UCLA

Moderator: Frank Levy, Daniel Rose Professor of Economics, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT

Responders:

Eran Ben-Joseph, , Professor of Landscape Architecture and Urban Design; Head of the Joint Program in City Design and Development, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT
Judith Layzer, Associate Professor of Environmental Policy and Head of Environmental Policy and Planning Group, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT

Networks Understanding Networks, Pt. 7: Kent Larson

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 17:35:24 GMT

Kent Larson: New Networks and Urban Transformation

CO2GO

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 16:08:50 GMT

A project by the SENSEable City Lab, MIT. Today, more than a third of global CO2 emissions are generated by transportation. CO2GO, a new type of smartphone application, is an effective tool that assists in making smarter individual transportation choices to collectively reduce carbon emissions in cities.

Concluding remarks

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:44:58 GMT

12 Filippo dal Fiore, Co-Head of Partners Relations and Technology Transfer, SENSEable City Lab, MIT

Moving into the Future - how to shape it?

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:44:16 GMT

11 (Pecha Kuchas followed by discussion panel)
Carlo Ratti Director, SENSEable City Lab, MIT
Panelists: Clara Gaymard, CEO & National Executive, GE France,
Lorenza Martínez, Undersecretary of Industry and Commerce, Ministry of Economy, Mexico,
Karoline Steen, Head of International Affairs, City of Copenhagen,
Antoine Picon, Professor of History of Architecture and Technology, Harvard Graduate School of Design,
Martin Chavez, Executive Director, ICLEI US Office

Changing government

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:40:30 GMT

10 (Pecha Kuchas followed by discussion panel)
Moderator: Carol Coletta, President & CEO, CEOs for Cities
Panelists: Simon Willis, Vice President Worldwide Public Sector, Internet Business Solutions Group, Cisco,
Gianluca Salvatori, President and CEO, Manifattura domani,
Pedro Miranda, Corporate Vice President, Head of Corporate Development, Siemens ONE,
Simon Giles, Global Lead Smart Technology Strategy, Accenture,
Nancy Odendaal, Senior Lecturer in City and Regional Planning, University of Cape Town.

Changing research

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:37:01 GMT

9 (Pecha Kuchas followed by discussion panel)
Moderator: Irving Wladawsky-Berger, Visiting Lecturer, MIT
Panelists: Rich Friedrich, Director of the Strategy and Innovation Office, HP Labs,
Eric Paulos, Assistant Professor Human-Computer Interaction Institute, Carnegie Mellon University,
Charles Kalmanek, Vice President of Networking & Services Research, AT&T Labs,
Mike Batty, Chairman of the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, UCL,
Daniel Obodovski, Director of Business Development, Qualcomm, CDMA Technologies,
John Frazer, Chair of Design Science, Queensland University of Technology

Welcome

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:34:40 GMT

8 Amy Glasmeier, Head of the Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Day's summary and next steps...

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:34:00 GMT

7 Assaf Biderman, Associate Director, SENSEable City Lab, MIT

Changing business

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:31:34 GMT

6 (Pecha Kuchas followed by discussion session)
Moderator: Mathieu Lefevre, Executive Director, New Cities Foundation
Panelists: Martin Fleming, Vice President IBM,
Saskia Sassen, Robert S. Lynd Professor of Sociology, Columbia University,
Beatriz Lara Bartolome,? Chief Innovation Officer, BBVA,
Jonathan F.P. Rose, Founder & President, Jonathan Rose Companies, John Horn, T-Mobile USA National Director of M2M.

Changing life

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:21:58 GMT

5 (Pecha Kuchas followed by discussion session)
The human experience of technologies within cities, and how it is impacting life and lifestyle changes
Moderator: Adam Bly, Founder and CEO of Seed Media Group
Panelists: Joeseph Paradiso, Director Responsive Environments Group, MIT,
Skylar Tibbits, Lecturer, Department of Architecture, MIT,
Mitchell Joachim, Associate Professor at NYU and Co-Founder of Planetary ONE and Terreform ONE,
Zazie Schafer, Nencetti Deputy Director, UN Global Pulse,
Anthony Townsend, Technology Forecaster and Strategist, Institute for the Future

Case-studies from around the world

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 15:55:11 GMT

4 (Pecha Kuchas and discussion session)
Past, present and future casestudies of technologies in urban environments

Moderator: Dennis Frenchman, Leventhal Professor of Urban Design and Planning, MIT
Panelists: Stefan Köhler, Mayor of Friedrichshafen (Skype),
Nicola Villa, Global Director of Urban Innovation Team, Cisco,
Johan Minnie, Director, Information Management, HDA, Republic of South Africa,
Bruce Schaller, Deputy Commissioner for Planning and Sustainability, New York City, Department of Transportation,
Bill Oates, CIO, City of Boston,
Per Als, Chief Transport Executive, City of Copenhagen

MIT Media Lab

Wed, 26 Jan 2011 21:30:07 GMT

In 2010, the world-renowned MIT Media Lab expanded into a new six-floor structure with approximately 163,000 square feet of laboratory, office, and meeting space designed by architect, Fumihiko Maki. This time-lapse video showcases the unique features of this building, which houses seven labs and various combinations of working groups. The design -- which includes open workshops, a central atrium, glass-enclosed elevators, and spectacular views of the Charles River and Boston skyline -- fosters collaboration among such diverse groups as the Biomechatronics group, the New Media Medicine group, and the Smart Cities group, which is developing foldable, stackable electric vehicles.

