scaling infrastructure

April 10–11 2014MIT Media Lab

THE PANELS

The Spring 2014 Scaling Infrastructure conference is the MIT Center for Advanced Urbanism’s (CAU) second and final infrastructure conference of our biennial theme that will convene political leaders, infrastructural engineers, design professionals and academicians to discuss groundbreaking ideas on infrastructure. Faced with new economic, political, and environmental challenges, the question of appropriate infrastructural investments and design scales is critical to the future of urbanized territories. The technical and political realities, design possibilities, and social and economic concerns for shaping sustainable infrastructural futures in American and International contexts will be addressed.

A new wave of interest has formed around the idea of resilience and redundancy, or scaling down infrastructure in customized ways to ensure systemic failure does not occur when urban areas are struck by unforeseen events, from economic to environmental catastrophes. In our age of sea level rise, monumental infrastructures may protect cities from flooding or risk of catastrophe from storms, but as we have seen in too many cases, monumental defense barriers can fail with drastic and calamitous results. Vast barrier systems and other single sources of protection require equally large amounts of concentrated innovation, funding, and governance to ensure their long-term success. But what happens when these forces are impossible to align? Similarly, new forms of urbanization demanded in American and International contexts are far different from twentieth century centralization models. What type of infrastructure is appropriate for remote areas where connecting to a main line of transit , energy, water, or logistical supply chain is impossible? Are new technologies changing the need for high-density populations to support infrastructural investments? What new scales of infrastructural research and thinking are going to propel urban form in the future? Is innovation in energy and transportation infrastructures that are flexible, adaptable, and scalable down to individual preferences a near reality?

Recalibrating InfrastructureOur first panel will explore the idea of “recalibrating” or scaling-back infrastructure in the context of shrinking cities that face serious declines in population, housing stock, fiscal resources and often political capacity. Speakers will address the new challenge of recalibrating their infrastructure networks, constructed last century for a population often two to three times as large as that presently living in the city. Removing infrastructure would seem a natural solution. Yet a recent study found that “substantial cost savings from decommissioning vacant infrastructure” would not occur, and that mixtures of better management, new technologies, and new design concepts were preferable. Difficult decisions lie ahead.and urbanists will play a key role.

Resilient InfrastructureThe second panel will be organized around the topic of “resilience,” and the newest ideas evolving out of how risk and disaster can be mitigated through redundancy and new scales of infrastructural engineering and design. This panel will address how current technologies are beginning to connect information and resources through organizations and networks. By comparing both top-down and bottom up approaches, the discussion will address how developing regions are collecting data to monitor changes in the environment. Multi-scale networks and infrastructural responses can then be designed and built to respond to these connections, which will be at the forefront of how we learn to address and be more prepared to face future challenges.

THE PANELSTHE PANELS

THE SCHEDULE

Micro InfrastructureThe third panel explores the next wave of infrastructures for extremely contrasting urbanizing territories through the idea of micro-infrastructure. How small can we imagine infrastructure, and how does this change the way we think about cities, urbanization, location choice, landscape resources, and design? The idea of “microgrids” will be presented for developing world contexts and urbanizing territories that do not currently have the ability to connect to centralized, existing sources of infrastructural energy or water. The idea of “autonomous infrastructure” will be discussed in relation to future visions for mobility and energy needs of horizontal city forms, where the automobile is the predominant form of transportation.

THE SCHEDULETHE SCHEDULE

Thursday 10th April 2014

3:15pm Registration in the Winter Garden Room, Media Lab

4:00pm Welcome and Introductions Alexander D’Hooghe, MIT Alan Berger, MIT Maria T. Zuber, MIT 4:30pm KEYNOTE Mayor Rahm Emanuel, City of Chicago

4:50pm Q&A with Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Professor Judith Layzer

5:40pm Reception in the Winter Garden Room, Media Lab

Rahm EmanuelMayor, City of Chicago and former Chief of Staff for President Obama

KEYNOTE

THE PARTICIPANTSFriday 11th April 2014

8:20am Breakfast and Registration in the Winter Garden Room, Media Lab

8:45am Welcome and Introductions Dean Santos, MIT Alan Berger, MIT

9:00am Recalibrating Infrastructure Sonja Beeck, Chezweitz Lawrie Robertson, Buro Happold Mayor Dayne Walling, City of Flint Moderator, Nancy Levinson, Places Journal Respondent, Lorena Bello, MIT

10:30am Break in the Winter Garden Room, Media Lab

11:00am Resilient Infrastructure Richard Serino, FEMA Richard Hindle, LSU Alfredo Brillembourg, Urban-Think Tank Adam Klaptocz, senseFly Moderator, Nancy Levinson, Places Journal Respondent, James Wescoat, MIT

