Current Issue

Understanding Demolition

Guest editor: Satu Huuhka (Tampere University)

Deadline for abstract submission: 7 October 2022

Is it environmentally, economically, socio-culturally more sustainable to extend buildings’ lives or to build new? What are the specific challenges, potentials, and contributions for retaining existing buildings as opposed to their demolition and replacement? What are the drivers for the demolition of buildings? How can a more sustainable approach be created? How can retention and adaptive change be applied in different conditions and different scales (buildings, neighbourhoods, building stocks)?

The aim of this special issue is to explore why demolition occurs: its environmental, socio-economic and cultural drivers, potentials and consequences, as well as policy and practices pertaining to avoiding demolition at different scales – supra-urban (country/region), urban (city/neighbourhood), building stock and building scale. How can planners and other stakeholders compare alternatives for densification without demolition i.e. by extending and infilling? What drives the replacement of existing buildings with new ones, what are the wider environmental, economic, and socio-cultural impacts on the sustainability of cities, and whether short-term financial gain is too privileged compared to other concerns. Submissions are welcomed that examine these phenomena in the different contexts of shrinking/growing communities. Contributions that explore the impacts of demolition from various viewpoints and multiple perspectives (urbanism, urban planning, obsolescence, resource efficiency, mass flows, embodied carbon, social value, etc.) are particularly welcome.

For the full submission details and further information, visit the B&C Community Website: https://www.buildingsandcities.org/calls-for-papers/understanding-demolition.html

Data Politics in the Built Environment

Guest Editors: Andrew Karvonen (Lund University) & Tom Hargreaves (University of East Anglia)

Deadline for abstract submission: 26 September 2022

How are data reconfiguring life in buildings and cities? Who are the subjects and objects of data-driven buildings and cities? What are the implications of data-driven buildings and cities for social equity and justice? How do these powers and associated practices align with policies and regulation?

The aim of this special issue is to improve our collective understanding of the practices, politics, and power implications of data-driven buildings and cities. How is data generated, metabolised, and gathered in the built environment? Who designs and governs these data flows and to what end? Who and what is enrolled in the datafication of buildings and cities? What forms and types of data are collected and what gets ignored in data flows at and across different scales? What are the broader implications for social justice and equity? We invite social scientists, planners, designers, building scientists, data scientists, and environmental scientists to shine a critical spotlight on the motivations, methods, and consequences of data-driven buildings and cities.

For the full submission details and further information, visit the B&C Community Website: https://www.buildingsandcities.org/calls-for-papers/data-politics.html

Alternatives to air conditioning: policies, design, technologies, behaviours

Buildings & Cities is pleased to announce our latest Special Issue Alternatives to air conditioning: policies, design, technologies, behaviours is now complete and available to read in full.

This special issue explores alternative approaches to providing thermal comfort and ventilation in different climatic zones across the world at the scales of building, neighbourhood and city.

In urbanised areas, there is an opportunity to break the current dependency on air conditioning. The design of cities, neighbourhoods and buildings can ensure ventilation and thermal comfort by climate friendly means. Retrofit opportunities for the existing building stock can make existing buildings comfortable without increasing energy demand. The design of new buildings and their environs can reduce or eliminate the need for air conditioning.

The collection considers the implications of these alternatives across a range of issues: health, wellbeing, air quality and heat stress; technical / design solutions; social expectations and practices; climate change; policy and regulation; supply chain and procurement; education and training.