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Research
CDD Forum *
Symposia *
Research Studios & Workshops
CDD Faculty
regularly seek out opportunities to engage masters and doctoral students
in collaborative research on topics that apply the group’s
intellectual interests to cases and current practice worldwide. Research
initiatives have included:
Digital City Design Workshop investigates the emergence of digital urban systems and their impact on the public realm. Recent projects have included Technology, Livability and the Historic City, enhancing mobility, trash collection, public lighting, the craft industry, and the Arno riverfront in the historic center of Florence, Italy. The project resulted in a book: Technological Imagination and the Historic City published by Ligouri in Italian and English. Other projects have included the Zaragoza Digital Mile in Spain, a new technology district with a responsive public realm, and design of the Seoul Digital Media City in Korea a global industry cluster that is now under construction. Dennis Frenchman, Michael Joroff, William J. Mitchell
Project for Reclamation Excellence/P-REX works on enviornmentally sustainable urbanism at all scales. Research and projects focus on understanding how natural and artificial systems dynamically function in regions and cities, and can inform new, smarter design and planning interventions. Currently, P-REX is collaborating with Toyota to study the Future of Mobility in North America. The venture will examine settlement and movement patterns in newly formed U.S. boomtowns to deduce appropriate future mobility methods, what these terroritories will look like in the future, and how they can intelligently recycle derelict landscapes. Drosscape: Wasting Land in Urban America was selected by Planetizen as a top 10 planning book in 2007. Alan Berger
Laboratory of Cultural Landscapes is a longstanding collaboration between CDD and the Universitat Politechnia de Cataluña in Barcelona, Spain that explores contemporary design rooted in local culture, heritage, and the arts. Projects have included Event Places, which investigated the growing importance of public events to the design of cities in the US and Europe. Over 100 event places were surveyed leading to guidelines for developing successful projects, published in the book Event Places. Another project, Designing the Llobregot Corridor proposed a cultural framework for regional development north of Barcelona. The lab has published a journal entitled ID/Identities. Eran Ben-Joseph, Dennis Frenchman
Urban
Simulation The SENSEable City
Laboratory is a collaboration with the MIT Media Lab’s Tangible
Media Group to develop new ways of interacting with intelligent
3-dimensional models of urban places and landscapes. The Luminous Table
and Illuminating Clay allow professionals to gain information on multiple
variables such as wind, shadow, traffic, drainage, topography, and
view-sheds as they design, using simple hand gestures. The tools also can
also facilitate public decision-making about complex development
proposals. Work by the director Carlo Ratti, Professor Eran Ben-Joseph,
Professor Hiroshi Ishii, and students has been widely published.
Public Housing Renewal has engaged many students over the years in assisting Professor Larry Vale to examine the fifty year rise, fall, and redevelopment of public housing projects from the perspective of their tenants and design professionals. The work has lead to two books: From Puritans to the Projects (Best Book in Urban Affairs, 2001), and Reclaiming Public Housing (Paul Davidoff Award, 2005). The work continues with an evaluation of public housing management in Chicago. Lawrence Vale
Sustainable Housing Development in China, sponsored by the Vanke Real Estate Group, is dedicated to improving the quality of residential development. Over a series of projects in Shanghai, Shenzhen and the Pearl River Delta, the group has investigated the livability of existing housing being built in China, compared to projects worldwide, and has developed model design guidelines for housing that is environmentally sound, economically viable, and accessible to all residents. Tunney Lee
CityMotion aims to develop technological approaches for improving transportation system performance in major Portuguese cities and allowing more efficient use of their resources. This multi-year research project is being carried out through the MIT Portugal Program, a large scale international collaboration involving MIT, government, and industries to develop educational and research programs related to urban systems. Christopher Zegras
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