1:00pm Lunch in the Winter Garden Room, Media Lab

2:00pm Micro Infrastructure Ken Laberteaux, Toyota Research Institute, North America Daniel Sperling, University of California, Davis Paola Viganò, Studio Scott Kennedy, Masdar Institute of Science and Technology Moderator, Jinhua Zhao, MIT 4:00pm Closing Comments

THE PARTICIPANTSTHE PARTICIPANTS

THE PARTICIPANTS

Alan Berger is Professor of Landscape Architecture and Urban Design at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Director of P-REX lab, at MIT, and also Research Director of CAU, MIT Center for Advanced Urbanism. All of his research and work emphasizes the link between our consumption of natural resources, and the waste and destruction of landscape, to help us better understand how to proceed with redesigning around our wasteful lifestyles for more intelligent outcomes. His most recent publications include: Systemic Design Can Change the World, and Landscape + Urbanism Around the Bay of Mumbai (with Rahul Mehrotra). He is a Prince Charitable Trusts Fellow of The American Academy in Rome.

Sonja Beeck works as a consultant for local authorities on questions of urban development such as IBA Berlin 2020, Nuremberg or Bremen. Together with Detlef Weitz she is also CEO of Chezweitz, a firm for scenography based in Berlin. She was previously a member of the academic staff of the Bauhaus from 2000 to 2010, she worked there for the long-term laboratory IBA STADTUMBAU 2010 and was responsible for the project development and managed many projects inventing new spatial development strategies for regions with shrinking population. She has also taught “City and Landscape” at the University of Innsbruck (2006 to 2008). After the final exhibition of IBA STADTUMBAU 2010, Sonja Beeck was teaching “Urban development and management in the international context” at the University of Kassel.

Lorena Bello is Lecturer in the Department of Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she teaches students fundamentals of the design of the built environment ranging from the scale of the object and buildings to that of the city and larger territories. She is also a doctoral candidate in Urbanism at the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC). Lorena’s research focuses on large scale territorial implications of infrastructure and urbanization as catalysts for design. Her dissertation on this topic began under the guidance of the late Manuel de Sola-Morales and is concluding under Joan Busquets of the Harvard GSD. She is about to found TERRALAB in association with MIT’s Center for Advanced Urbanism to continue this research with projects in the USA and Europe.

Alfredo Brillembourg is the founding partner of Urban-Think Tank (U-TT) in Caracas, Venezuela, and since 2007, has been the chair for Architecture and Urban Design at the Swiss Institute of Technology (Eidgenossische Technische Hochschule, ETH) in Zurich, Switzerland. His research and practice focus on both theoretical and practical applications within architecture and urban planning. Working in global contexts by creating bridges between first world industry and third world, informal urban areas, they focus on the education and development of a new generation of professionals, who will transform cities in the 21st century. He was recently awarded the 2012 Holcim Global Silver Award for innovative contributions to ecological design practices, and the 2012 Golden Lion Award at the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale.

Rahm Emanuel was elected the 55th mayor of Chicago on February 22nd, 2011 and was sworn in on May 16th, 2011. Since taking office, Mayor Emanuel announced the redeployment of over 1,000 police officers back onto beats in Chicago’s neighborhoods and has attracted more than 25,000 private-sector jobs for residents across the city. Since taking office, Mayor Emanuel has enacted education reforms allowing for elementary students to gain an extra hour and 15 minutes every day and two additional weeks every year, and has submitted two balanced budgets that hold the line on taxes. Additionally, Mayor Emanuel launched Building a New Chicago, a $7 billion coordinated infrastructure plan that will revitalize the city’s roads, rails, and runways, and create tens of thousands of jobs for Chicagoans.

Prior to becoming Mayor, Emanuel served as the White House Chief of Staff in President Barack Obama’s administration. Before accepting the position as Chief of Staff to the President, Emanuel served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives representing Chicago’s 5th District . Prior to being elected to Congress, Emanuel served as a key member of the Clinton White House from 1993 to 1998, rising to serve as Senior Advisor to the President for Policy and Strategy.

Richard L. Hindle is the Emerson/Womack Assistant Professor of design at the Robert Reich School of Landscape Architecture, Louisiana State University. Professor Hindle’s research focuses on technology in the garden and landscape with an emphasis on material processes, innovation, and patents. His current research explores innovation in landscape related technologies across a range of scales, from large-scale mappings of riverine and coastal patents to detailed historical studies on the antecedents of vegetated architectural systems. He received a Graham Foundation Award for the reification of the “Vegetation-Bearing Architectonic Structure and Systems” and continues to explore the technological origins of other emergent technologies.

