URBAN FUTURES
MS DESIGN AND URBAN ECOLOGIES THESIS WORKS 2022
INTRODUCTION MS Design and Urban Ecologies research and public work in the times of crisis, injustice, and uncertainty
futures through design, the ability of “others” to engage in collective action, imagining beyond “certain, narrow set of solutions” into novel-creative “uncertain” responses, that set relational infrastructures into everyday practice
Resilience, perseverance, and inventiveness are
sustaining social order and inclusive processes of
among the many qualities that characterize
transformation.
the Class of 2022. This cohort of students joined the program at the height of the COVID
Drake Reed engaged in a process of self-
pandemic, when vaccines were not available and
awareness that examined his interactions with
communities across the nation and world were
surveillance devises in a variety of urban places.
struggling with unprecedented challenges. They
His thesis Working Toward Anti-Surveillance
came from cities and nations that spanned the
Constructs delved into the history of surveillance
globe. They converged perhaps for the very first
campaigns on Black, Brown and marginalized
time in a virtual space that offered the possibility
communities and sought to develop tools that
of engaging individually and as a collective with
could eventually engage BIPOC youth, the most
global and local social, economic, spatial, and
impacted by surveillance technology today
environmental issues, including those highlighted
Drake’s project seeks to narrow the distance
by the global public health crisis. They martialed
between personal agency and technology
a variety of resources and tools to creatively
through a series of collective actions and radical
respond to both current conditions and historic
dissemination methods.
inequalities, collaborating with and advocating for the most impacted and needed communities.
Emily Sandstrom thesis The Symbolism of the Smart City questioned the use of similar
As vaccines became available and the pandemic
technology to plan, monitor, manage and
abated, the distance between peers disappeared
regulate urban life across cities. Her research
and they finally were allowed to move, explore,
and analysis look into Hudson Yards, one of
and live in their own skins within the complex
the most emblematic sites of the global smart
environment of New York City. This coincided
city movement. She seeks to understand the
with the beginning of the thesis year, when
current political trend in urban governance that
each of them began a unique journey of inquiry,
has adopted this type of initiative and produced
exploration, and self-discovery. Their research
new and spectacular urban imaginaries that can
possibilities were endless as well as their drive for
be seen in cities around the world. Emily also
social and spatial justice. As they delved into their
explores creative ways that visitors to Hudson
chosen subject matter, they were able to identify
Yards can interpret the new hyperreal urban
the theoretical and practical gaps that had to be
imaginary and identify harmful data-driven
bridged, and they discovered many opportunities
outcomes.
that would allow them to help redirect urban
With similar determination to construct and
envisions an actionable participatory process
disseminate counter-narratives, Tori Gruber
that acknowledges the need for both historic and
shows how people who use drugs can become
popular knowledge about the process of urban-
primary agents of harm reduction. Her project
rural transformation as a means of promoting
Beyond Bodies Atlas proposes that agencies and
social, spatial, and environmental justice.
drug users share information and support each other in ways that reduce harm and amplify
Nicholas Arvanitis’ project Assembling Relief
support for drug-users and community members.
looks at the use of public space in New York
While seeking successful interventions and safer
City and beyond, historically and during the
methods of harm reduction, this project involves
pandemic. With a focus on the lack of access
the creation and dissemination of a critical map of
to publicly available toilets, particularly for
community locations that is accessible online and
vulnerable populations including the unhoused,
in print, accompanied by useful knowledge, key
essential workers, and seniors, Nicholas examines
resources, and participatory tools that envision
public restrooms in a wider socio-political and
possible interventions, policy changes and design
geographical context, eventually focusing on
considerations that promote the well-being and
possible applications in Manhattan’s Lower East
safety of drug-users and the communities they
Side. He develops a prototype design for new
inhabit.
facilities and outlines a process for realizing the project.
