Archinect - Features

The Paris Model: Adapting and Creating Public Space as Cities Get Hotter

2019-10-03T05:00:00-04:00

This July, Paris recorded an all-time high temperature of 42.6 degrees Celsius (108.7 Fahrenheit).

The Parisian authorities quickly introduced measures to cool people down, including an app to point people towards 922 “Urban Islands of Coolness.” The measures included the installation of misting machines, water fountains, late night opening of parks and pools and the mapping of cultural spaces. Through absolute necessity, a whole new network of public spaces has been created, adapted or highlighted in the city via new technologies in reaction to soaring temperatures.

Let's explore some of those approaches.

Come rain or shine: reviving collective urban form with the GSD's Office for Urbanization

2016-09-16T12:17:00-04:00

In architecture, city-wide design concepts have a checkered history: public housing projects and century-old zoning ordinances seem to have created almost as many problems as they were intended to solve. And yet, the dream of the collective urban form may be restored with the work of the Harvard Graduate Design School’s new Office for Urbanization. Headed by landscape architecture professor Charles Waldheim, the Office for Urbanization is currently tackling the problems of sea level rise in Miami Beach, but the scope of its research is unearthing a promising new realm of possibilities.