Transportation Policy and Planning (at HKS)
This course provides an overview of the issues involved in transportation policy and planning as well as an introduction to the skills necessary for solving the various analytic and managerial problems that are peculiar to this area.
The course is organized around seven problems:
1. Analyzing the market for a service;
2. Costing and pricing;
3. Network design and scheduling;
4. Controlling congestion and pollution;
5. Transport as a tool to shape, and be shaped by, land use;
6. Investment evaluation;
7. and Public-private partnerships and the regulation of private carriers.
Examples are drawn from both urban and intercity passenger and freight transportation.
Course format:
Five of the classes are lectures and the remaining 19 are case discussions.
Prerequisites: Some exposure to microeconomics is assumed.
This course is scheduled on Mondays and Wednesdays at HKS in Rubenstein 306 (R306 classroom is part of the recent HKS construction and can be accessed via the third-floor hallway).
Please see the draft shopping schedule.
Additional meetings: optional Friday reviews: 8:45 am – 10:00 am, Wexner 330.
Cities by Design I
“Cities by Design I” is concerned with in-depth longitudinal examination of urban conditions in and among selected cities in the world. The broad aims are: to engage in both comparative study for the purpose of broadening definitions of what it is to be urban; to identify characteristics that render particular cities distinct; to understand the manner in which geography, locational circumstances, and related infrastructural improvements both constrain and promote opportunities for city development; and to gain insight into the role of human agencies, planning institutions, and design cultures in shaping cities and their role in broader regions. The cities under examination are Barcelona, Boston, Berlin, Mumbai, Quito, and Shanghai. Each will be the subject of three lectures followed by student-led presentations around four preassigned projects, themes, or events of consequence for the city in question and how these projects, themes, or events are reflective of the city’s broader narratives.
“Cities by Design I” is mandatory for and limited to all incoming Master of Architecture or Landscape Architecture in Urban Design students. Grading in this fall semester will be based on performance in the student-led presentations, attendance, general class participation, and a final response essay.
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Land Use and Environmental Law
As a scarce and necessary resource, land triggers competition and conflict over its possession and use. For privately owned land, the market manages much of the competition through its familiar allocative price-setting framework. However, because one person’s use of privately owned land affects the individual and collective interests of others, and because market mechanisms alone are not always adequate to protect or promote such interests, laws enacted by legislative bodies, administered by government agencies, and reviewed by courts play a significant role in determining the use of land.
Encompassed in local ordinances, higher-level legislation, administrative rules, constitutions, judicial opinions, discretionary governmental decisions, and private agreements, land use laws and environmental laws shape the look, feel, and socioeconomic dynamics of cities, suburbs, and rural areas worldwide. For example, zoning’s use restrictions affect whether neighborhoods are homogeneous or heterogeneous. Its density and lot area restrictions scatter, cluster, or even drastically curb housing production. Its height and setback restrictions sculpt the skyline. Environmental laws govern the extent to which land uses pollute air, water, and land, whether habitat is available for endangered species, whether wetlands are preserved, and whether individuals build in areas vulnerable to floods, hurricanes, forest fires, and earthquakes. Do these laws achieve the types of environments desired by everyone? Do they serve some groups more than other groups? Are they an undue infringement on individual rights to property, free speech, and other constitutionally protected rights? Do they stifle design creativity? Are they up to the task of addressing the anticipated consequences of climate change?
This course is about land use laws and environmental laws and introduces students to their content and controversies. Although the course operates on the assumption that incoming students have no legal knowledge or background, those with a background in law can also benefit. Students will gain a working knowledge of popular legal techniques, their implementing institutions, and their judicial reception, along with an understanding of theories that explain and justify the demand for law’s control over privately owned land. For pedagogical reasons, laws from the United States will be used as primary sources, but comparisons and distinctions with laws in other countries will be regularly made. The role of nonlawyer professionals, such as planners, designers, public policymakers, real estate developers, and community activists in influencing, drafting, and implementing land use and environmental laws is unpacked. The course defines and distinguishes law’s method from those employed by other disciplines and fields. Reading assignments come from primary sources such as legislation, judicial opinions, and constitutions, as well as secondary sources such as law review articles, journal articles, book excerpts, and professional reports. A written exercise requires students to examine one provision in a zoning ordinance and draft its replacement. An oral final exam will measure overall fluency with the subject matter.
