Urban Campus Research Articles

Design Factors and Criteria for Building a Non-Level Pedestrian Crossing at an Urban Campus

Bandung Islamic University (UNISBA) is in a densely populated urban area of Bandung. UNISBA lecture and administrative buildings are scattered in several locations. In architecture typo-morphology terms, a campus building with this environmental setting is often referred to as an urban campus. The high traffic flow on these roads, together with the intense conflict between road crossers, often results in congestion due to vehicle deceleration needed to allow pedestrian crossing. To facilitate the need for the movement for the users of the UNISBA campus buildings and minimize conflicts with road users, infrastructure that connects the UNISBA campus buildings is needed to facilitate pedestrian crossing. The pedestrian crossing could be in the form of a level crossing in the same elevation as the road or a non-level crossing situated above or under the road. The type of pedestrian crossing studied in this paper is a non-level pedestrian crossing in the form of a pedestrian bridge. In designing the infrastructure for non-level crossings, it is necessary to pay attention to the movement patterns that occur and the factors that influence willingness to use. This study aims to determine the movement pattern of UNISBA campus facility users consisting of students, lecturers, educational staff, and visitors by using quantitative origin-destination spatial analysis. Descriptive exploratory factor analysis was also used to determine the preferences of the users of the UNISBA campus buildings to use non-level crossings. The results of this analysis will be the basis for designing non-level accessibility between UNISBA campus buildings.
 Keywords: pedestrian crossing, pedestrian bridge, urban campus, urban design, urban mobiity

Conscious Mobility for Urban Spaces: Case Studies Review and Indicator Framework Design

A lack of data collection on conscious mobility behaviors has been identified in current sustainable and smart mobility planning, development and implementation strategies. This leads to technocentric solutions that do not place people and their behavior at the center of new mobility solutions in urban centers around the globe. This paper introduces the concept of conscious mobility to link techno-economic analyses with user awareness on the impact of their travel decisions on other people, local urban infrastructure and the environment through systematic big data collection. A preliminary conscious mobility indicator framework is presented to leverage behavioral considerations to enhance urban-community mobility systems. Key factors for conscious mobility analysis have been derived from five case studies. The sample offers regional diversity (i.e., local, regional and the global urban contexts), as well as different goals in the transformation of conventional urban transport systems, from improving public transport efficiency and equipment electrification to mitigate pollution and climate risks, to focusing on equity, access and people safety. The case studies selected provide useful metrics on the adoption of cleaner, smarter, safer and more autonomous mobility technologies, along with novel people-centric program designs to build an initial set of conscious mobility indicators frameworks. The parameters were applied to the city of Monterrey, Nuevo Leon in Mexico focusing on the needs of the communities that work, study and live around the local urban campus of the Tecnologico de Monterrey’s Distrito Tec. This case study, served as an example of how conscious mobility indicators could be applied and customized to a community and region of interest. This paper introduces the first application of the conscious mobility framework for urban communities’ mobility system analysis. This more holistic assessment approach includes dimensions such as society and culture, infrastructure and urban spaces, technology, government, normativity, economy and politics, and the environment. The expectation is that the conscious mobility framework of analysis will become a useful tool for smarter and sustainable urban and mobility problem solving and decision making to enhance the quality of life all living in urban communities.

Academic advising and the lessons of the civil rights and social justice campus movements

ABSTRACT The changing campus demographics following World War II and the U.S. Black Student Movement of the 1960s unified and influenced the values of academic advising and student support services. This article argues that this context of U.S. college civil rights protest resulted in the call for more inclusive student support services that combined social work, counselling, social justice, and academic knowledge. Academic histories like Martha Biondi’s comprehensive Black Revolution on Campus and Ibram Rogers’s The Black Campus Movement document well the call for Black counsellors, trained social workers, and academic coaches at campuses on the east and west coasts during the Era of Protest. This study adds to these representations by looking at this history through the lens of a midwestern U.S. flagship, urban campus. Academic and student affairs administrators are taking note of the new generation of undergraduate students and their penchant for protest, especially regarding the Black Lives Matter movement spurred by the tragic deaths of college-aged and college-bound young Black men like Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown that has strengthened during the pandemic after the murder of George Floyd. .