Learn more about the lab's current research at the MIT Media Lab.

Emerald Cities: How Are Cities Advancing the Shift to a Green Economy?

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 00:29:48 GMT

This talk was given on December 1, 2009 as part of the MITEI Seminar Series. - Abstract - How can cities best position themselves in the green economy? What is the role of manufacturing in urban areas? How can a city best choose an economic development strategy given its size and unique economic history? How should federal policy support policy innovation among cities? Joan Fitzgerald shows how in the absence of a comprehensive national policy, cities like Chicago, New York, Portland, San Francisco, and Seattle have taken the lead in addressing the interrelated environmental problems of global warming, pollution, energy dependence, and social justice. Cities are major sources of pollution but because of their population density, reliance on public transportation, and other factors, Fitzgerald argues that they are uniquely suited to promote and benefit from green economic development. - About the Speaker - Joan Fitzgerald is the Director of the Law, Policy and Society Program at Northeastern University. Previously, Fitzgerald taught urban policy and public affairs at the New School University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Ohio State University. She specializes in urban economic development, urban sustainability planning, workforce development, and green economic development . The Emerald Cities project builds on her co-authored 2002 economic development book, Economic Revitalization: Strategies and Cases for City and Suburb, which examines how traditional economic development strategies can be used to promote more sustainable and equitable development. It also integrates questions raised in her second book, Moving Up in the New Economy (2006), which focuses on strategies for helping low-wage workers advance into better paying positions through skills upgrading. MITEI thanks CERA for its generous support of the Seminar Series.

Keynote 1

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 18:48:39 GMT

Peter Hirshberg, Co-founder and Chairman, The Conversation Group; Chairman, Board of Advisors, Technorati. Introduction: Assaf Biderman, Associate Director, MIT SENSEable City Lab. 10/12/2009.

Tad Hirsch and Trevor Pagleni with Andrew Woods: Terminal Air

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 01:41:28 GMT

Terminal Air (Institute for Applied Autonomy and Trevor Paglen) with Andrew Woods Tad Hirsch (Institute for Applied Autonomy) and experimental geographer Trevor Paglen will present early research for their new project, Terminal Air, an interactive installation that enables audiences to track a fleet of CIA-operated aircraft around the world. These airplanes, which were first uncovered by an international network of amateur aviation enthusiasts and later reported on by various investigative journalists, are known to be involved in "extraordinary rendition"--the practice of illegally transporting terrorism suspects to secret overseas military bases for torture and interrogation. Paglen will also talk about Torture Taxi: On the Trail of the CIA's Rendition Flights, which he co-wrote with journalist AC Thompson. Andrew Woods of Harvard Law School will also speak. + Trevor Paglen is an artist, writer, and experimental geographer working out of the Department of Geography at the University of California, Berkeley, where he is currently completing a PhD. His work involves deliberately blurring the lines between social science, contemporary art, and a host of even more obscure disciplines in order to construct unfamiliar, yet meticulously researched ways to interpret the world around us. His most recent projects take up secret military bases, the California prison system, and the CIA's practice of "extraordinary rendition." Paglen's artwork has been shown at the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art (2003), the California College of the Arts (2002), MASSMOCA (2006), Halle 14 - Stiftung Federkiel (2006), Diverse Works (2005), and numerous other arts venues, universities, conferences, and public spaces. Tad Hirsch is a researcher and PhD candidate in the Smart Cities Group at MIT's Media Lab, where his work focuses on the intersections between art, activism, and technology. He is also a 2005-7 graduate affiliate at the Center for Advanced Visual Studies. He has worked with Intel's People and Practices Research Group, Motorola's Advanced Concepts Group and the Interaction Design Studio at Carnegie Mellon University, and has several years experience in the nonprofit sector. Tad is also a frequent collaborator with the Institute for Applied Autonomy, an award-winning arts collective that exhibits throughout the United States and Europe. He publishes and lectures widely on a variety of topics concerning social aspects of technology, and has received several prestigious commissions and awards. Tad holds degrees from Vassar College, Carnegie Mellon University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The Institute for Applied Autonomy (IAA) was founded in 1998 as a technological research and development organization dedicated to the cause of individual and collective self-determination. Their mission is to study the forces and structures which affect self-determination and to provide technologies which extend the autonomy of human activists. Andrew Woods worked with the American Civil Liberties Union on El Masri v. Tenet, a civil lawsuit challenging the extraordinary rendition of Khaled El Masri from Macedonia to Bagram, Afghanistan. Andrew is at Harvard Law School, where he also organizes students to litigate human rights claims in US courts. He is currently working to build the Project on Soldier Testimony and Human Rights and editing GOOD Magazine.

Green Wheel - Smart Mobility & Ubiquitous Computing

Thu, 16 Apr 2009 17:55:43 GMT

Mobile Experience Lab and Smart Cities Group worked together to envision future scenarios describing design opportunities related to topics that deal with social navigation, distributed data sensing, healthcare, bike sharing racks optimization, peer-to-peer freight, urban races and civic engagement. The final outcome consists in a 7 minutes video containing 10 scenarios that proposes our vision on Smart Mobility & Ubiquitous Computing.

