Public Space

Against the rush of the 24 hour news cycle and whiplash politics of the day, Dash Marshall proposes a slow space for Hudson Square. Viewsstand brings Hudson Square’s history into dialogue with the present by creating a newsstand on Little 6th Avenue and converting the street to a plaza of reflection and conversation.

What is the value of design in shelters? When is good design not enough? How can we create design guidelines that improve the lives of residents and staff, not burden them? And as urbanists, should we focus our energies on addressing today’s crisis, or long-term solutions to house the most vulnerable?

Public bathrooms are a basic need, public health concern, human rights concern, and quality of life concern. We propose a series of creative legislative, funding and management strategies for the City of New York to create more public bathrooms.

New York City's open spaces should protect the dignity and human rights of people experiencing homelessness; connect those living on the streets with the resources they need; and welcome them without excluding other New Yorkers.

As part of our 2019 Forefront Fellowship, these posters feature proposals explore the role buildings can play in advancing heat resiliency.

The Turning the Heat report emerges from the Urban Design Forum’s partnership with the Mayor’s Office of Resiliency to research how urban design can mitigate the impacts of extreme heat in New York City’s most heat-vulnerable neighborhoods.

Urban Design Forum Executive Director Daniel McPhee sits down with Duncan Pescod, Chief Executive Officer of WKCD, for a wide-ranging discussion about the project’s financing and design, extensive public engagement efforts, and the future of WKCD in light of recent protest movements in Hong Kong.

Daniel McPhee sits down with James Nozar, CEO of Strategic Property Partners, to discuss how he has worked collaboratively with Mayor Jane Castor to leverage Water Street's unique single investment structure to streamline design and development and build a new ground-up urban hub for Tampa.

Daniel McPhee sits down with Chris to discuss how Waterfront Toronto's lengthy public engagement process resulted in detailed block plans specifying architectural character and use, as well as major investments in the public realm.

As part of the 2018 Forefront Fellowship, Julie Chou, Kevin Gurley, and Bo Hong developed a booklet highlighting the importance of public bathrooms in the public realm.

In 2017-18, we invited our Fellows and other experts to consider the question of maintaining New York City’s essential infrastructure: its open spaces, roadways, subway stations, public housing, commercial corridors, and green infrastructure.

By Gretchen Dykstra The heart of Manhattan was reborn when the Times Square Business Improvement District (BID) was established in 1992, led by Gretchen Dykstra. Dykstra went on to serve as Commissioner of Consumer Affairs under Mayor Bloomberg, and was the Founding President of the National 9/11 Memorial Foundation. Today, she lives in the Hudson […]

By Carter Strickland Improved water quality paved the way for the redevelopment of New York City’s waterfront from manufacturing to residential and park uses. But combined sewer overflows remained a vexing problem—exacerbated by a century of development and increased rainfall during to climate change. Carter Strickland worked on the problem as Deputy Commissioner and then […]

By Margaret Tobin A decades-long impasse over the development of the west side waterfront ended in the summer of 1993 when Margaret Tobin, Tom Fox, and councilman Tom Duane cut open a chainlink fence at Pier 62—returning a small piece of the waterfront to the public realm. Tobin served as the Executive Vice President and […]

The most daunting challenge facing our city today is not what to build, but what to restore.