Project Description

The city is a phenomenon that resists scientific understanding and observation. Urban studies have faced at least two significant difficulties: (i) the problem of representation, given the complexity and scale, multiplicity and temporalities of its component systems; (ii) the validation of theories, hypotheses and results of analyses, models and simulations, due to the impossibility of directly observing the city in its many materialities and layers, agents and places. This project is on the frontier of building the next generation of urban analysis and simulation instruments. It proposes a set of methods to integrate urban infrastructures to dynamic aspects of spatial, social, environmental, technical and cybernetic systems of cities, able to represent the functioning and performance of cities, from different flows and systems of interaction to the formation of physical structures such as blocks, buildings and street networks, and semantic structures linked to the activities carried out in their spaces.

Exploring digital environments and virtual and extended reality, it launches a network of studies on immersive technologies in urbanism. The objectives include developing interfaces to capture different urban environments to represent dynamics and generate databases of urban configurations and spatial behaviour with sufficient robustness to test hypotheses and validate results found via analysis and simulation methods. The technologies developed will be applied in updating teaching, and in prospecting for solutions to concrete problems such as access to opportunities, mobility and sustainability.

Research Team

· Vinicius M. Netto (PI)

· Marcos Lage, Instituto de Computação UFF

· Naylor Vilas Boas, LAURD/PROURB UFRJ

· Edgardo Brigatti, Instituto de Física, IF UFRJ

· Fernando Lima, Center for Design Computing, Pennsylvania State University

· Fabiano Ribeiro, Departamento de Física, UFLA

· Paul Torrens, SimSpace Lab, CUSP NYU

· Fábio Miranda, Electronic Visualization Lab, University of Illinois at Chicago

Financial Support

· PROGRAMA DE APOIO A PROJETOS TEMÁTICOS NO ESTADO DO RIO DE JANEIRO - 2021 Tecnologias imersivas para cidades mais resilientes, justas e sustentáveis. SEI-260003/015789/2021 - APQ1 Proc. E-26/211.381/2021(Brazil). Valor: R$ 292.112,00

Stage of Progress

· Ongoing (since 2022)