
Gundula ProkschUniversity of Washington | UW · Department of Architecture
Gundula Proksch
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Publications (40)
The first year of COVID-19 tested the economic resilience of cities, calling into question the viability of density and the essential nature of certain types of services. This study examines built environment and socio-economic factors associated with the closure of customer-facing food businesses across urban areas of Seattle, Washington. The stud...
Despite popular interest and recent industry growth, commercial-scale aquaponics still faces economic and regulatory barriers primarily resulting from political and economic systems which insufficiently address pressing environmental challenges. The sustainability potential of aquaponic food production can help address and overcome such challenges...
Chicago's history and urban development have been connected to its role as a food hub and driver of technological innovations in the food industry. In the 1970s, the city started redefining its relation to agriculture by integrating various forms of urban agriculture. Today, the city is known for its strong network of community gardens, educational...
Please find a preprint of this chapter on ResearchGate. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Rooftop greenhouses (RTGs) have become an iconic symbol for integrating Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) in cities and have greatly inspired urban agriculture advocates, archite...
Please find a preprint of this chapter on ResearchGate. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Aquaponics is a circular food production system that combines fish and plant cultivation. Its benefits can further the urban agriculture movement through sustainable food production, c...
INTRODUCTION In the diverse field of urban agriculture practices, an increasing number of operations cultivate produce using hydroponic (soilless) systems with high-tech enclosures to increase productivity and locate the growing system in and on buildings. Together with indoor farms, plant factories, and other building-related (often vertical) form...
Aquaponics is a circular food production system that combines fish and plant cultivation. Its benefits can further the urban agriculture movement through sustainable food production, community support, and education. While the growing system is well understood, its prospective integration into cities, regional foodsheds, and circular economy requir...
Growing in popularity, the circular city framework is at the leading-edge of a larger and older transitional dialogue which envisions regenerative, circular, and symbiotic systems as the future of urban sustainability. The need for more research supporting the implementation of such concepts has been often noted in literature. To help address this...
The current pandemic, with its associated need for physical distancing and the accompanying transformation of the built environment, generates the pressing need for built environment researchers to refocus their research and respond to the current public health crisis. An interdisciplinary team from the College of Built Environments at the Universi...
The current pandemic, with its associated need for physical distancing and the accompanying transformation of the built environment, generates the pressing need for built environment researchers to refocus their research and respond to the current public health crisis. An interdisciplinary team from the College of Built Environments at the Universi...
The current pandemic, with its associated need for physical distancing and the accompanying transformation of the built environment, generates the pressing need for built environment researchers to refocus their research and respond to the current public health crisis. An interdisciplinary team from the College of Built Environments at the Universi...
A circular city builds upon the principles of circular economy, which key
concepts of reduce, reuse, recycle, and recover lead to a coupling of
resources: products and by-products of one production process become the
input of another one, often in local vicinity. However, sources, types and
available quantities of underutilised resources in cities...
Energy use within buildings contributes to nearly a third of carbon emissions in the United States (Zhang et al. 2019, EPA). Meanwhile, between 30-40% of food in the U.S. is wasted and generates carbon emissions equivalent to that of 37 million cars yearly (UN FAO). Long term decarbonization strategies within the built environment can look to alter...
Energy use within buildings contributes to nearly a third of carbon emissions in the United States (Zhang et al. 2019, EPA). Meanwhile, between 30-40% of food in the U.S. is wasted and generates carbon emissions equivalent to that of 37 million cars yearly (UN FAO). Long term decarbonization strategies within the built environment can look to alter...
Energy use within buildings contributes to nearly a third of carbon emissions in the United States (Zhang et al. 2019, EPA). Meanwhile, between 30-40% of food in the U.S. is wasted and generates carbon emissions equivalent to that of 37 million cars yearly (UN FAO). Long-term decarbonization strategies within the built environment can look to alter...
This research collaboration between the Circular City + Living Systems (CCLS) research lab and the architecture practice Weber Thompson addresses the intersection of three critical topics affecting the carbon footprint of the built environment: adaptive reuse of existing buildings, increased availability of electric and autonomous vehicles, and foo...
This research collaboration between the Circular City + Living Systems (CCLS) research lab and the architecture practice Weber Thompson addresses the intersection of three critical topics affecting the carbon footprint of the built environment: adaptive reuse of existing buildings, increased availability of electric and autonomous vehicles, and foo...
This research collaboration between the Circular City + Living Systems (CCLS) research lab and the architecture practice Weber Thompson addresses the intersection of three critical topics affecting the carbon footprint of the built environment: adaptive reuse of existing buildings, increased availability of electric and autonomous vehicles, and foo...