Meera Chakravarthy proposes to strengthen ties between arts, health, and community
Lastly, Roberta Werthein examines in her project
development. Her thesis Operationalizing the
Delivering the Last Mile another way that needs
“Artivist” devises an artist-driven framework
for urban infrastructure have shifted during the
for the creation of a fiscal sponsorship initiative
pandemic, using a social justice lens to highlight
seeking to serve artists which work has approved
the absence of a supporting infrastructure for
or has the potential to produce a positive health
delivery workers. Roberta addresses their need to
impact at the community level. Engaging talented
access public spaces to eat, rest, and be protected
artists facing challenges to fund and administer
by designing strategies for them to claim
their own projects, Meera’s designed this
underused and neglected public infrastructure
intermediary agency model to be implemented
that take the form of new support hubs.
by an international development health system
Partnering with “Los Deliveristas,” an organization
company named ThinkWell.
of delivery workers, her project starts this ambitious process by developing design protocols
Irtiza Ahmed Chaudhry thesis Peri-Urban
for the organization and the transformation of an
Urbanism explores socio-spatial restructuring in
underutilized space into the first pilot worker’s
peri-urban regions with a focus on the Hudson
center.
Valley in New York State. Starting with a rigorous understanding of the region’s history and
Tom Angotti, William Morrish, and Gabriela
geography, Irtiza seeks to identify populations
Rendón
that have been marginalized and excluded from decision-making processes that would allow them to build power and agency. To this end, Irtiza
CONTENT ASSEMBLING RELIEF Nicholas Arvanitis page 6
OPERATIONALIZING THE ARTIVIST Meera Chakravarthy
PERI-URBANISM Irtiza Ahmed Chaudhry page 10
page 8
BEYOND BODIES ATLAS Tori Gruber page 12
WORKING TOWARD ANTI-SURVEILLANCE CONSTRUCTS Drake Reed page 14
THE SYMBOLISM OF THE SMART CITY
DELIVERING THE LAST MILE
Emily Sandstrom
Roberta Werthein
page 16
page 18
ASSEMBLING RELIEF
PROVIDING SUSTAINING PUBLICITY AND PROVIDING TRANSIENT COMFORT
by Nicholas Arvanitis
6 DUE
KEYWORDS new york city local food systems food governance policy analysis regenerative economy strategic planning participatory design
Public restroom accessibility has been a massive ongoing challenge that New York City has yet to overcome. Prior to the 1970’s, New York had a well funded network of public amenities, which consisted of public showers, pools and restrooms. After taking on large amounts of public debt, the city was forced to cut back public spending, inevitably prompting the closure of many of these facilities. Homelessness as a modern dilemma started to emerge as a major urban issue in the 1980’s as a result of divestment in public affairs. The lack of public facilities, especially those that provide plumbing to the public, is extremely harmful to the homeless population who rely on these facilities to carry out essential activities. Increasing the availability of public restroom facilities has the potential to provide a basic level of dignity to an otherwise neglected population in the city. Many local NGOs that target homeless population specifically, have advocated for better access to public restroom infrastructure in order to provide clean and safe amenities for this specific demographic. Despite this support, there has not been much progress to implement more restrooms across the city. Although, homelessness and public restroom facilities are issues that are intimately bound, 311 complaints and NYPD data suggest that the problem is actually much larger than just the homeless population. In 2017, the city introduced the Criminal Justice Reform Act which decriminalized offenses like public urination because of the sheer
abundance of these offenses backing up the justice system. The NYPD issue between 20 and 30 thousand citations for public urination each year, many of which could be prevented if there were more accessible bathrooms. This project serves as an exploration of public restrooms as a global and historical phenomenon, starting broadly and converging on a neighborhood truly in need of a new approach. Through a series of local case studies of existing local strategies and mapping of relevant spatial criteria, Manhattan’s East Village is identified as an urban situation without an appropriate process for addressing the lack of accessible restrooms in the area. By conducting interviews with relevant stakeholders and attending meetings with public actors discussing the process for addressing this issue, a clear disconnection between local, public and private interests was evident. In order to rectify this miscommunication, a potential implementation process is proposed and grounded in the context of the identified urban ecology. After inquiring into the topic of public restroom access in New York City, it appeared to be less of a task of reimagining their material typology and more of an issue of scarcity as a result of divestment, current land use roadblocks and stakeholder miscommunication. However, it is clear that the lack of interest in fixing this glaring issue is in part generated by the failures of the existing typological features. In collaboration with architectural and industrial designers, a new restroom DUE 7
