Redesigning “Urban Green”: Urban Ecology Studio

Engineering and architecture students gathered for their first studio class in September 2009, eager to meet the challenge of Nilda Mesa, then-Assistant Vice President of Columbia University’s Office of Environmental Stewardship, to start at home: how to make Columbia University produce 50 percent less waste, use 50 percent less energy, and consume 50 percent less water.

This pioneering studio was a highly integrated effort between the Urban Design Lab at the Earth Institute, the Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, the Center for Research on Environmental Decisions, the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, the Center for Climate Systems Research, the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Biology, and a long list of significant community partners – all challenging each other with the goal of improving eco-system functionality in urban environments.