By 2050, two-thirds of the world's population will live in cities and consume 80% of the global food supply. As the changing climate exacerbates pressure on all sectors of the economy, new frameworks for resource management in urban areas have been introduced. The food-water-energy nexus and the circular economy are two prominent examples; these co...
Open Access until August 2020:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/24751448.2020.1705714
Twenty-first-century cities face challenges including potential food shortages, water scarcity, and dependence on nonrenewable energy sources. These are increasingly intensified by global population growth. The development of innovative solutions fo...
Aquaponics’ potential to transform urban food production has been documented in a rapid increase of academic research and public interest in the field. To translate this publicity into real-world impact, the creation of commercial farms and their relationship to the urban environment have to be further examined. This research has to bridge the gap...
As the building sector faces global challenges that affect urban supplies of food, water and energy, multifaceted sustainability solutions need to be reexamined through the lens of built environments. Aquaponics, a strategy that combines recirculating aquaculture with hydroponics to optimize fish and plant production, has been recognized as one of...
The emerging discipline of biomimetics converges biology, chemistry, and engineering to offer a scientific approach to bio-inspiration. It develops methodologies for the in-depth analysis of nature to derive technological advances. In the field of architecture, biomimetic research primarily has the potential to contribute to the design of innovativ...
The University of Washington eScience Institute runs an annual Data Science for Social Good (DSSG) program that selects four projects each year to train students from a wide range of disciplines while helping community members execute social good projects, often with an urban focus. We present observations and deliberations of one such project, the...
Creating Urban Agriculture Systems offers you background, expertise, and inspiration for designing with urban agriculture. It shows you how to grow food in buildings and cities, operate growing systems, and integrate them with natural cycles and existing infrastructures. It teaches the essential environmental inputs and operational strategies of ur...
Imagine a city of the future where nature has re-emerged into the streets, food grows in permaculture gardens next to where we live and work, tidelands once filled in for industry re-emerge to allow rivers to meander, transportation infrastructure has decentralized and dissolved, and the waterfront has blurred and soften. These transformations of t...
Imagine a city in which nature and urban form are indistinguishable. Food grows in permaculture gardens where people live and work; tidelands re-emerge in industrial zones, allowing rivers to return to their meandering past; and twentieth-century infrastructure is replaced by biologically engineered soft systems that generate increasingly complex e...
With water scarcity and food insecurity growing globally, communities and cities today face urgent infrastructural challenges including: how to supply their residents with fresh water and food. By analyzing existing urban water management and agricultural practices, this study identifies an imbalance between the pressures on cities to secure their...
Designers are expanding the definition of Sustainable Design by incorporating biological processes and systems directly in their projects. Systems like green roofs and living machines have proved themselves invaluable for reducing a project’s overall environmental footprint. More recently, advanced algae cultivation technologies – some still in the...
Interdisciplinary education is becoming a hallmark strategy for preparing and providing students with the skills necessary for addressing the complexity of our contemporary built environments.
In this paper, we examine how the studio model of education presents opportunities for increasing interdisciplinarity in the classroom. Specifically, we deve...
Designers are expanding the definition of Ecological Design by incorporating biological processes and systems directly in their design. Systems like green roofs and living machines have proved themselves invaluable for reducing a design’s overall environmental footprint. Algae-based energy is almost 30 times less expensive per unit than energy gene...
Designers are expanding the definition of Sustainable Design by incorporating biological processes and systems directly in their projects. Systems like green roofs and living machines have proved themselves in valuable for reducing a project’s overall environmental footprint. More recently, advanced algae cultivation technologies – some still in th...
Rooftops in our urban centers represent a vast potential of currently underused space. The transformation of these urban rooftops into an environmental, ecological resource through the increased implementation of green roof technology is becoming standard practice in many cities throughout the world. Due to the rapidly growing interest in urban agr...
Despite severe catastrophes caused by heatwaves, droughts, and desertification, global water problems have not yet penetrated general consciousness. This study looks at the imbalance between the pressures on cities to provide their inhabitants with fresh water in contrast to the industrial agriculture's wasteful water use. Emerging urban agricultur...
Rooftops in our urban centers represent a vast potential of currently unused space. The transformation of these urban rooftops into an environmental/ecological resource through increased implementation of green roof technology is becoming standard practice in many cities throughout the world. Due to the rapidly growing interest in urban agriculture...
This paper demonstrates how existing historic ‘parkways’, a legacy of American Landscape Architecture, can be overlaid with sustainable interactive programs, particularly with regard to urban agriculture, to increase their environmental, social and cultural values. Many of these linear landscapes conceived following formal principles are underutili...
Deserted parks, maintenance intensive lawns, vacant boulevards, over-sized road medians and dog-walkers turf shape the image of contemporary green spaces in North American cities. The large number of under-utilized green spaces is the starting point for re-thinking urban public green space, as an active, social urban infrastructure. Urban greenways...