Jointly Offered Course: HKS SUP-663
Real Estate Finance and Development
This course teaches the fundamentals of real estate finance and development. Lectures and case studies introduce students to the full range of financial analysis skills and analytical processes for evaluating private and public development and investment in real estate. All major property types and land uses are covered as well as all stages of the development process, including site selection, market analysis, financial feasibility, design and legal considerations, construction, lease-up, operations, and sale of the final product. The cases are designed to place students in a number of decision-making situations commonly faced by real estate professionals. Prior or supplementary study of microeconomics is useful, but not required. Students studying business, law, and government, as well as selected undergraduates will be admitted, space permitting.
Nano Micro Macro: Adaptive Material Laboratory (with SEAS)
This course is an interdisciplinary platform for designers, engineers, and scientists to interact and develop innovative new products. The course introduces ideas-to-innovation processes in a hands-on, project/product-focused manner that balances design and engineering concepts with promising, real-world opportunities. Switching back and forth between guided discovery and focused development, between bottom-up and top-down thinking, and market analyses, the course helps students establish generalizable frameworks as researchers and innovators with a focus on new and emerging technologies. Students will conduct part of their work in the Wyss Institute or SEAS science labs on Oxford Street as well as in the GSD FabLab at Gund Hall.
Note: For MDE students, this course can satisfy a GSD course requirement by enrolling in SCI 6477, or a SEAS course requirement by enrolling in ES 291. However, it cannot simultaneously satisfy both requirements.
Prerequisites: None.
Introduction to Computational Design
This is an introductory course to computational design and the prerequisite for a spring course that deals with more advanced topics in the field. This course is primarily intended for designers with little background in programming who are interested in developing their skills in order to be able to better understand, interface with, and customize the digital tools they are using, or develop their own software and interactive applications. The course introduces students to fundamental concepts and techniques in computational design as well as the relevant mathematics. By the term “computational design” we mean an ad hoc set of methods borrowed from computer science, computational geometry, and other fields, and adapted to specific design problems such as design development, fabrication, analysis, interaction, and communication.
Jointly offered with SEAS EngSCI29
Material Systems: Digital Design and Fabrication
Digital design and fabrication technologies have become integral to the discourse surrounding contemporary design and architectural practice. The translation from design to realization is mediated by a range of tools and processes whose development is informed over time by material properties, skill, technology, and culture. As a whole, these systems are the vehicle by which design teams, manufacturers, installers, and ultimately users engage the materiality of architecture. Parallel technological developments relating to the way in which things are designed (digital modeling, simulation, generative design, etc.) and the way things are made (automation, computer-controlled equipment including robotics, advanced materials, etc.) have afforded new opportunities and challenges related to the realization of new forms in architecture, part customization, user-centered design, and enhanced building performance.
Within this context, this year’s course positions ceramic material systems as a vehicle for exploring applied research methodologies and investigation into the opportunities (and challenges) afforded by digital fabrication techniques. Building on nearly a decade of research by the Material Processes and Systems (MaP+S) group at the GSD and long-time collaboration with the Harvard Ceramics Studio in Allston (with Kathy King), this course will advance strategies for robotics, additive manufacturing, and other computational fabrication technologies.
Ceramics are the first material created by humankind and are produced across scales and applications from the craft studio to high-volume, automated manufacturing environments. Pleasing to the touch and easily manipulated by hand, it can just as easily be subject to digital technologies and robotic approaches. While ceramic-specific aspects of material design and manipulation will be taught, emphasis is on understanding ceramics as a microcosm of material research that offers insights that transfer to work with almost any material used in architecture.
Course format: The course includes weekly lectures, discussions, and hands-on workshops. Lectures include a historic overview of material systems, fundamentals of fabrication and manufacturing, strategic customization, digital and physical prototyping, digital simulation, introduction to robotic systems, introduction to product development, production economics, research methods, and other topics. Selected readings of book chapters and papers will supplement topics taught in class. Students will be introduced to a range of digital fabrication and robotic systems and their related software environments and digital techniques.
The technical and systems knowledge imparted in the class will be complemented by the teaching of research methods in the technology area, through a combination of readings and writing exercises. Students will be proposing and working on a research-based ceramics project throughout the semester, culminating in a substantial experimental prototype and a conference-level paper that frames the project as an instance of design technology research in ceramic material systems. Beyond Gund Hall, some activities and project work will take place in the Harvard Ceramics Studio in Allston and, depending on project typology, may engage the Autodesk BUILD Space in Boston.
The course is supported by a grant from ASCER Tile of Spain. We plan to exhibit all student work in a show at the Allston Ceramics Studio at the beginning of 2020. A selection of projects may also be shown at the 2020 CEVISAMA in Valencia, Spain.
