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Transition thinking incorporated: towards a new discussion framework on sustainable urban projects Ghent University
Today, cities worldwide are engaged in urban projects and activities in a concerted drive towards sustainable development. However, the concept of “sustainable urban projects” is inherently normative, subjective and ambiguous. Furthermore, the popularity of sustainable urban initiatives does not guarantee that increased pressure on dominant unsustainable urban systems will occur. In this article, we argue that strong urban debates on these ...
Retooling Higher Education in an Age of Rising Inequalities, a (post)-COVID-19 Reflection on the Importance of Engaged Urban Pedagogies Vrije Universiteit Brussel
The global pandemic has amplified the need for a more drastic reappreciation of the so-called ‘social dimension’ of higher education. The ministerial communiqués of the European Higher Education Areas describe this social dimension as ‘the creation of an inclusive educational landscape’, emphasising the need to ensure equity of access, participation, and successful completion for learners with increasingly diverse backgrounds. In this chapter, ...
Energy transition in the nebular city: connecting transition thinking, metabolism studies and urban design Vrije Universiteit Brussel KU Leuven
Transforming urban infrastructures is an essential part of creating more sustainable urban regions. But rethinking these complex systems requires a better understanding of their spatial dimensions and their relation with urban morphology and spatial structure. This paper addresses that gap by examining different conceptualizations of technical infrastructure and space in science, technology and society studies (STS), transition thinking, ...
How ‘alternative’ alternative urban policies really are? Looking at participatory budgeting through the lenses of the right to the city Vrije Universiteit Brussel
The paper proposes to focus on a specific instance of 'alternative' urban policy: participatory budgeting (PB). A policy initiative originally developed in the Brazilian city of Porto Alegre in the 1990s, PB enables city-dwellers to co-decide about the allocation of (part of) the city's financial resources. Its model is at present embraced by nearly 1,500 municipalities in 6 continents, for PB is widely regarded as a policy benchmark being ...
Interfacing Genk: Citizen Participation and Critical Urban Intelligence Hasselt University
Urban interfaces are often understood as straightforward media to foster a standardized customer engagement of citizens with and in smart city processes. In contrast, in this essay we take Johanna Drucker’s humanities approach to interfaces as a starting point to redefine the urban interface as a critical zone of relations between multiple frameworks and embodied users. Our aim is to explore the merits of this approach in an urban development ...
Interactive spatial planning of urban green infrastructure – Retrofitting green roofs where ecosystem services are most needed in Oslo Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Spatial multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) is increasingly being used to inform urban green infrastructure planning. We explore the use of modern cloud computing technologies (Google Earth Engine) to facilitate public access to spatial MCDA of ecosystem services from green infrastructure. Using the spatial prioritization of green roof retrofitting in Oslo, Norway, as a case study, we present a web application that is a generalizable tool ...
INTERACT : a comprehensive approach to assess urban form interventions through natural experiments Ghent University
Background: Urban form interventions can result in positive and negative impacts on physical activity, social participation, and well-being, and inequities in these outcomes. Natural experiment studies can advance our understanding of causal effects and processes related to urban form interventions. The INTErventions, Research, and Action in Cities Team (INTERACT) is a pan-Canadian collaboration of interdisciplinary scientists, urban planners, ...
Methodology for assessing determinants of manure use in urban areas of Africa Institute of Tropical Medicine
The objectives of this study were to identify the major determinants (e.g. zootechnical and socio-economic parameters) of manure management practised by urban livestock keepers. Data were collected from four single-visit, multi-object surveys in three cities of Africa. The livestock keepers were classified either as 'good user' or 'bad user' of manure depending on how they use the manure. The results of this study indicate that the habit of ...
Socialist urban development in Kosovska Mitrovica : compressed socio-spatial duality in a medium-sized industrial city in Yugoslavia’s underdeveloped South Ghent University
This article examines spatial patterns of socialist urban transformation in Mitrovica (Kosovo) from the mid-1950s to the early 1980s. During the initial phase of intensive urban development (1957–1965), the monopolistic position of the high-priority enterprise Trepča in financing and allocating housing in combination with the material and physical contingencies of the pre-socialist city led to the concentration of urban development in the free ...