Following our site visit to Congo Street Initiative in Dallas, the Bruner Foundation team headed to New York City to our next 2013 Rudy Bruner Award finalist site, Via Verde. Submitted by Jonathan Rose Companies and Phipps Houses, Via Verde (the “Green Way”) is a 222-unit affordable housing development in the Melrose section of the South Bronx. The project, completed in 2012, was designed as a model for healthy and sustainable urban living.

View of Via Verde from fourth floor fruit tree orchard.  Photograph: ©David Sundberg/Esto

We spent two cold, windy days on site, touring the project with the design and development team, taking photographs, as well as meeting with people involved in its development, design, and operation in the Bronx and Manhattan. Like the Congo Street Initiative, Via Verde illustrates another approach to designing affordable, sustainable housing, albeit at a larger scale and catalyzed by a different set of circumstances.

Via Verde grew out of two international design competitions that were part of the New Housing New York (NHNY) Legacy Project, which sought to create a new standard for affordable housing and development. The first, the 2004 NHNY Design Ideas Competition, was sponsored by AIA New York (AIANY) in partnership with New York City Council and the City University of New York and solicited design concepts for three sites. Powerhouse: New Housing New York, an exhibit and public programming supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, showcased selected entries at AIANY’s Center for Architecture. Read more…

After we got our dream team of architects and designers to come up with their brilliant solutions for the inclusive city of tomorrow, we needed a cover for our October issue that would be worthy of the ideas inside. So we decided to take a step into the future ourselves, with augmented reality.

This incredible technology has to be seen, to be believed. We suggest you get out your smart phone or tablet now and download the Metropolis New City App (For Android devices, go here. For Apple devices, go here).  Point your device at the cover (or the image in this blogpost), and watch a visualization of our Brave New City— specially created by Grimshaw for Metropolis—come to life!

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There is a new naval battle being fought off the coast of Britain, but not of the kind that Admiral Nelson would recognize. The ocean is turning out to be the next frontier for renewable energy, and Britain leads the world in off-shore wind energy generation – it has already installed 330 wind turbines on its seas. Now several engineering firms are vying with each other to develop giant wind turbines for Britain, with capacities in excess of 10MW – double the size and power of any existing turbines.

Two Norwegian firms are currently in the lead, both offering mammoth windmills that “float” in areas where the sea is too deep to lay foundations. Read more…