The Mobility Innovation Center announced that Qing Shen, professor of Urban Design & Planning and an expert in transportation planning and policy, has received a $100,000 award to study commuting patterns and develop a model to understand the effect of telework and flexible scheduling. The project will build off the existing Commute Trip Reduction (CTR) survey for employers who are in the CTR program as required by state law in the central city portion of Seattle. In addition, a complementary…
Research Theme: Natural Resources & Sustainability
Use or conservation of resources as well as broader notions of sustainability in the built environment
Lingzi Wu
Lingzi Wu is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Construction Management (CM) at the University of Washington (UW). Prior to joining UW in September 2022, Dr. Wu served as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of Alberta, where she received her MSc and PhD in Construction Engineering and Management in 2013 and 2020 respectively. Prior to her PhD, Dr. Wu worked in the industrial construction sector as a project coordinator with PCL Industrial Management from 2013 to 2017.
An interdisciplinary scholar focused on advancing digital transformation in construction, Dr. Wu’s current research interests include (1) integration of advanced data analytics and complex system modeling to enhance construction practices and (2) development of human-in-the-loop decision support systems to improve construction performance (e.g., sustainability and safety). Dr. Wu has published 10 papers in top journals and conference proceedings, including the Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering, and Automation in Construction. Her research and academic excellence has received notable recognition, including a “Best Paper Award” at the 17th International Conference on Modeling and Applied Simulation, and the outstanding reviewer award from the Journal of Construction Engineering and Management.
As an educator and mentor, Dr. Wu aims to create an inclusive, innovative, and interactive learning environment where students develop personal, technical, and transferable skills to grow today, tomorrow, and into the future.
Celina Balderas Guzmán
Celina Balderas Guzmán, PhD, is Assistant Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture. Dr. Balderas’ research spans environmental planning, design, and science and focuses on climate adaptation to sea level rise on the coast and urban stormwater inland. On the coast, her work demonstrates specific ways that the climate adaptation actions of humans and adaptation of ecosystems are interdependent. Her work explores how these interdependencies can be maladaptive by shifting vulnerabilities to other humans or non-humans, or synergistic. Using ecological modeling, she has explored these interdependencies focusing on coastal wetlands as nature-based solutions. Her work informs cross-sectoral adaptation planning at a regional scale.
Inland, Dr. Balderas studies urban stormwater through a social-ecological lens. Using data science and case studies, her work investigates the relationship between stormwater pollution and the social, urban form, and land cover characteristics of watersheds. In past research, she developed new typologies of stormwater wetlands based on lab testing in collaboration with environmental engineers. The designs closely integrated hydraulic performance, ecological potential, and recreational opportunities into one form.
Her research has been funded by major institutions such as the National Science Foundation, National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center, UC Berkeley, and the MIT Abdul Latif Jameel Water and Food Systems Lab. She has a PhD in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. Previously, she obtained masters degrees in urban planning and urban design, as well as an undergraduate degree in architecture all from MIT.
Narjes Abbasabadi
Narjes Abbasabadi, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Washington. Dr. Abbasabadi also leads the Sustainable Intelligence Lab. Abbasabadi’s research centers on sustainability and computation in the built environment. Much of her work focuses on advancing design research efforts through developing data-driven methods, workflows, and tools that leverage the advances in digital technologies to enable augmented intelligence in performance-based and human-centered design. With an emphasis on multi-scale exploration, her research investigates urban building energy flows, human systems, and environmental and health impacts across scales—from the scale of building to the scale of neighborhood and city.
Abbasabadi’s research has been published in premier journals, including Applied Energy, Building and Environment, Energy and Buildings, Environmental Research, and Sustainable Cities and Society. She received honors and awards, including “ARCC Dissertation Award Honorable Mention” (Architectural Research Centers Consortium (ARCC), 2020), “Best Ph.D. Program Dissertation Award” (IIT CoA, 2019), and 2nd place in the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Race to Zero Design Competition (DOE, 2018). In 2018, she organized the 3rd IIT International Symposium on Buildings, Cities, and Performance. She served as editor of the third issue of Prometheus Journal, which received the 2020 Haskell Award from AIA New York, Center for Architecture.
