Underground Urbanism

Have you ever wondered what lies beneath the streets of your city? Do you picture, in isolation, a series of train tunnels and pipes? Or perhaps the foundations of tall buildings that lie scattered, like icebergs, beneath the surface? As our cities grow up, out, and down, it is time we better understood how the different layers of these complex urban environments relate to one another. Underground Urbanism seeks to provide a new perspective on our cities, and consider how this might be used to engage more positively with them. So, tip your cities upside down to have a closer look, and let us rethink them from (below) the ground, up.

Sustainable urban planning and urban renewal are major challenges of the 21st century. In this context, Urbanism and Town Planning proposes a geohistorical approach to urban construction. The city and its neighborhoods are studied through their materials and general layout, which sometimes reveal a logic of economic profitability, prestige and social equity, and sometimes a more innovative approach from an environmental perspective. Across these elements, unbuilt spaces (distinctive streets and squares) and built spaces (commercial and residential areas, both individual and collective) form a three-dimensional grid of “voids” and “solids”, characteristic of urban landscapes and lifestyles. Supported by numerous original examples, this book is a comprehensive summary of the most tangible elements of urban planning and development; elements that must be put into context in order to think concretely about the development of the cities of the future.

This book gets to the bottom of the twenty-first-century city, literally. Underground moves beneath Romania’s capital, Bucharest, to examine how the demands of global accumulation have extended urban life not just upward into higher skylines, and outward to ever more distant peripheries, but also downward beneath city sidewalks. Underground details how developers and municipal officials have invested tremendous sums of money to gentrify and expand Bucharest’s constellation of subterranean Metro stations and pedestrian pathways, basements and cellars, bunkers and crypts to provide upwardly mobile residents with space to live, work, and play in an overcrowded and increasingly unaffordable city center. In this sense, the repurposed underground facilitates dreams of middle-class ascendancy. This sense of optimism, the book shows, invariably gives way to ambivalence as the middle classes confront the indignities of being incorporated into the city from below. Bruce O’Neill argues that these loosely coordinated efforts have not only introduced novel forms of social fragmentation but also a new aesthetics of inequality that are fundamentally shaping where and how the middle classes fit in the city. Pushing urban studies beyond a cartographic perspective—with its horizontal focus upon centers and peripheries, walls and gates—O’Neill brings into focus the vertical dynamics of gentrification that place some “on the bottom” and others “on top” of the city. As cities around the world extend further downward in the name of development and sustainability, Underground makes clear that scholars and practitioners of the twenty-first-century city will need to become ever more attuned to the cultural politics of urban verticality, asking not just who is included in the city and who has been pressed outside of it, but also who is on top and who is placed on the bottom.

This book includes 46 scientific papers presented at the conference and reflecting the latest research in the fields of data mining, machine learning and decision-making. The international scientific conference “Intellectual Systems of Decision-Making and Problems of Computational Intelligence” was held in the Kherson region, Ukraine, from May 25 to 29, 2020. The papers are divided into three sections: “Analysis and Modeling of Complex Systems and Processes,” “Theoretical and Applied Aspects of Decision-Making Systems” and “Computational Intelligence and Inductive Modeling.” The book will be of interest to scientists and developers specialized in the fields of data mining, machine learning and decision-making systems.

This book summarizes the latest studies regarding innovation in urban design and planning. It shares many tips and insights about sustainable solutions for the issues facing transport systems, innovative digital technologies, and ICT trends. The book touches upon the need to integrate the three fields of Architecture, Engineering, and Technology that have become indispensable. This is intended to respond to the increasing human needs and population growth in cities on one hand and to develop a holistic approach that helps overcome challenges to sustainability and environment management on the other hand. With the power of engineering in practice, problems of design and development once considered too complex to be dealt with other than empirically, intuitively, or by trial and error, are now becoming more solvable and applicable. This book offers strategies and solutions that enable designers to bring together knowledge in the fields of architecture, engineering, and technology to overcome challenges facing in modern times.

The book considers the underground development of cities from a systemic point of view. The authors' scientific methodology for planning a system of alternative design configurations in a metropolis (including underground infrastructure) on the basis of applied system analysis methods is revealed. The book presents a short guide and a number of practical applications of morphological analysis, cognitive modeling, and other system analysis methods as tools for solving various urban problems, including risk assessment in the transport infrastructure of a city; evaluation and justification of constructing different types of underground objects on a selected site according to its structural, functional and geological factors; construction of scenarios aimed at informed decision-making in planning complex underground facilities. The book provides novel and convenient tools for urban development to professionals in urban planning, municipal authorities and investors, and researchers in urban studies.

This book includes the proceedings of the 19th International Scientific Conference “Energy Management of Municipal Transportation Facilities and Transport EMMFT 2017”, which was held in Khabarovsk, Russia on 10–13 April 2017. The book presents the research findings of scientists working at universities in the Far Eastern, Siberian and Ural Federal Districts of Russia, and of Serbia, which are unique regions notable for sustainably operating complex transport infrastructures in severe climatic and geographic environments. It also offers practical insights into transportation operation under such conditions.The book discusses the experiences of colleagues from Slovenia, Ukraine and Latvia in the development of transport infrastructure and construction of transport facilities and features and includes the results of a wide range of studies, such as managing multimodal transportation, improving the efficiency of locomotives, electric locomotives, traction substations, electrical substations, relay protection and automation devices, and power-factor correction units. It addresses topics like renewable energy sources, problems of the mathematical and simulation modelling of electromagnetic processes of electrical power objects and systems, aspects of cost reduction for fuel-and-power resources, theoretical aspects of energy management, development of transport infrastructure, modern organizational and technological solutions in construction, new approaches in the field of management, analysis and monitoring in transport sector.Comprising 142 high-quality articles covering a wide range of topics, these proceedings are of interest to anyone engaged in transport engineering, electric power systems, energy management, construction and operation of transport infrastructure buildings and facilities.

Underground facilities, such as tunnels, sewer, water and gas networks form the backbone of the economic life of the modern city. In densely populated areas where the demands for transportation and services are rapidly increasing and the construction of new roads and railways are prohibited, the construction of a tunnel might be the only alternative. Brief and readable, this reference is based on a combined 75 years of field experience and places emphasis is on simple practical rules for designing and planning, underground infrastructures. The books’ begins with a clear and rigorous exposition of the classification of underground space, important considerations such as geological and engineering and underground planning. This is followed by self-contained chapters concerning applications for underground water storage, underground car parks, underground metros & road tunnels and underground storage of crude oil, lpg and natural gas. The book has 15 chapters covering various usage of underground space. There are about 135 figures and tables. The book contains about 20 case histories/examples. One of the first book to address all of the major areas in which this technology is used, this book deals with major topics such as: hydroelectric projects with modern planning of complex underground structures; underground storages of food items, crude oil and explosives and highly cautious underground nuclear waste repositories. Rail and road tunnels and TBM are described briefly. Risk management in underground infrastructures is of vital importance. Civil Engineers, Mining Engineers, and Geotechnical Engineers will find this book a valuable guide to designing and planning underground infrastructures both in terms of its applications. Risk management method for underground infrastructures Vital tips for the underground storage of food, water, crude oil, natural gas and munitions Provides design tips for Underground Parking Facilities Instruction for the designing planning and construction for underground Metros and road tunnels Planning and design of underground nuclear waste repositories Clearly explains the benefits and drawbacks of underground facilities Quick guide to the various modern mechanical underground parking options Explanation of construction planning and Risk management Places expert advice for planning and constructing projects at the finger tips