OPERATIONALIZING THE ARTIVIST
AN URBAN ECOLOGY MODEL FOR DESIGNING HEALTH OUTCOMES FOR COMMUNITY BASED ARTS DELIVERY by Meera Chakravarthy
8 DUE
KEYWORDS community health well-being artivist intermediaries
Artists often produce work that helps better the well-being of their local communities. However, for the past century, arts funding and arts organization models have focused on supporting arts as a product for exchange and arts as it relates to placemaking. This idea of community development through the arts often leads to making a place look and feel better, and as a result, the work of the artist is used to increase the economic value of a place. However, the goal of artists’ work is not always to increase the economic value of a space, rather it can be to create a stronger and healthier community. There is a need to shift this narrative for funders and practitioners and focus on the non-economic indicators of the work of artists so that artists’ work is not used for commodification. This thesis proposes a way to do this by linking arts to the healthy community agenda and designing a fiscal sponsorship model that specifically serves artists who hope to connect their work with community health. Arts and health have an inherent connection, but there is little evidence or practice on connecting art and health at the community level. There are a variety of stakeholders thinking about art and health separately, but few are both researching and operationalizing the connection. Furthermore, artists themselves want to serve their communities and create healthy and well environments for all people, however they often lack the skills and support structure to do so. This thesis establishes the correlation
between arts, health, and community development. The research questions center on understanding what types of interventions currently connect arts and health, how they can be evaluated in both quantitative and qualitative ways, and what motivations artists have to connect their work to health. This thesis also poses an artist driven framework for a fiscal sponsorship model that helps create, fund, and practice community development through the arts in a way that is grounded in health. The research questions for design focus on understanding how arts outcomes can be translated into health outcomes for funders, what the role of an intermediary agency is to facilitate this process, and how artists can feasibly be supported to operationalize this work. To conduct the research and design of this thesis, I used two main types of research modalities, which are critical praxis and triangulation research. Within these modalities, I used 4 different research methodologies. Through the critical praxis modality, I conducted a historical timelining exercise and used case studies/participant observations to establish a connection between art and health. I used the triangulation research modality to conduct data analysis and indexing to establish a measurable correlation between arts and health and conduct group interviews to better understand the connection between arts and health through the eyes of arts practitioners. My research helped ground the design for an operational model that can help “artivists” (artists who are community activists) around the world make a direct health impact in
their local communities, and get funded for it. This thesis is written to give intermediary agencies a framework of how to design programs that support artists who practice community art that connects to health and well-being. I worked with the international development health systems company, ThinkWell, to design a fiscal sponsorship model that will help artists operationalize projects related to community health. I created the model based on two scenario-based case studies in Nairobi, Kenya with a musician, and NYC, US with a theater artist. As a product of this design, my main findings were that intermediary agencies can play a key role in helping artists communicate the impact of their work while reducing the artist’s administrative burden. I also concluded that artists and communities have too much burden on them to be entrepreneurs who must create, evaluate, and fund their projects. They need other entities and organizations to help support them and translate the impact of their work. This thesis serves as a guide for intermediary agencies and funders to step up and create models that can help scale the impact of community art work. There needs to be a clearer role for intermediary agencies like ThinkWell to help community based arts work get created and funded. The hope is for more models to emerge across various health and development organizations to help formally merge the sectors of community art and community health and to blend them into the urban ecology framework. DUE 9
PERI-URBANISM
SOCIOSPATIAL TRANSFORMATION IN THE HUDSON VALLEY by Irtiza Ahmed Chaudhry
10 DUE
KEYWORDS migration urbanization agriculture political ecology agency participatory