More info:
mobile.mit.edu/greenwheel/
cities.media.mit.edu

Principal Investigators: Federico Casalegno, William J.Mitchell

Project Leaders: David Boardman, Ryan Chin, Michael Lin, Steve Pomeroy

TDP and the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology (MIST)

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:46:54 GMT

MIT's Technology and Development Program (TDP) is participating in a new program to assist the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology (MIST) to establish a graduate science and engineering program in Abu Dhabi, UAE, focused on renewable energy and sustainable technology. This video shows the plans for the green city which would house the MIST campus.

Building Responsive Cities: Technology, Design, and Development

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

04/04/2008 1:30 PM Broad InstituteDennis Frenchman, MCP '76, MAA '76, Leventhal Professor of Urban Design and Planning, Director, City Design and Development, MIT; Antonio di Mambro, '71, MAA '77, MCP '77, Principal, Antonio di Mambro+ Associates; Martha Lampkine Welborne, MCP '81, MAA '81, Managing Director, Grand Avenue Committee, Los Angeles; Tom Campanella, PhD '99, Assistant Professor, Department of City and Regional Planning, University of North Carolina, Chapel HillDescription: Even as new supercities pop up around the world, with populations in the tens of millions, urban planning remains stuck in an older time. As Dennis Frenchmansays, "Amazingly very little progress has been made ... We're using basically the models and methods of the 1920s." Frenchman says we need to confront the immense challenges of rapid urbanization, universal mobility sustainability and basic livability. Some emerging concepts include new century cities, where single "messy" mixed"use zones will house shopping, living, and commerce. He describes technology networks built into urban environments, producing streams of data that not only reveal how a city works, but allow better real"time management of systems. Cities will sense traffic flows and change street signage and lane markings accordingly. Smart cars will guide users to available parking. Public buildings will have changing faces. This "agile infrastructure has the potential to make day to day interactions more efficient and productive, but also more personal, because systems can interact with you and adjust to your desires," says Frenchman. Boston invests big"time in infrastructure, says Antonio di Mambro, but its transportation system is very "Boston"centric." He believes it's time to convert this system into a regional one, "tied to a new image of the city." Di Mambro is developing a new transportation network based on the area's "educational necklace," developing a West Station hub that connects universities to each other, and to the rest of the world. Di Mambro also describes how coastal cities should plan for global warming impacts. He describes Venice's strategic plan to defend itself from rising water, which includes massive mobile flood barriers, environmental restoration, economic development of neglected areas and green infrastructure. In the 1990s, Martha Lampkin Welborne became convinced that Curitiba, Brazil's public transit system would be perfect for LA. In this system, buses operate in dedicated lanes, with costs far less than those required for subway or even light rail. A nonprofit team "created the vision and sold it to everyone -- the MTA and the city." After this accomplishment, LA's mayor drafted her to create an economic center in a desolate city stretch. In re"imagining Grand Avenue, says Welborne, she has been transforming a physical vision into a reality, starting with a precise economic analysis, politicking with city and county officials and collaborating with Frank Gehry. "Without being hyperbolic, it's the greatest building boom in human history," says Tom Campanella of China's construction frenzy. Campanella marshals many astonishing facts to back up the statement: In Shanghai, more than 900 million square feet of commercial office space were added to the city between 1990 and 2004, roughly equivalent to 335 Empire State Buildings. Between 1985"1995 Shanghai's footprint and suburbs jumped from 90 to 790 square miles. China will end up with more than 1 billion people in its cities. We Americans must "learn humility," he says, in imagining urban planning for this scale of building boom, or establishing what constitutes good versus bad urbanism. About the Speaker(s): Lawerence Vale is the author or editor of six books examining urban design and housing. Architecture, Power, and National Identity (1992), a book about capital city design on six continents, received the 1994 Spiro Kostof Book Award for Architecture and Urbanism from the Society of Architectural Historians. Vale is also Co"Editor, with Sam Bass Warner, Jr., of Imaging the City: Continuing Struggles and New Directions (Center for Urban Policy Research Press, 2001), and co"editor, with Thomas J. Campanella, of The Resilient City: How Modern Cities Recover From Disaster (Oxford University Press, 2005), which was recognized as one of the "Ten Best Books for 2005" by Planetizen, the Planning and Development network. He attended Amherst College, and received the S.M.Arch.S. degree from MIT and a D.Phil from the University of Oxford. He has been a Rhodes Scholar and a Guggenheim Fellow, as well as the recipient of the 1997 Chester Rapkin Award from the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning. He has taught at the MIT since 1988.Host(s): School of Architecture and Planning, Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Diversifying Cities: Migration, Habitation, and Community Development

