Built Environment Disciplines Research Articles

Effectiveness of Evidence-Based Design Approaches for Built Environment Professional Education: A Case Study on an Urban Design Studio

Urban built environment professions are facing challenges due to the less predictable future of cities, as well as the increasing expectations from clients and the general public. It is crucial to support and inform these professions with sound evidence in order to promote the sustainability of cities. However, there have been few efforts to introduce evidence-based design (EBD) theories and frameworks into built environment professional education. This study presents an EBD framework for an undergraduate urban design studio. The effectiveness and long-term impact of EBD approaches and the framework presented were examined via learning outcomes, student reflections, and guest comments across two rounds of studio delivery. The reflections and comments were coded and analyzed using NVivo 11. The effectiveness of the EBD approach is confirmed for the premises, development, and effectiveness of urban design proposals that align with the concerns and expectations of professional guests. The wide range of evidence and techniques also fosters cross-disciplinary collaborations. This study sheds light on education in the built environment disciplines, which would further enhance the strength of relevant professions, ultimately contributing to the sustainability of society.

Current research and opinion on land governance for societal development in and on the global south

The articles analysed and presented in this editorial are from the Special Issue (SI) entitled, Current Research and Opinion on Land Governance for Societal Development in and on the Global South, curated from an e-conference that brought together many diverse scholars and practitioners from across the global land community. These articles can become multi- inter- and cross-disciplinary reference material for in-class and on-field education and learning in land studies. Their knowledge base covers specific subjects on land use planning, urban development, land administration, land governance, land policy, rural development, land management, real estate, land tenure, property rights and gender and women concerns (to mention a few). All scholars within the land profession—whether in the business, geography, sociology, area studies, anthropology, planning, engineering and the built environment disciplines—are encouraged to read, use and apply this knowledge base in their distinct roles in the land sector or land-related activities.

Geographies of Encounter, Public Space, and Social Cohesion: Reviewing Knowledge at the Intersection of Social Sciences and Built Environment Disciplines

This article seeks to address long-standing questions in academia, practice, and policymaking regarding the role public spaces might have in promoting cross-cultural encounters and experiences of social cohesion in socially and culturally diverse urban contexts, and what theories and methods researchers and practitioners might use to objectively evaluate this. To answer these questions, this article carries out a systematic literature review of theories and methods for studying person-environment relationships from a range of social science and built-environment disciplines. The review provides a basis for interdisciplinary knowledge exchange to develop an innovative theoretical and methodological framework that draws together key analyses of social cohesion with recent urban design literature, to hypothesize how key social dimensions that characterise intercultural encounter and their social experience of cohesion link to physical, management, and use attributes of public space design. The proposed framework provides a multi-dimensional account of how public spaces with different design approaches are connected to different experiences of social encounters, which in turn impact varied experiences of social cohesion, paving the way for new knowledge about the geographies of encounters.

The impact of retrofitted ventilation approaches on long-range airborne infection risk for lecture room environments: design stage methodology and application

There is a continued need to improve the energy (and by extension carbon) performance of the existing building stock in Europe and globally. Recent experiences with the COVID-19 pandemic have demanded even more of the built environment disciplines when it comes to air quality and ventilation rates particularly in teaching environments which are seen as necessary developmental sectors for the learning of the population. As such it is important that these spaces are safe for students and staff where, until now, infectious disease risk assessments were not typical. In addition to this, there is a risk that envelope refurbishment (which is critical for energy performance) without the provision of adequate ventilation may lead to high-risk scenarios for occupants in university spaces and additional measures may be required. This study presents a design stage risk assessment methodology and applies this to evaluate different retrofitted ventilation approaches combined with additional control measures for a lecture room environment. A real case study lecture room in Ireland was used to demonstrate the methodology for evaluating the airborne infectious disease risk (using the Wells-Riley model) under different ventilation approaches (natural and mechanical), infiltration rates (existing and upgraded), class sizes and times, mask efficiencies as well as the use of an air cleaner. The methodology that was adopted was shown to be flexible and capable of considering a wide range of different retrofit and user specific combinations. The results from the evaluation indicate a wide range in event specific reproductive numbers, however, the use of a well-designed natural or mechanical ventilation system was seen as significant in stabilising or suppressing virus transmission and reducing the likelihood of highly reproductive events. It was found that combinations of measures with ventilation were the most effective at suppressing reproductive numbers. It is recommended that during known pandemics (in the short-term) infectious control strategies should use filtration (through masks or air cleaners) and adequate ventilation. Long-term refurbishment strategies should consider the provision of hybrid ventilation systems which integrate key energy saving measures (such as heat recovery and demand-controlled ventilation), virus control (such as HEPA filtration) and low energy cooling solutions (such as passive cooling).