SARS-CoV-2 control on a large urban college campus without mass testing

Objective A small percentage of universities and colleges conducted mass SARS-CoV-2 testing. However, universal testing is resource-intensive, strains national testing capacity, and false negative tests can encourage unsafe behaviors. Participants A large urban university campus. Methods Virus control centered on three pillars: mitigation, containment, and communication, with testing of symptomatic and a random subset of asymptomatic students. Results Random surveillance testing demonstrated a prevalence among asymptomatic students of 0.4% throughout the term. There were two surges in cases that were contained by enhanced mitigation and communication combined with targeted testing. Cumulative cases totaled 445 for the term, most resulting from unsafe undergraduate student behavior and among students living off-campus. A case rate of 232/10,000 undergraduates equaled or surpassed several peer institutions that conducted mass testing. Conclusions An emphasis on behavioral mitigation and communication can control virus transmission on a large urban campus combined with a limited and targeted testing strategy.

TOKYO UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE KATSUSHIKA CAMPUS - A DESIGN PROCESS INTEGRATING PARKS WITH CULTURAL FACILITIES

This paper reports on the design process for the Tokyo University of Science Katsushika Campus, which culminated in the execution of a masterplan, using urban planning, whereby the campus was integrated with a park. The result was an urban campus integrated with a park, making it a model case for campus planning of the future in that it was characterized by liaison with the locality.

Characterizing flow conditions of urban environments from wind-induced noise measurements: A semi-empirical wind noise model of the University of the District of Columbia campus

In this work, the flow conditions within the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) urban campus are predicted from wind-induced noise. Wind-induced noise obtained from a collection of spatial distributed microphones are used to estimate the mean velocity airflow and wind noise distribution across the UDC campus. Wind speed and direction are estimated by fitting the second-order statistics of semi-empirical models of wind noise distribution from microphone measurements to analytical models in the least squares sense. The accuracy of the proposed is investigated for average microphone separation and time resolution. Comparisons of the wind speed and direction results to ultrasonic anemometer measurements are discussed.

Research on the Indicators of Sustainable Campus Renewal and Reconstruction in Pursuit of Continuous Historical and Regional Context

As cities transition from incremental development to stock development, university campuses in suburban areas are progressively becoming urban university campuses. The stability of the boundary between urban university campuses and the city, along with the fact that the campus’s overall spatial capacity is reaching its maximum, makes it impossible for urban university campuses to have future spatial expansions. This article focused on the stock development, renewal, and transformation of urban campuses. From the perspective of urban university campus block morphology hierarchy and using the Wushan Campus of South China University of Technology in Guangzhou as an example, this study utilized urban morphology theory, data mining technology, big data collection, and visualization techniques to measure campus block morphology. Then, K-means clustering was utilized to classify the block form, and historical background research was employed to study the many forms of typical block form. Finally, the campus renewal and transformation guiding principles were introduced, and the control index of block form renewal and transformation was formed, evolving into the university campus block form renewal and transformation design technique. This strategy was used to investigate the general revitalization of college campuses.

Study of the Environmental Quality Index in an Urban Campus Area

Environmental Quality Index (EQI) has been used as a common measurement for environmental quality in Indonesia. However, EQI is only measured in a wide administrative area. In reality, environmental quality measurement in smaller areas is also needed to formulate the right environmental policy. EQI study at Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM), as an urban campus, is important because it prioritizes the educopolis vision which commits to create a conducive education environment and be responsive to ecological issues. This research aims to identify the EQI of UGM and analyse the vision of educopolis and open system campus related to EQI. The method which is used is mixed-method of quantitative to obtain the EQI value from Air Pollution Index, Water Pollution Index, and Forest Cover Index, as well as qualitative method to review the educopolis vision and open system campus through analysis of strength, weakness, opportunity, threat (SWOT). The EQI in this study is 50.77, categorized as very less. The vision of the educopolis campus in contrast with the current open system campus. The management strategy to improve the EQI is formulated through the management of vehicles, waste, integrated water in Belik and Code sub-watersheds, and urban green space.