Prior to joining the University of Washington, she taught at the University of Texas at Arlington and the Illinois Institute of Technology. She also has practiced with several firms and institutions and led design research projects such as developing design codes and prototypes for low-carbon buildings. Most recently, she practiced as an architect with Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture (AS+GG), where she has been involved in major projects, including the 2020 World Expo. Abbasabadi holds a Ph.D. in Architecture from the Illinois Institute of Technology and Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees in Architecture from Tehran Azad University.
Statistical Analysis of Embodied Carbon Emission for Building Construction
Kang, Goune; Kim, Taehoon; Kim, Yong-woo; Cho, Hunhee; Kang, Kyung-in. (2015). Statistical Analysis of Embodied Carbon Emission for Building Construction. Energy And Buildings, 105, 326 – 333.
Abstract
Buildings are significant contributors to the greenhouse effect through emission of considerable carbon dioxide during their life cycle. Life cycle carbon resulting from buildings consists of two components: operational carbon (OC) and embodied carbon (EC). Recent studies have shown the growing significance of EC because much effort has already been invested into reducing OC. In this context, it is important to estimate and reduce EC. Because of the variability and uncertainty contained in a range of conditions, the EC of building needs to be calculated based on probabilistic analysis. This study identifies and analyzes the statistical characteristics of EC emitted from building construction materials. It was aimed at buildings constructed of reinforced concrete and nine representative construction materials. Descriptive statistics analysis, correlation analysis, and a goodness-of-fit test were performed to describe the statistical characteristics of EC. In addition, a case study was carried out to show the difference between the deterministic and probabilistic estimations. Presenting statistical information on EC data and the differences between the deterministic and probabilistic values, the result shows the necessity and reasonability of the probabilistic method for EC estimation. (C) 2015 Published by Elsevier B.V.
Keywords
Construction; Construction Materials; Greenhouse Gases; Probability Theory; Goodness-of-fit Tests; Quantitative Research; Building Materials; Correlation; Descriptive Statistics; Embodied Carbon; Goodness-of-fit; Buildings (structures); Reinforced Concrete; Statistical Analysis; Embodied Carbon Emission; Greenhouse Effect; Carbon Dioxide; Life Cycle Carbon; Operational Carbon; Oc; Probabilistic Analysis; Building Construction Materials; Statistics Analysis; Correlation Analysis; Probabilistic Estimations; Statistical Information; Ec Data; Probabilistic Method; Ec Estimation; Life-cycle; Energy Measurement; System Boundary
Why Neighborhood Park Proximity Is Not Associated with Total Physical Activity
Stewart, Orion T.; Moudon, Anne Vernez; Littman, Alyson J.; Seto, Edmund; Saelens, Brian E. (2018). Why Neighborhood Park Proximity Is Not Associated with Total Physical Activity. Health & Place, 52, 163 – 169.
Abstract
This study explored how parks within the home neighborhood contribute to total physical activity (PA) by isolating park-related PA. Seattle-area adults (n = 634) were observed using time-matched accelerometer, Global Positioning System (GPS), and travel diary instruments. Of the average 42.3 min of daily total PA, only 11% was related to parks. Both home neighborhood park count and area were associated with park-based PA, but not with PA that occurred elsewhere, which comprised 89% of total PA. This study demonstrates clear benefits of neighborhood parks for contributing to park-based PA while helping explain why proximity to parks is rarely associated with overall PA.
Keywords
Physical Activity; Parks; Urban Planning; Environmental Health; Global Positioning System; Built Environment; Green Space; Recreation; Social Determinants Of Health; Health Research; Accelerometer Data; Self-selection; United-states; Public Parks; Older Women; Walking; Adults; Facilities
Ancient and Current Resilience in the Chengdu Plain: Agropolitan Development Re-‘Revisited’
Abramson, Daniel B. (2020). Ancient and Current Resilience in the Chengdu Plain: Agropolitan Development Re-‘Revisited’. Urban Studies (sage Publications, Ltd.), 57(7), 1372 – 1397.
