Urban design practice organizes and transforms space through the development of urban projects, organizing the choices of intervention on a territory. Several initiatives in research and project ...practice aim to explore the integration of aspects related to the functioning of natural ecosystems in project design. Nevertheless, urbanization processes are instead a major cause of ecosystem degradation. Regenerative design proposes a better understanding of the site to guide a participatory and continuous improvement process to achieve projects with mutual positive impacts to society and ecosystems, allowing their coevolution. The implementation of regenerative design shows preliminary results internationally through various tools, but its consideration in France remains superficial. In this paper, we explore the origin and contemporary practice of regenerative design, we qualify this theory in relation to other currents of sustainable and ecological urbanism, and finally we identify the five theoretical principles of a regenerative urban project, to propose a definition to this term.
The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) has experienced substantial difficulties in effectively achieving its purpose owing to the interplay of political, social, and economic interests, as well as ...institutional and policy contexts in developing countries such as Romania. This study presents a systematic evaluation of the quality of environmental impact statements (EISs) from seven urban areas in Romania. We followed an updated Lee-and-Colley evaluation approach to assess the quality of 21 EISs in four main categories, namely development and local environment, impact identification and evaluation, alternatives and mitigation, and presentation and communication. Our findings show that the range of impacts studied, the alternatives, and mitigation measures were poorly outlined in the analyzed reports, while the description of the project and the environmental factors were of higher quality. Our study identifies EISs weaknesses, namely insufficient data sources for determining the baseline conditions, poor reliance on rigorous quantitative modelling when predicting the impacts, and unclear monitoring arrangements. It also suggests ways to improve the quality of EISs and to enhance sustainable policy decisions in countries that are struggling with the implementation of EIA depending on the scale of the project and the actors involved.
•The EISs assessed for urban projects in Romania have moderate quality overall.•The EISs assessed are more descriptive and less analytic.•Public participation during scoping has not been addressed in the EISs assessed.•EISs contains mostly qualitative than quantitative methods for impact assessments.
The creation and usage of serious games on virtual reality (VR) and/or interactive platforms for the teaching of architecture, construction, urban planning, and other derived areas, such as security ...and risk prevention, require design processes, studies, and research that lead to further consolidation expansion. In that sense, this paper presents two main aims developed: the improvement of a virtual navigation system through the results of previous user studies and mixed research (quantitative and qualitative) improved based on the user perception for educational and professional uses. The VR system used is based on Unreal Engine programming of the HTC Vive sensor. This study is related to the GAME4City 3.0 and a broader project focused on gamified visualization and its educational uses in architectural and urban projects. The results reflect great interest, good usability, and high motivation for further usage for all types of users. However, an apparent resistance to deepen its use continues to be perceived in academia. Based on the research results, weak points of educational gamified systems have been identified, and the main differences and needs in user profiles' function. With these data, progress regarding implementing this kind of system at the teaching and professional levels must be pursued.
With more than 110,000 inhabitants, Saint-Denis is the third most populated municipality of Ile-de-France and is now facing urban transformation. It’s at the heart of Greater Paris projects : the ...high-priority urban redevelopment area NPNRU (Nouveau programme national de renouvellement urbain), 2024 Olympic games sites, Grand Paris Express metro station and call for projects “Let’s invent the metropolis”. This unprecedent renewal is concomitant with discourses of ecological transition and “environmental excellency”. Those projects are contested by residents’ groups, who are waiting for substantial transformations of their environment, better living conditions and some form of environmental justice.
Large‐scale urban projects (LSUPs) are capable of changing cities' structures and, consequently, have a potential deep impact on land values. However, to assume that the LSUP always uplift land ...values may dismiss too quickly some key aspects of these investments. This work uses a difference‐in‐differences model to assess the impacts of LSUPs on land values, implemented in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Results indicate that the impacts of LSUPs vary according to the kind of project (transit, iconic building and retail) and property (residential, commercial and vacant land). Macroeconomic cycles, negative externalities, and projects location within the local urban structure are key to understand the impacts' dynamics.
Resumen
Los proyectos urbanos a gran escala (PUGS) son capaces de cambiar las estructuras de las ciudades y, por consiguiente, tienen un profundo impacto potencial en el valor del suelo urbano. Sin embargo, asumir que los PUGS siempre aumentan el valor del suelo puede desestimar demasiado rápido algunos aspectos clave de estas inversiones. Este estudio utiliza un modelo de diferencias en diferencias para evaluar los impactos de los PUGS en los valores del suelo, que se ha implementado en Belo Horizonte (Brasil). Los resultados indican que los impactos de los PUGS varían según el tipo de proyecto (tránsito, construcción emblemática y comercio minorista) y la propiedad (residencial, comercial y terrenos baldíos). Los ciclos macroeconómicos, las externalidades negativas y la ubicación de los proyectos dentro de la estructura urbana local son fundamentales para comprender la dinámica de los impactos.