Scott Kennedy is Co-Director of The Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he is responsible for overseeing program development and operations. Prior to joining the Center, he worked with MIT to establish two new research universities in Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates. Trained in engineering sciences with a doctorate from Harvard University, his research work has focused on the investigation and design of complex physical and organizational systems. Scott acts as an advisor to various international projects related to sustainable energy and development in Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

Adam Klaptocz is the Head of Hardware and Mechanical Engineering at senseFly SA. He is passionate about civilian drones and their potential to do good to our planet and all its inhabitants, he splits his time between the R&D department at senseFly SA, developing the latest generation of drones for the GIS and mapping sectors, and Drone Adventures, traveling the world and flying drones for good causes. His passion was born during his Ph.D work at EPFL in Switzerland, where he designed several iterations of the AirBurr, a flying robot designed specifically to bounce off obstacles in crowded environments. His goal is now to bring drones out of the lab and into the hands of the people that need it the most, whether its in humanitarian aid, conservation or industry.


THE PARTICIPANTS

Ken Laberteaux is a Senior Principal Scientist for the Toyota Research Institute-North America in Ann Arbor, MI. In his nineteen years in the automotive and telecommunication industries, Ken has produced twenty-five scholarly publications, eight patents, and fourteen additional invention disclosures. Ken’s current research focus is sustainable mobility systems, including grid-vehicle interactions, vehicle electrification feasibility, security and privacy issues of smart grid, battery lifetime modeling, and US urbanization and transportation patterns. Earlier in his time at Toyota, Ken worked on advanced safety systems, leveraging synergies in communication, sensing, and computation.

Judith Layzer investigates the role of ideas—including scientific, economic, and political ideas—in environmental policymaking. She also analyzes the efficacy of local and regional environmental policies and policymaking processes. Currently, in collaboration with the Urban Sustainability Directors’ Network, she directs the Urban Sustainability Assessment (USA) Project, an effort to determine what kinds of urban sustainability programs yield genuine environmental benefits. In addition, Layzer is the author of The Environmental Case: Translating Values Into Policy (CQ Press), now in its third edition; Natural Experiments: Ecosystem-Based Management and the Environment (MIT Press); and the forthcoming Freedom, Efficiency, and Environmental Protection: Conservative Ideas And Their Consequences (MIT Press).

Nancy Levinson is Editor and Executive Director of Places Journal, an award-winning journal of architecture, landscape, and urbanism, published in partnership with Design Observer. Nancy brings to her editorial work experience in academia and practice, most recently as the founding director of the Phoenix Urban Research Laboratory at Arizona State University and as co-founding editor of Harvard Design Magazine at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Nancy is a frequent design juror and lecturer, and has contributed to diverse academic and trade periodicals, including Architectural Record, Landscape Architecture Magazine, the Journal of Planning Literature, the Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Perspecta, The Architect’s Newspaper, and Metropolis.

Miho Mazereeuw is a landscape architect and architect, who has taught at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University and the University of Toronto prior to joining the faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is also Co-Director of OPSYS whose work focuses on the field of disaster reconstruction/prevention and is currently working in Haiti, Japan and Chile. As an Arthur W. Wheelwright Fellow, she is completing her forthcoming book entitled Preemptive Design: Disaster and Urban Development along the Pacific Ring of Fire featuring case studies on infrastructure design, multifunctional public space and innovative planning strategies in earthquake prone regions. Her design work has been exhibited at the Architect’s Museum in Tokyo Japan, University of Texas at Austin and de Ark Architecture Center in Leewarden Netherlands.

Lawrie Robertson is a strategic planner, urban designer and architect with experience in strategic regional and city planning, international development, urban and building design. Lawrie joined Happold Consulting in 2006 as Head of Strategic Planning, leading on multidisciplinary city-regional planning, urban development and infrastructure projects. His work has included leading HC teams for the 20 year strategic plan for Detroit , USA; Berezniki Solikamsk Usolye Region Masterplan, Russia; King Abdullah Research City for Atomic and Renewable Energy (KA-CARE); the Masterplan Framework for King Khaled International Airport City in Riyadh; the Hercogiste Eco City project in Latvia and the Gothenburg River City Regeneration project in Sweden as well as other new city projects in the Middle East, Asia and Europe.

Brent Ryan is Associate Professor of Urban Design and Public Policy. Ryan’s research focuses on emerging urban design paradigms, with a particular focus on postindustrial cities and neighborhoods. His book Design After Decline: How America rebuilds shrinking cities, was published in 2012 by the University of Pennsylvania Press and was selected by Planetizen as a Top Ten Book of 2012. Ryan has published in edited volumes including The City After Abandonment and the Oxford Handbook of Urban Planning as well as in the Journal of Urban Design, Journal of the American Planning Association, Urban Morphology, Journal of Planning History, and Urban Design International.