An understanding gap? Planning education in a time of change: a response to Taylor and Close

Building on Taylor and Close’s (2022) commentary reviewing the skills gap concerning how planners are educated and trained, this response places this ‘gap’ in the context of key relationships that shape this; between skills, knowledges and attitudes, including a more nuanced understanding of knowledge; between the Royal Town Planning Institute, planning schools and employers and between planning and other built-environment disciplines. The resulting argument is that a more nuanced understanding of where different responsibilities lie for educating and training planners needs to be a pre-requisite for understanding how the skills gaps identified by Taylor and Close should be addressed.

The Inter/Transdisciplinary Framework for Urban Governance Intervention in the Egyptian Informal Settlements

There is a need to understand the complex nature of informal settlements to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 11: “Making cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable”. Thus, addressing the urban governance of informal settlements requires an inter/trans-disciplinary scope to reach a cross-cutting agenda that combines social/behavioral, economics, and public health with the built environment disciplines. Respectively, this paper aims to establish an integrative framework based upon a blended inter/trans-disciplinary approach of urban governance for informal settlements in Egypt. The study adopts a theoretical analytic methodology to achieve its aim by reviewing the literature on informal settlement policies. It argues that the inter/trans-disciplinarity approach contributes to integrative urban governance agendas that enhance the quality of life of informal settlements. While exploring three bottom-up perspectives of understanding the formation of informal urban settings—socioeconomic, morphological, and sociophysical—an integrative model is developed to allow a contextual perspective for examining informal domains. The model is articulated to guide the purpose of the multidimensional analysis methods for investigating informal contexts. An integrative agenda with six analysis tasks, each involving interdisciplinary group of academics, experts, stakeholders, and authorized representatives, is outlined by the method originated in this paper. Ultimately, and concerning aspects of sustainable urban cities, the paper introduces an integrative agenda that enables overcoming gaps in current upgrading practices when examining the informal settlements of the Egyptian contexts.

The El Segundo Refinery: Whiteness, Imperialist Expansion and Extractive Infrastructures

Planning for racially just futures requires reckoning with and unlearning practices of whiteness embedded within histories and theories of planning. Through archival and policy research, this historical-structural analysis identifies the El Segundo Chevron oil refinery as a center of racial capitalism and imperialism. The refinery’s formation in 1911 was not only enabled by racially exclusive policy, but also shaped the City of El Segundo through the consolidation of corporate political power at the local level. Sites of extraction, from Los Angeles to the Amazon, reveal historic and ongoing injustices, which built environment disciplines must confront in order to move forward in solidarity.

A Transformative Architectural Pedagogy and Tool for a Time of Converging Crises

The institutional frameworks within which we conceive, design, construct, inhabit and manage our built environments are widely acknowledged to be key factors contributing to converging ecological crises: climate change, biodiversity loss, environmental degradation, and social inequity at a global scale. Yet, our ability to respond to these emergencies remains largely circumscribed by educational and professional agendas inherited from 20th-century Western paradigms. As the crises intensify, there is a compelling case for radical change in the educational and professional structures of the built environment disciplines. This paper presents a work-in-progress examination of an emergent architecture programme at Te Wānanga Aronui O Tāmaki Makau Rau/Auckland University of Technology (AUT), Aotearoa New Zealand. The program is within Huri Te Ao/the School of Future Environments, a transdisciplinary entity formed in 2020 to integrate research and teaching across Architecture, Built Environment Engineering, and Creative Technologies. The school itself is conceived as a collaborative project to co-create an outward-facing civic research platform for sharing ecologically positive design thinking across diverse communities of practice. The programme foregrounds mātauranga Māori (Indigenous ways of knowing), transdisciplinary systems, and regenerative design as regional place-oriented contributions to planetary-scaled transformation. We illustrate and evaluate a specific curriculum change tool, the Living Systems Wellbeing (LSW) Compass. Grounded in Te Ao Māori (Māori cosmology and context), the Compass offers a graphic means for students to navigate and integrate ecological relationships at different scales and levels of complexity, as well as affords insights into alternative foundational narratives, positive values, design strategies, and professional practices. This paper identifies four foundational factors for transformative pedagogies. The first factor is the value of a collectively held and clearly articulated vision and focus. The second factor is the capacity and commitment of an academic team that supports and values the vision. Thirdly, the vision needs to meet and acknowledge place-specific knowledges and values. Finally, the pedagogy should have an action research component founded in real-world interactions. While this research-based pedagogy is place-based and specific, we argue that these four factors are transferable to other learning institutions and can support critical pedagogies for social, cultural, and ecological wellbeing.