Urbanization, the expansion of cities into formerly rural areas to accommodate the migrating population, and the transformation of the rural regions to become technologically sophisticated, is facilitated by the growth machine to generate capital and profit. Migration is multi-directional and motivated by a desire to seek a better quality of life; it is rooted in uneven development at both regional and global scales. Global hyper urbanization is contingent on, and coeval with, the processes of global de-ruralization. The increasing encroachment of cities is degrading and responsible for the disintegration of the hinterlands. As this is happening, the peri-urban, where a city meets the countryside, is becoming the most commonly inhabited type of settlement. It is a transitional area on the cusp of change. The study of these areas reflects the processes driving urban transformation. Further, social and environmental problems occurring in the urban-rural hinterlands give insight into the global challenges in emerging megacities. This thesis explores urban transformation focusing on the dynamic nature of the peri-urban landscape. The study aims to understand the processes that produce and reproduce the urban environment. This understanding is formed by examining the historical relationship between urban and rural, which has been mediated by changing social, political, and economic structures. The processes are further interpreted through the individuals and groups who drive them, the agency they produce, and the oppression they enact. This
comprehension forms the foundation for a research framework consisting of tools designed to investigate peri-urban areas across multiple temporal and spatial scales. In my study, the rural sociological account, which examines the present moment, will be supplemented by historical analysis and accompanied by mapping of geographic spatial relations and land use patterns. The framework intends to gain insight into the structural whole of the region to uncover oppressive systems that don’t produce the agency they intend to. The project uses the research framework to study the Hudson River Valley. This study is also used to refine the research process itself. Nestled between two expanding urban centers, the Hudson Valley has been instrumentalized for its natural resources and food production since its colonization. Small-scaled farms in the region are being threatened by increased demand for housing and big agriculture, driving up land costs. Policies to keep the taxable land value affordable for farmers are used by wealthy estate owners to evade property taxes and accumulate more land. In addition, the agricultural system continues to exploit and oppress farmworkers employed in the area. These workers are primarily Latino migrants whose efforts contribute to sociospatial reproduction and building capacity for others, yet cannot enjoy similar freedom.
stakeholders affected by and effective to the processes which shape the urban field. The lived experiences of disenfranchised social groups are recorded as they too have the knowledge to contribute, and value to assert. Partnering with the rural migrant ministry has facilitated this part of the process by providing access to the communities they work with. This engagement has revealed the resources they require to equip workers and their families with the agency to participate in the process that affects them and makes their voices heard.
The second part of the research framework employs participatory processes and ethnographic tools to co-produce knowledge with the DUE 11
BEYOND BODIES ATLAS
MAPPING HARM REDUCTION ECOLOGY by Tori Gruber
12 DUE
KEYWORDS equitable health distribution harm reduction ecology mapping of the commons settlement
Beyond Bodies is a collection of resources for drug-users and community members to consider successful interventions and safer methods of preventing harm in public space using the principles of harm reduction. The first resource is a map that shows the location for all varieties of treatment and medically related services specific to drug-users. This map comes in a digital and printed format. The second resource is a leaflet, Gray Matter, that contains the printed map along with pertinent information that could benefit the quality of life of drug-users, and by extension their community. The third resource is a card game, Gray Matter Card Game, to be played within community spaces to consider possible interventions, policy changes, or design considerations with the drug-user in mind. The fourth component is a short book of research and analysis surrounding the 125th Commercial Corridor in Harlem and the present trials and discords on the presence of treatment and harm reduction facilities. This project begins in consideration of the well-being and safety of the drug-user. By creating points on a map that show where to go in order to receive clean needles, water, and other materials, a visual artifact illustrating harm reduction ecology emerges that primarily surrounds the drug-user and the material conditions of their using; however, starting from this point of building ties and access between the material and the person renders more visible a social infrastructure that allows for something like harm reduction to engender change.
