2.22.2012 | cities, planning, spatial analysis
Cities may be seen as systems that, at their best, foster symbiotic interactions and equitable transactions that efficiently distribute resources. To achieve this, planning spaces that enable encounters among individuals to take place is paramount. The discipline of urban design recognizes the importance of these factors, but it has typically failed to develop a common template to address...
2.21.2012 | architecture, markets
The Marin County Civic Center in the city of San Rafael, Calif., is a striking sight. At once stunning and curious, it was the hyper-modern...
2.20.2012 | culture, inequality, salvador
It's Carnival time. This is when millions leave their worries behind and go with the flow of the world's largest collective parties. Brazil's...
2.19.2012 | art, pop-up, mumbai
During my first visit to Bombay Underground, a community library, bookshop and exhibition space in Mumbai's trendy Bandra...
2.18.2012 | urbanism, ecology, quotes
"We need to view the fragility of the planet and its resources as an opportunity for speculative design innovations rather than as a form of...
2.17.2012 | photography, barcelona
An exhibit recently opened at the Barcelona Photographic Archive that uses photography as a tool to understand urban change through time...
2.16.2012 | street life, podcasts
"Love at (and for) the Food Truck" is a conversation with Tiffany Pham, third-generation owner of the Momogoose food truck in Boston...
2.15.2012 | architecture, development, events
The 2011 Hong Kong & Shenzhen Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism \ Architecture, which started in December, is in its final week at...
2.14.2012 | art, public space, events
Political events and public protests are often held in large communal spaces such as town squares and plazas. But what do these places hold and...
2.13.2012 | architecture, planning
On Feb. 9, the Architectural Association in London held a symposium on urban informality titled “Design as Political Engagement"...
2.12.2012 | crime, demographics, links
The latest assortment of featured links from Ali Madad, including "Raise the Crime Rate," "An Interview With Mike Gibbons on Public...
2.11.2012 | planning, research, kabul
For many of us, it is difficult to imagine Afghanistan without thinking of the Taliban, Osama bin Laden, ethnic divisions and...
2.10.2012 | politics, public space
My support for the Occupy movement has changed. I still find it inspiring that people around the world are prioritizing democracy...
2.9.2012 | technology, governance
In a post on modeling open-source cities, Polis featured a video about "Crowdsourced Moscow 2012: A Public Space Game" by Andrei...
2.8.2012 | art, public space
"The Hundred Story House" is a new collaborative public art project by myself – Leon Reid IV – and Julia Marchesi. I met Julia...
2.7.2012 | water, sanitation, ecuador
Since November 2009, I have been involved in a United Nations international development cooperation program in Ecuador aimed at...
2.6.2012 | design, street life, phnom penh
City life, though chaotic, is often one replete with rules — whether explicit laws or implicit norms about where to walk, how to drive, and where...
2.5.2012 | art, politics, china
This week, the first solo show in Sweden of the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei opened at the art center Magasin 3. The exhibition focused on...
2.4.2012 | architecture, housing
The Kubuswoningen, or cube houses, in Rotterdam were designed by Piet Blom in the mid-1980s. Their distinctive shape — a cube...
2.3.2012 | planning, participation, surakarta
In 2001, after four decades of authoritarian rule, Indonesia underwent one of the most ambitious decentralization programs attempted...
2.2.2012 | housing, development, video
Sheela Patel and Jockin Arputham — two of the world's most respected voices on housing and urban poverty — recently addressed...
2.1.2012 | green space, research
Is it possible to assign a monetary value to public green space in cities? Alex Lo recently published an assessment of methods based on choice...
1.31.2012 | photography, featured artist
Marc Yankus's sleepy-eyed portraits of the city "as it sinks into slumber" or "rouses itself to face a new day" are beautiful images of an...
1.30.2012 | architecture, design, events
Zines were supposed to have been doomed by the Internet, with deathblows from blogs and a final thrashing from tweets and tumblrs...
1.29.2012 | news, links
Ali Madad's latest assortment of featured links, including "The Turgot Map of Paris," "Train to Always," "Homeless Signs," "Island of...
1.28.2012 | space, maps, quotes
"How many maps, in the descriptive or geographical sense, might be needed to deal exhaustively with a given space, to code...
