Cities of the Future: Towards Sustainable City Economies

It goes without saying that cities of tomorrow face numerous challenges that will change their appearance drastically. We only now begin to notice a gradual change towards climate-adaptive cities, inner-city renewable energy production, and more healthy urban environments by re-naturing our public realm and buildings as well as accommodating...

Cities of the Future: Control in Times of Acceleration

'The architect who proposes to run with technology knows now that he [sic] will be in fast company, and that, in order to keep up, he may have to emulate the Futurists and discard his whole cultural load, including the professional garments by which he is recognized as an architect. If, on the other hand, he decides not to do this, he may find...

Cities of the Future: On Nature and the Grammar of Design

In his book, 'The sense of style', the cognitive scientist Steven Pinker argues that the categories of grammar reflect the four building blocks of thought: time, space, causality, and matter. Coincidentally, these building blocks are the same ones that dictate the grammar of spatial design. In them being absolute categories, they describe well...

Cities of the Future: A Mobile and Sustainable Society

My research career started with a publication about externalities of mass motorization. Academic researchers are producing an endless stream of paper. Unfortunately, only a few of these publications have practical relevance. Even if they do, their recommendations are frequently butchered, mitigated or ignored in the political arena. Such...

Between City and Palace: The Palais des Beaux-Arts

Railways in the urban context: An architectural discourse

Railway and city have coexisted for more then 150 years. The realization of railroads in the 19th century can be seen as an important contribution to the development of the city. But during the making of railroads there was too little consideration for the overall picture of the city. The result is that today the railway is entangled with the...