|
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:
Cultural
Landscape and Regional Development involved faculty and students at MIT
and the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) in Spain in planning for the future of the
Llobregat River Corridor, which extends north from the city of Barcelona to the Pyrenees
mountains. Included are scores of abandoned textile colonias that were
once formed the industrial heart of the country. With the involvement of
communities and institutions along the river, the project proposed using
the historical and cultural fabric of the region to organize renewal
efforts. Work was lead by Professors Mark Schuster, Dennis Frenchman, and
Eran Ben-Joseph and sponsored by the Generalitat de Catalunya, and
culminated in the publications of Designing
the Llobregat Corridor, 2001 and Event Places, 2004.
Public
Housing Renewal research has involved nearly two dozen students since
1992, assisting Professor Larry Vale's investigations into the
redevelopment of projects in Boston.
This work has explored the fifty-year rise and fall of three public
housing developments, examining them from the perspectives of their
low-income residents, and assessing the contributions of the
environmental design professionals who have helped to redevelop these
once-devastated places. Research led to two books: From Puritans to the Projects,
which won the 2001 Best Book in Urban Affairs, and Reclaiming Public Housing: A Half Century of
Struggle in Three Public Neighborhoods.
Seoul
Digital Media City is a cooperative effort with the City of
Seoul Korea, Office of the Mayor to design a new city planned to become the center
of Korean broadcasting, music, film, computer game, and other digital
media based-industries. Led by Professor Dennis Frenchman, students and
colleagues in Korea
prepared design concepts for the city center, involving new mixes of use,
advanced wireless communication, and flexible public spaces. Now being
implemented, the project focuses on the world’s first
“mediated street”, where design approaches and technologies
will be tested in a reinterpretation of the traditional Korean street.
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.
West
Philadelphia Project is a program integrating research,
teaching, and community service. Directed by Professor Anne Spirn since
1987, work has involved community organizations, neighborhood groups, and
teachers and students in public schools. Activities have included design
and construction of community landscape projects, maintenance of a
digital database, stormwater management strategies, and curriculum for an
inner-city junior high school.
Zaragoza
Public Realm Project is a cooperative effort in designing the public
realm for over a mile of development along a new high speed rail
line. Directed by Professor Dennis
Frenchman and Professor William Mitchell, the project will incorporate
advanced digital displays, network access, sensing capabilities, and
content to make a highly responsive environment that can serve the needs
of different groups – residents, workers, visitors – at
different times. Companies such as
Telephonica and Samsung will participate in the experimental project,
along with some of the world’s leading thinkers and scholars in the
information society field.
|