Ecologies, Techniques, Technologies III: Ecology and the Design World
Required for both MLA 1 and MLA AP students taking the third LA core-studio.
Ecological Principles for Design (Steven Handel):
The fundamentals of ecological science are introduced toward investigating, understanding, and shaping landscape structure, function, and change. Through lectures, discussions, field trips, and readings, the core principles of ecological science relevant to designing landscapes—from small to large—are introduced and integrated, from populations to communities, ecosystems, and the landscape ecological linkages among sites. Topics will include plant species reproduction and evolution, the relevance of biodiversity to landscape function and management, stresses facing designed landscapes, and the added values of ecological perspectives. We will discuss the particular problems and opportunities of urbanized landscapes, a dominant arena for modern landscape design work, as well as differences between natural and human-dominated landscapes. Disturbances, including climate change and sea level rise, intrude on ecological landscape design, and these processes must be included in site planning. Site analysis must include living and abiotic components of the ecosystem: How should this be addressed in your projects? Pragmatically, what can each site plan include for better ecological functioning? How can ecological needs be integrated with the other concerns of modern landscape design?
Evaluation: Two hour-long exams, short essays on species niche requirements, field trip reports, participation in discussions, and ecological ideas for your studio project work. Local field trips will give us experiences in ecological structure and analysis of habitats.
An Introduction to Woody Plants as a Design Medium (Chris Matthews):
Recognizing that plants are one of the essential mediums of landscape architecture, this module seeks to introduce the student to the relationships between plants and people (horticulture) and the relationships between plants and the environment (ecology). The class focuses on the following topics and objectives:
– Concepts and practices necessary for using woody plants as a design medium.
– An introduction to the spatial, visual, functional, temporal, and sensorial qualities of woody plants in the landscape.
– An introduction to the horticultural requirements of woody plants particularly as it relates to the urban environment.
– Techniques and practices for using woody plants in the designed landscape.
On Tuesdays, this course will take place in Gund 111 from 8:30 to 10:00 am. The course will move into three different sections from 10:00 to 11:30 AM.
The additional Wednesday session taught by Chris Matthews is taken only by MLA AP students.
Structural Design II
This course is a continuation of GSD 6227 and completes the introduction to the analysis and design of building structures. Both 6227 and 6229 are the required courses to satisfy (and exceed) accreditation requirements for structures in the MArch I program.
The course has three closely related pedagogical components. First, it introduces additional methods for structural analysis and design—numerical analysis techniques, physical model analysis, ultimate strength design of reinforced concrete elements, and structural design software.
Second, it completes the introduction to the elements of structures by introducing 3-D trusses, continuous beams, statically indeterminate frames, shells, and membranes. In addition to timber and steel, we introduce the design of reinforced concrete structures.
Finally, this course dedicates a significant amount of time to the design of structural systems, addressing both gravity as well as lateral loading scenarios. The design of structural systems is not treated as a purely quantitative exercise but as a design activity that synergizes architectural design and the mechanics of structural principles. Design exercises and case study analysis serve to expose the relationship between structural systems and architectural form and space. Students will learn to identify typical design strategies for structural system strategies and understand their spatial and formal ramifications. They will learn to select and apply appropriate methods of analysis when conducting structural analysis studies in order to make informed decisions throughout the architectural design process.
A computer-based structural analysis program (Multiframe 3-D) will be used during the course. Together with its first part, GSD 6227, this course:
– Provides an understanding of the behavior of structural systems.
– Gives students an exposure to basic and advanced structural concepts and teaches simple calculations and the use of computer tools applicable in the early stages of the design process in order to select and size the most appropriate structural systems.
– Teaches the engineering language in an effort to improve communication with the engineers in the design team
Prerequisites: GSD 6227 or equivalent.
Ecologies, Techniques, Technologies I
This course is an introduction to understanding plants, from unmanaged plant communities to managed living structures. Through field visits, observation, lectures, short design exercises, and readings, students will define new notational systems and translate the associations, structure, and attributes of plant communities into design languages that they will be able to apply in their futures design proposals. The methodology of the course is based on the translation of empiric observations, measurements in situ, and research on cultural and vernacular living structures into design languages, supported and extended into the context of their biophysical ecology. The goal of the course is to introduce the potential of plants as a means of design. The outcome of the course will be a wallpaper proposal and a booklet describing typologies of plant communities to be designed and “undesigned” under a new notational system describing the main attributes of each typology. Black and white field notes, lecture sketches, diagrams, and series of curated drawings in axon, plan, and section will be the language of the course.