Beyond Bodies acknowledges that quality of life that disregards the agency of all people presents a direction that negates the nuanced experiences that could better inform reliance systems and reveal adjustments and necessary designed interventions in public space, private space, and policy. This statement falls in line with the sixth foundational principle of the National Harm Reduction Coalition Knowledge, which, “affirms people who use drugs (PWUD) themselves as the primary agents of reducing the harms of their drug use and seeks to empower PWUD to share information and support each other in strategies which meet their actual conditions of use.” Knowledge informs quality of life considerations, and knowledge routinely unconsidered through traditional means of public participation in urban planning and policy creates marginalized knowledge, including persons who are institutionally pathologized, criminalized, and therefore kept out of decision-making that concerns the public, and thus public use of space.
DUE 13
WORKING TOWARD ANTISURVEILLANCE CONSTRUCTS A PEDAGOGICAL RESOURCE
by Drake Reed
14 DUE
KEYWORDS counter cartography education abolition auto-ethnography
Let me state from the outset that my research, largely, outlines a design of a mapping system. This mapping system will 1) provide examples of populations in western queens that have historical comprised majority black communities falling into low income brackets; 2) delineate ways that noticed low income black populations relate to the urban environments in which they reside; 3) asses wither harmonious or disharmonious relates to the above mentioned populations have with systems of surveillance installed in their environments to ostensibly protect, and sever them; 4) evaluate the history of these systems of surveillance paying attention to how they have tended to police, exploit, and violently “watch” POC in general, and specifically black populations in the United States from the post antebellum era to present day; 5) use these evaluations explicitly to show cases of anti-black, racist, and white supramcist intentionality as will be noted not only in my own theorization, but also those of noted scholars Cedric Robinson, Simone Brown, and Ruha Benjamin; 6) Lastly this will culminate into a method of mapping systems that confront these sexeist, racist, classest constructs to propose a counter cartography in which to investigate and resist. The violent history and current state of policing in America is detrimental both visibly and discreetly to Black, brown, and marginalized communities. I believe that we are not the trauma of our past, but the living legacy of our ancestors’ teachings and imaginations. An abolition-based anti-surveillance tool
must exist in, and survive this reality to deconstruct mechanisms of violence in order to build something new, a collective future.
proposed in this thesis does not look to garner a solution in a classical western sense but continues the lineage of the Black Radical Tradition.
The scope of investigating mass surveillance campaigns on Black, brown, and marginalized communities is both vast and ambiguous. Surveillance technology is a construct that can feel both tangible and beyond our control. It is tangible because we encounter these constructs everyday when we look down at our phones. We can click a button or swipe on a screen for instant access to information. What feels beyond our control are the mechanisms our phone or computer uses to get that instant information, maybe it’s the invisibility of where your information is going to or coming from when logging into social media. I feel the violent grip of surveillance technology in my daily existence. On my commute to school on the N-Train from Astoria to Union Square I can’t help but document the tensions of the physical and digital worlds constantly clashing like a game of cat and mouse. My research stems from a sense of urgency to demystify the distance between personal agency and technology, which surveillance capitalism works to uphold. This thesis looks to illuminate the relationship of history and racialized surveillance to contemporary technology. The intentions of this thesis is to spark collective action and radical dissemination methods to countermap our futures in relation to surveillance technology. The design project DUE 15
THE SYMBOLISM OF THE SMART CITY AND THE CASE OF HUDSON YARDS by Emily Sandstrom
16 DUE
KEYWORDS smart city technogovernance neoliberalism hudson yards spatial representation urban futures
High-tech features, ubiquitous computing capacities, and looming clouds of big data: These are the buzzwords that underscore an epochal moment in urbanism. It appears as though the desire to integrate smart features have become a de facto norm for cities across the globe. At the same time, proposals for utopian purposebuilt smart cities have cropped up in rapid succession, and are becoming increasingly harder to look away from. Yet somehow, smart cities remain a nebulous concept, and illusive in both their presence and purpose. Supposedly, the “City of Tomorrow” is one that can be monitored, managed, and regulated in real time with an increased presence of digital infrastructures. Sensors, cameras, and data extracting infrastructures work together to generate huge sums of real time data that allow governing agents to manage and optimize the day-to-day of urban life. Proposals for these integrations and de-novo projects are typically presented in a spirit of entrepreneurialism, highlighting partnership and support from tech companies and research institutes. Turning through the repetitive marketing briefs you will find a fixation on the economic opportunity that a digitally managed city would provide. This thesis examines Hudson Yards as a primary case study in order to assess larger growing trends of smart city desires. At $25bn, Hudson Yards is America’s most expensive private realestate development (shamefully with the aid of $5.2bn taxpayer contributions) tucked over on the West side of Manhattan. It was marketed as America’s