THE PARTICIPANTS

Richard Serino was appointed by President Obama and confirmed by the Senate as the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Deputy Administrator in October 2009. In this role, he worked directly with Administrator Craig Fugate to promote the “whole community” approach to emergency management, which seeks to build, sustain, and improve the Department’s capacity to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate all hazards. Mr. Serino strived to improve FEMA programs and emergency management by hearing directly from disaster survivors, communities, and FEMA employees. These improvements are focused on emphasizing financial accountability, improving the use of analytics to drive decisions, advancing the workforce, and fostering a culture of innovation. Under Mr. Serino’s leadership, FEMA has championed initiatives such as FEMA Corps, FEMA Stat, the FEMA Think Tank, a detailed budgetary process, and a Disaster Workforce Transformation.

Daniel Sperling is Professor of Civil Engineering and Environmental Science and Policy, and founding Director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis (ITS-Davis). He is recognized as a leading international expert on transportation technology assessment, energy and environmental aspects of transportation, and transportation policy. He has testified 10 times to the US Congress and state legislatures, and provided keynote presentations and invited talks in recent years at international conferences in Asia, Europe, and North America. In the past 25 years, he has authored or co-authored over 200 technical papers and 11 books, including Two Billion Cars (Oxford University Press, 2009). In June 2013, he was named a recipient of the Blue Planet Prize from the Asahi Glass Foundation. The prize has been described as the Nobel Prize for the environmental sciences.

Paola Viganò is an architect and urbanist, she has a PhD in architectural and urban composition and is professor in urbanism at the Università IUAV of Venice. She is also a guest professor at several European schools of architecture (including the Catholic University of Leuven, EPFL Lausanne, Aarhus, Harvard Graduate School of Design), serves on the board of the European Masters of Urbanism programme (EMU) and is coordinator of the PhD in Urbanism at IUAV. In 1990 Viganò founded Studio with Bernardo Secchi and has won several international competitions. In 2008 Studio was one of the ten teams selected for the Grand Paris research project and was shortlisted in 2012 for the New Moscow project. Her major publications include La città elementare (1999), Territori della nuova modernità/Territories of a new modernity (2001), Antwerp: Territory of a New Modernity (2009, with Bernardo Secchi) and I territori dell’urbanistica (2010), recently translated into French (Les territoires de l’urbanisme, 2012).

Dayne Walling is serving in his second term as the Mayor of the City of Flint . His vision of a sustainable 21st Century community has attracted new investments and energy to the difficult challenge of turning Flint around. He is committed to bringing new jobs, making neighborhoods safe, and supporting great schools in Flint and across Michigan. Under his leadership, the City of Flint has adopted its first comprehensive master plan in more than 50 years. Mayor Walling serves on the Executive Committee for the Michigan Economic Development Corporation and is Chairman of the national Manufacturing Alliance of Communities.

James Wescoat is the Aga Khan Professor in the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture, in the Department of Architecture at MIT. His research has concentrated on water systems in South Asia and the US from the site to river basin scales. For the greater part of his career, Professor Wescoat has focused on small-scale historical waterworks of Mughal gardens and cities in India and Pakistan. At the larger scale, Professor Wescoat has conducted water policy research in the Colorado, Indus, Ganges, and Great Lakes basins, including the history of multilateral water agreements. He led a USEPA-funded study of potential climate impacts in the Indus River Basin in Pakistan with the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA). More recently, he led an NSF-funded project on “Water and Poverty in Colorado.”

Jinhua Zhao is the Edward H. and Joyce Linde Career Development Assistant Professor of urban planning at DUSP. He holds Master of Science, Master of City Planning and Ph.D. degrees from MIT and a Bachelor ’s degree from Tongji University. He studies travel behavior and transportation policy, public transit management, and China’s urbanization and mobility. He sees transportation as a language, to describe a person, to characterize a city, and to understand an institution. His current project examines the interaction between policy making by the governments and behavioral response from the public in the context of China’s urban development. He very much enjoys working with students.


THE PARTICIPANTS

The Center for Advanced Urbanism wishes to thank the following for their generous support, guidance, and collaboration:

Sherry and Alan Leventhal Family FoundationMuriel and Norman B. Leventhal Family FoundationDean Adèle Naudé Santos and the Dean’s Office MIT School of Architecture + PlanningMIT Department of ArchitectureMIT Department of Urban Studies and PlanningMIT Media LabMIT Resource Development In addition, the Center for Advanced Urbanism would like to acknowledge and thank its members and collaborators:American Institute of Architects, Clinton Global Initiative, US Department of Housing and Urban Development, African Agribusiness Knowledge Center Network,Reynaers Aluminium NV.

Finally the Center wishes to thank the conference co-organizers Professor Alan Berger, Professor Alexander D’Hooghe, and Prudence Robinson. Design SIEN

A SCARFF DESIGN

SCALING INFRAST-RUCTURE

