Understanding urban choices for adulthood after Hurricane Katrina

As young people begin transitioning into adulthood, they need to make a number of important choices. Will they try to improve their education? Can they find a job? Where will they live? The way they answer these questions will have a lot to do with the progress they make in their lives. There are people who decide to go back or stay in places that limits their opportunities. Hurricane Katrina destroyed many cities across the US, leaving neighborhoods even deeper in poverty and more disadvantaged than before.  In such conditions, it seems like it should be easy to determine the factors they take into account in deciding where to move next. However, these decisions turn out to be quite complicated. Tatjana Trebic MCP’16, studies the cases of 53 low-income mothers between the ages of 19 to 29 to understand how these women made choices and trade-offs during and after the reconstruction of their neighborhoods. Based on her analysis, Tatjana creates a  framework to identify the constrains that planners should keep in mind in trying to serve low-income emerging adults in the US. For example, for many young mothers, neighborhood safety competes with social network support when deciding to stay or go back to an old neighborhood. By understanding more about these kinds of tradeoffs regarding neighborhood choice, planners and policy makers will be better equipped to prioritize social services versus other institutional support for these vulnerable groups.

To see Tatjana’s framework, make sure to download her thesis here.

Rebuild by Design competition: a new tool for resilience planning

New Meadowlands Proposal, MIT CAU + ZUS + Urbanisten

In the past few years, cities have experienced devastating effects of climate change. The physical impacts of major weather events have spurred cities to look for ways of minimizing risks and disruption. Competitions are being used to encourage innovative design, increase public awareness and gain support for investment in resiliency projects. Catie Ferrara, MCP’ 16, uses the federal  competition to analyze three such competitions in New Jersey municipalities.  None actually received any financial support to implement the ideas that emerged from their competitions. While all three efforts appeared to have some positive effects (such as cross-boundary collaboration and increasing awareness of the problem), politics and limited local capacity made it hard to get anything built. Catie provides practical proposals to overcome these challenges. If you’d like to read more, you can download her thesis here.