City Science: Performance Follows Form

This book showcases cutting-edge research on city form revealing that urban design features--such as topology, morphology, entropy and scale--have massive implications to the quality of life for a city’s residents.

The Aretian team, a spin off company from the Harvard Innovation Lab, has developed a city science methodology to evaluate the relationship between city form and urban performance. This book illuminates the relationship between a city’s spatial design and quality of life it affords for the general population. By measuring innovation economies to design Innovation Districts, social networks and patterns to help form organization patterns, and city topology, morphology, entropy and scale, to create 15 Minute Cities, are some of the frameworks presented in this volume. 

Therefore, urban designers, architects and engineers will be able to successfully tackle complex urban design challenges by using the authors’ frameworks and findings in their own work. Case studies help to present key insights from advanced, data-driven geospatial analyses of cities around the world in an illustrative manner. This inaugural book by Aretian Urban Analytics and Design will give readers a new set of tools to learn from, expand, and develop for the healthy growth of cities and regions around the world.

Ramon Gras is a City and Infrastructure Researcher and Designer from Barcelona, working on the urban innovation space. At Harvard, Ramon graduated from the inaugural cohort of the Harvard MDE program, where he developed research around design criteria for innovation districts operating in synergy with logistics hubs. Prior to developing his joint thesis with Jeremy at Harvard, Ramon worked at Ferrovial’s Innovation office in London, where he led design and technology projects at the London Heathrow Airport and the London Underground. Ramon developed at MIT urban design projects for the Kendall Square expansion and Somerville Innovation Districts in the Boston Area. Ramon’s thesis at MIT addressed the consolidation problem in air freight transportation by designing an advanced Business Intelligence platform. He expanded his training at MIT after working as a designer in major infrastructure projects involving bridge design, maritime infrastructure, high speed rail, and architectural design (a Richard Rogers project). Ramon’s early research at BarcelonaTech focused on bridge design, high performance materials, and nanotechnology applications for structural engineering. Ramon is interested in enhancing innovation around Cities, Technology and Infrastructure, by designing creative and rigorous interdisciplinary solutions to address large, complex challenges facing the cities of the future.

Jeremy Burke is a City and Architectural Designer and Researcher interested in how new modeling techniques can describe complex social systems. At Harvard, Jeremy graduated from the inaugural cohort of the Harvard MDE program, where he developed research around design criteria for innovation districts operating in synergy with logistics hubs and developed industrial infrastructure to support local agriculture. Jeremy explores how traditional design methodologies can be informed through computational thinking. The resulting systems-level understanding of a space can be used to inform the design and development of sustainable architectural and infrastructure projects and to foster healthy communities. In addition, Jeremy has worked with a variety of start-ups to plan, market, and create new strategies for continued growth. Prior to his joint thesis with Ramon at Harvard, Jeremy worked with Kennedy Violich Architecture, BRU Architects, and Alon Development, and has experience completing a wide range of projects from smart sustainable houses, to modern renovations within historical contexts, and the master plan and design of a four million square foot resort and entertainment facility. Jeremy is originally from Santa Fe, NM.