Inequity on suburban campuses: University students disadvantaged in self‐improvement travel

AbstractMany new university campuses have been built in suburban areas where transit and service facilities are negligible. However, few studies explore the educational and transportation equity issues related to campus location. Based on a 2017 survey comprising 1673 students on 37 campuses in Shanghai, this study applied multilevel models to examine the association between the built environment around campuses and university students' travel behaviors. In particular, we focused on the travel that students undertake for self‐improvement activities (e.g., internships and education‐related activities) because this type of travel plays an important role in improving students' abilities and promoting their career development. We found that students on suburban campuses, which are characterized by being farther away from the city center, being single land use, and having fewer transit services, engage in fewer and longer trips to self‐improvement destinations. However, students studying on urban campuses, which are characterized by mixed land use and greater accessibility to the city center and subway service, engage in more frequent and shorter trips to self‐improvement destinations. Therefore, students on suburban campuses are at a disadvantage regarding educational opportunities and access to transportation to engage in self‐improvement activities off campus.

University Student Health Services, Local Experience, and Emerging Needs: Bridging the Past With the Future.

University students' health and well-being is critical, especially in the aftermath of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic; however, a comprehensive and integrated approach in academic institutions remains neglected. In this context, the local experience from a pilot university-based Student Health Center at an urban campus in Greece is presented. Select health promotion and disease prevention screening and monitoring initiatives are summarized from the viewpoint of a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats analysis, with emerging health needs and policy implications. Long-term sustainability is feasible, only if synergies and close collaboration with other university units and local health authorities are developed. A post-pandemic call to action for intervention programs that integrate physical and mental health care, as well as raise awareness among university stakeholders and health policy makers, is issued. [Journal of Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services, 61(3), 27-31.].

Assessing the carbon footprint of a Colombian University Campus using the UNE-ISO 14064–1 and WRI/WBCSD GHG Protocol Corporate Standard

Higher education institutions (HEIs) transfer skills and knowledge between industries, the government, and the public, playing a vital role at educating future leaders in creating a globally sustainable system. Therein, evaluating greenhouse gas emissions from an educational institute is the first step towards the proposed reduction targets at the local, national, and international levels. In this research, we report the first approximate carbon footprint calculation of emissions corresponding to scope 1, scope 2, and scope 3 emissions for the main urban campuses of Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Medellín, using the UNE-ISO 14064–1 and WRI/WBCSD GHG Protocol Corporate standard. The carbon footprint in 2019 was approximately 7250.52 tons CO2 eq, and 0.432 tons CO2 eq per person. Scope 1 emissions accounted for about 2.84% of the carbon footprint, while scope 2 and 3 emissions each contributed nearly 14% and 83%, respectively. The largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions were the transportation process (58.51%), the wastewater process (17.01%), followed by electricity consumption (14.03%), and the e-mails that are sent (6.51%). It is suggested some proposals and strategies for mitigating and reducing emissions. Colombian HEIs exhibit the lowest ton of CO2 eq. per person compared to the other HEIs. Several reasons explain this behavior across the document such as geographic location (climate and topography), cultural factors (consumption patterns and types of transportation), population size, typology (public or private), gross domestic product (GDP) of each country, and methodology implemented. Results cannot be extrapolated to the Colombian case for the differences in the local conditions; therefore, it is not possible to get solid conclusions on the CF behavior in the Colombian HEIs. In this research, we provide for the first time a carbon footprint calculation where the sociological, political, and geographic conditions not extrapolated representing a valuable contribution to the HEI’s of the country. This research can be a benchmark in the carbon footprint calculation and a methodological contribution to HEIs in the country.