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

04/04/2008 3:15 PM Broad InstituteXavier de Souza Briggs, Associate Professor of Sociology and Urban Planning, MIT ; Jessica Andors, MCP '99, Deputy Director, Lawrence CommunityWorks; Abel Valenzuela, Jr., MCP '88, PhD '95, Professor, Director, Center for the Study of Urban Poverty, University of California, Los Angeles; Anna Hardman, MCP '71, PhD '88, Lecturer, Department of Economics, Tufts UniversityDescription: The largest scale migration in human history, says Xavier de Souza Briggs, is potentially the most transformative as well. It's time to consider new frames for issues, he says -- not rehash "civic life as a competition over power" but perhaps see this as a moment when we can realize, finally, the ancient idea of a citizenship. For planners, this may mean learning "how to create a welcoming place, a sense of what's possible." At least 3% of the world's population today live in places where they were not born, says Anna Hardman, and this number is rapidly rising. And yet "immigrants are invisible in dramatic and not so dramatic ways." When riots exploded outside Paris two years ago, "policy makers had no tools to grasp what was happening" because they hadn't collected information on immigrants in those neighborhoods. "They thought it would destroy the perception that everyone with a French passport is a Frenchman." But officials and planners must take greater heed of immigrants, given their growing economic impact in both their new homes and their countries of origin. Focusing just on integration in migrant cities misses two other vital processes, says Abel Valenzuela, Jr. While migrants often lead precarious lives, frequently under the radar of the authorities, they nevertheless are powerfully transforming the neighborhoods into which they move. In South Central LA for example, Latino immigrants have recently surpassed African"Americans, bringing "new cultural mores, economic opportunitiesand lots of great food." Soccer lovers take over parks, and street life feels noticeably different, with vendors, art, employment markets and bazaars. Some communities welcome these changes; others attempt to curtail new activities, frowning on colorful public events and fearing negative impacts on labor markets. Valenzuela sees immigrant flow on the whole as "an economic and cultural stimulus" that may lead to revitalized civic institutions. He promotes policy reform, a path toward normalization for undocumented immigrants and defusing racial tensions that immigrant legislation provokes. He also suggests planners look beyond big gateway cities to rural communities and suburbs, to which immigrants are also bound. Although Lawrence CommunityWorks has built well"designed housing and launched a slew of ventures in this old Massachusetts mill town, Jessica Andors takes greatest pride in her group's network organizing approach. She notes that many "community development interventions are to a large extent supply side--designing the best housing, offering programs to meet local needs." CommunityWorks instead focuses on investing in "informed, educated demand, with people voicing and acting collectively toward what they want." This ultimately gives them an opportunity to shape the political environment that doles out important resources. CommunityWorks helps families save money, buy homes, invest in higher education; it builds mutual support networks; and engages in collective action to "transform the landscape of the city, whether economic, civic, or physical." About the Speaker(s): Xavier de Souza Briggs has a national reputation for his work on social capital and the 'geography of opportunity' _ a policy and research field concerned with the consequences of segregation by race and income. He founded and directs the Community Problem"Solving Project @ MIT, a free learning space for people and institutions worldwide where they can access useful tools for problem"solving in the field. He has written The Geography of Opportunity: Race and Housing Choice in Metropolitan America (Brookings Institution Press, 2005). Prior to MIT, he taught on the public policy faculty at Harvard where he received the Kennedy School's award for excellence in teaching in 2002. A senior policy official in the Clinton Administration from 1998 to 1999, Briggs was Acting Assistant Secretary for Policy Development and Research at the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. He has been an adviser to The World Bank, The Rockefeller Foundation and other groups. Briggs received a B.S. from Stanford University's School of Engineering, an M.P.A. from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and a Ph.D. in Sociology and Education from Columbia's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Host(s): School of Architecture and Planning, Department of Urban Studies and Planning

The History of MIT's Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 04:00:00 GMT

04/04/2008 9:00 AM Broad InstituteGary Hack, PhD '76, Paley Professor of City and Regional Planning, Dean of the School of Design, University of PennsylvaniaDescription: Who better than Gary Hack to recount the colorful 75"year tale of the Department of Urban Studies and Planning? Associated with the department for more than half its life, and saturated with its lore, Hack reaches backward to describe the story's "five acts," and then forward to imagine the department's future. The department emerged in the midst of the Depression, with faculty engaged primarily in city planning. Graduates "went out with the equipment to plan the massive growth in this country that occurred after World War II," says Hack, with the know"how for laying out roads and neighborhoods. Act 2, "the urban studies years," came after the war, with the department swelling to accommodate returning GIs, and a growing interest in studying "the implications of renewal and slum clearance." The last half of the '50s proved fertile, with the launch of Harvard and MIT's Joint Center for Urban Studies. Then came the 60s, and "forces at work that tore the department apart." The Vietnam War, city riots, and questions about the direction of urban growth, "raised enormous doubts about what planning was up to." MIT faculty and students became advocates for neighborhood groups. In Act 3, "the urban action era," a new department head added such fields as criminal justice and environmental planning, and committed to diversity of both faculty and students. By 1980, academic life had evolved into an "era of parallel solitudes," clusters of people intensely involved with each other "with a minimum amount of glue." This Act 4 saw the start of an international planning focus, as well as a turn toward giving students the skills to be directly involved in building and real estate. The most recent period, Act 5, has witnessed DUSP leaders working "hard to lift out of the rich bouillabaisse constructed over all those years some themes with crosscutting energy, things that could bring people together," such as projects in New Orleans. Hack imagines that MIT's DUSP, along with other U.S. planning departments, will need to function in an increasingly global and interconnected world. Confronted by climate change, and massive growth of cities, planners will need to transcend their traditional ways of thinking and working. Hack concludes with a thought experiment: If we built high"speed rail in the Northeast corridor, cutting travel time from Boston to New York to one hour, what kind of development should occur, and what are the likely impacts? "We're ill equipped even to answer these questions, and we need to do better," Hack says. About the Speaker(s): Gary Hack teaches, practices, and studies large"scale physical planning and urban design. He is co"author of the third edition of Site Planning and Lessons from Local Experiences,/i>, as well as numerous articles and chapters on the spatial environment of cities. Recently he was a member of the team that won the competition and prepared the design guidelines for redeveloping the World Trade Center Site. He also co"directed an international comparative study of urbanization patterns on four continents, published as Global City Regions: A Comparative Perspective. Hack has prepared plans for over thirty cities in the United States and abroad, including the redevelopment plan for the Prudential Center in Boston, the West Side Waterfront plan in New York City, and the new Metropolitan Plan for Bangkok, Thailand. He has also worked with smaller communities on urban design issues. Earlier in his career, Hack directed several large neighborhood demonstration projects and the redevelopment of urban waterfronts in a number of Canadian cities. He has also served as an urban design consultant for projects in Japan, Taiwan, China and Saudi Arabia. Hack has served on the executive committee of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning and the Planning Accreditation Board. He is a former chair of the Philadelphia City Planning Commission, and is active in civic affairs in Philadelphia. Hack received his B.Arch. from the University of Manitoba, an M.Arch. and M.U.P. from the University of Illinois, and a Ph.D. from MIT.Host(s): School of Architecture and Planning, Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Rebuilding New Orleans: An Opportunity to Re-Energize the Planning Profession?