Teaching data analysis for building performance simulation – Series: Building simulation and calculation tools in teaching

AbstractThe Erasmus+ project, entitled ‘Digital Erasmus – a roadmap to using building performance simulation to achieve resilient design’ (DesRes), seeks to transform the learning experience of students in built environment disciplines using a continuous digital learning cycle. Three universities play a part in this project: Graz University of Technology (TU Graz), Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) and the University of Strathclyde (UoS), each developing and delivering a module to complete the learning experience in building simulation. This paper describes the aims and learning objectives associated with the workshops taught at TU Graz as part of the module dedicated to energy monitoring. These workshops tackle the complexity of working with large data sets, which commonly arise from energy monitoring research. In particular, the workshops aim to provide a practical understanding of how to identify, handle, reshape, clean up and evaluate important summary statistics from incomplete data sets. These are fundamental skills in building simulation where model validation and calibration are increasingly commonplace.

COVID-19 catalyst: emergent pedagogies and a DIAgram framework

The global COVID-19 pandemic has delivered extraordinary challenges across geographies as well as practices, and clearly academia has not been spared. While the events of 2020 and 2021 have revealed some limits to teaching in the ‘old (pre-pandemic) normal’, technology-supported pedagogies have been emerging for several years. This pandemic has been a potent catalyst, not only for ad-hoc adaptation, but potentially for long-term change and improvement. The ‘old normal’ is now long passed, and approaches to learning and teaching continue to explore new ground. This article draws on the work of Built Environments Learning + Teaching (BEL+T), an academic group within the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning at the University of Melbourne. The BEL+T group applies creative problem-solving and design-led approaches, evidence-based research methodologies and project-focused consultancy to improve teaching quality and student engagement in built environment disciplines. The following sections introduce a learning design framework – the Delivery, Interaction, Assessment (DIA) framework – which was developed by BEL+T as a tool to communicate with and support staff throughout 2020 and 2021, and continues to be used to support teaching efforts. The translation of the elements of the DIA framework and its related ‘DIAgram’ to specific learning activities are presented in the following sections ‘on the (virtual) ground’. Some emergent pedagogies for virtual learning environments (VLEs) are outlined, exploring relationships between students, teachers, objects, sites and VLEs for learning, alongside implications for teacher presence and performance online. These key factors have influenced online approaches both before and since the onset of the pandemic. They deliver implications for emergent hybrid approaches such as dual delivery and blended synchronous learning, which are in turn driven by the needs of a still-distributed student cohort and the challenges of ongoing unpredictability.

Exploring the development of context appreciation in coursework that targets problem-solving for sustainable development

