Facilitating the Human Scale: A Response to Urban Intensification

<p>Over the last half century, globalization has catalysed a new wave of urban expansion. Implications of this growth will further intensify the complexities of the urban metropolis, where transecting transit networks, communication infrastructures, production and consumption undergird a multifaceted set of economic and social processes. A recent paradigm shift over the last half-century has seen change in terms of the city being viewed in formal terms to being considered for its dynamic ways. This shift has not only seen the traditional hierarchical urban condition questioned, but reflects the amorphous trends in urban growth. The main intention of the research is to develop a model framework for re-appropriating established industrial infrastructural components to facilitate the human scale in the face of an intensifying urban realm. The work of James Corner, Rem Koolhaas, Bernard Tschumi, Charles Waldheim, Alex Wall and Richard Weller are critically engaged to inform this thesis’ theoretical framework. This research explores the viability of these theoretical imperatives in addressing issues typically associated with urban intensification, specifically the spatial, cultural and sociological implications of urban encroachment into the industrial precinct. Overall the research suggests the act of leveraging phenomenological qualities inherent to industry landscapes can play a fundamental role in appropriating the human scale within this contextually indifferent typology.</p>

Facilitating the Human Scale: A Response to Urban Intensification

<p>Over the last half century, globalization has catalysed a new wave of urban expansion. Implications of this growth will further intensify the complexities of the urban metropolis, where transecting transit networks, communication infrastructures, production and consumption undergird a multifaceted set of economic and social processes. A recent paradigm shift over the last half-century has seen change in terms of the city being viewed in formal terms to being considered for its dynamic ways. This shift has not only seen the traditional hierarchical urban condition questioned, but reflects the amorphous trends in urban growth. The main intention of the research is to develop a model framework for re-appropriating established industrial infrastructural components to facilitate the human scale in the face of an intensifying urban realm. The work of James Corner, Rem Koolhaas, Bernard Tschumi, Charles Waldheim, Alex Wall and Richard Weller are critically engaged to inform this thesis’ theoretical framework. This research explores the viability of these theoretical imperatives in addressing issues typically associated with urban intensification, specifically the spatial, cultural and sociological implications of urban encroachment into the industrial precinct. Overall the research suggests the act of leveraging phenomenological qualities inherent to industry landscapes can play a fundamental role in appropriating the human scale within this contextually indifferent typology.</p>

A Multicriteria, Bat Algorithm Approach for Computing the Range Limited Routing Problem for Electric Trucks

As a result of increasing urban intensification, civic planners have devoted additional resources to more sustainability-focused logistics planning. Electric vehicles have proved to be both a lower cost alternative and more environmentally friendly than the more ubiquitous internal combustion engine vehicles. However, the predominant decision-making approaches employed by businesses and municipalities are not necessarily computationally conducive for the optimization and evaluation of urban transportation systems involving electric vehicles. An innovative modelling and planning approach is proposed to enable urban planners to more readily evaluate the contribution of electric vehicles in city logistics and to support the decision-making process. Specifically, this paper provides a multicriteria modelling-to-generate-alternatives (MGA) decision-support procedure that employs the Bat Algorithm (BA) metaheuristic for generating sets of alternatives for electric vehicle planning in urban transshipment problems. The efficacy of this multicriteria, BA-driven MGA approach for creating planning alternatives is demonstrated on an urban transshipment problem involving electric trucks.

Secure bicycle parking: downtown Toronto office buildings

Road congestion, urban intensification, environmental degradation and health concerns among other factors have led to an increase in cycling rates in Toronto. This increase in the cycling modal share, and a public policy environment that wishes to facilitate additional cycling, has in turn caused an increase in demand for associated facilities including secure bicycle parking. This paper examines the current provision of secure bicycle parking in downtown Toronto office towers and formulates a best practices standard to inform and encourage a more widespread adoption for a diverse range of office building size, location, and construction date. Many office buildings in downtown Toronto were built prior to the creation of zoning for bicycle parking, thus this paper focuses its recommendations on the implementation of future secure bicycle parking in the downtown core.

Secure bicycle parking: downtown Toronto office buildings

Road congestion, urban intensification, environmental degradation and health concerns among other factors have led to an increase in cycling rates in Toronto. This increase in the cycling modal share, and a public policy environment that wishes to facilitate additional cycling, has in turn caused an increase in demand for associated facilities including secure bicycle parking. This paper examines the current provision of secure bicycle parking in downtown Toronto office towers and formulates a best practices standard to inform and encourage a more widespread adoption for a diverse range of office building size, location, and construction date. Many office buildings in downtown Toronto were built prior to the creation of zoning for bicycle parking, thus this paper focuses its recommendations on the implementation of future secure bicycle parking in the downtown core.

Walkable live/work neighbourhoods in big box greyfields

The research focussed on how urban greyfields, especially abandoned big box retail, can be redeveloped into mixed-use walkable live/work neighbourhoods for an energy-efficient future. The history of shopping centre and big box retail and the mixed-use residential redevelopment of such sites using the new LEED Neighbourhood Development rating system were studied. Four principle concepts were found and used to guide the design projects. They were sustainable urbanism planning versus Modernist auto-dependency; mixed-use planning; walkable neighbourhood concepts; and live/work units. These help create local employment in transit-based neighbourhoods having nearby services and amenities to reduce commuting and auto-dependency. The design project on a 25-acre Toronto greyfield includes Continuous Productive Urban Landscapes for food production and a trail system promoting walking, cycling and greater contact with nature. Greyfield sites used for sustainable communities help offset valuable farmland losses and offer useful urban intensification possibilities for a looming energy crisis.

Walkable live/work neighbourhoods in big box greyfields

The research focussed on how urban greyfields, especially abandoned big box retail, can be redeveloped into mixed-use walkable live/work neighbourhoods for an energy-efficient future. The history of shopping centre and big box retail and the mixed-use residential redevelopment of such sites using the new LEED Neighbourhood Development rating system were studied. Four principle concepts were found and used to guide the design projects. They were sustainable urbanism planning versus Modernist auto-dependency; mixed-use planning; walkable neighbourhood concepts; and live/work units. These help create local employment in transit-based neighbourhoods having nearby services and amenities to reduce commuting and auto-dependency. The design project on a 25-acre Toronto greyfield includes Continuous Productive Urban Landscapes for food production and a trail system promoting walking, cycling and greater contact with nature. Greyfield sites used for sustainable communities help offset valuable farmland losses and offer useful urban intensification possibilities for a looming energy crisis.

Trying to Smart-In-Up and Cleanup Our Act by Linking Regional Growth Planning, Brownfields Remediation, and Urban Infill in Southern Ontario Cities

The reuse of brownfields as locations for urban intensification has become a core strategy in government sustainability efforts aimed at remediating pollution, curbing sprawl and prioritizing renewal, regeneration, and retrofitting. In Ontario, Canada’s most populous, industrialized, and brownfield-laden province, a suite of progressive policies and programs have been introduced to not only facilitate the assessment and remediation of the brownfields supply, but to also steer development demand away from peripheral greenfields and towards urban brownfields in a manner that considers a wider regional perspective. This article examines the character and extent of brownfields infill development that has taken place in three Ontario cities (Toronto, Waterloo, and Kingston) since the provincial policy shift in the early 2000s. Using property assessment data and cleanup records, the research finds that redevelopment activity has been extensive in both scale and character, particularly in Toronto where the real estate market has been strong. While the results are promising in terms of government efforts to promote smarter growth that builds “in and up” instead of out, they also reveal that government could be doing more to facilitate redevelopment and influence its sustainability character, particularly in weaker markets.