The Role of Contact Networks in Reconsidering Urban Systems Hierarchies

Netcom ◽  
2000 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 253-266
Author(s):  
Maria Giaoutzi ◽  
Anastasia Stratigea
2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 24
Author(s):  
Anastasia Tzioutziou ◽  
Yiannis Xenidis

The continuous growth of cities brings out various concerns for improved development and management of the multifaceted urban systems, including those of resilience and smartness. Despite the many significant efforts in the research field, both notions remain changeable, thus retaining the lack of commonly accepted conceptual and terminological frameworks. The paper’s research goals are to designate the current direct and indirect links in the conceptualizations and research trends of the resilience and smart city frameworks and to prove the potential of the conceptual convergence between them in the context of urban systems. The application of a semi-systematic literature review, including bibliometric evidence and followed by content analysis, has led to the observation that as the resilience discourse opens up to embrace other dimensions, including technology, the smart city research turns its interest to the perspective of urban protection. Therefore, both concepts share the goal for urban sustainability realized through specific capacities and processes and operationalized with the deployment of technology. The paper’s findings suggest that the conceptual and operational foundations of these two concepts could support the emergence of an integrated framework. Such a prospect acknowledges the instrumental role of the smart city approach in the pursuit of urban resilience and unfolds a new model for sustainable city management and development.


Urban Studies ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 004209802110140
Author(s):  
Sarah Barns

This commentary interrogates what it means for routine urban behaviours to now be replicating themselves computationally. The emergence of autonomous or artificial intelligence points to the powerful role of big data in the city, as increasingly powerful computational models are now capable of replicating and reproducing existing spatial patterns and activities. I discuss these emergent urban systems of learned or trained intelligence as being at once radical and routine. Just as the material and behavioural conditions that give rise to urban big data demand attention, so do the generative design principles of data-driven models of urban behaviour, as they are increasingly put to use in the production of replicable, autonomous urban futures.


Author(s):  
Luciano Cupelloni

AbstractThe theme is the urban re-qualification, applied in particular to the architectural heritage and the public space. The goal is the ongoing challenge of outlining a new perspective aimed at “common good” and sustainability. The instrument chosen is the “environmental technological design,” understood as a cultural, scientific, and social position, that is, as a position on the role of architecture. The contribution reiterates the urgency of restoring the transformative power of the design mission to the project, too often reduced to a set of technical compilation procedures. In the best cases, a position that is lost in the complication of procedures, in the extension of time, in the waste of economic and human resources. A crisis of the project as “anticipation” of progressive scenarios, precisely in the most acute, ever more serious phase, of the urgency of the reorganization of urban systems, with a view to environmental, social and economic sustainability. Not a recent urgency, today only brought to light, dramatically, by the reality of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Among the solutions, the design experimental research, well beyond the objective of flexibility, up to the notion of “functional indifference,” understood not as shapeless neutrality, but as the maximum functionality of spatial, architectural and urban quality.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (21) ◽  
pp. 11732
Author(s):  
Massimiliano Viglioglia ◽  
Matteo Giovanardi ◽  
Riccardo Pollo ◽  
Pier Paolo Peruccio

Cities will have a decisive role in reducing the consumption of resources and greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Various experiences of urban regeneration have exploited Information and Communication Technology (ICT) potentialities to optimize the management of complex systems and to encourage sustainable development models. This paper investigates the role of ICT technologies in favouring emerging design for Circular Economy (CE) in the urban context. The paper starts by defining the theoretical background and subsequently presents the goal and methodology of investigation. Through a scoping review, the authors identify case studies and analyse them within the Ellen MacArthur Foundation classification framework that splits the urban context into three urban systems: buildings, mobility and products. The research focuses on nine case studies where the ICT solutions were able to promote the principles of CE. The results show, on the one hand, how data management appears to be a central issue in the optimization of urban processes and, on the other hand, how the district scale is the most appropriate to test innovative solutions. This paper identifies physical and virtual infrastructures, stakeholders and tools for user engagement as key elements for the pursuit of CE adoption in the urban context.


Author(s):  
Edlam Abera Yemeru

Urbanization and industrialization have followed interconnected pathways throughout history. In an urban era where cities concentrate the world’s population and economic activity, industrial hubs development will be inextricably associated with urban dynamics. Cities offer specific advantages that enable industrial productivity, but this is differentiated across the urban system. This chapter reviews the relationship between cities and industrialization, with a specific focus on the role of national urban systems in industrial hubs development. In doing so, it makes a case for a focus on cities and urban systems as key determinants of industrial hubs development and outcomes.


2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 336-351
Author(s):  
Bart Rijken ◽  
Edwin Buitelaar ◽  
Lianne van Duinen

In cities around the world, housing demand is increasing rapidly. Since housing supply is inelastic, house prices are rising as well, which causes affordability problems. Although there is consensus about the need to raise production, there is debate about its location: within the existing city, on underused or derelict buildings and sites, or on greenfield land outside existing city boundaries? The question we address is how researchers on the science–policy interface can support these debates and facilitate evidence-based decision-making. We address two major problems while doing this: (1) the complexity of the object at hand, that is, of the development of urban systems and (2) the politicised nature of science-for-policy. The contribution of this paper is that it links complexity theory to the literature about science-for-policy, two usually unconnected literatures. An additional contribution is that it shows how the role of the scientist as ‘honest broker’, as developed by Roger Pielke, can be operationalised and applied to existing policy debates. We do that for the Dutch debate about housing development in existing urban areas.


2017 ◽  
Vol 49 (8) ◽  
pp. 1922-1942 ◽  
Author(s):  
Udo Pesch ◽  
Anne-Lorène Vernay ◽  
Ellen van Bueren ◽  
Sofie Pandis Iverot

In many sustainable urban innovation projects, the efforts, endurance and enthusiasm of individuals at key positions are considered a crucial factor for success. This article studies the role of individual agency in sociotechnical niches by using Kingdon’s agenda-setting model. Although strategic niche management is commonly used to study processes of urban innovation, the process of niche formation and the role of individual agency has been understudied. We will introduce the notion of the ‘niche entrepreneur’ as an actor who, analogous to Kingdon’s policy entrepreneur, connects the elements that are needed to develop a successful niche that allows learning for sustainability transitions. We will study the process of niche formation and the role of individual entrepreneurship therein, and identify the strategies that have been used by individuals to create a successful niche. This will be done for three cases in urban systems integration: the development of Eva Lanxmeer, a residential district in a drinking water retention area in Culemborg, the Netherlands; the transformation of the waste management practices of Lille Métropole Urban Community, France; and the development of the urban district Hammarby Sjöstad, Sweden. Our findings show that for the successful formation of niches, it is necessary to create ambitious, but clear goals and matching concrete operational plans; niche entrepreneurs may play the role of project champions that contribute significantly to the operationalization, monitoring and the effectuation of the original goals of the project; the strategies of niche entrepreneurs emphasize the building of coalitions and the securing of space for learning.


2020 ◽  
pp. 23-58
Author(s):  
Yoshiki Yamagata ◽  
Perry P.J. Yang ◽  
Soowon Chang ◽  
Michael B. Tobey ◽  
Robert B. Binder ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Big Data ◽  

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document