The Urban Design program is newly centered on the premise that only a combination of leadership, technical, and design skills will lead to meaningful change in the way we think, plan, and construct our built environments. Building on the leadership of the late Michael Sorkin, the program is specifically designed to foster new conversations in response to our urbanized planetary crises and provide transformative alternatives that radically reimagine our cities as equitable, diverse, resourceful, and ecologically nimble.
Participatory Urbanism fuses research, design, advocacy and leadership in unique and transdisciplinary ways. We bring together technology, practice and activism in different strengths and scales across the program’s innovative pedagogy, year-long “design think tanks” where students and professors work together to define questions, propose solutions, and disseminate their findings. We have deep links and interests in both the Global North and Global South, as well as across the emerging economies of the East. Equity, democracy, intelligence, and efficacy are understood as key and important urban tools. Students in the program will learn how to adapt and translate conventional methods of analysis and production to a new projective framework, resulting in imaginative proposals that productively tap into infrastructural engineering, environmental planning, big data technology, and digital protocols that are fundamentally reshaping our built environments.
Participatory Urbanism redefines the very objectives and scope of urban design by foregrounding racial, social,and environmental justice as primary drivers and areas of enquiry. Emergent protocols and concerns from spatio-social practices, urban anthropology, sociology, and public health afford students new agency for working with underserved communities and collectives, allowing them to question and radically reimagine urban power structures.
Participatory Urbanism is a joint initiative between the J. Max Bond Center for Urban Futures and Graduates Programs Spitzer: architecture, landscape architecture and sustainability in the urban environment – a program fusing engineering, sciences, and social sciences. Together, we provide a broad range of resources, engagement opportunities, and renowned faculty extending to the CUNY system. We aim to equip students to tackle deeply rooted biases and inefficiencies within our urban design and decision-making processes. Research in the program examines specific critical agendas in order to extrapolate alternatives and focuses on flash-point crises such as migrancy, urban interdependencies, social and spatial inequities, epidemiology, urban health, density, and ecology.
The program is designed to be completed in three full-time, sequential semesters (fall, spring, fall). Applicants to the Urban Design program should hold a professional degree in either architecture or landscape architecture. Applicants from other backgrounds will be considered only in exceptional circumstances and on demonstration of a high level of design ability.
STEM DESIGNATION
This MUP in Urban Design program is listed within the U.S. government’s official STEM fields list and is therefore eligible for the STEM OPT extension for F-1 students. See the STEM OPT Hub for more information.
This course constitutes the first half of a year-long design research lab. Organized around a series of lectures and design workshops, the course will develop research agendas to analyze and catalyze imaginative urban studies. The course will also provide students with critical tools to examine social, environmental, and technological concerns in design processes. These include but are not limited to geospatial mapping, environmental simulations and planning, urban anthropology, and economic and data analysis.
Corequisite: UD 61100
UD 61100: Urban Design Seminar I - 3 credits
This course constitutes the first half of a year-long design seminar. The seminar provides opportunities to develop in-depth competency in topics that support and broaden the design curriculum; it complements Design Lab I through seminar-style learning and/or digital lab coursework.
Corequisite: UD 61001
UD 61510: Topics in Urban Histories and Theories - 3 credits
Courses offered under this rubric will introduce students to the study of cities and built environments through time and across cultures. Exploring urbanism in a variety of geographical and historical contexts, students will critically probe issues of design, technology, ecology, planning, and socially situated practices in their relation to broader historical and environmental frameworks.
UD 61520: Topics in Urban Ecologies and Technologies - 3 credits
Courses offer under this rubric productively tap into expertise such as infrastructural engineering, environmental planning, urban ecology, big data technology, and digital protocols to gain competency and insight into the forces that are fundamentally reshaping our built environments. The aim is to research, model, analyze, simulate and/or manage key urban ecological and technological concerns.
Spring Term 2
UD 62001: Urban Design Lab II - 6 credits
This course constitutes the second half of a year-long design research lab. The course expands on the research agendas developed in Design Lab I while deepening the understanding of social, environmental, and technological concerns in design processes. Tools used include but are not limited to geospatial mapping, environmental simulations and planning, urban anthropology, and economic and data analysis.
Prerequisites: UD 61001, UD 61100
Corequisite: UD 62100
UD 62100: Urban Design Seminar II - 3 credits
This course constitutes the second half of a year-long design seminar. The seminar provides opportunities to develop in-depth competency in topics that support and broaden the design curriculum; it complements Design Lab II through seminar-style learning and/or digital lab coursework.
Prerequisites: UD 61001, UD 61100
Corequisite: UD 62001
UD 61530: Topics in Socially Situated Practices - 3 credits
Courses offered under this rubric redefine the objectives and scope of urban design by foregrounding racial, social, and environmental justice as primary drivers and areas of enquiry. Emergent protocols and concerns from spatio-social practices, urban anthropology, sociology, and public health afford students a new agency for working with underserved communities and collectives, allowing them to question and radically reimagine urban power structures.
UD 61510: Topics in Urban Histories and Theories - 3 credits
Courses offered under this rubric will introduce students to the study of cities and built environments through time and across cultures. Exploring urbanism in a variety of geographical and historical contexts, students will critically probe issues of design, technology, ecology, planning, and socially situated practices in their relation to broader historical and environmental frameworks.
Fall Term 3
UD 73000: Urban Design Lab III / Capstone - 6 credits
This course constitutes the third design research lab and will act as a capstone project for students to deploy agendas, competencies, strategies, and methods developed in the first year of the program. The capstone project will allow students to carry out faculty-guided or independent research — subject to approval — in urbanism as it relates to a wide range of concerns, including social and environmental justice, technology, and infrastructure.
Prerequisites: UD 62001, UD 62100
Corequisite: UD 73100
UD 73100: Urban Design Seminar III / Capstone - 3 credits
This course constitutes the third design seminar. The seminar provides opportunities to develop in-depth competency in topics that support and broaden the design curriculum; it complements Design Lab III / Capstone seminar-style learning and/or digital lab coursework.
Prerequisites: UD 62001, UD 62100
Corequisite: UD 73000
UD 61520: Topics in Urban Ecologies and Technologies - 3 credits
Courses offer under this rubric productively tap into expertise such as infrastructural engineering, environmental planning, urban ecology, big data technology, and digital protocols to gain competency and insight into the forces that are fundamentally reshaping our built environments. The aim is to research, model, analyze, simulate and/or manage key urban ecological and technological concerns.
Urbanism Elective - 3 credits
Students will choose a relevant course from a list of electives curated by faculty, drawing from offerings within and beyond the Spitzer School.
