Archinect - Features

Transforming Climate Pessimism Into Resilient Design Action

2021-10-01T08:48:00-04:00

Like in so many places across the US, summer of 2021 was announced by the symphonic celebration of cicadas that, for seventeen long years, were patiently colluding within the earth’s caverns before proclaiming their virtuosity in our parks and green spaces. The cicadas that have made so much noise, literally with their raucous reaching up to 100 decibels, and figuratively as they managed to capture a sensational buzz across various news media, are part of the largest generation of periodic cicadas known as Brood X. The next time we will see these winged torpedoes will be in 2038. By then, the world will look very different.

Trashing the Community-Backed BIG U: East Side Coastal Resilience Moves Forward Despite Local Opposition. Will NYC Miss Another Opportunity to Lead on Climate and Environmental Justice?

2021-07-13T08:28:00-04:00

In late October 2012, Superstorm Sandy crashed into the East Coast. Causing more than $70 billion in damage, the storm ripped buildings from their foundations and flooded streets. In New York City, the hard concrete edge that separates Lower Manhattan from the East River was breached, filling the FDR expressway with brackish water and short-circuiting ConEdison’s 14th Street Substation, causing the much-circulated image of a near-total blackout in all points south. With the freeway flooded and the Lower East Side dark, this unprecedented damage came to represent the vulnerability of coastal infrastructure.

Designing for Disaster, Before It Happens: Resilient by Design Seeks Architects

2017-06-02T12:41:00-04:00

Disasters resulting from climate change, such as sea level rise, often cause billions of dollars of damage. In an era when the United States Federal Government has largely withdrawn from climate change policy, San Francisco Bay Area-based Resilient by Design has released a design brief in hopes of assembling ten teams of architects, engineers, designers and experts to help anticipate and design for the needs of the region before massive devastation occurs. So what architects should apply?

Student Works: Resilient Public Housing from Parsons

2013-11-06T15:05:00-05:00

Responding to a daunting list of post-Sandy urban concerns, M.Arch students at the Parsons New School for Design proposed a variety of affordable housing complexes in an under-developed patch of Manhattan’s Lower East Side.