Showing papers by "Thomas Kvan published in 2015"

The Australian Urban Intelligence Network Supporting Smart Cities

Abstract: As the global population continues to grow and an increasing number of people move to cities, there is need for ambitious approaches to provide urban information infrastructures and analytical tools to support smart urban design and planning. This chapter introduces the Australian Urban Intelligence Network, which brings together a network of researchers, planners and policy-makers from across Australia who have access to an online workbench of data and tools. The workbench comprises over 1100 datasets and 100 spatial statistical routines, and a select number of planning support systems and geodesign tools. In this chapter, we outline the urban data and analytical capability the online workbench; introduce a couple of the PSS tools and spatial statistical capabilities through a case study approach. We also discuss the user outreach and capacity building capability program which is a critical component to assist with user adoption. We conclude the chapter with some reflections on the lessons learnt and next steps in the project.

Designing learning spaces for interprofessional education in the anatomical sciences

Abstract: This article explores connections between interprofessional education (IPE) models and the design of learning spaces for undergraduate and graduate education in the anatomical sciences and other professional preparation. The authors argue that for IPE models to be successful and sustained they must be embodied in the environment in which interprofessional learning occurs. To elaborate these arguments, two exemplar tertiary education facilities are discussed: the Charles Perkins Centre at the University of Sydney for science education and research, and Victoria University's Interprofessional Clinic in Wyndham for undergraduate IPE in health care. Backed by well-conceived curriculum and pedagogical models, the architectures of these facilities embody the educational visions, methods, and practices they were designed to support. Subsequently, the article discusses the spatial implications of curriculum and pedagogical change in the teaching of the anatomical sciences and explores how architecture might further the development of IPE models in the field. In conclusion, it is argued that learning spaces should be designed and developed (socially) with the expressed intention of supporting collaborative IPE models in health education settings, including those in the anatomical sciences.

BIM-PIM-CIM: The Challenges of Modelling Urban Design Behaviours Between Building and City Scales

Abstract: This paper discusses the challenges that designers face when modelling the anticipated behaviours of people: their movement and transactions around and within precinct scale development. Building Information Modelling (BIM) software philosophy contrasts with that of City Information Modelling (CIM)—the route by which we consider how precinct scale development, being somewhere between the two (BIM and CIM), requires a wholly different approach to information and behaviour modelling. The authors offer evidence of the value of augmenting the planners’ analytical approach with the architects’ synthesis from data leading to meaningful speculations on otherwise unanticipated future scenarios for the precinct far beyond expectation. Novel approaches to modelling behaviour at precinct scale suggest alternative readings of precincts, which require a wider set of approaches to Precinct Information Modelling (PIM) software development than simply an expansion of BIM.

Distributed and Heterogeneous Data Analysis for Smart Urban Planning

Abstract: Over the past decade, ‘smart’ cities have capitalized on new technologies and insights to transform their systems, operations and services. The rationale behind the use of these technologies is that an evidence-based, analytical approach to decision-making will lead to more robust and sustainable outcomes. However, harvesting high-quality data from the dense network of sensors embedded in the urban infrastructure, and combining this data with social network data, poses many challenges. In this paper, we investigate the use of an intelligent middleware – Device Nimbus – to support data capture and analysis techniques to inform urban planning and design. We report results from a ‘Living Campus’ experiment at the University of Melbourne, Australia focused on a public learning space case study. Local perspectives, collected via crowd sourcing, are combined with distributed and heterogeneous environmental sensor data. Our analysis shows that Device Nimbus’ data integration and intelligent modules provide high-quality support for decision-making and planning.

The Next City and Complex Adaptive Systems

Abstract: Urban futures are typically conceptualized as starting anew; an urban future is usually represented as a quest for an ideal state, replacing the status quo with visionary statement about ‘better’ futures. Repeatedly, propositions reinvent the way we live, work and play. The major urban innovations for the changing cityscape from the last 100 years, however, have opportunistically taken advantage of unprecedented technical developments in infrastructure rather than be drawn from architectural inventions in their right, such as telecommunications, services, utilities, point-to-point rapid transit including the elevator. Howard’s Garden City therefore presaged the suburb, just as Le Corbusier et al. proposed the erasure of significant sections of inner city Barcelona and Paris to replace them with the newly contrived towers; the city reformed as the significantly more mobile and dense ‘Ville Radieuse’. More recently Masdar emerged from virgin sand and Milton Keynes from pristine pasture, serving as counterpoints to the paradigm of erasure and rebuild. Despite all these advances in technology and science, little has changed in the paradigm of urban form; the choices we have today are largely restricted to the suburban house or the apartment in the tower. Should the “next city” offer an alternative vision for the future, and what new design processes are required to realize the next city?