Perspectives in Metropolitan Research

Softcover
16.5 x 24 cm
English

As laboratories for the future and experimental locations for architectural and social developments, metropolises must face complicated challenges by constantly re-inventing themselves. Complex and dynamic spheres of influence permeate major cities and necessitate communication, critical-constructive modes of thinking, processes for negotiation, and suggestions for solutions. Using unconventional specialized topics, the series Perspectives in Metropolitan Research explores these developments. Each topic is discussed in a processoriented manner, which is supplemented by considerations for taking action.
Perspectives in Metropolitan Research is a joint project of the HafenCity University Hamburg [HCU] and the foundation ZEIT-Stiftung Ebelin und Gerd Bucerius. The series’s focus reflects the disciplinary collaboration and intellectual approach found at the HCU. The volumes focus on subject matter that reflects the planned, built, surveyed, and lived surroundings and connects these with their social, economic, political, and cultural aspects. The series will release one volume yearly with rotating guest editors.

Self-induced Shocks: Mega-Projects and Urban DevelopmentPerspectives in Metropolitan Research 1

978-3-86859-370-9
29,80€

Recent history of mega-projects has largely been written as a record of disasters. Wellknown examples have turned into icons of planning failures, costly overspending, and excessive delays. Despite these systemic risks inherent in top-down massive interventions into the urban fabric, mega-projects have always played a decisive role in the development of cities. As “self-induced shocks”, they create a state of emergency that effectively leads to the pooling of finances, expertise, and public awareness. In this way objectives can be met that would have been unattainable in everyday practice.

This publication explores, with an international focus, the inherent ambivalence of megaprojects as drivers of urban transformation on the one hand and potential catalysts for uncontrollable dynamics on the other. It elucidates various forms and facets of large-scale construction ventures: as vehicles of urban development, as temporary large-scale events, as management challenges, and as elements of a changing urban development within the context of “eco-cities” and “smart cities.”

Passion for the Built EnvironmentPerspectives in Metropolitan Research 2

978-3-86859-439-3
29,80€

Our built environment is the result of multilayered and elaborate thought and design processes. Each of the architecture, landscape architecture, and civil engineering disciplines involved in this process has a wide range of design methods and their own disciplinary culture and history of ideas. New methodological approaches have emerged at the interfaces of these disciplines that require an interdisciplinary debate about designing. The focus of this publication is the current discussion about design, understood not only as the creation of a beautiful product, but as a task of building culture.
Passion for the Built Environment provides new insights and perspectives and illuminates the array of methodological approaches and design options called for by our built environment—from the design to the realization and the finished property.

Science and the CityHamburg’s Path to a Built Environment Education
Perspectives in Metropolitan Research 3

978-3-86859-458-4
29,80€

Hamburg’s early starting point for a higher education of the built environment professionals was the initiation of a building and engineering drawing class (Bauzeichenklasse). Brought to life back in May 1767, for the following 250 years the organization and academic professionalization of the built environment education in Hamburg has undertaken a long and sometimes winding road through several organizations, times, policies. This book is drawing a bow from this first initiative to today’s HafenCity University Hamburg with its pronounced interdisciplinary strategic profile, combining all built environment related disciplines together with a socio-cultural reflection on cities and urban society under one roof.

Science and the City links three perspectives: It shows Hamburg’s organization of the built environment education from a retrospective, provides insights into institutionalized interdisciplinarity at various institutions and underlines the interdisciplinary approach at the HafenCity University Hamburg in particular.

New Stakeholders of Urban Change: A Question of Culture and Attitude?Perspectives in Metropolitan Research 4

978-3-86859-487-4
24,80€

In the urban centers of Europe, residents are increasingly demanding not only to participate in the discussion about the densification of our cities, but also to shape it actively. It is especially creative planning projects that succeed in finding new role models and structures for urban development: artists act as urban developers, theaters carry out urban projects, curators curate the city, architects also take on the role of social workers. This results in new hybrid fields of action that require a rethinking of established strategies and the constellations of those involved.
This volume brings together perspectives from quite different professions at the interface of urban planning and cultural practice, in order to seek answers to some central questions: how does this hybridity generate a contemporary urbanity? How must contemporary institutions be structured? And how should a new culture of cooperation be set up to enable a mutual dialog and transparency in development processes between citizens and authorities, as well as between the various stakeholders?