Abstract
The Dujiangyan irrigation system, China's largest, is one of the world's most important examples of sustainable agropolitan development, maintained by a relatively decentralised system of governance that minimises bureaucratic oversight and depends on significant local autonomy at many scales down to the household. At its historic core in the Chengdu Plain, the system has supported over 2000 years of near-continuously stable urban culture, as well as some of the world's highest sustained long-term per-hectare productivity and diversity of grain and other crops, especially considering its high population density, forest cover, general biodiversity and flood management success. During the past decade, rapid urban expansion has turned the Chengdu Plain from a net grain exporter into a grain importer, and has radically transformed its productive functioning and distinctive scattered settlement pattern, reorganising much of the landscape into larger, corporately-managed farms, and more concentrated and infrastructure-intensive settlements of non-farming as well as farming households. Community-scale case studies of spatial-morphological and household socio-economic variants on the regional trend help to articulate what is at stake. Neither market-driven 'laissez-faire' rural development nor local state-driven spatial settlement consolidation and corporatisation of production seem to correlate well with important factors of resilience: landscape heterogeneity; crop diversity and food production; permaculture; and flexibility in household independence and choice of livelihood. Management of the irrigation system should be linked to community-based agricultural landscape preservation and productive dwelling, as sources of adaptive capacity crucial to the social-ecological resilience of the city-region, the nation and perhaps all humanity.
Keywords
Urbanization; Economies Of Agglomeration; Agricultural Ecology; Sustainability; Urban Planning; Land Use; China; Agglomeration/urbanisation; Agroecosystems; Environment/sustainability; History/heritage/memory; Redevelopment/regeneration; Cultivated Land; Countryside; Expansion; State; Rise; Modernization; Conservation; Integration; Earthquake; Agglomeration; Urbanisation; Environment; History; Heritage; Memory; Redevelopment; Regeneration; Population Density; Production; Farming; Agriculture; Decentralization; Autonomy; Food Production; Households; Landscape; Resilience; Rural Development; Food; Farms; Regional Development; Productivity; Economic Development; Case Studies; Agricultural Production; Biodiversity; Sustainable Development; Governance; Preservation; Crops; Flood Management; Irrigation; Permaculture; Radicalism; Socioeconomic Factors; Grain; Flexibility; Heterogeneity; Variants; Urban Areas; Irrigation Systems; Rural Communities; Bureaucracy; Landscape Preservation; Agricultural Land; Flood Control; Density; Infrastructure; Urban Sprawl; Livelihood; Farm Management; Rural Areas; Urban Farming; Settlement Patterns; Agribusiness; Market Economies
Transitions In Urban Waterfronts: Imagining, Contesting, And Sustaining The Aquatic/terrestrial Interface
Taufen, Anne; Yocom, Ken. (2021). Transitions In Urban Waterfronts: Imagining, Contesting, And Sustaining The Aquatic/terrestrial Interface. Sustainability, 13(1).
Abstract
Urban waterfronts represent hybrid locations of ecological, economic, and social zones of transition and dispersal, spatially reified between land and water. Yet, through advancements in technology and the emergence of globally linked economies, the structure and function of urban waterfronts as economic and industrial drivers is becoming increasingly complex. As cities seek to redevelop their waterfronts in response to these changes, recent research and scholarship has focused on understanding the ecological, social, and economic benefits derived from urban waterfronts. This research reveals that their benefits are unevenly distributed among local and regional populations as sites of accumulated inequity and inaccessibility that are generative for only a relatively small percentage of the people living in a metropolitan area. Set within this paradoxical nexus, this paper frames a call to scientists, planners, academics, and waterfront activists to expand urban waterfront research from an indicator and benefits model to incorporate three conceptual tools for better understanding key dimensions of waterfront reclamation within the context of green infrastructure research: urban hybridity, functional performance and hierarchies of access. We explore these key dimensions in relation to the waterfront redevelopment of Tacoma, Washington, USA. By acknowledging the hybridity of urban waterfronts, we illustrate that their relative performance and accessibility require ongoing empirical study and practical intervention. Our theoretical explorations plot some of the potential areas of investigation for examining the structural and functional transitions of urban waterfronts as critical locations for green infrastructure development for the 21st century.
