scholarly journals Planning and designing urban places in response to climate and local culture: A case study of Mussafah District in Abu Dhabi

Spatium ◽  
2011 ◽  
pp. 14-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milica Bajic-Brkovic ◽  
Mira Milakovic
Keyword(s):  
Urban Development ◽  
International Society ◽  
Urban Spaces ◽  
Abu Dhabi ◽  
Local Culture ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Urban Places

This paper deals with how climate and local culture specifics contribute to urban diversity, and how they affect the way urban spaces are being conceived, planned and designed. The authors argue that regardless of the globally accepted principles of sustainability which emphasize smart responses, diversity and culture as the prime drives in urban development of, cities around the world are continually experiencing the all-alike solutions, which often compromise their identity and character. Having taken the genuine stands of the philosophy as a starting point for examining the subject, the authors explore and present how the climate specifics, along with the uniqueness of local culture, lead toward the solutions which make a difference to their cities. The discussion is illustrated by the case study the authors were engaged in, the Mussafah District project in Abu Dhabi, a redevelopment proposal recently initiated and developed by International Society of Urban and Regional Planners -ISOCARP and Urban Planning Council of Abu Dhabi.

scholarly journals Sukcesy fińskiego systemu edukacji, czyli dlaczego Finlandia szczyci się jednym z najlepszych systemów szkolnictwa na świecie – porównawcze studium przypadku

2018 ◽  
pp. 349-365
Author(s):  
Ewelina Czujko-Moszyk
Keyword(s):  
Social Economic ◽  
Educational Reforms ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Political Factors ◽  
Descriptive Case Study ◽  
Education Major ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The World ◽  
High Social Status

This paper seeks to answer the question why Finland is considered to have one of the best education systems in the world. The author aims at providing a descriptive case study of Finland in comparison to the Polish educational system with some reference to other Western countries. The world first noticed Finland following the release of PISA results in 2001. Yet, PISA overview is just a starting point for this case study. The paper analyses different social, economic and political factors which, in the author’s opinion, contributed the most to the Finnish success in education. Major arguments for the Finnish success are preceded by an overview of educational reforms from the 1950s until the present. The author argues that the remarkably high social status of teachers, their autonomy and great qualifications,consistency in educational reforms which offer high quality, equity and decentralization are the primary reasons for Finland’s global success. All of the above achievements are compared to Poland’s current situation in education.

Estimating western ringtail possum (Pseudocheirus occidentalis) density using distance sampling

2010 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 197 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. R. Finlayson ◽  
A. N. Diment ◽  
P. Mitrovski ◽  
G. G. Thompson ◽  
S. A. Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Urban Development ◽  
Population Size ◽  
Western Australia ◽  
Distance Sampling ◽  
Reliable Estimate ◽  
Population Estimates ◽  
Density Estimates ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Ringtail Possum

A reliable estimate of population size is of paramount importance for making management decisions on species of conservation significance that may be impacted during development. The western ringtail possum (Pseudocheirus occidentalis) is regularly encountered during urban development and is the subject of numerous surveys to estimate its abundance. A variety of techniques have been used for this species with mixed results. This paper reports on a case study using distance sampling to estimate density of P. occidentalis in a small habitat remnant near Busselton, Western Australia. Density estimates obtained were within the range of previous studies of this species and we suggest that this technique should be employed in future surveys to improve the accuracy of population estimates for this species before development.

scholarly journals Post Covid-19 urbanization requires new standards and per capita in planning, design, and building

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdol Aziz Shahraki
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Protection ◽  
Urban Transport ◽  
Urban Spaces ◽  
World Health ◽  
The World ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Public Health Protection ◽  
Urban Places

Abstract This paper studies investment reductions in urban health protection programs in the recent decades under the umbrella of plutocratic ideas. It studies the densely populated slums with little urban spaces, narrow sidewalks, traffic jams, and degraded environmental components. This paper addresses the question of how shall we reopen post-covid-19 cities sustainably and lively? Our method to find a solution is an innovative mathematical model that suggests revision in the current regulations and standards, sizes, and per capita of urban spaces with the help of maximizing necessary investments. This paper analyzes crowded neighborhoods, urban transport sites, and polluted environments where people cannot respect world health organization protocols concerning individual and public health protection. This research aims to maximize investment in public health protection for supplying suitable urban places’ sizes. Outcomes of this research will be helpful to reopen cities in the post-covid-19 everywhere in the world.

scholarly journals DIGITAL ACCOUNTS AFTER DEATH: A CASE STUDY IN IRAN LAW

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 153-182
Author(s):  
Abbas Mirshekari ◽  
Ramin Ghasemi ◽  
Alireza Fattahi
Keyword(s):  
Digital Information ◽  
Legal Systems ◽  
Analysis Method ◽  
The Public ◽  
Content Analysis Method ◽  
The World ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The One

