:::::::::::::::::::::::::: Anto Lloveras: URBAN PLANNING

Showing posts with label URBAN PLANNING. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 4, 2026

Semantic Intelligence and Urban Futures

Semantic City Planning Systems (SCPS), as presented by von Richthofen et al., signify a paradigmatic shift in urban planning by employing Semantic Web Technologies (SWT) to bridge fragmented urban knowledge across domains and disciplines, thus offering a more integrated, dynamic, and evidence-based planning methodology centred on four meta-practices—representational, evaluative, projective and synthetical, where each captures essential planning modalities from visualisation and assessment to envisioning and data synthesis; the paper meticulously maps how SWT—from linked data and RDF triples to ontologies and knowledge graphs—enable machine-readable urban models, allowing planners to connect and reason across silos, translating static data into “live” systems that support real-time feedback and design space exploration; dynamic knowledge graphs (DKG) emerge as a critical innovation, capable of powering digital twins, parallel world simulations and multi-agent decision-making systems, thereby addressing not only interoperability issues but also the lack of causal linkages in traditional planning heuristics; while the synthetical meta-practice appears most developed in the literature due to its alignment with AI and ICT innovation, the projective meta-practice is underrepresented, revealing a need for more robust computational design frameworks that respect the inherent complexity of urban futures; crucially, the authors critique the visual primacy in digital tools and advocate for a more inclusive epistemology that recognises non-visual, processual and tacit dimensions of urban experience; SCPS therefore repositions urban planning as a design-scientific endeavour—an adaptive, ontology-driven knowledge ecosystem that can scaffold real-time urban interventions and adaptive policy modelling through semantic enrichment, domain ontologies and feedback systems, signalling a decisive move towards a city-science paradigm rooted in meaning, context and computation rather than static representations or expert silos. von Richthofen, A., Herthogs, P., Cairns, S., et al. (2022) Semantic City Planning Systems (SCPS): A Literature Review. Journal of Planning Literature, 37(3). https://doi.org/10.1177/08854122211068526

Digital Twins as Catalysts for Urban Sustainability

The Barcelona Circular City model, presented by vCity and documented in recent simulations and reports, exemplifies how Digital Twins function as vital instruments for designing and monitoring urban transitions toward sustainability; by virtually replicating city systems in real time, these models enable urban planners to simulate, evaluate and optimise infrastructure, transport, energy and waste management under a holistic lens, integrating social, economic and ecological indicators into a single decision-making environment, especially when guided by frameworks like the Circular City Index, an open-data tool that benchmarks municipal progress across Spain, fostering comparability, policy learning and accountability through a reproducible methodology anchored in transparency and inclusivity, as demonstrated in applications ranging from mobility flows in Viladecans to charging station coverage in Barcelona, where complex spatial datasets are transformed into actionable insights; for instance, in the case of the 15-minute city simulation for Barcelona, the model exposed areas of uneven accessibility to basic services, prompting tailored interventions such as redistributed libraries and expanded metro access, thus evidencing how the digital twin does not merely reflect urban reality but proposes corrections to its inertia, which is further illustrated in the comprehensive report “Circular Barcelona: A New Urban Model” (October 2025), where digital infrastructure and circular economy converge in a civic-technological alliance for resilient futures, co-funded by European recovery programmes and hosted at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, this initiative operates at the crossroads of research, policy and digital transformation, empowering local governments to shift from reactive to anticipatory planning while anchoring decisions in measurable sustainability metrics. vCity (2025) Report. Circular Barcelona: A New Urban Model. Barcelona Supercomputing Center, https://vcity.tech

Madrid tops the national housing disparity list * Urban asymmetries and territorial tensions in the capital: when access to housing reproduces socioeconomic exclusion maps

