The Shaping of Urban Design (ABPL90316)

The subject is a critical and creative introduction to some of the contemporary tools and techniques that are required in the practice of urban design. It connects a theoretical backdrop to the practices of urban designers, as well as those of related built environment disciplines like architects, landscape architects, urban planners and strategists, and urban technologists.

It emphasises links between ideas and practice — particularly focusing on the various ways that urban change is produced or emerges — including fieldwork techniques focused on Melbourne’s Central Business District. It also explores various ways of graphically representing change, dynamics and evolution of urban environments, systems, and places.

The subject involves a group design exercise, called Incomplete City.  This design studio-like ‘sprint’ runs through the middle weeks of the subject, and involves the creation of a city from scratch, produced by working in small teams which ultimately come together in the form of a giant collective drawing, developing collaboration, participation and visualisation skills as well as understanding new forms of urban infrastructure and technology.