PurposeThis study aims to explore the role of planned, sudden shifts in lived experiences, in influencing learner capabilities towards improved problem-solving for sustainable development outcomes. The authors responded to employers of engineering and built environment graduates observing limited “real-life” problem-solving skills, beyond using established formulae and methods, in spite of attempts over more than two decades, to train engineers and other built environment disciplines in areas such as whole system design and sustainable design.Design/methodology/approachA grounded theory approach was used to guide the analysis of data collected through ethnographic methods. The process involved reflecting on authors’ efforts to develop context appreciation within a course called “International Engineering Practice”, using two years of collected data (archived course information, including course profile; completed assessment; lecture and field visit evaluations; and focus groups). The study is built on the authors’ working knowledge of Bloom’s Taxonomy and Threshold Learning Theory, and the well-established role of “context appreciation” in complex problem-solving. After the first iteration of the course, the authors looked for additional theoretical support to help explain findings. The Cynefin framework was subsequently used to augment the authors’ appreciation of “context” – beyond physical context to include relational context, and to evaluate students’ competency development across the four domains of “clear”, “complicated”, “complex” and “chaotic”.FindingsThis study helped the authors to understand that there was increased capacity of the students to distinguish between three important contexts for problem-solving, including an increased awareness about the importance of factual and relevant information, increased acknowledgement of the varying roles of professional practitioners in problem-solving depending on the type of problem and increased appreciation of the importance of interdisciplinary teams in tackling complex and complicated problems. There were several opportunities for such courses to be more effective in preparing students for dealing with “chaotic” situations that are prevalent in addressing the United Nations’ 17 sustainable development goals (UNSDGs). Drawing on the course-based learnings, the authors present a “context integration model” for developing problem-solving knowledge and skills.Research limitations/implicationsThe research findings are important because context appreciation – including both physical context and relational context – is critical to problem-solving for the UNSDGs, including its 169 targets and 232 indicators. The research findings highlight the opportunity for the Cynefin framework to inform holistic curriculum renewal processes, enhancing an educator’s ability to design, implement and evaluate coursework that develops physical and relational context appreciation.Practical implicationsThe study’s findings and context integration model can help educators develop the full range of necessary problem-solving graduate competencies, including for chaotic situations involving high degrees of uncertainty. Looking ahead, acknowledging the significant carbon footprint of global travel, the authors are interested in applying the model to a domestic and/or online format of the same course, to attempt similar learning outcomes.Originality/valueConnecting Bloom’s taxonomy deep learning and threshold learning theory critical path learning insights with the Cynefin framework context domains, provides a novel model to evaluate competency development for problem-solving towards improved holistic physical and relational “context appreciation” outcomes.

Exploring transformative pedagogies for built environment disciplines: the case of interdisciplinarity in low carbon transition

ABSTRACT The integration of transformative pedagogies into curricula is recognized as a strategy to deal with the new demands of complexity in learning, which include equipping future professionals with the necessary knowledge and skills to transition to a low carbon built environment. It requires a dedicated interdisciplinary learning environment. Creating this environment remains a challenge due to the lack of a learning tool to facilitate an interdisciplinary approach. Perhaps due to this challenge, interdisciplinarity within the context of low carbon transition (LCT) in the built environment has not been sufficiently explored. This study deals with this gap in the literature by developing a pedagogical approach founded on the combined use of Grounded Theory Method, Cognitive Mapping Technique and Meaningful Learning Activities. This paper focuses on the testing phase of this approach, which engaged researchers, postgraduate and undergraduate students. The findings promote a transformative pedagogy to explore the socio-technical dimension of the LCT. They point out the type of interdisciplinarity, which we need to integrate into traditional curricula, moving from vocabulary construction at the undergraduate level to exploration of different perspectives at the postgraduate level. Recommendations on the ways in which this approach could become common practice are also made.

Addressing Socio-technical Issues in Built Environment Research: A Philosophical Premise

AbstractResearchers within the built environment disciplines have increasingly drawn on a plurality of social methods in order to enrich their research. Three decades down the line the place of philosophy in the choice of appropriate research methods is yet to be appreciated by some built environment researchers. Consequently, a lack of adventure in interpretive research, wrong choice of methods and underrepresentation of the qualitative approach are reported, which suggests the existence of a knowledge gap. This study is aimed at illustrating the philosophical premise for employing social research methods to address socio-technical issues in built environment research. In achieving this, reference was made to a fire incident in a student dormitory in Nigeria as a problem upon which contrasting–subjectivist and objectivist–philosophical positions were examined. The consideration of these philosophical positions and the choices that resulted from both spectrums were seen to have their strengths and weaknesses. To offset the weaknesses in each approach while also leveraging on the strengths that each approach offers, the paper illustrated how a compromise–pragmatist–position can be reached to allow for the choice of, and mixing of multi-methods to solve research problems that could not be adequately solved using any single method.

