Examines the urban environment as a natural phenomenon, human habitat, medium of expression, and forum for action. Subject has two related, major themes: how ideas of nature influence the way cities are perceived, designed, built, and managed; and how natural processes and urban form interact and the consequences of these for human health safety and welfare. Description from the course home page: This course explores the urban environment as a natural phenomenon, human habitat, medium of expression, and forum for action. The course has several major themes: how ideas of nature influence the way cities are perceived, designed, built, and managed; how natural processes and urban form interact and the consequences for human health and welfare; how planners and designers can shape the urban natural environment. Each student researches and presents a case, either historical or an example of contemporary theory and practice.

Provides the opportunity for students to work intensively on developing the research claims and arguments in their writing. Open to both Master's and Ph.D. students and designed to maximize cross-fertilization between programs and research areas. First part devoted to reading and writing assignments that guide students in focusing on the connections between their research claims, the evidence that supports those claims, and the reasoning that underlies that support. In the latter part, students provide successive drafts of their project for group commentary and guidance in revision. The purpose of this seminar is to expose the student to a number of different types of writing that one may encounter in a professional career. The class is an opportunity to write, review, rewrite and present a point of view both orally and in written form.

Seminar on the history of selected features of the physical environment of urban America. Among the features considered are parks, cemeteries, tenements, suburbs, zoos, skyscrapers, department stores, supermarkets, and amusement parks. Focuses on readings and discussions.

Surveys theories of regional growth, factor mobility, clustering, industrial restructuring, learning regions, and global supply chains from a political-economy perspective. Examines/critiques accounting frameworks including accounting for the underground economy, multipliers, linkages, and supply chains used to assess employment and environmental impacts, infrastructure investments. Assesses price indices, industrial location and employment measures, and shift-share analyses. Discussions of US and foreign applications.

This course focuses on the archaeology of the Greek and Roman city. It investigates the relationship between urban architecture and the political, social, and economic role of cities in the Greek and Roman world. Analyzes a range of archaeological and literary evidence relevant to the use of space in Greek and Roman cities (e.g. Athens, Paestum, Rome, Pompeii) and a range of theoretical frameworks for the study of ancient urbanism.

A writing practicum associated with 11.200 and 11.205 that focuses on helping students present their ideas in cogent, persuasive arguments and other analytical frameworks. Reading and writing assignments and other exercises stress the connections between clear thinking, critical reading, and effective writing. This course examines the principles and practices of clear and effective communication in addressing public issues and policies. It aims to help students plan, organize, and present their analysis and research in the form of well-founded claims and persuasive arguments that address the interests, concerns, and expectations of their audience. To achieve this aim, the course encompasses the following learning objectives: to sharpen students' persuasive skills in the service of planning, program, and policy analysis; to develop students' writing style to help them achieve the clarity and vigor needed to be persuasive in their academic and professional lives; to provide practice in presenting the fruits of research orally; and to provide guidance in the use of source material, both conventional and electronic, in the conduct of research, the sharing of information with colleagues, and the production of finished work The curriculum consists of a series of writing assignments, due in alternate weeks, that focus on case studies in organizational and public communication, capped by an oral presentation on a planning topic of the student's own choosing. The planning topic would ideally be one that focuses on the individual student's research interests, either current or projected. The presentation could consist of anything from a contemplated research proposal to preliminary findings to substantially completed research with conclusions and recommendations. It should also serve as a capstone activity encompassing the learning in the course.

Help the Guinard family struggle to make ends meet and get ahead in their poverty-stricken homeland, Haiti. In this sometimes tragic and always challenging simulation game, you help the parents, Jean and Marie, and their children, Patrick, Jacqueline, and Yves, make decisions about work, education, community building, personal purchases, and health care that might brighten their future. Includes lesson plans for teachers.

The Beijing Urban Design Studio is a joint program between the MIT and Tsinghua University Schools of Architecture and Planning. The goal of the studio is to foster international cooperation through the undertaking of a joint urban design and planning initiative in the city of Beijing involving important, often controversial, sites and projects. Since 1995, almost 250 MIT and Tsinghua University students and faculty have participated annually in the studio, making it one of the most successful and enduring international academic programs between China and the US. It has received the Irwin Sizer Award from MIT for outstanding innovation in education. The studio takes place over five weeks in June and July including several weeks in residence at Tsinghua University and two brief study tours to locations and projects that inform the work. It will include 18-20 MIT and 10-15 Tsinghua Architecture and Planning students. The Beijing City Planning Institute, responsible for strategic planning in the city, participates in the studio as the client.