New Urban Professions—A Journey through Practice and Theory(Changing) Perspectives in Metropolitan Research 5

978-3-86859-515-4
29,80€

New urbanist fields of work?! Influencing urban development purposefully and positively can only be accomplished productively if one goes beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries. What is required therefore is a rethinking within urbanist practice.
New Urban Professions—A Journey through Practice and Theory provides exploratory discussions of phenomena, reflections and professionalization possibilities in the various fields of work. In the first section, a wide variety of practitioners are presented, who try out suitable development strategies and procedural approaches. They experiment with professional and personal competences and reassess the relationship between creativity and multiple authorship. Theoretical reflections present a variety of perspectives. Whether, to what extent, where, and how the emerging necessary competences can be taught and learnt is also a decisive factor in the long-term success of collective urban design of the future. The second part addresses this topic: what form might a sustainable exchange of experience take, what curricular consequences would appear necessary and in what roles, spaces, and spatiotemporal contexts must one prepare for the coproduction of the city?

With contributions by, among others: Renato Anelli, Anna Paula Couri, Christopher Dell, Christoph Heinemann, Bernd Kniess, Ton Matton, Michael Obrist, Klaus Overmeyer, Doina Petrescu, PlanBude, Carlo Ratti, Stefan Rettich, Tatjana Schneider, Snøhetta, Teleinternetcafe, Umschichten, Kai Vöckler, Kathrin Wildner

Constructing Innovation: How Large-Scale Projects Drive Novelty in the Construction IndustryPerspectives in Metropolitan Research 7

978-3-86859-678-6
29,80€

The construction sector is not exactly known for its innovation. Also, the reputation of large-scale projects builds less on their capacity to generate novelty than on their likelihood to fail in terms of project management’s performance indicators of time and cost. And yet, throughout the history of construction, the sector has regularly experienced the introduction of novel technologies and techniques, often advanced through large-scale projects such as the Eiffel Tower or Sydney Opera House.
This book seeks to shed light on this aspect of large-scale construction projects. The volume contains the results of an interdisciplinary collaboration between scholars from the social sciences and construction engineering. Through six indepth case studies comprising recent large-scale construction projects in Germany, chapters take different disciplinary and conceptual premises to explore the contribution these projects have made in generating and dispersing innovations.

Digital City Science. Researching New Technologies in Urban EnvironmentsPerspectives in Metropolitan Research 6

978-3-86859-600-7
29,80€

How do science and technology shape future cities—and how do cities shape science and technology in return? Who are the architects and actors behind these processes? Driven by a transdisciplinary approach, Perspectives in Metropolitan Research 6 will elaborate on the intertwinements of science, technology, and cities. The contributions will discuss recent theoretical approaches on how to look at the intersection between digitalization and cities scientifically, as well as how to define one’s role as a researcher. What are the assumptions that guide our view while researching? What does it mean to work transdisciplinarily with a focus on the future of cities? In sum, this edition offers an overview of current perspectives on the Digital City. It is conceptualized as a forum for academic exchange on different methods, methodologies, measurements, and materials; on theories, treasures, toys, and tools; and on power, prestige, problems, and perfection of/in digital city research.
This volume is based on contributions to this year’s City Science Summit (CSS 2019), a global conference hosted by the CityScienceLab at HafenCity University Hamburg in cooperation with the MIT Media Lab. The summit looked towards future cities that are more livable and innovative in using novel technologies for urban decision-making, design, and operation. In addition to academic members and researchers of the City Science Network, the summit also welcomed international mayors, established experts, and high-level CEOs.