In recent times, cyberspace is being widely used so that everyone has a digital account. It naturally entails its own legal issues. Undoubtedly, one of the main issues is that what fate awaits the account and its content upon the account holder’s death? This issue has been neglected not only by the primary creators of digital accounts but also by many legal systems in the world, including Iran. To answer this question, we first need to distinguish between the account and the information contained therein. The account belongs to the company that creates it and allows the user to use it only. Hence, following the death of the account holder, the account will be lost but the information will remain because it was created by him/her and thus belongs to him/her. However, does this mean that the information will be inherited by the user’s heirs after his/her death? Can the user exercise his/her right to transfer account content to a devisee through a testament? Comparing digital information with corporeal property, some commentators believe that the property will be inherited like corporeal property. This is a wrong deduction because the corporeal property can disclose the privacy of the owner and third parties less than the one in cyberspace. This paper aims to show what happens to a digital account after its user passes away and examine the subject using the content analysis method in various legal systems in the world, especially in Iran as a case study. The required information is collected from law books, articles, doctrines, case laws, and relevant laws and regulations of different countries. To protect the privacy interests of the deceased and others, it is concluded that the financially valuable information published by the account holder before his/her death can be transferred to successors. As a rule, the information that may violate privacy by divulging should be removed. However, given that this information may be a valuable source in the future to know about the present, legislators are suggested to make digital information, which may no longer lead to the invasion of the decedent’s privacy, available to the public after a long time.

scholarly journals Sport in the time of transformation in Poland. Gdańsk case study

2020 ◽  
pp. 101-120
Author(s):  
Dobrosław Mańkowski
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Economic Life ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Political Transformation ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Sports Club ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The World

Various areas of social and economic life and their changes during the political transformation after 1989 have been studied and analyzed by Polish sociologists. It seems that one of the areas that has been left out and which constitutes a terra incognita is the world of sport.  As in other areas, individual and collective social actors who organized, managed or participated in the world of sport had to come to terms with the new social, economic and political order. That is why the transformation seen through their eyes and what they did, their motivations and ways of coping with changes are interesting and broaden our knowledge about the transformation period.  In the article, I present a fragment of my own research on the course and effects of political transformation, based on the example of a multi-sectional Workers’ Sports Club Stoczniowiec Gdańsk (currently GKS Stoczniowiec Gdańsk). I was interested in the struggles of people who organized sport, which they had to face in the period of transformation. I was interested in how they experienced the clash with the emerging new social order. What strategies they adopted in their organizational activities and their practices during the transformation. The case study is treated as a field study and a conceptual pilot study which is a starting point for further exploration. I used two methods: desk research (among others, press articles, club information, official data, statistical data were collected) and in-depth interviews (IDI) with social actors operating in the sports club. The analytical framework for the study consists of three dimensions of transformation, namely the economic, political and legal, and social ones. The theoretical foundations, on the other hand, are the perspectives of new institutionalism, especially the theory of fields by Fligstein and McAdam and the concept of deinstitutionalization by Christine Oliver.

Sustainable Urban Development

2018 ◽  
pp. 30-40
Author(s):  
Nicola Boccella ◽  
Irene Salerno
Keyword(s):  
Urban Development ◽  
Urban Design ◽  
Rapid Growth ◽  
Development Planning ◽  
Local Communities ◽  
Sustainable Urban Development ◽  
The World ◽  
University Of Rome ◽  
The City

The concept of participation in sustainable urban development practices is actually more and more popular in Europe and all over the world. In parallel, there is a rapid growth of urban design and planning projects including local communities in urban development planning activities. According to such concepts, this chapter, starting from the description of the results of field and desk researches carried out by ‘La Sapienza' University of Rome and related to communities involvement strategies currently available in Europe, describes and analyses a case study based on a concrete application of theoretical and methodological approaches, and two more cases of possible application of an integrated methodology. All the projects described concern the city of Rome.

Virtual Cities as Memoryscapes

2020 ◽  
pp. 236-256
Author(s):  
Maria Alexandra ◽  
Gago Da Câmara ◽  
Helena Murteira ◽  
Paulo Simões Rodrigues
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Lisbon Earthquake ◽  
Historical Awareness ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The City ◽  
Determining Factor ◽  
Over Time

The digital re-creation of a past city represents more than a mere depiction of its historical awareness; it also represents its imaginability. In retrospect, the imaginability of the city corresponds to the outcome of various perceptions that we have acquired of it over time, and which currently confers us with a certain degree of accuracy in its readability. The imaginability of the city is therefore a determining factor in virtually re-creating the latter and subsequently converting it into a memoryscape. This theory can be validated by the specific case study of Lisbon, Portugal, which has during the last few years been the subject of at least four projects that sought to virtually re-create the city’s past. Despite presenting themselves distinctively with different technological applications, the four projects held the same starting point; the great Lisbon earthquake of 1755 (a major disruptive event in its history), and were all focused on presenting the cityscape that was lost as a result. Lisbon’s iconography from the sixteenth century to the mid-eighteenth century (drawings, engravings, and paintings) was used as crucial data.

