Content July 22, 2007
Welcome to Ian (Anirban) Banerjee’s online classroom!
This blog was created with the aim of collecting, analyzing and disseminating urban success stories and educative case studies from different fields and different parts of the world. After my inspiring field studies in Curitiba, the famous ecological model-city of Brazil, I developed a fascination for cities that have found ingenious ways to radically reinvent themselves. On the background of the global challenges we are facing, I feel a strong urge to share these positive references with my students, colleagues, and all those who, like me, are in desperate need of inspiration !
I hope the chosen links to knowledge banks, articles, websites, videos and other sources, will help students and interested readers to navigate through the ever growing pool of knowledge. The subjects and methods of this collection cover a broad field of inquiry applying multiple perspectives of observation and reflection.
The growing complexity of our world throws us some truly stubborn challenges that beg for new references. I adhere to the belief, that before mapping out any alternative futures, it is necessary that the observer understands his/her own epistemological make up: which models do we (knowingly or unknowingly) apply to interpret the world?
This collection of case studies, success stories and other patterns, will, I hope, inspire the readers to design their own tools to look into the urban condition from their own shifting perspectives…and maybe even inspire them to growing ideas themselves …
Looking forward to your contributions!
Ian Banerjee, August 2, 2007; Vienna/Austria
Great to see your ideas and projects in blog format! Will certainly watch the newsfeed, hope to have more time soon to read through the wealth of information you created in such a short time. I really liked the video “The Web of Life and Technology”… amazing work.
btw what a nice coincidence, this blog was created on my birthday
Thanks Gregor for your comment. I am still in the process of ordering the categories. dealing with the constraints of web technology.
Dear Ian,
I wonder if you’d consider delving into Sarajevo as the next object of your study, especially since you just ‘experienced’ it for the first time!
Regards,
Kavya
PS Don’t forget, you drank the fountain water, which according to legend, means you will most certainly return.
hey you!
well done in such a short time!!
funny that i have your site through research, and you asked once, how come many visitors even under site construction; i have the answer now, late but still
i hope everything s fine, congrats
see you
merve
Hi Ian!
its a nice effort to compile vistas for future urban developments. just a few days ago, i have decided to look into this particular arena regularly alongside my doctoral research in environment science in next 4 years. when we met on day before yesterday at your father’s farmhouse, i forgot to tell you that i am a civil engineer with professional experience in structural design, masters in environment engineering and committed to sustainable development. as a structural engineer, i might look for integration of Building and Bridge in a single frame; as a environment engineer i would like to cover minimum top soil, expanding more in the vertical space; as a sustainable developer i dream to bridge between urban and rural lifestyles; and lastly as a fan of Santiago Calatrava, i like to play with curves. all of this you may find in ‘Swargadyan’ described in my story at “http://sabujerswapna.blogspot.com . i am eagerly waiting for friendly collaboration with architects to bring my dream into reality. and you are welcome to visit my other blogs through links given on this blog; will get some more, though not in a structured format like yours. nevertheless, i hope we would have more interactions in future.
~Sarit
just great !!!