Black Undergraduate Networking on an Urban, Historically White Campus: The Making of Social Capital

Formerly preferred, but increasingly required, a college degree has become a prerequisite in a competitive job market. For Black undergraduates who continue to face systemic disparities in college completion, gaps in hiring are exacerbated by unequal access to leadership positions and professional training, such as internships, during college. Since informal connections and social networks heavily influence occupational access, this research article presents a relational, ethnographic approach to better understand the opportunities and constraints of networking for Black undergraduates in an urban campus context. This study advances prior social capital research by not only offering where networks exist but also presenting how they form and develop over time and across space. The findings show how Black students attending an urban, selective, and historically White institution (HWI) do not merely discover connections but deliberately construct them, illuminating the process through which social capital is made.

Development and implementation of a COVID-19 Vaccine and Pandemic Planning course: An interprofessional education approach.

We developed an online interprofessional COVID-19 Vaccine and Pandemic Planning course at the height of the pandemic to prepare health science students for future vaccine delivery. Faculty from nursing, pharmacy, medical, and dentistry developed a six-week online co-curricular interprofessional education activity open to all health science students across seven schools on three campuses within the same University system. Total enrollment included 303, with 228 completing the course from 16 programs. The majority of students were from the Doctorate in Dental Surgery (DDS) program (26.2%) and the Midwestern urban campus (90.3%). Successful rapid course development and implementation was attributed to several factors. The broad range of students across health science programs and differing years in respective programs provides insight to plan future co-curricular activities. The rapid development of a system-wide health science IPE course has implications for continuously changing professional health education needs.

The influence of natural environments on creativity.

This study investigated the effects of different natural environments on attention restoration and creativity. To compare the restorative benefits based on the degrees of perceived naturalness in urban areas, this study categorized environments into three types of perceived naturalness and tested the effect on one's creativity. The urban campus was selected as the study site, representing high-, medium-, and low-perceived naturalness photosets downloaded from Google Street Map images as experimental stimuli. The study invited 100 subjects to take the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults (ATTA), which measures creative thinking by viewing the onscreen photosets of the experimental stimuli. In addition, this study asked participants to complete the Perceived Restoration Scale (PRS) questionnaires. The results showed that high- and medium-perceived naturalness in the urban-campus site was superior to low-perceived naturalness in creative performance. In addition, there were significant differences in elaboration and flexibility for different degrees of perceived naturalness. Various degrees of perceived naturalness showed a substantial correlation between PRS scores and ATTA scores. The attention restoration benefits of high- and medium-naturalness environments improve creativity. Our study indicates that viewing natural environments stimulates curiosity and fosters flexibility and imagination, highly natural environments distract our minds from work, and the benefits of attention restoration can improve the uniqueness and diversity of creative ideas. This study provides a reference for creative environmental design and supports further understanding of nature's health and creativity benefits in urban areas.

Buildout and integration of an automated high-throughput CLIA laboratory for SARS-CoV-2 testing on a large urban campus.

In 2019, the first cases of SARS-CoV-2 were detected in Wuhan, China, and by early 2020 the first cases were identified in the United States. SARS-CoV-2 infections increased in the US causing many states to implement stay-at-home orders and additional safety precautions to mitigate potential outbreaks. As policies changed throughout the pandemic and restrictions lifted, there was an increase in demand for COVID-19 testing which was costly, difficult to obtain, or had long turn-around times. Some academic institutions, including Boston University (BU), created an on-campus COVID-19 screening protocol as part of a plan for the safe return of students, faculty, and staff to campus with the option for in-person classes. At BU, we put together an automated high-throughput clinical testing laboratory with the capacity to run 45,000 individual tests weekly by Fall of 2020, with a purpose-built clinical testing laboratory, a multiplexed reverse transcription PCR (RT-qPCR) test, robotic instrumentation, and trained staff. There were many challenges including supply chain issues for personal protective equipment and testing materials in addition to equipment that were in high demand. The BU Clinical Testing Laboratory (CTL) was operational at the start of Fall 2020 and performed over 1 million SARS-CoV-2 PCR tests during the 2020-2021 academic year.