Madrid currently ranks as the Spanish region with the highest housing price disparity, a clear manifestation of an urban segmentation that silently excludes those unable to keep pace with the speculative logic of the property market, particularly in hyper-developed districts like Valdebebas where the average square metre price vastly exceeds the national mean, driven by targeted private investment and selective public infrastructure projects that favour capital accumulation over inclusive urban growth, while peripheral areas remain underinvested and disconnected, thus reinforcing persistent territorial inequality that transforms housing from a right into a commodified privilege, this pattern mirrors similar dynamics in places like Puente Romano in Marbella or urban sectors of Jaén, where local populations are increasingly priced out, exposing the regressive nature of market mechanisms that shape cities according to profitability rather than inhabitability, with real estate valorisation strategies—ranging from tax incentives to aesthetic urban renewal—serving to legitimise rising costs and drive gentrification processes that systematically displace low-income residents, the result is an urban fabric fractured along economic lines, in which the geography of housing reflects and amplifies deeper structural imbalances, making it imperative to rethink housing policy not merely as a matter of supply, but as a tool for redistributive justice and spatial equity, addressing the right to live in the city as a non-negotiable component of democratic coexistence rather than a variable dictated by speculative pressures.

Friday, January 30, 2026

La arquitectura invisible de la emergencia habitacional

En el corazón de las metrópolis tensionadas por el alza de precios y la escasez de suelo disponible, emerge una estrategia silenciosa y transformadora: la reconversión de oficinas en viviendas como respuesta adaptativa a una demanda habitacional en constante expansión, una medida que, sin necesidad de expandir los límites urbanos, reutiliza infraestructuras infrautilizadas en enclaves urbanos consolidados para aliviar un déficit estructural que el Banco de España cifra en más de 700.000 viviendas; esta dinámica, impulsada por la obsolescencia funcional de ciertos edificios de oficinas y el auge del teletrabajo, ha sido catalizada por normativas autonómicas más flexibles y por la inversión privada interesada en reposicionar activos sin uso en mercados de alta rentabilidad residencial, como ejemplifica el caso de la antigua sede de Manpower en Madrid, reconvertida por Argis en un complejo de lujo, o el caso opuesto de Vallecas, donde Vía Ágora construirá viviendas asequibles sobre suelo terciario gracias a nuevas regulaciones urbanas, una doble cara del fenómeno que revela tanto oportunidades de mercado como conflictos sociales entre usos especulativos y necesidades reales de vivienda; el informe de Atlas Real Estate Analytics estimó que solo en las grandes áreas metropolitanas españolas hay más de 11 millones de metros cuadrados con potencial de transformación, lo que permitiría añadir más de 90.000 viviendas al parque actual, mientras que CBRE, JLL o Knight Frank constatan una clara tendencia en inversión que, aunque se enfoca principalmente en el segmento prime o turístico, también deja espacio para fórmulas de alquiler social si el marco regulatorio y fiscal acompaña, y si los municipios logran armonizar sus planes de ordenación urbana con las nuevas realidades demográficas y laborales, como ya sugirió Jorge Galindo al señalar que “la planificación urbanística se ha quedado obsoleta frente a los cambios sociales estructurales” como el trabajo remoto o el comercio electrónico; en última instancia, convertir oficinas vacías en hogares no solo es una medida pragmática sino también un gesto simbólico de adaptación de la ciudad a su tiempo, un acto de reciclaje estructural que convierte la rigidez del cemento en flexibilidad social, sin necesidad de colonizar nuevo suelo ni construir de cero lo que ya existe dormido.

Monday, May 6, 2024

The Experience of the City: Public Space, Nature and the Right to Urban Meaning

The Experience of the City: Public Spaces, Housing and Urban Nature is a multidisciplinary course hosted by the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, aimed at addressing the challenges and complexities of contemporary public space. The programme critiques how urban environments are often planned using strictly technical parameters, neglecting the social perception, symbolic value and ecological potential of shared spaces. These oversights result in dysfunction: spaces designed to foster interaction and citizenship instead become socially sterile or conflictive, severed from the everyday lives of their users. Through the participation of architects, environmental psychologists, geographers, and biologists, the course unpacks how elements such as vegetation, morphology and collective memory shape public space. The debate encompasses issues like the unequal distribution of green areas, the symbolic poverty of certain urban landscapes, and the tension between infrastructure and emotion. Contributors such as José Antonio Corraliza, Enric Pol, and Agustín Hernández Aja provide critical insights into urban green as more than decoration —as a vehicle for identity, affect, and sustainability. Anto Lloveras introduces the notion of SOCIOPLASTICS to interpret relational art within the urban realm, inviting a rethinking of public space as a performative and epistemic field. The course ultimately argues that reclaiming urban nature and rehumanising public infrastructures is essential not only for environmental reasons, but for restoring urban dignity —the right to inhabit, participate in, and make sense of the city.

Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 2024. The Experience of the City: Public Spaces, Housing and Urban Nature [humanities course]. 16 Nov–2 Dec 2024. Oficina de Actividades Culturales, UAM.

The experience of the city: public spaces, housing and urban nature ////////// La experiencia de la ciudad: espacios públicos, vivienda y naturaleza urbana____curso de humanidades UAM URBANAS

– José Antonio Corraliza, environmental psychologist, stresses the urgent need to recover meaning in the design of public space, arguing that "urban green must go beyond decoration—it's about turning concrete into something that beats."
– Josep Selga, biologist, remarks on the unnoticed structural role of urban trees: "We’ve grown so used to them that we overlook their power to shape the essence of the city—do we want a city to live in, or one to escape from?"
– Javier Ruiz, architect, defends the communicative nature of public space: "It's the only place where communication unfolds in its most random and vital form. Cities must be imperfect to remain alive; we must resist singular solutions."
– Pedro Molina, geographer, draws attention to marginal green areas: "Small, overlooked lots act as micro-reservoirs of naturalness and should be protected as urban landscape archives."
– Mariano Sánchez, horticulturist at Madrid’s Botanical Garden, underscores that "emotional well-being in green spaces depends not just on design, but on plant quality, genetic integrity, and acoustic comfort."
– Enric Pol, environmental psychologist, highlights structural barriers to sustainable behaviour: "Citizens may wish to act sustainably, but urban dynamics often prevent them. Anchoring sustainability in collective identity is key."
– Enrique Bardají, architect, proposes a reading of public space through typology and urban morphology: "Understanding these patterns can guide the regeneration of old cities and the design of new ones."
– Salvador Rueda, biologist and environmental psychologist, offers a radical urban model: "By liberating the interior of the urban block from traffic, we restore the citizen’s full spatial status."
– Agustín Hernández Aja, architect, critiques the symbolic void of many urban designs: "We’ve created spaces that lack the character or meaning needed for citizens to identify with them. Appropriation is essential—for example, Dehesa de la Villa in Madrid."

The urban spaces, their design and the planning of their use, are subject to an intense public debate that affects both the new urban spaces in non-consolidated areas and the public spaces inserted in consolidated urban networks. This debate refers to the location and location of public spaces, such as the design, equipment and productivity of such spaces. Frequently, the planning of these spaces is done with strictly technical criteria without taking into account the social perception and the use that is made of public spaces. The result is that such spaces designed to be meeting places, crossroads and promoters of social interaction end up becoming unproductive scenarios (ghettos) when not on platforms where irresolvable social conflicts are expressed. The reasons for these imbalances are very varied, ranging from processes of refunctionalization of public spaces, to changes in the typology of users and their demands, including the fact that, in fact, there are inadequacies in the location, design and equipment of the spaces. This course aims to contribute to the debate on urban public spaces, emphasizing the presence of natural elements and the impact that these elements can have on human well-being. For this, it is intended to bring together specialists from different branches (architecture, urban planning, geography, gardening, environmental psychology, etc.) in order to evaluate and make proposals for the improvement of the quality of public spaces, which is a way of make the city more alive and friendly.

Anto Lloveras is an architect, artist and curator based in Madrid, and the director of LAPIEZA, a platform for experimental contemporary art. He trained in architecture at ETSAM (Madrid) and the Delft University of Technology, and has taught in architectural studios and seminars at NTNU (Norwegian University of Science and Technology) and Universidad Rey Juan Carlos III (Madrid). His current research explores the intersection of philosophical hermeneutics and SOCIOPLASTICS, a conceptual device he develops to analyse the epistemological and narrative structures underpinning relational artistic practices.