Based on the author's extensive experience as a working planner, this book gives readers an insider's view of sub-state urban planning--the nitty-gritty details on the interplay of politics, law, money, and interest groups. The author takes a balanced, non-judgmental approach to introduce a range of ideological and political perspectives on the operation of political, economic, and demographic forces in city planning. Unlike other books on the subject, this one is strong in its coverage of economics, law, finance, and urban governance. It examines the underlying forces of growth and change and discusses frankly who benefits and loses by particular decisions. A four-part organization covers the background and development of contemporary planning; the structure and practice of contemporary planning; fields of planning; and national planning in the United States and other nations, and planning theory. For individuals headed for a career in planning.

Embracing a biological and evolutionary perspective to explain the human experience of place, Urban Experience and Design explores how cognitive science and biometric tools provide an evidence-based foundation for architecture and planning. Aiming to promote the creation of a healthier and happier public realm, this book describes how unconscious responses to stimuli, outside our conscious awareness, direct our experience of the built environment and govern human behavior in our surroundings. This collection contains 15 chapters, including contributions from researchers in the US, the UK, the Netherlands, France and Iran. Addressing topics such as the impact of eye-tracking analysis and seeing beauty and empathy within buildings, Urban Experience and Design encourages us to reframe our understanding of design, including the narrative of how modern architecture and planning came to be in the first place. This volume invites students, academics and scholars to see how cognitive science and biometric findings give us remarkable 21st-century metrics for evaluating and improving designs, even before they are built.

Sourcebook of Contemporary Urban Design presents more than 300 noteworthy case studies in its 600 pages, the first large-scale book of its kind to showcase a complete and diverse range of structures worldwide. The case studies incorporate many types of urban space projects, indoor and outdoor, making this lushly illustrated, information-rich book an invaluable resource that architects and architectural students will turn to again and again. Each case study includes a succinct description of the project at hand, listing its name, client, and location and presenting its unique objectives, challenges, and solutions. Every case study also features numerous full-color photographs and detailed renderings of site and floor plans. Finally, each case study provides a full listing of those involved in the project: the design firm and its participating architects, engineers, consultants, and contractors.

Urban Design Since 1945: A Global Perspective reviews the emergence of urban design as a global phenomenon. The book opens with the urgent need to rebuild cities and re-house the millions of refugees living in camps and shantytowns at the end of the Second World War. Against this background, the book traces the collapse of the modernist, comprehensive state-planning schemes on both sides of the Iron Curtain as global corporations emerged, concentrating on networks and enclaves. It describes how Latin America and then Asia began a rapid urbanisation process, shifting the global urban centre away from Europe and overturning existing urban design models. This resulted in global megacities of an unprecedented scale, often with large associated shantytowns. By outlining the dominant models in urban design over the last sixty years - the metropolis, the megalopolis, the fragmented metropolis and the global megacity - the book provides an essential framework for students of the subject. Featured case studies include: the rebuilding of metropolitan capitals in Europe and Asia, such as Berlin, London, Moscow, Tokyo and Beijing the construction of new towns like Nowa Huta, Poland; Harlow, UK; Chandigarh, India; Brasilia, Brazil; Milton Keynes New Town, UK; and Shenzhen, China the megalopolis as a global phenomenon from the American East Coast, Texas, California, Arizona and Florida, with examples from Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America, such as Caracas, Venezuela the fragmented metropolis as a global phenomenon, with American, Asian and European examples, such as Downtown and Midtown (New York), Shinjuku (Tokyo), Canary Wharf (London), La Défense (Paris) and Potsdamer Platz (Berlin) megacities as a global phenomenon, such as Jakarta in Indonesia or Bangkok in Thailand, that include urban agriculture and urban villages, as do shrinking eco-city regions such as Duisburg, Germany or Detroit, USA World's Fairs such as Brussels 1958 and Osaka 1970 which feature as drivers of innovation, as do Olympic events in Tokyo (1964), Barcelona (1992), Beijing (2008) and London (2012).

This book provides an original research perspective to the field of contemporary urban conflicts. Even though violent conflicts have transformed cities during the XX century, it is nowadays possible to identify the phenomenon of “Tensions” as a specific contemporary both social and spatial urban changes catalyst. Through a collection of essays from various disciplines focusing on international case studies—from India to Europe to Latin America— the publication explores the multifaceted concept of “spatial tensions” as a lens for better understanding contemporary urban transformations. While tensions often depend on spatial dispositives and superstructures, they also offer a powerful key for design practices and strategies.

This work springs from the idea that human aspirations for the city tend to overstate the role of rationality in public life. The author explores the part serendipity plays in urban experience.

Maybe the Global Village metaphor has never been more accurate than it is today, where societies join forces in the fight against the COVID 19 pandemic, in a global coordinated effort, possibly never tested before in the known history of Humankind. Although we are sure that in the past some other shared demands have united the different peoples of the world, this has never been so strongly necessary, mainly in what the global scientific community is concerned. This is a fight for the survival of a society. However, we should not lose sight of what we are fighting for. We fight together for people. Not just for the abstract value of Human life, but for life in society as a whole, including its moral and ethical aspects. The topics of this book are based on this claim, on what makes it possible. We do not build our lives in a vacuum, or in distant Invisible Cities, but through a higher value, which represents physical life in society: the City, built by the discipline of Urbanism. This book is a spin-off of the International Research Seminar on Urbanism_SIIU2020. Inspired by the contents of twelve research seminars, a group of researchers from the universities of Barcelona, Lisbon and São Paulo discuss the contemporary agenda of research in Urbanism. Following the conference, a selection of 35 original double-blind peer-reviewed research papers were brought together with different perspectives about such an agenda.