While I was in New York City last week I was lucky enough to catch the exhibit – Design with the Other 90%: Cities before it closed. The exhibit, by the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum and hosted by the UN Visitors Center, displayed 60 projects, proposals, and solutions that “address the complex issues arising from the unprecedented rise of informal settlements in emerging and developing economies.” I found this exhibit especially inspiring because it went beyond defining the problems of rapid urbanization, and instead focused on actionable and innovative solutions that have already been carried out. Below I have selected a few of my favorite projects:
Map of Kiberia – Kiberia, an informal settlement of about 750,000 to 1 million people in Nairobi, Kenya, was the site of a large participatory mapping project. The Map pictured was created as part of a larger crowd sourcing community mapping project using volunteers and tools from OpenStreetMap, the GroundTruth Initiative and community organizations. The final product is a digitized map called “Voice of Kibera” which allows residents to share community information via news, videos, and SMS messages, which are added to the map using the open source Ushahidi platform.
Incremental Housing in Iquique, Chile and Nuevo Leon, Mexico – The government of Chile hired the Architectural firm Elemental to design incremental housing, on land purchased through a government subsidy as a new form of “social housing.” Instead of using the traditional “sit and services” approach to social housing, the architects here went beyond providing the basic foundation and infrastructure necessary for families to build their own homes. Instead the firm designed the most expensive half of the house – the structure, bathroom, kitchen and roof. Then the family completed the remaining portions of their home. Through this unique approach a variety of houses emerged.
Grassroots Mapping - Lima, Peru. According to the exhibit, “Grassroots Mapping is an open-source, participatory approach that enables communities to create their own maps using inexpensive equipment. Residents own the resulting images and maps, which they can use to support land-title claims or to aid in upgrading efforts.” Having participated in a community mapping project in South Africa before I know that one of the most complex elements of such a project is getting reliable aerial images of these areas. Therefore I found the simple approach used here quite exciting. An MIT graduate student simply used digital camera with continuous mode shooting lofted by a kite, balloon, or inflated trash bag to snap aerial images.
Even though the exhibit has since closed information about all of the urban solutions can be found on the project’s website.
- Melissa
All images are linked to their original source or taken by the author at the exhibit.
In less than two weeks I will be leaving New York City to start the next phase of my career in Singapore. Besides spending most of my time packing and preparing, I have had sometime to reflect upon my last two years in New York. There are certainly many people who I will miss in this great city, but there are also many elements of the city that I know can not be recreated anywhere else. While some of these things have developed organically, others are the result of active urban planning policies. Below is a list of some of my favorite things that I will miss about New York.
grid turns 200 years old! Hippodamus of Miletus, the ancient Greek urban planner, viewed the urban grid as a manifestation of “the rationality of civilized life.” Urban historian Edward K. Spann believes unlike no other city in the world, “was the triumph of the grid as decisive as in America’s greatest city.” How has New York City’s grid shaped your urban experience?
NYC Grid Turns 200 “Two hundred years ago on Tuesday [March 22], the city’s street commissioners certified the no-frills street matrix that heralded New York’s transformation into the City of Angles — the rigid 90-degree grid that spurred unprecedented development, gave birth to vehicular gridlock and defiant jaywalking, and spawned a new breed of entrepreneurs who would exponentially raise the value of Manhattan’s real estate.” Read more from the 
Lagos to Expand BRT System “Lagos, Nigeria’s bus rapid transit (BRT) system, established in 2008, will expand its services more than 13 miles from Oshodi to Ikorodu… Since its inception three years ago, the BRT between Mile 12 and CMS stations has transported 170 million passengers and reduced travel times by 30 minutes, 
A petition to save Chandigarh, Le Corbusier’s modernist city in India, from being sold off bit-by-bit “With the knowledge of—and in some cases, it is asserted, the complicity of—local ministries, furniture, light fixtures, and architectural drawings have been auctioned off in the international antiquities market. The news the city’s iconic Corbusier-designed manhole covers were fetching upward of US $20,000 at auction in Europe and the United States raised alarms in international modernist preservation and Indian heritage circles. International Herald Tribune design critic 
Kaohsiung Public Transit Push “In 2006, Kaohsiung City recorded a paltry 4.3 percent share for public transportation usage. In the years since, the Kaohsiung City government launched an ambitious plan to increase ridership in Taiwan’s second largest urban area…. Once a culture of public transportation ridership is firmly established, the government will begin to implement policies to discourage specific private transportation options.” Read more from 