Mon, 17 Oct 2005 04:00:00 GMT

Kristina Ford, Adjunct Professor of Environmental Studies, Bowdoin College; Former Executive Director, New Orleans City Planning Commission Description: There's no love lost between Kristina Ford and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin; he made it clear that she was not welcome as the city's main planner when he assumed office. The bone Ford has to pick is not merely with the current mayor and his notion of a casino- and hotel-dominated New Orleans, but with a wrongheaded planning process in her hometown, and elsewhere in U.S. cities. One big issue for Ford: how cities often treat the comprehensive land use plans they generate every few years as if they are realistic blueprints. "People look backwards when creating a vision of the future, and it's often a nostalgic vision of what used to be better in memory than in fact." Ford notes, "I don't know many plans from 15 years ago that contemplated Walmarts, or Home Depots." Over time, zoning decisions diverge from the plan or people simply ignore the plan altogether. In the case of New Orleans, a city Ford reveres for its vibrant, distinctively diverse culture, urban planning never took into account how people actually lived -- in tight-knit neighborhoods, relying on an underground economy and spotty transportation. So after Hurricane Katrina, it is essential, believes Ford, that rebuilding plans embrace reality. Real urban recovery would mean luring back New Orleans residents, currently dispersed all over the country, with jobs. "With big contracts coming in, 25% must go to native New Orleanians," says Ford. "If they don't have skills, they should be taught." When one family member returns, it "creates a toehold for the whole family to return." Ultimately, "words for planning are gimmicks," says Ford. Planners must stop "tinkering at the margins," but step right into the politics of their communities, and "invite ways to measure their own effectiveness." About the Speaker: From 1992 to 2000, Kristina Ford led the New Orleans city planning office. She also headed the New Orleans Business Corp., an agency created to develop city-owned property. Ford was previously a planning director of Missoula, Montana, and author of the 1989 APA book, Planning Small Town America, and other textbooks on community planning issues. Host(s): School of Architecture and Planning, Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Voices from New Orleans: Design and Planning Diaspora

Mon, 03 Oct 2005 04:00:00 GMT

There is general agreement that to call New Orleans home means "living with danger, dangerously," as William Barry put it.

(eco)Logical: Greening the 21st Century City

Thu, 07 Apr 2005 04:00:00 GMT

Without much national fanfare, Chicago has transformed itself into a paragon of green virtue.

ME++ The Cyborg Self and the Networked City

Thu, 13 Nov 2003 05:00:00 GMT

11/13/2003 5:30 BartosWilliam J. Mitchell, Alexander W. Dreyfoos Professor of Architecture and Media Arts and Sciences ; Director, Smart Cities research group, MIT Media LabDescription: Throughout history, humans have created unique physical spaces in which to live, work and socialize. But the digital age has completely transformed the places in which we conduct our affairs, according to William J. Mitchell. We don't congregate at the town bank any more for financial transactions. We visit ATMs or bank online. Interactions that once required people to face each other now take place via computer, often across vast distances. Mitchell describes the disappearance of familiar public structures like phone booths, as well as the migration of work from office to just about anywhere a wireless connection is possible. As technology becomes imbedded in our lives and literally disappears into the woodwork, Mitchell sees the possibility for new kinds of extended communities. Network technology has enabled "discontinuous, asynchronous global agoras," says Mitchell, exemplified by the most recent Gulf War protests. Organizers used digital space (email lists and websites) to help orchestrate public gatherings, which in turn generated images fed back to the Internet, spurring interest in country after country, time-zone after time-zone. Mitchell believes that such networks open up new methods for human assembly and political organization, but also increase the risks to individuals of surveillance.About the Speaker(s): William J. Mitchell is the former Dean of the MIT School of Architecture and Planning. Prior to coming to MIT, he was the G. Ware and Edythe M. Travelstead Professor of Architecture and Director of the Master in Design Studies Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. His latest book is Imagining MIT, (MIT Press, 2007). His previous books include: e-topia: Urban Life, Jim But Not As We Know It, (MIT Press, 1999) High Technology and Low-Income Communities, with Donald A. Sch_n and Bish Sanyal (MIT Press, 1998) City of Bits: Space, Place, and the Infobahn, (MIT Press, 1995) The Reconfigured Eye: Visual Truth in the Post-Photographic Era, (MIT Press, 1992) The Logic of Architecture: Design, Computation, and Cognition, (MIT Press, 1990). Mitchell holds a B.Arch. from the University of Melbourne, an M.Ed. from Yale University, and an M.A. from Cambridge. He is a Fellow of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Mitchell is currently chair of The National Academies Committee on Information Technology and Creativity. Host(s): Office of the Provost, MIT LibrariesTape #: T17906.

