My first Publication Arup_BuildingDesign2020_v2 | Page 48

Boston’s Innovation District pilot program
allocated 1000 acres of underdeveloped
waterfront land to attract high-tech
investment with mixture of live-work and
collaborative spaces, extensive bike-friendly
Case Study: Eco-Towns in the United Kingdom
infrastructure and LEED certification for all
structures over 50,000 sqft.
The innovation district is designed to
explore the intersection of entrepreneurship
and environmental sustainability. The area is
a model for sustainable development, having
added 4,000 jobs and 200 new companies to
the region over a several-year period. Waste
reduction and transportation management
programs are being fielded to gain further
efficiencies from the program.
Case Study: City Innovation Districts
Location / Business: Boston, MA. Boston
Redevelopment Authority for City of Boston. Bicester’s 5,000-home development includes
an energy centre, a community centre, a
primary school and “eco-pub”; every building
in the town includes efficient insulation,
rainwater harvesting and an integrated
solar array.
Of the four cities designated “eco-towns”
in 2009, Bicester is the only municipality that
has held itself to the government’s original
planning criteria for renewable energy, public
transport, and efficient and affordable homes.
The eco-town project is an important testbed
for integration of meaningful sustainability
and renewability measures across entire
communities.
Location / Business: Bicester, UK.
A2Dominion for Cherwell District Council.
3.3 Connectivity Urban Connectivity
Data-informed design holds the promise of high-performing,
livable buildings, neighbourhoods and cities with an
increased level of built-in resilience to social, economic
and climate change. As embedded sensing systems become
commonplace, data analysis, currently implemented within
individual building projects, will scale to the neighbourhood
and city levels, allowing planning professionals, public
officials and the community at large more extensive
involvement with the design process.
Urbanisation will drive an increased degree of
connectivity between buildings, city systems, and the people
that inhabit and use them; the rich streams of resultant data
will need to be synthesised and communicated in a manner
accessible to a diverse range of stakeholders. A general
trend of increased intra-project coordination and inter-
project connectivity has considerable implications for waste
reduction, project timelines, and the ultimate desirability and
habitability of new designs. Holistic, regional-scale design plans offer considerable
potential benefits alongside the challenges of scale and project
management. Shifts in scaled procurement methodologies,
seamless resource integration, and operational savings
will continue to make large public projects a vital part of
the AEC sector. The design process itself is evolving along
with finance and management strategies, with alternate
procurement methods and the increasing use of Design-
Build placing an increasing amount of design control at the
contractor level.
Considered from a climate mitigation standpoint, urban
connectivity and regional-scale design offers considerable
operational efficiencies. Connectivity beyond buildings
empowers a shift towards measuring emissions, rather
than energy use, as a relevant metric of sustainability.
Informational connectivity between building and
infrastructure projects paves the way for the development
of district energy systems, centralised fuel sources,
and productive reuse of waste products such as water, heat
and energy.
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