The urban domination of the planet: A Rancièrian critique

2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 389-409 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristina Grange ◽  
Michael Gunder
Keyword(s):  
Urban Land ◽  
The Other ◽  
Urban Fabric ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The World ◽  
Urban Places ◽  
Opening Up

A competitive urbanisation discourse is dominating the world. So much so that, following Lefevbre’s later work, Brenner and Schmid, among others, have recently re-invigorated the term ‘planetary urbanisation’ to promote a new epistemology of the urban. This is an epistemology which re-conceptualises the world as constituted by an extended urban fabric that lacks global exteriority – all the world is now to be perceived as a part of a global condensed, extended or differential urbanisation. But this also begs the question: what of the other non-urban-dwelling population who inhabit the 97% of the landmass that currently is not developed as urban land? The article begins by considering contemporary debates about planetary urbanisation. Having introduced arguments of equality developed by the philosophy of Rancière, it then considers planetary urbanisation from the perspective of equity. The article argues that we currently are witnessing an urban domination of the planet that not only fails in recognising the non-urban outside, but perhaps more importantly, increasingly is creating ‘geographies of despair’. It concludes by arguing for planning theories that take rubrics other than just that of the urban as their starting point, in order to contribute to opening up both urban and non-urban places as potential stages where disruptive politics, including those pertinent to planning, may be both played out and appropriately understood.

scholarly journals Challenges in Adapting Sustainable City Solutions from Finland to Different Contexts Worldwide: A Libyan Case Study

Energies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (10) ◽  
pp. 1883
Author(s):  
Carmen Antuña-Rozado ◽  
Justo García-Navarro ◽  
Pekka Huovila
Keyword(s):  
Urban Development ◽  
Global South ◽  
Research Centre ◽  
Sustainable City ◽  
Human Settlements ◽  
Technical Research ◽  
The World ◽  
Flexible Framework

The EcoCity concept presented here has been designed in Finland and improved through collaboration with local partners and stakeholders to adapt to varying contexts while trying to provide solutions for the improvement of human settlements around the world, particularly in the Global South. Supported by specific methodologies and effective facilitation processes and skills, also developed by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd. (VTT), it provides a structured yet flexible framework for conducting the complex dialogue leading to ecocity implementation, the importance of which is typically overlooked. This article discusses the theoretical underpinnings of the concept in relation to the general ecocity debate, as well as its main historical influences linked to the Finnish urban development tradition. The process thus enabled is illustrated by a Libyan case study.

scholarly journals Przestrzeń cyfrowa i internet jako przedmiot zainteresowań w badaniach geograficznych = Digital space and the Internet as the subject of interest of geographical research

2019 ◽  
Vol 91 (2) ◽  
pp. 21-37
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Janc
Keyword(s):  
Digital Divide ◽  
Real Space ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Geographical Research ◽  
Digital Space ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Space Data ◽  
Digital Spaces

The development of the Internet drove significant changes in the social and economic functioning of people and spatial units. In the case of geography, the Internet changed its nature as a science about space, by expanding on the available topics and methods of study by which geographers come to know the world. New possibilities were a result, though also challenges, above all in relation to the role in geographical research played by the Internet and digital space (data generated through the use of the Internet). Major developments to the World Wide Web and to the Internet as a whole, as well as new solutions made possible by the latter’s creation combine with phenomena subject to scientific analysis to leave as insufficient previous state-of-the-art research methods in the field of Internet geography. The aim of this article is therefore to identify the main problems with research in digital space. Emphasis is put on relationships between real and digital space from the two complementary perspectives of digital space as a source of information about real space for research and of digital space as the subject of research. Explored first is the way in which digital space furnishes data upon which descriptions of real space can be based. An attempt is then made to discover the nature of digital space in its spatial aspects, with the relationship between digital and real space determined. A literature review further serves as the basis for the presentation of four research topics relating to the geography of the Internet, i.e. digital-divide analysis, issues of the management of socio-economic processes, cyber-balkanisation, and the relationships between real and digital spaces. The digital divide relates to access or skills, as well as to individual motivations and socio-cultural preferences, which can also be observed in the different ways people use the Internet. The digital divide is subject to constant change amid the rapid development of the Internet and the increasing importance of the Web in everyday life. Growing interest in concepts relating to the functionality of various areas in so-called smart cities and smart rural areas arises out of issues of spatial management. Cyber-balkanisation in turn constitutes a fragmentation of the Internet more and more manifested by users as they have increased control over online content. The final research topic, concerned with the relationships between real and digital spaces, is crucial to an understanding of the Internet’s role in geography. The presented areas of research on the Internet and digital space, as well as the research directions referred to, should be treated as a starting point for a broader discussion. In the case of analyses of Internet geography, it is essential for basic terms to be determined and defined. Also of importance is a general determination of the role and importance of the Internet in geography.

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