Gaining Ground: A History of Landmaking in Boston

Thu, 06 Nov 2003 05:00:00 GMT

11/06/2003 6:00 PM e25-111Nancy Seasholes, Author, Gaining Ground; Research Fellow, Department of Archaeology, Boston UniversityDescription: After years of determined sleuthing, Nancy Seasholes can now state for the record that one-sixth of Boston, or 5250 acres, consists of "made" land _ that is, land created by overcoming incoming tides with mountains of fill. Surprisingly, before Seasholes, only one other historian had attempted to trace the growth of Boston by land fill, and it turns out he got quite a bit wrong. Seasholes, an archaeologist by training, came to her task in a roundabout way, as a consultant in the environmental review process on such large projects as Boston's "Big Dig." In her effort to learn whether excavation was taking place on original or "made" land, she consulted a cornucopia of primary sources: city and state records, corporate and municipal commission reports. She uncovered a number of unsavory episodes, including Boston's effort in the 1840s to keep the famine Irish from settling in the city. By filling in some sewage-filled tidal flats of the South End and Back Bay, Boston created upscale residential areas to entice the wealthy Yankee residents to stay in the city. Today, in these same neighborhoods, falling ground water levels are rotting the wooden pilings on which many historic homes rest, which will be costly to repair, and be extremely vulnerable in an earthquake.About the Speaker(s): Nancy S. Seasholes is an historian and historical archaeologist. She has an A.B. in history from Radcliffe College, an M.A.T. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in archaeology from Boston University. In addition to her research fellowship at Boston University, she is an instructor at the Harvard University Extension School. She was a contributing author to Mapping Boston (The MIT Press, 1999). Host(s): Office of the Provost, MIT LibrariesTape #: T17836

Housing the Lowest Income Americans: The Past, Present and Future of Public Housing

Sat, 07 Jun 2003 04:00:00 GMT

06/07/2003 9:00 AM KresgeLawrence Vale, SM '88, Professor and Head of the Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT School of Architecture and PlanningDescription: Vale provides a historical overview of public housing in America and shares insights from his most recent book Reclaiming Public Housing. He shows provocative images from early advertisements to demonstrate some of society's long held attitudes toward public housing and those who live in public housing. He analyses government policies as they evolved to provide housing to "reward people who are most deserving" of assistance, or to provide housing assistance as a "coping mechanism". About the Speaker(s): Larry Vale is Professor and Department Head, Department of Urban Studies and Planning in the School of Architecture and Planning at MIT. He attended Amherst College, and received the S.M.Arch.S. degree from MIT and a D.Phil from the University of Oxford. He has been a Rhodes Scholar and a Guggenheim Fellow, as well as the recipient of the 1997 Chester Rapkin Award from the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning. He has taught at the MIT since 1988. Host(s): Alumni Association, Alumni AssociationTape #: 16604 and 16605

Ground Zero: The Design Competition

Tue, 06 May 2003 04:00:00 GMT

05/06/2003 10-250Rafael Vi_oly, Architects PC, New YorkDescription: Rafael Vi_oly and Frederic Schwartz led the THINK team, whose design was one of two finalists for the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation's World Trade Center design competition. In this talk at MIT, Vi_oly gives a candid and personal account of one of the most emotionally charged competitions in US history. He talks about winning and losing, down to the final moments of the competition.About the Speaker(s): Rafael Vi_oly is the principal of the internationally recognized firm of Rafael Vi_oly Architects, which he established in 1983, with practices in New York, Tokyo and Buenos Aires. Mr. Vi_oly was born in Montevideo, Uruguay. The son of the artistic director of the Sodre Opera Theatre and a noted film maker, Vi_oly spent his early years in Uruguay and Argentina, where he moved with his family at the age of five. Surrounded by music as a child and a serious student of the piano, Vi_oly developed a professional career as a concert artist before turning his attention to architecture. After completing his studies in architecture at the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism of the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, Vi_oly, with six associates, formed the Estudio de Arquitectura. This firm ultimately became one of the largest architectural practices in South America. He earned a Masters Degree at the University of Buenos Aires and then joined its faculty, teaching architectural theory in the graduate architecture program. In 1974, a military coup resulted in a major reorganization of the University and Vi_oly left to help found the alternative architecture school, which operated independently during the occupation. Vi_oly came to the United States in 1978, first as a guest lecturer at Washington University and then at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. He settled permanently in New York in 1979, setting up an independent practice, providing a wide array of architectural, interior design and urban planning services. Recent awards include an Excellence in Design Award 1994 by the New York State Association of Architects for the Lehman College Physical Education Facility; a Bard Award from the City Club of New York and the first prize in the national design competition for the Snug Harbor Music Hall, Staten Island. Host(s): School of Architecture and Planning, Department of ArchitectureTape #: T16102