Explores social, technological, political, economic, and cultural implications of "Big Plans" in the urban context. Local and international case studies (such as Boston's Central Artery and Curitiba, Brazil's bus transit system) are used to understand the process of making major changes to the city fabric. The efficacy of top-down and bottom-up planning and the applicability of planning strategies across cultural boundaries are considered.

There are several hundred thousand Brownfield sites across the country. The large number of sites, combined with how a majority of these properties are located in urban and historically underserved communities, dictate that redevelopment of these sites stands to be a common theme in urban planning for the foreseeable future. Students form a grounded understanding of the Brownfield lifecycle: how and why they were created, their potential role in community revitalization, and the general processes governing their redevelopment. Using case studies and guest speakers from the public, private and non-profit sectors, students develop and hone skills to effectively address the problems posed by these inactive sites.

In the new Gotham Gazette game, you are a knight, setting out to rescue funding for yourself or your community. The decisions you make along the way will determine whether you fail or succeed, how many points you acquire and whether you are a budget apprentice, a journeyman or -- at the apex-- a master of the budget.

Focuses on the role of the business improvement district (BID) as a popular and contemporary tool for urban revitalization. Explores BID origins, theoretical underpinnings, enabling legislation, and organizational issues. Emphasizes BID service provision including advocacy, marketing, sanitation, streetscape improvement, security and transportation, while examining BID performance using such indicators as crime rates, vacancy rates, and retail sales. Considers BID organizations throughout North America as well as comparable schemes in Australia, Holland, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa, and the United Kingdom.

Designed for use by teachers, students, historians, and general users, the site features hundreds of documents and images about children in Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, drawn from newspapers, government and other official records, oral histories and memoirs, and many other sources.

This course's aims are two-fold: 1) to offer students the theoretical and practical tools to understand how and why cities become torn by ethnic, religious, racial, nationalist, and/or other forms of identity that end up leading to conflict, violence, inequality, and social injustice; and 2) to use this knowledge and insight in the search for solutions. As preparation, students will be required to become familiar with social and political theories of the city and the nation and their relationship to each other. They also will focus on the ways that racial, ethnic, religious, nationalist or other identities grow and manifest themselves in cities or other territorial levels of determination (including the regional or transnational). In the search for remedies, students will be encouraged to consider a variety of policymaking or design points of entry, ranging from the political- institutional (e.g. forms of democratic participation and citizenship) to spatial, infrastructural, and technological interventions.

Examines the evolving structure of cities, the dynamic processes that shape them, and the significance of a city's history for its future development. Develops the ability to read urban form as an interplay of natural processes and human purposes over time. Field assignments in Boston provide the opportunity to use, develop, and refine these concepts.

This class is intended to introduce students to understandings of the city generated from both social science literature and the field of urban design. The first part of the course examines literature on the history and theory of the city. Among other factors, it pays special attention to the larger territorial settings in which cities emerged and developed (ranging from the global to the national to the regional context) and how these affected the nature, character, and functioning of cities and the lives of their inhabitants. The remaining weeks focus more explicitly on the theory and practice of design visions for the city, the latter in both utopian and realized form. One of our aims will be to assess the conditions under which a variety of design visions were conceived, and to assess them in terms of the varying patterns of territorial "nestedness" (local, regional, national, imperial, and global) examined in the first part of the course. Another will be to encourage students to think about the future prospects of cities (in terms of territorial context or other political functions and social aims) and to offer design visions that might reflect these new dynamics.

City to City, as a class, will jump into the complexity of planning in New Orleans, a post-disaster city. City-to-City will ask how a post-disaster city grapple with its ideas of identity, what it is, who it represents, and how it projects its sense of self to residences, businesses, tourists, and to the outside world. In considering its people, how do city planners think about who lives where and why? At the same time, how can city planners celebrate a city's history and its culture and how can these elements be woven into reconstruction? Students will travel from Cambridge to New Orleans over Spring Break to meet and consult with their alumni clients, and continue to work on projects.

This graduate seminar examines the roles that civil society actors play in international, national, and local environmental governance. We will consider theories pertaining to civil society development, social movement mobilization, and relations between state and non-state actors. During the course of the semester, particular attention will be given to the legitimacy and accountability of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Case studies of civil society response to specific environmental issues will be used to illustrate theoretical issues and assess the impacts that these actors have on environmental policy and planning.

This subject explores the techniques, processes, and personal and professional skills required to effectively manage growth and land use change. While primarily focused on the planning practice in the United States, the principles and techniques reviewed and presented may have international application. This course is not for bystanders; it is designed for those who wish to become actively involved or exposed to the planning discipline and profession as it is practiced today, and as it may need to be practiced in the future.