The Urban Design Lab is continuing its post-Maria initiative in Vieques, Puerto Rico studying options for resilient short-term development projects with longer-term implications for scaling-up economic development. The team is headed by UDL Director Richard Plunz, with Vilma Rivera Gallagher, Maria Paola Sutto and Urban Planner Douglas Woodward, faculty member of the Graduate School of… read more

On October 10 the Urban Design Lab (UDL) was an important presence to the celebration of the 125th Street Business Improvement District 25th year anniversary. The work of the pilot Columbia SPS summer course on Sustainable Urbanization was displayed at the BID’s Annual Meeting. The projects included design proposals from Morningside Drive to the Hudson… read more

The Summer High School Pilot Program “Sustainable Urbanization: New Designs for the Future City” ended on July 13th with a final presentation to the CEO of Harlem’s 125th Street Business Improvement District, Barbara Askins; the Columbia VP for Communication Victoria Benitez; Community Board 9 representatives; local architects, and education professionals. The students researched bridges between… read more

Urban Design Lab Director Richard Plunz will introduce his new book City Riffs: Urbanism, Ecology, Place in New York on September 21, 2017 at the Italian Academy of Columbia University, located at 1161 Amsterdam Avenue, at 6:00 PM City Riffs traces the changing perspectives on urban design within an ever-changing global context, and considers trans-disciplinary… read more

In September 2013, the National Science Foundation announced that the Urban Design Lab (UDL) had been awarded a five year, $2.5 million Science, Engineering and Education for Sustainability (SEES) grant to study how New York City urban green infrastructure can mitigate coastal zone pollution. UDL Co-Director Patricia Culligan leads a team integrating urban planning and… read more

The Urban Design Lab (UDL) mapped and analyzed land-use and agricultural parcel distribution in the Hudson Valley Region for a report released in Februrary 2011 by the Glynwood Center, a longtime partner of the UDL.  This work is part of the Lab’s focus on agriculture and food systems in the New York City region and… read more

January 2011 was a month of intense traveling for the Urban Design Lab (UDL) with Director Richard Plunz and Assistant Director Michael Conard  giving a series of high profile presentations on their work in China. In Beijing, they offered an exemplar of their activity to a venture capital group undertaking large urban projects and a second… read more

Through the award of an Ultra-X grant from the National Science Foundation and U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service, the Urban Design Lab (UDL) undertook a collaboration with Columbia University colleagues and many community partners on a project aimed at monitoring the neighborhood scale intersections between residents, the improved urban “green”, green roof performance, and… read more