Cities and Resurrection: Jerusalem and Us

Wed, 11 Sep 2002 04:00:00 GMT

9/11/2002, 5:30, 1-190 Julian Beinart The presentation is a case study of Jerusalem, the most destroyed and rebuilt city in history, and a major site for the three great monotheistic religions which are now adhered to by more than half the religious population of the world. Basic ideas of loss and restitution are briefly examined in the stories and laws of the Jewish, Christian and Moslem texts, as well as in some writing in psychiatry, and in the eschatologies arising from Jerusalem in particular. Some of these are then applied to four case studies of major shrines in Jerusalem: the built and imagined Temples of the Jews, destroyed and never rebuilt; the Christian Church of the Holy Sepulchre, frequently destroyed but constantly rebuilt; the Moslem buildings on the Haram-al-Sharif, threatened but never destroyed by human hands; and the Hurva synagogue, twice destroyed, and as of yet not rebuilt but involving important design proposals by famous architects over the past 25 years. Finally twelve general principles of the resilience of buildings are put forward, derived from both the religious and architectural evidence of Jerusalem. School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T12605

Fires, Earthquakes, Modernization and Air Strikes: The Destruction and Revival of Japan's Cities

Mon, 06 May 2002 04:00:00 GMT

05/06/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Carolina Hein Natural disasters, fires, and earthquakes, destroyed Japan's cities in whole or in part on numerous occasions over the last centuries. Human intervention, political change, modernization, and the air raids of the Second World War brought about further destruction and promoted the transformation of the Japanese city in the 19th and 20th centuries. Carola Hein argues that the traditional patchwork character of Japanese cities allowed for flexibility in their transformation, and that many traditional features of Japanese urbanism survived in spite of the obvious changes. The reconstruction of Japanese cities was generally left to private initiative and comprehensive centralized planning intervention, and only occurred when and where the cities had to be adapted to political, economic, social and cultural changes. School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T11511

The Predicament of Aftermath: Reflections on 9-11 and Oklahoma City

Mon, 29 Apr 2002 04:00:00 GMT

04/29/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Edward T. Linenthal In this talk, Edward Linenthal discusses the similarities and differences in cultural reactions to the events of September 11, 2001, and the aftermath of the Oklahoma City terrorist bombing of April 19, 1995. He explores the co-construction of narrative and memorial process in light of considerations for the World Trade Center and a memorial at the site. School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T11459

After the Unrest: Ten Years of Rebuilding Los Angeles Following the Trauma of 1992

Mon, 22 Apr 2002 04:00:00 GMT

4/22/2002, 5:30, 10-485 William Fulton In addition to dealing with natural disasters, Los Angeles has repeatedly had to deal with social and civic unrest over the past 40 years-most recently in 1992, when widespread unrest rattled a region already afflicted with floods, fires, earthquakes, and a recession. The past decade has seen renewed efforts to unify the city and revitalize long-distressed section of central and south-central L.A. But have improvements really been made? And however resilient it may be socially and economically, can Los Angeles remain unified enough politically to continue to function as a single city? School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T11397

Patriotism and Reconstruction: Washington, DC after Conquest and Arson during the War of 1812

Mon, 08 Apr 2002 04:00:00 GMT

04/08/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Anthony S. Pitch The 24-hour occupation of the nation's capital by British forces during the War of 1812 was arguably the lowest point in American history. The President fled to Virginia hours before the invaders torched the White House, Capitol, State and War Departments, and the Treasury. The colossal buildings that represented the hopes and aspirations of the young Republic were now wizened and hollow in what was nothing more than a 14-year-old glorified village, with 8,000 residents. It should have doomed the infant capital to instant oblivion, with many claiming the moment was opportune to relocate to Philadelphia or elsewhere to save the cost of rebuilding. But a surge of patriotism followed the heroic defense of Fort McHenry, the birth of the anthem, and a monumental victory over the British at New Orleans. It reinvigorated those in Congress invoking the memory of George Washington, who had personally selected the site for a capital and marked the locations of its major public buildings. Local businessmen overcame Congressional critics citing post-war depleted Treasury coffers, by proffering bank loans to fund the costly estimates. Yet even though Washington won the vital reprieve as America's capital, rebuilding would be halting and arduous, slowed and marred by squabbling over designs, construction material, a paucity of creative artists, and financial restraints. But the monumental buildings would rise again, with legislators reconvening in even more splendid comfort, due in no small measure to a President who micromanaged, keenly aware that a rebuilt White House and Capitol would be symbolic of national resilience and unity. School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T11296

Beirut, Beirut

Mon, 01 Apr 2002 05:00:00 GMT

04/01/2002, 5:20, 10-485 Hashim Sarkis Through a series of cases in the history of the reconstruction of Beirut (from 1990 to the present), Hashim Sarkis illustrates a number of points and characteristics about Beirut's resilience. The type of resilience that Beirut exhibits is shaped to a great extent by its disproportionate scale in the economy and politics of the country. It is more "Beirut, Beirut" than "Beirut, Lebanon." Reconstruction is more time consuming than destruction, and by the time we get to the reconstruction of buildings, their place in both memory and in space usually shifts. There is also considerable tension between architecture and infrastructure when it comes to reconstruction, and infrastructure usually wins. The historical burden of preservation overwhelms the first phases of reconstruction and tends to dim innovative design thinking in the later stages. Different approaches (restoration, renovation, rehabilitation) and mechanisms (private, public, collaborative) coexist in a competitive manner. There is a lag effect between the planned and the unplanned aspects of reconstruction, a dynamic that is often stronger than either one. Places hold a strong character that survives destruction, but character is not always expressed in physical form. While the marks on destruction appear strongest in architecture, the expressions of continuity, reconciliation, and resilience are stronger (and more effective) in other media such as novels (e.g. Beirut, Beirut; The Water Ploughman) and films (e.g.: Beirut ya Beirut; West Beirut). School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T11206