Assessing Xeriscaping as a Retrofit Sustainable Water Consumption Approach for a Desert University Campus

Assessing water usage associated with urban green infrastructure is crucial for water resource management and sustainable planning of desert campus areas. A public university campus layout in the desert region is considered an urban city subject to urban water consumption (UWC) of significant intensity and extent, even though the urban layout is essential to all campus occupants’ comfort and environmental sustainability needs. Hence, there is a need to reduce its detrimental effects through sustainable methods for campus water content. This study focuses on assessing urban xeriscaping landscape quantities as a practical potential approach to support university campus decision-makers in reducing urban water consumption and preserving the urban campus water content as asset management and life quality. Four selected landscape field experiments were undertaken by adopting xeriscaping landscape design instead of existing conventional urban design at King Faisal University’s (KFU) campus layout, Al-Ahsaa, Eastern Province, Saudi Arabia. The study built a specific practical sustainability retrofit approach in water conservation from conventional to xeriscaping method inside the existing public desert campus area. Applying the study approach framework considering xeriscaping layout design provided sustainability requirements, retrofit approach, and pathway to effective landscape mapping, based on reasonable and accurate quantities of xeriscaping landscape items, to convert the KFU campus layout as a low water consumption campus with an average reduction of 41% water consumption within the remaining campus layout. The results of this study contribute to the water conservation and management in university desert campus and opens the door for other studies on the use of this approach for thermal reduction, economic and environmental benefits beside its value for water reduction.

“It’s just a constant concern in the back of my mind”: Lived experiences of college food insecurity

Objective: Food insecurity is a growing concern to the health and wellbeing of college students. This study aims to examine the lived experiences of students at-risk of food insecurity and associated challenges in a public urban campus. Participants: The study recruited 21 college students at risk of food insecurity using purposive sampling. Methods: We performed qualitative interviews with three focus groups and conducted a thematic analysis to explore themes that emerged from participant discussions. Results: Three central themes emerged from our qualitative analysis: (a) barriers to accessing stable and healthy food; (b) impacts of food insecurity on academic performance and physical and mental health; and (c) coping strategies for navigating food insecurity. Conclusions: The study highlights the distinct natures of food hardship and responses specific to urban public college students. Suggestions for academics and college administrators to mitigate college food insecurity are discussed.

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Sorority Women's Perceptions of Survivors' Services and Justice on an Urban Campus

While researchers have attempted to estimate the prevalence of and identify risk factors for sexual assault, less is understood about the relationship among populations at high risk for sexual assault and their perceptions of survivors’ services organizations and justice. The purpose of this investigation is to contribute to existing research through exploratory qualitative analyses of 43 undergraduate sorority women’s perceptions of survivors’ services and justice on a large, urban campus in the Pacific Northwest in the United States. Results of these exploratory analyses revealed that the sorority women had preferences for informal confidants and services whom they could trust concerning matters of sexual violence. The women also discussed that they would prefer confidential and mental health competent services for fear that disclosing sexual violence might draw public attention to them. On the same note, the women expressed a preference for justice that would prioritize their reputation and minimize stigmatization and highlighted how disclosure of sexual violence could impact their social, educational, and employment opportunities. Moreover, they described a fear of being blamed or not believed about sexual violence. Lastly, participants supported relatively punitive sanctions for perpetrators. Overall, participants cited many barriers to accessing formal support services, exposing the persistent justice gap that remains for this population. Findings suggest a need for outreach regarding campus services designed to address sexual violence.

Evaluating the Use of Intervarsity Bioblitz as an Engagement and Reporting Tool for Biodiversity in Green and Blue Spaces on Urban Campuses: A Case Study of Irish Universities

Evaluating the Use of Intervarsity Bioblitz as an Engagement and Reporting Tool for Biodiversity in Green and Blue Spaces on Urban Campuses: A Case Study of Irish Universities