first “fully quantifiable community,” one that would be supported by circuits of networked infrastructure to run a flawless operation. The development has a complicated past and a precarious future: it was indeed one of the most notable achievements of the Bloomberg years. Mayor Bloomberg’s transformation of New York City was a blur of data-driven, real estate led, freemarket leaning policies that sought to cement the city’s status as a World City. His approach involved an unwavering faith in drawing in extremely wealthy individuals and corporations to live and operate in New York City with the belief that their assets would trickle down and invigorate working class neighborhoods, infrastructures, and public services. To draw in this type of capital, he fixated on reconfiguring the image of New York, the outward perception of the city through architectural spectacle and adopting a technochauvinistic platform that would secure investors and offer performance-based returns of an urban environment. Zooming out from Hudson Yards, the political will driving smart city initiatives have parallels across the globe. In this thesis I first assess the burgeoning desires for smartness, and how they are playing out in reality. Whilst this is not a specific attempt to valorize the logic or ideology that the smart city is born from and reproduces, I acknowledge that these desires are not innocuous by any means and synthesize key literature that has cautioned the likely harmful outcomes of data-driven urbanity. I then illustrate how the paradigm of smartness has been adopted by
urban governments in order to remain competitive in a changing global landscape dominated by new forms of technology and information capital. To draw in these new forms of capital and sustain them, governing bodies have had to fixate on reworking an urban image, one that would be enticing to expanding industries. Finally, I analyze the components of these new urban images, to draw conclusions about what spatial and visual symbols have been produced. This involves the analysis of renderings from smart city design briefs, which have relied on spectacular, hyperreal imagery, looking as though they were plucked from a sci-fi movie. The imagery ironically feels like a dated promise of the future: a perfect, rational, vibrant city, rich with community relations and thoughtful uses of public space. In the case of Hudson Yards, I address how a new spectacle has been brought to the New York City skyline, obscuring its own political reality within its material forms. The spatial analysis in this research seeks to understand what the new symbols offered by the “Cities of Tomorrow” can tell us about the political imaginaries that are being sold, and what they reveal about the rapidly growing distance between image and reality.
DUE 17
DELIVERING THE LAST MILE ESSENTIAL WORKERS ARE VITAL BUT NEGLECTED BY THE CITY ECONOMY
by Roberta Werthein
18 DUE
KEYWORDS essential workers gig economy workers Rights workers center support hubs
When the pandemic struck New York City, the online retail demand increase created the need for more delivery workers, these workers became frontline and essential workers, which put their physical bodies and minds in danger to fulfill other people’s demands. I am showing this new human infrastructure that is created, a new reliance system. Using the theory of the spatial contract by Alex Shafran. Consequently, these workers are all hired by different big tech companies, making them independent contractors, so they are exploited and don’t receive any benefits or basic needs such as resting and comfort stations, to be able to fulfill their jobs in normal human conditions. Due to the increasing delivery workers’ exploitation, I want to assist the workers to obtain the rights they deserve. To aid them not just to survive, but to be a baseline system of the city. I want to make this a formal urban system by showing how they are the new system that the population relies on. My thesis investigates the impact of increased online retail on the urban space and labor force in NYC. Based on a local worker rights organizations (Los Deliveristas) demands’ I want to explore how the 4th demand –a physical public space to eat, rest, and be protected from extreme weather– can be spatialized. This organization is created by the Workers Justice Project to represent all these delivery workers that have been exploited throughout the last two years. Considering the findings of my research, this thesis also seeks to find ways to use public spaces as a public good for the delivery workers to be able to receive basic necessities and to make this exploited