Keywords
Place Attachment; Community Participation; Cities; Justice; Indicators; Challenges; Resilience; Governance; Space; Urban Waterfronts; Complexity; Urban Hybridity; Functional Performance; Hierarchies Of Access; Public Access; Stormwater Management; Infrastructure; Reclamation; Green Aspects; Waterfront Development; Urban Areas; Terrestrial Environments; Waterfronts; Economics; Hierarchies; Redevelopment; Regulation; Dispersal; Economic Activity; Shorelines; Regions; Terrestrial Ecosystems; Sustainable Development; Structure-function Relationships; Ports; Rivers; Metropolitan Areas; Urbanization; United States--us
Measuring Neighbourhood Air Pollution: The Case of Seattle’s International District.
Bassok, Alon; Hurvitz, Phil M.; Bae, C-H. Christine; Larson, Timothy. (2010). Measuring Neighbourhood Air Pollution: The Case of Seattle’s International District. Journal Of Environmental Planning & Management, 53(1), 23 – 39.
Abstract
Current US regulatory air quality monitoring networks measure ambient levels of pollutants and cannot capture the effects of mobile sources at the micro-scale. Despite the fact that overall air quality has been getting better, more vulnerable populations (children, the elderly, minorities and the poor) continue to suffer from traffic-related air pollution. As development intensifies in urban areas, more people are exposed to road-related air pollution. However, the only consideration given to air quality, if any, is based on ambient measures. This paper uses an inexpensive, portable Particle Soot Absorption Photometer (PSAP) to measure Black Carbon (BC) emissions, a surrogate for diesel fuels emissions, in Seattle's International District. With the aid of a GPS receiver, street-level BC data were geocoded in real space-time. It was found that pollution levels differed substantially across the study area. The results show the need for street-level air pollution monitoring, revisions in current land use and transportation policies, and air quality planning practice.
Keywords
Emission Standards; Air Pollution; Atmospheric Deposition; Social Groups; Waste Products; Sanitary Landfills; Black Carbon; Freeway Air Pollution Sheds (faps); Land Use; Mobile Monitoring; Neighbourhood Air Quality; Aerosol Light-absorption; Respiratory Health; Coefficient; Exposure; Symptoms; Children; Pollutants; Particles; Exhaust; Asthma
Improved Fog Collection Using Turf Reinforcement Mats
Feld, Shara I.; Spencer, Benjamin R.; Bolton, Susan M. (2016). Improved Fog Collection Using Turf Reinforcement Mats. Journal Of Sustainable Water In The Built Environment, 2(3).
Abstract
Impoverished communities are particularly vulnerable to increasing water scarcity. The development of low-cost technologies that improve access to unconventional water sources, such as the freshwater contained in fog, is one way to address water scarcity. Passive fog collectors, sited to maximize exposure to orographic and advection fog, are typically constructed using 35% Raschel mesh stretched within a structural frame. To assess improvements to this technology, the fog collection potential of nonwoven turf reinforcement mats ( TRM), underwent preliminary testing in a laboratory fog tunnel and more conclusive testing at a field site in Lima, Peru. In fog tunnel tests, both of the two tested TRM specimens increased fog collection yields over 35% Raschel mesh by 26 and 33% respectively. At one field site, the tested mats increased fog collection yields over 35% Raschel mesh by 62 and 75% respectively. At a second field site, these materials increased collection volumes over the 35% Raschel mesh by 146 and 178% respectively. Differences in TRM performance at different sites were likely due to different orientation to prevailing winds at the two test stations. This work suggests that nonwoven turf reinforcement mats have the potential to improve water access in arid, foggy low income communities. (C) 2016 American Society of Civil Engineers.
Keywords
Water; Efficiency; Fresh Water; Water Resources; Water Supply; Peru; Fog Capture