Reverberations: Mexico City's 1985 Earthquake and the Transformation of the Capital

Mon, 18 Mar 2002 05:00:00 GMT

03/18/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Diane E. Davis In this lecture, Diane Davis examines the impact of Mexico City's 1985 disastrous earthquake on the social, spatial, and political character of Mexico's capital city. Davis discusses the earthquake's implications for social movement, the character of land use and property ownership, and the legitimacy of the capital city's political leaders and major construction contractors and argues that sometimes physical disasters such as earthquakes can produce profoundly unanticipated beneficial effects. In addition to empowering urban citizens to organize on their own behalf to challenge a corrupt and highly bureaucratized local government, (and thereby accelerating the urban democratic transition) Mexico City's earthquake also helped expose the political biases of government authorities and weakened the strong hold of street vendors and the informal sector on the local economy and land use. As a result, Mexico City now is governed by a democratic and more socially responsible government committed to fostering citizen participation, building new low-income housing projects, and "rescuing" Mexico City's historic cultural heritage, all with the aim of recapturing the social and symbolic centrality of the downtown area, where the earthquake produced most damage. School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T11119

Double Restoration: Berlin after 1945

Mon, 11 Mar 2002 05:00:00 GMT

03/11/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Brian Ladd The reconstruction of Berlin, after the massive destruction it suffered in World War II, was complicated in two fundamental ways. First was the question of historical continuity. On the one hand, there was a desire to reconstruct: to repair a damaged but extant city or, more broadly, to continue its best traditions in architectural style, social policy, and economic development. On the other hand, everyone in charge was determined to break demonstratively with the immediate past, that is, with the Third Reich; but they did not agree about which cultural, architectural, or urbanistic traditions were the Nazi ones. The second complication arose from the fact that the city was soon divided between two ideologically opposed regimes in east and west, each determined to claim the legacy of pre-Nazi Berlin, to display the clearer break with Hitler, and to prove its cultural and political superiority. Under these complicated circumstances, the rebuilding of Berlin became one of the most visible venues of the early Cold War, even as it remained a matter of basic comfort and prosperity for ordinary Berliners. School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development T11053

Spectacular Reconstructions: Ways of Seeing and the Politics of Recovery in American Urban Disasters

Mon, 04 Mar 2002 05:00:00 GMT

03/04/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Kevin Rozario Kevin Rozario uses the two most devastating urban catastrophes in American history, the Chicago fire of 1871 and the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, to explore how extraordinary recovery from sudden ruination can be both compelling and inspiring. He discusses industrialization and cultural responses to disaster, with analysis of narrative accounts of disaster as well as performative accounts that have served to reassure Americans that new and improved urban environments can come of disaster. He further explores how the "mass consumer culture" of America has shaped American responses to events of September 11th. School of Architecture and Planning, Joint Program in City Design and Development, ESD T11030

Creatively Destroying New York: Fantasies, Premonitions, and Realities in the Provisional City

Mon, 25 Feb 2002 05:00:00 GMT

02/25/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Max Page This lecture places the attack on the World Trade Center in the context of New York's history as a place that is seemingly destined to be destroyed and rebuilt with stunning regularity. It explores three ways of looking at a central experience, and cultural trope, about New York City: that it is a city of creative destruction, regularly destroying and rebuilding itself. Professor Page begins with a discussion of extraordinary moments of destruction, both natural and human-made (from fires and blizzards, to acts of terrorism), and then argues that it is the "regular" processes of creative destruction - through private real estate development and government urban renewal - which are far more important in shaping both New York's physical organization as well as its cultural image. Finally, he explores how the imagination of New York's destruction - in art, literature, and cinema - is not only at the heart of New York life but of American culture as a whole. Joint Program in City Design and Development T10988

Creatively Destroying New York: Fantasies, Premonitions, and Realities in the Provisional City

Mon, 25 Feb 2002 05:00:00 GMT

2/25/2002, 5:30, 10-485 Max Page This lecture places the attack on the World Trade Center in the context of New York's history as a place that is seemingly destined to be destroyed and rebuilt with stunning regularity. It explores three ways of looking at a central experience, and cultural trope, about New York City: that it is a city of creative destruction, regularly destroying and rebuilding itself. Professor Page begins with a discussion of extraordinary moments of destruction, both natural and human-made (from fires and blizzards, to acts of terrorism), and then argues that it is the "regular" processes of creative destruction - through private real estate development and government urban renewal - which are far more important in shaping both New York's physical organization as well as its cultural image. Finally, he explores how the imagination of New York's destruction - in art, literature, and cinema - is not only at the heart of New York life but of American culture as a whole. Joint Program in City Design and Development T10988

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