hidden periphery of delivery workers visible in the urban system. There is an urgent need to make the delivery workers visible in the urban environment. I started researching when covid hit New York City as there was an urban ecology rapture and the whole city was put in lockdown. Consequently, the term “frontline and essential workers” became a main topic on the news. Referring to the delivery workers’ infrastructure; Who are these frontline workers? Where do they come from? What is their income level? Where do they live? Are they being recognized and visible in the urban system? Who are they hired by? Are they being protected? These are the first research questions that I started looking at followed by questions regarding the urban infrastructure; Is the city’s bike infrastructure prepared to accommodate a rising gig economy? Do these workers have shelter infrastructure to fulfill their basic needs such as resting, eating, and charging their phones? Are the city public spaces working as a public good for these workers? Is there enough public space? All these questions will be answered in the following sections and as a result, I discovered many issues regarding the city and this new human infrastructure that is growing.To begin with, my research started looking at the urban ecology rapture that was created when the Covid-19 pandemic struck the world. That is to say that long-term structural changes started to occur, because the online retail demand started growing exponentially, driving the last-mile facility storage to move back into the cities, to keep up with the same-day delivery service. This urban mobility transition created 6 environmental impacts that I detected being; environmental impact, waste outcome, labor, land use, public health, and transportation
safety concerns. Consequently, I focused my research on the labor impact, as my main interest is building strategies to facilitate the urban environment for the workers, that continuously risk their lives to facilitate the functioning of the city’s systems and infrastructures. My work in progress is currently studying Long Island City as a possible project site. This all started because there was a rezoning of 40% of all available land for new development and waterfronts turned into luxury buildings and pseudo-public spaces that were mostly privately owned. My project is a Strategic Planning Proposal regarding Lo Deliveristas demand number 4; The right to use a physical public space–To eat, rest, and be protected from extreme weather. I want to explore how the 4th demand can be spatialized. My design proposal involves a strategic plan including different stakeholders which will lead to the creation of a (1) workers center and (2) comfort stations that will serve as recreation hubs called “Support Hubs”. The worker’s center is envisioned to work as a shelter where the delivery workers can stop, charge their bikes, go to the bathroom, and rest. On the other hand, the comfort stations will serve as a physical public space to eat, rest, and be protected from extreme weather. These can be permanent structures through shipping container conversion. There will be a movable option too, being a truck that moves around the city and you can see its location through the support hubs app. My ideal is a co-design process with the people who developed these demands. Based on the outcome of these conversations, this can be an advocacy resource for them, and help them deliver a proposition for the city agencies (DOT and Department of city planning). DUE 19
BIOS BIOS
Nicholas Arvanitis is a Greek-Canadian musician and graduate from the University of Toronto. In his bachelor degree, he majored in Environmental Studies and developed a passion for sustainable design, urbanism and the built environment. Nicholas joined the MS Design and Urban Ecologies program seeking an education that promoted designing solutions for environmental issues that urban centres are facing. Alongside his studies, he has been steadily releasing music under the moniker “Shagabond” through prominent independent record labels including eOne Music and Majestic Casual Records. He has had the opportunity to perform live all across Canada, as well as in the United States and Europe. After graduating, Nicholas will be attending the Yale School of Architecture as an M Arch I student.
Meera Chakravarthy works at the intersection of arts, community, and business. She has a background in strategy consulting and design with a specific interest in how culture plays a role in development. Her interests lie in the role arts and culture play in developing communities and how we can design sustainable processes for arts to be at the forefront of community development. Meera currently works as a program manager for an international health organization called ThinkWell. She has worked with a range of government, foundation, and nonprofit clients, helping develop policy, strategy, and analytics. She has also been involved in corporate social responsibility efforts across her various roles. Meera holds bachelor’s degrees in both Music and Economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She also holds a masters degree in Design and Urban Ecology from Parsons School of Design at the New School. She is a native of Overland Park, Kansas but currently resides in NYC. In her spare time, Meera continues her work as a performing musician, playing flute and collaborating in a collection of world music projects across the globe.