1.27.2012 | dance, film, wuppertal
In riveting scenes from Wim Wenders' 2012 Oscar-nominated 3-D dance film, "Pina," dancers for the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch...
1.26.2012 | housing, gentrification, são paulo
Brazil has become known for innovative urban initiatives, including the noted 2001 Statute of the City, which aimed to affirm the social...
1.25.2012 | architecture, quotes
"I want projects in the Biennale to look seriously at the spaces made by buildings: the political, social, and public realms of which...
1.24.2012 | art, quito
Since my arrival in Quito two years ago, one of my most exciting discoveries has been Oswaldo Guayasamín. This iconic Latin American...
1.23.2012 | urbanism, design, africa
It has been nearly four months since we breathed a huge sigh of relief. After more than a year of meetings, informal conversations, exorbitant...
1.22.2012 | architecture, resilience, haiti
Last week marked the second anniversary of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti. The devastation — more than 315,000 people dead, 1.5 million...
1.21.2012 | architecture, peacebuilding
There is no question that architecture and planning have been crucial components of conflicts taking place in cities. But...
1.20.2012 | architecture, activism, detroit
The Detroit Collaborative Design Center (DCDC) is not content with the status quo when it comes to built environment professionals...
1.19.2012 | ecology, development, featured place
There used to be direct physical and visual access to the Sasaki Garden in New York City's Washington Square Village, but New York...
1.18.2012 | water, quotes
"In a dusty office of the municipal buildings in K-West ward in northwest Mumbai there is a detailed map of the Paris water supply...
1.17.2012 | art, events
Wandering through satellite images captured by Google Earth, artist Marco Cadioli uncovered manmade landscapes resembling...
1.16.2012 | tourism, kenya
On the red dirt roads of southern Kenya, a few hours from Malindi, kids chase and hail streams of Jeeps and Land Rovers hauling...
1.15.2012 | cartography, slums, links
Ali Madad presents his latest assortment of online serendipity, from visualizing slumlords to Libera's 'Lego' Concentration Camp...
1.15.2012 | media, development
Last Wednesday, the Institute of Development Studies in the U.K. released a short film exploring how the British media depict...
1.14.2012 | politics, video
UC Berkeley sociologists Claude Fischer and Michael Burawoy went tête-à-tête in an incisive debate at the peak of the Occupy fervor last...
1.13.2012 | planning, public space
Rosalie Genevro's article "Starrett City: A Home of One’s Own — With Party Walls" traces the history of a beloved modernist housing...
1.12.2012 | technology, community
The American Internet is atwitter after Microsoft announced last week that it had patented a mobile application technology giving...
1.11.2012 | architecture, mapping, research
While we've previously mused on the agency of mapping in reconfiguring information vital to the production of the urban realm, the Mapping...
1.10.2012 | technology, development
Escalators are usually associated with the internal workings of multi-level buildings. On notable occasions, moving staircases appear...
1.9.2012 | housing, politics, spain
More than three years after the beginning of the global economic crisis, Spain continues to fall without a visible end. One of the most...
1.8.2012 | events, picks
With the new year under way, many events on architecture, planning and urbanism await. As traveling abroad takes a bit of planning...
1.7.2012 | travel, picks
Now that the holidays are over, you may be looking forward to your next vacation. Consider a trip to one of the "10 Best Ethical...
1.6.2012 | planning, podcast
The connections between faith and city planning are undeniable. Faith-based groups rebuild areas after disasters, they develop affordable...
1.5.2012 | housing, hanoi
Before Vietnam moved toward a market-driven economy in the mid-1980s, the state heavily regulated the housing sector and was the...
1.4.2012 | architecture, public space
In looking forward to the coming year in architecture, Polis chose the top 10 architectural projects of 2011. Zaha Hadid’s Guangzhou...
1.3.2012 | hacking, prague, video
Billboards are ubiquitous sights in urban settings. As conduits for advertising, they are often viewed as eyesores and and ignored...
1.2.2012 | architecture, picks
In selecting our list of the 10 best works of architecture and landscape architecture in 2011, we at Polis have focused on a number of...
