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I attended the Annual Meeting of the American Association of Geographers in Boston and participated in a number of sessions. Federico Cugurullo and I co-organised two paper sessions on the theme of ‘Situating Smart: Spatial and Material Politics of Smart Urbanisation’ and I organised a panel discussion on The Experimental City. On the way to the conference one morning, I stumbled across the Fenway Victory Gardens in the Frederick Law Olmsted’s Back Bay and Fens (pictured above). This is the oldest operating Victory Gardens in the US. Wonderful to see that they are still used for growing!

 

Thanks to Catalina Turcu at UCL for the invitation to serve as a guest critic for the final presentations for her Sustainable Urbanism students. It was a pleasure to attend the research team presentations and discuss innovative ways to make Nacka (a suburb of Stockholm) a more liveable and vibrant place. Bravo!

I am recruiting a PhD student to conduct a study on smart urbanisation. The four-year post will focus on the political and spatial aspects of smart as it is being implemented in various Northern European cities. The position is based at Urban and Regional Studies at  KTH campus. More information on the position is here:

https://www.kth.se/en/om/work-at-kth/lediga-jobb/what:job/jobID:137107/where:4/

 

Congratulations to Mahmoud Elwerfalli for passing his PhD viva today at the University of Manchester! I was honoured to supervise his thesis on ‘Learning from the Vernacular: Sustainable Architecture and Contemporary Courtyard Housing in Libya’. In his research, Mahmoud produced novel insights about contemporary notions of sustainable development and historical building practices in Libya. The courtyard house is now reemerging as a favoured housing design in Middle Eastern countries. Well done, Dr. Elwerfalli!

My colleague Peter Brokking and I visited Nacka today with 50 Master’s students for our course on ‘Urban Development and Planning’. This Stockholm suburb will change rapidly over the next few decades as the subway system is extended by three stops. The students will use the Nacka case study to develop planning visions and urban designs over the next six weeks. They will present their ideas to the Nacka municipality in March. Exciting stuff!

The December issue of Nordregio News includes an interview with me by Peter Schmitt. We discussed the implications of ‘Experiments and Living Labs’ and how they are attempting to steer urban development through co-creation activities. The interview is here (PDF link). Thank to Peter for the opportunity!

Congratulations to my PhD student, Kelly Watson, for successfully passing her viva with no corrections. Her doctoral research on ‘Learning Loops in Sustainable Design: Applying Social Return On Investment (SROI) to Buildings’ involved the development of a novel approach to assess the social value of architectural design. The work contributes to the growing wellbeing agenda of the built environment and approaches to evaluate building performance from a user perspective. Thanks to Alan Lewis and Flora Samuel for their examination work and to co-supervisors James Evans and Tim Whitley (Arup). Excellent work, Dr Watson!

Stockholm syndrome strikes! After seven years in Manchester, it is high time for new challenges. I just started a new position in KTH Urban and Regional Studies at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology and am looking forward to new collaborations with Jonathan Metzger, Karin Bradley, Tigran Haas and many others. I will continue to conduct research on urban innovation, smart cities, and experimentation but in a very different context. Come and visit!

I contributed to a new Cambridge University Press edited volume titled Towards a Cultural Politics of Climate Change: Devices, Desires and Dissent. The book is edited by Harriet Bulkeley, Matthew Paterson, and Johannes Stripple, and includes case studies from the US, Europe and Australia on different modes of low-carbon transition. More info here.

I am very pleased to announce the formation of the Manchester Urban Institute in early 2017. MUI will extend the agenda of cities@manchester over the last six years and provide a platform of collaboration among the Centre for Urban Resilience and Energy, the Centre for Urban Policy Studies, the Cities, Politics and Economies Group, the Global Urban Research Centre, and the Manchester Architecture Research Centre. Prof Kevin Ward will serve as the inaugural director of MUI.