Irtiza Ahmed Chaudhry is a Pakistani Architect, Designer, and Urbanist. He graduated from the National College of Arts with a Bachelor of Architecture in 2017. He has since practiced architecture focusing on residential, corporate, and interior design. Irtiza’s travels across Pakistan have allowed him to visit and work on rural development projects, witnessing the impact of community-focused design. He moved to New York as a Fulbright Scholar enrolled in the Design and Urban Ecology Masters program at Parsons. There he developed an interest in socio-spatial reconfiguration and the evolution of urban landscapes. He approaches design as a problem-solving tool and employs it at multiple scales and through various mediums, including furniture, jewelry, and ceramics. Irtiza is passionate about art, the environment, and sustainable practices. His nomadic nature, exposure to multiple cultures, and curiosity to learn from people and places form the foundation of his professional practice.
20 DUE
Tori Gruber is an urban researcher and landscape designer. Her research and design project on harm reduction ecology considers health care intervention in public space as an intentional shift towards inclusive healthy community standards. Her design project engages community members while providing supportive maps and knowledge for drug-users to receive proper health care services. She will be partnering with the Narcotic City Project, a global initiative concerning the intersection between harm reduction, public space, and drug use.
Drake Reed is a nomadic urbanist with a background in grassroots housing advocacy. He received his B.S. at Towson University (‘15), in Baltimore Maryland. After college, he developed an interest in social anthropology and redlining in racially segregated cities. Since then he has lived in San Francisco where he worked in housing development and attained a post-baccalaureate (‘19). He believes racially conscious infrastructure will focus on the needs and evolution of black and brown neighborhoods. He is interested in using photography, illustrations, and data visualization to reimagine the built environment. His current research addresses the necessity of a radical shift in affordable housing, which he envisions through centering blackness and all of its dimensions.
Emily Sandstrom is a Bahraini-Swedish urbanist and researcher living in New York City, with a BS in Economics from Northeastern University and a professional background working in print publishing and with art institutions. She is passionate about understanding the ways in which economic and political tensions manifest in cities across the world. Emily currently writes about technological integration into the built environment throughout history and the politics of emerging technologies in our urban futures. Previously she has worked on the evolving issues of urban surveillance in public space and the ways in which they impact communities with imposed identities. Emily is passionate about enviornmental policy, architectural history, and emerging methods of imagining our cities.
Roberta Werthein has worked for over three years as a notable Graphic Designer in the insurance company field. You may know her from her work as the lead graphic designer at Experta Seguros Insurance Company, but Roberta can also be credited with contributions to Modo Río Project (University of Buenos Aires), Ht contenidos, communication agency designer, and Besingular, publicity agency designer. Roberta has been honored with exhibiting the design “Modo Río” project in “Rethinking Vicente Lopez” exhibition within the 4th Design Biennale at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA). It is an Illustrator featured project in Behance, selected by Adobe Curators. She holds a BA in Graphic Design at The University of Buenos Aires and currently resides in Buenos Aires, Argentina. She is currently pursuing a graduate degree in Design and Urban Ecologies at Parsons School of Design at The New School. Roberta has a significant interest in creating branding/brand image, logo design, and poster design, all her work is dedicated to these fields. Presently, she conveys a fascination in urbanism, community based work and social phenomenons related to urban planning.
DUE 21
THESIS WORKS 2022
MS Design and Urban Ecologies
Design Emily Sandstrom Roberta Werthein Images Nicholas Arvanitis
Parsons The New School for Design http://www.newschool.edu/parsons School of Design Strategies http://sds.parsons.edu Urban@Parsons http://sds.parsons.edu/urban/ MS Design and Urban Ecologies https://www.newschool.edu/parsons/ms-designurban-ecology/
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