抄録
大規模都市計画 (Large‐scale urban projects: LSUP)は都市の構造を変えることができ、その結果として、地価に大きな影響を与える可能性がある。しかし、LSUPが必ず地価を上昇させると決め付けることは、これらの投資対象の重要な側面の一部を早々に見落とす可能性がある。本稿では、差分モデルを用いて、ブラジルのベロオリゾンテで実施された、LSUPが地価に及ぼす影響を評価した。結果から、LSUPの影響が、プロジェクトの種類 (交通、象徴的建造物、小売)および性質 (住宅用地・商業用地・空閑地)により異なることが示される。マクロ経済のサイクル、負の外部性、プロジェクトが地域の都市構造の中で行われていることが、影響のダイナミクスを理解する鍵となる。
This study offers a detailed analysis of an under‐researched social problem of in‐situ marginalisation and its causes by drawing on the concept of state entrepreneurialism. Our empirical data stem ...from the Lingang mega project in Shanghai and one of its neighbourhoods named Neighbourhood No.57 where we find that the residents have not been relocated but are instead suffering from declining public services and environmental quality from surrounding industrial developments. The root cause of this problem is the municipal government’s prioritisation of its strategic objectives of economic development over the livelihood of local residents. The strategic vision of the municipality has led to mass relocation in its early phases of development but in its later stages leaves many residents waiting for relocation whilst being gradually surrounded by industrial developments. Despite continued residential complaints and petitions, in‐situ marginalisation is not resolved due to the institutional arrangement of Lingang, which has centralised planning and financing powers to newly created project‐oriented state organisation. Social responsibilities have been relegated to lower‐tiered governments in Lingang which have neither planning power nor the financial resources to resolve the problems of residents. By examining the case of Lingang, this paper provides a different analytical framework for explaining the social problems emerging from China’s mega urban developments.
本文运用 “国家企业家主义” (state entrepreneurialism) 的概念分析 “就地边缘化” (in‐situ marginalisation) 的社会问题 。 案例来自于上海临港新城内的某社区 。该社区的居民没有因为重大项目而动迁，但面临公共设施不足，受到由周边工业开发所引起的环境污染问题的影响。就地边缘化问题是由于市政府着重于经济发展战略。为达成战略目标，开发项目的管理制度将经济发展和规划权利转移到侧重负责开发的管委会和国企开发公司，而将社会管理下放给缺乏经济能力的镇政府。由于这样侧重于经济的战略开发和相应的管理模式，这些与重大项目关系不大的社区居民就出现了就地边缘化。通过此案例，本文提供了一个与西方理论不同的框架来诠释中国重大项目开发所导致的社会问题。
In contrast to the perception that mega-urban projects are the epitome of neoliberal governance, in China they are initiated by the state as a state development strategy, which represents a new ...governance mode of 'state entrepreneurialism'. The market is used as a new governance mechanism to mobilize the resources of multiple actors. Consequently, the delivery of mega-urban projects is neither driven by market actors nor controlled by the state alone. Mega-urban projects are the sites where governance innovation is experimented upon. Focusing on Lingang in Shanghai, the paper reveals that a horizontal networked mode of governance has emerged.
This article analyses the nocturnal dimension to the Reims Grand Centre project. It brings out a shift in approach by those involved in urban design, with an increased sensitivity to nocturnal ...matters. This provides a way of improving user comfort and developing new evening and night-time usages. Nevertheless, this attention to the nocturnal dimension is incomplete, seeking to make places more attractive only to certain parts of the population, leading to various pre-existing usages being displaced or pushed out, thereby increasing social and behavioural normativity.
Urban development projects involve some complex relationships between institutional public agents, who govern local territories, and economic agents, who make urban economies. These relationships ...between the stakeholders of the economic sectors (transport, water, housing, energy, industry…) and the territories shaped by public action thus define the type of urban governance which results from interactions. In this paper, we develop the hypothesis that the relation between these stakeholders has a major impact on the mechanisms that produce the city. In this perspective, we apply an analytical framework (sector/territory dialogues) to two river cities in order to understand how the interplay between the stakeholders modifies urban geography. Analysing the relationship between the city, the river and the port in Venlo (The Netherlands) and Strasbourg (France) provides examples of project-based urban planning that is founded on negotiation between the river stakeholders (port authorities, inland waterway managers, transport and logistics firms) and the different levels of public policies (municipal, intermunicipal, regional, national levels). Eventually, this approach allows us to consider the forms taken by the above sector-territory dialogue within the urban space in terms of tools and scales. Finally, the paper ends with a discussion about the value of a contribution from geography to an understanding of these governance issues.
•We propose a geographical perspective on urban governance in two river cities.•We analyse the negotiation between the river stakeholders and the levels of public policies.•To provide a better understanding of the port–city relationships
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