Learning Space Design: The Presentation of a Framework for the Built Environment Discipline

ABSTRACTThis paper reports on research undertaken to identify the specific learning space preferences of built environment students within a UK university. Through an instrumental case study design, utilizing a sequential exploratory mixed methods approach, this research explored learning space requirements for built environment students. Initial focus groups were conducted to identify elements of the learning spaces that are important in students learning spaces, which were then used to develop questions for the survey phase of the research. From this, we proceeded to develop a framework for learning space design for built environment students. Eight important learning space factors were identified; access to space, convenient workspaces, environment, layout, sense, integrated space, esthetics, and identity. Initial findings are presented regarding differences between disciplines in their rating of elements of the learning space. A framework is presented for practitioners to use in the design process for the development of built environment disciplines learning spaces. This research adds to current understanding regarding student-centered learning and workplace research, highlighting preferences for specific learning space factors. The current research is part of a bigger study but presents built environment disciplines outcomes which are applicable to a larger group.

Determining indoor environmental criteria weights through expert panels and surveys

ABSTRACTA growing focus on occupant comfort, health and wellbeing has resulted in attempts to quantify indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and to determine the relative contributions of single IEQ aspects to an overall IEQ index. The recently developed IV20 tool assesses potential IEQ to label overall IEQ, and assign separate scores for the main indoor environment (IE) areas: thermal, visual, acoustic and air quality. In the absence of objective, universally applicable IEQ weights, this paper develops and executes a methodology asking regional experts with different backgrounds to make relative comparisons between related IE aspects. The authors hypothesize that wide-ranging subjective evaluations can be combined into useful relative weights (best operational solution based on the current status of IE literature).This paper presents results from an IE expert survey on relative IE aspect weights using simple percentile prioritization and the Analytic Hierarchy Process pairwise comparison. Results are compared to expert panel judgements to ensure validity. The advantages of this combined weight determination method are (1) that the expert survey ensures a broad spectrum of opinions and allows for input from different built environment disciplines, and (2) that the expert panel has tool-specific insight, methodology awareness and state of the art knowledge.

Assessment of academic stress and coping strategies among built environment undergraduate students in Nigerian higher education

PurposeStress has become an important topic in the academic environment. However, studies on academic stress among built environment students have received little attention. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to assess the causes of academic stress, and its coping strategies among built environment undergraduate students in public higher education institution (HEI) in Nigeria.Design/methodology/approachAn extensive literature review was conducted to identify the causes of academic stress and its coping strategies among the students in HEIs, using quantity surveying students as a case. Primary data were elicited through questionnaire survey administered on 189 quantity surveying students in Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria. A total of 169 copies of the questionnaire were returned and suitable for analysis. The data obtained were analyzed using the mean score and t-test.FindingsThe study identified 27 causes of students’ academic stress, and the analysis of the total ranking revealed that 8 out of 27 causes of academic stress were considered important. The results of t-test indicated that except for 5 out of 27 identified causes of student academic stress, there is no statistically significant difference in the perceptions of male and female students. The study further identified 30 coping strategies employed by students in dealing with academic stress, out of which six identified coping strategies were considered important. In addition, the results of t-test revealed that except for 11 out of 30 identified coping strategies, there is no statistically significant difference in the perceptions of male and female students surveyed.Practical implicationsThe identification of the important causes of academic stress and its coping strategies among the students in the public higher education will be useful for the university management to formulate policies toward providing a well-balanced academic environment that is conducive to better learning. In addition, policy recommendations are proposed.Originality/valueThe findings will help the academic staff and university management to design and implement policies toward refining the teaching procedures in higher education. Also, this study would be of great value to academic staff and university administrators to develop a framework for incorporating stress coping strategies in the higher education curriculum. This study is important as not many empirical studies relating to academic stress and its coping strategies have been conducted in the built environment disciplines.

