Urban Design Lab Handbook – Dialogue-oriented urban transformation processes and practical approaches from Latin America and the Caribbean

A
Evolution
The Urban Design Lab in Latin American Cities:
A View from Academia
Andreas Hofer
Joining contemporary global discussions on key topics
such as “how to organize the living environment in
urban agglomerations” is a central element within the
study of architecture at the Vienna University of Technology.
Since we would like our students to actively
join this global discourse on urban issues, we also aim
to equip them—besides the formal, conceptual and
functional part of their education—with social skills to
interact and engage with “the people out there”. This
is why the educational mandate of our large school of
architecture (we host more than 6,000 students in
a small country like Austria, with a population of eight
million inhabitants) is based on growing international
networks, partnerships, and cooperation programs with
research and teaching institutions across the globe.
At the same time, the city of Vienna, with its
long urban history based on inclusive social development,
constitutes an informative laboratory “outside
the classroom” that skillfully interconnects urban
design, architecture and social demands in all its urban
development processes. This interface between global
and local approaches to research and teaching inspired
the creation of the Urban Design Lab within our academic
environment.
The second central element behind the creation
of the Urban Design Lab was influenced by early twentieth
century pioneer work by European architects in
Latin America. The Austrian architect and urban
designer, Karl Brunner, and his contemporaries Alfred
Agache, Werner Hegemann or Le Corbusier are synonymous
with the intercontinental exchange of knowledge
about urban design between Latin America and
Europe at that time. Brunner introduced practical
urban design solutions for rising metropolises such as
Bogotá, Santiago de Chile and Panamá in the 1930s
and 1940s (Hofer, 2003), gaining worldwide reputation
with his Manual de Urbanismo (Brunner, 1940). Since
then, research on his accomplishments has led to
several academic partnerships and cooperation projects
between the TU Wien on the one hand, and
individuals and institutions in several regions of Latin
America on the other hand. A constantly growing
network of research and teaching—combining theory
and practice—has been emerging from this during
thelast two decades.
The academic roots of the Urban Design Lab
The Urban Design Lab is a methodology aiming to
trigger the urban transformation of a neighborhood or
district. Based on a participatory approach involving
the local community, the Urban Design Lab entails
various methodological steps towards a general urban
development strategy and specific design projects.
As a staff member of the Department of Urban Design
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