Knowledge Integration for Low Carbon Transition: The Case of Energy Retrofit

The Energy Retrofit concept plays an important role in the transition to low carbon cities, because buildings make a transdisciplinary perspective. Thus, an integrated approach to research, learning and teaching in the built environment disciplines is required. The Authors present the final stage of the first work package of an H2020-Marie-Sklodowska Curie project, which focuses on the development of an Innovative Learning Platform for Knowledge Integration in Energy Retrofit. This paper, which first summarizes the conceptual framework that was elaborated in an earlier phase, focuses on the methodological approach that was used to define the relevant information networks concerning Energy Retrofit using a cognitive mapping technique. The methodology is applied to 10 case studies in order to explore the relationships between Energy Retrofit and built environment transformation processes. The methodological approach is structured as follows: 1) Collecting case studies; 2) Identifying main topics; 3) Coding list of concepts; 4) Defining relationships; and 5) Updating the conceptual framework. The findings show that the adopted methodological approach is useful for integrating diverse disciplinary perspectives and for improving users’ cognitive skills that are involved in mutual and joint learning processes. In conclusion, this study presents an innovative approach to research, learning and teaching in built environment disciplines. Keywords: Energy Retrofit; Built Environment; Integrated Project; Knowledge Integration; Design Education

The seven lamps of planning for biodiversity in the city

Cities tend to be built in areas of high biodiversity, and the accelerating pace of urbanization threatens the persistence of many species and ecological communities globally. However, urban environments also offer unique prospects for biological conservation, with multiple benefits for humans and other species. We present seven ecological principles to conserve and increase the biodiversity of cities, using metaphors to bridge the gap between the languages of built-environment and conservation professionals. We draw upon John Ruskin's famous essay on the seven lamps of architecture, but more generally on the thinking of built-environment pioneers such as Patrick Geddes (1854–1932) who proposed a synoptic view of the urban environment that included humans and non-humans alike. To explain each principle or ‘lamp’ of urban biodiversity, we use an understanding from the built-environment disciplines as a base and demonstrate through metaphor that planning for the more-than-human does not require a conceptual leap. We conclude our discussion with ten practical strategies for turning on these lamps in cities. Urban planners, architects, landscape architects, engineers and other built-environmental professionals have a key role to play in a paradigm shift to plan for the more-than-human, because of their direct influence on the evolving urban environment. This essay is intended to increase dialogue between ecologists and members of these professions, and thus increase the biodiversity of cities around the world.

Review of Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) applications in the built environment: Towards automated building inspection procedures using drones

Abstract Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS – a.k.a. drones) have evolved over the past decade as both advanced military technology and off-the-shelf consumer devices. There is a gradual shift towards public use of drones, which presents opportunities for effective remote procedures that can disrupt a variety of built environment disciplines. UAS equipment with remote sensing gear present an opportunity for analysis and inspection of existing building stocks, where architects, engineers, building energy auditors as well as owners can document building performance, visualize heat transfer using infrared imaging and create digital models using 3D photogrammetry. This paper presents a comprehensive review of various literature that addresses this topic, followed by the identification of a standard procedures for operating a UAS for energy audit missions. The presented framework is then tested on the Syracuse University campus site based on the literature review to showcase: 1) pre-flight inspection procedure parameters and methodologies; 2) during-flight visually identified areas of thermal anomalies using a UAS equipped with Infrared (IR) cameras and; 3) 3D CAD modeling developed through data gathered using UAS. A discussion of the findings suggests refining procedure accuracy through further empirical experimentation, as well as study replication, as a step towards standardizing the automation of building envelope inspection.

Sustainable Urban Water Management under a Changing Climate: The Role of Spatial Planning

The provision of a sustainable supply of water is an increasingly difficult task to achieve in many urban environments. This arises because of pressures related to population growth and increased per capita demand for water. Additionally, climate change is impacting the natural cycle of water in many locations, with a significant impact projected for the future. Many scholars advocate ‘sustainable urban water management’ (SUWM) as an approach that can address the root causes of these challenges. Yet the implementation of SUWM and adaptation to climate change in the urban water sector remains limited. This paper argues that spatial planning provides tools and processes that can facilitate the full implementation of SUWM goals, and adaptation to climate change. The potential of spatial planning to achieve SUWM, including sustainable urban water supply management through both supply and demand end initiatives, in light of climate change, is discussed. A framework is developed to consider a broad range of spatial planning interventions that can facilitate adaptation to climate change and SUWM concurrently. The paper provides information and tools to assist water planners achieve SUWM and a well-adapted water sector and urban environment, in an integrated, holistic and comprehensive manner, to meet future water supply needs. Achieving these goals will need collaborative activities across multiple built environment disciplines. Future research activities to advance these goals are outlined.