Nature-based design, combined with the transformation of underlying worldviews, can enhance urban resilience.
Increasing vegetation and green and blue spaces in cities can support both climate change mitigation and adaptation goals, while also enhancing biodiversity and ecological health Maibritt Pedersen Zari (Auckland University of Technology) explains why nature-based solutions (NbS) must be a vital part of urban planning and design.
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Why a coordinated programme of built environment research needs to be based on the public good
Gavin Killip and Kate Simpson (Nottingham Trent University) propose a coordinated research programme of field trials to create a focus for iterative learning about outcomes in the built environment, for the public good. They explain why a transdisciplinary programme is needed and seven key characteristics of the programme are proposed.
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How to decide which research challenge to address
How should researchers decide which challenge and issues to address? Marcel Schweiker (RWTH Aachen University) considers the challenges for built environment researchers and reflects on how individuals can make decisions about their own research priorities and portfolios.
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Research papers in B&C are being widely read
Buildings & Cities is pleased to announce that in 2024 our peer reviewed articles were viewed and downloaded 523,612 times from the journal's website.
The great interest shown here is an indicator of the journal's role as an important resource and as a valued contributor to the field.
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Why a new approach to sustainable development is needed.
Alice Moncaster (University of the West of England) reflects on the lack of progress in sustainable development over several decades. This failure is argued to be linked to how sustainable development has been framed: the separation of technical issues from social justice and equity. Understanding, involving and empowering communities (and wider society) is the key to making progress and achieving sustainable development goals.
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Guest Editor: Paolo Tombesi (EPFL)
Deadline for abstracts: 24 MARCH 2025 (noon GMT)
How can the complexity and challenges of physical territorial reconstruction (after disasters) across diverse disciplines, stakeholders and governance be organised and synthesised?
Do current debates and practices on physical territorial reconstruction (i.e. urban and rural built environments after destruction by "natural" disasters, warfare, conflict or industrial accidents) reflect the scope required to address the whole range of complex issues? Does the inherent complexity of the task cause the fragmentation of scholarship and knowledge into an array of disciplines and issues that must be partial in order to remain governable? Is there a need for a theory capable of composing and giving operational coherence and strength to separate efforts? Is there value in rethinking how knowledge can be managed?
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Buildings & Cities gratefully acknowledges and thanks our reviewers.
The Editors of Buildings & Cities would like to thank all our reviewers for their contribution and support during 2024. High-quality peer review is essential to the success of this journal and we greatly appreciate the dedication and efforts of all those who have contributed to this. Our reviewers have invested much thought, care and insights which have greatly benefitted authors. An enormous THANK YOU to this diverse community of scholars who help to maintain the highest standards for both Buildings & Cities and the wider community.
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How building research can harness AI for mass decarbonisation
Ten years ago, it was rare to read building science papers referencing learning algorithms, sensor networks, cloud computing or digital twins. Now, data-driven techniques are at the core of building decarbonisation research, generating both new opportunities and new risks. Jenn McArthur (Toronto Metropolitan University) reflects on how the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming building decarbonisation research.
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Understanding the interactions between urban form, outdoor and indoor spaces, and local climate requIres interdisciplinary interaction
Gerald Mills (University College Dublin) considers the big challenges for cities amid global climate change (GCC) and discusses the need for an inter-disciplinary approach among urban climate sciences to overcome obstacles. A distinction is made between global climate science, which focusses on Earth-scale outcomes, and urban climate science, which refers to processes and impacts at city-scales, including buildings, streets and neighbourhoods.
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Why large cities will need to contract or be abandoned altogether
William E. Rees (University of British Columbia) explains why urbanisation has been a significant contributor to ecological overshoot (when human consumption and waste generation exceeds the regenerative capacity of supporting ecosystems) and climate change.1 Civil society needs to begin designing a truly viable future involving a ‘Plan B’ for orderly local degrowth of large cities.
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Why the next industrial revolution needs to be based on nature and not "technology"
Over the past 50 years the world has seen countless summits and agreements to reduce carbon emissions and prevent ecological overshoot. We have seen widespread adoption of the SDGs, a rapid shift to renewable energy, and numerous urban planning strategies to create biodiversity corridors, rewild rivers, and enable public and non-motorised transport options. However, appearances are deceiving. Chrisna du Plessis (University of Pretoria) considers the challenge of how to foster an ecological civilization in a world obsessed with technological innovation.
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How can conditions be created for decent living standards for all without exceeding planetary limits?
Energy and climate policies have tended to focus on the promotion of energy efficiency and renewable energies, but there is no evidence that these measures alone will be able to meet climate and sustainable development goals. This special issue explores what the concept of sufficiency means for the built environment - both as a floor (minimum) and a ceiling (maximum) to ensure a "good life". Sufficiency is explored in many interconnected issues such as land use and density, space usage (size and adaptability), sharing of goods, services and spaces, and space conditioning (heating, cooling and ventilation) for health.
MoreEndorsements
We have found the journey with Buildings & Cities very professional – no doubt the smoothest publication process we have worked through in our careers. The editor’s direction has been clear and easy to navigate and respond to.
I am excited about the prospects of this new journal, Buildings and Cities. Its highly respected and experienced editorial team will ensure that the journal’s focus on interdisciplinary and multi-scale approaches will push our industry forward in addressing critical issues facing the built environment.
The quality of editorial work and support to authors is unmatched within the landscape of property and construction journals. The editors are highly experienced and have a strong track record of working closely with each author.
By crossing the scale of buildings and cities, as well as bridging the gap between social and technical research, Buildings and Cities is of vital importance to academics and practitioners working to support sustainable and socially just improvements in the built environment. The editor-in-chief has an extraordinary and well-deserved reputation for fostering new ideas as well as thoughtful and constructive critique. This journal is poised to make significant contributions to the fields its topics integrate.
My experience of the review process has been extremely positive: it has always been rigorous, constructive and improved the papers considerably.
The launch of Buildings and Cities has to be warmly welcomed. The members of the editorial team have an excellent track record in actively engaging with the scholarly community for ensuring that published papers are not only rigorous but also relevant.
Featuring integrated, topical perspectives about the issues in built environment, authors will find guided support, an expert editorial team, and a superior, high quality publication with a visionary, not-for-profit journal, Buildings and Cities. Readers will see articles addressing key research and high-level discussion about accelerating and implementing strategies to address stringent climate goals.
I wholeheartedly commend the new Buildings and Cities journal under its Editor in Chief, Richard Lorch, together with Niklaus Kohler, Ray Cole, Fionn Stevenson and others. It was a privilege to serve on the editorial board of its predecessor, Building Research and Information for 19 years. It is my opinion that it was consistently the most interesting and impactful journal in its field – which Lorch, together with other Board members and contributors essentially defined. I have every confidence that Buildings and Cities will continue this record.
In light of the many challenges that cities face, we need a journal that cuts across disciplinary and professional boundaries to enhance our understanding and insights. This new transdisciplinary journal with a strong editorial team will be a great support to researchers and practitioners alike.
Buildings and Cities is poised to be a leading scientific peer reviewed journals. Its Editor in Chief, Richard Lorch, has an unparalleled reputation of upholding academic fairness and complete integrity. Consequently, I have no hesitation in recommending 'Buildings and Cities' to my peers.
Interdisciplinary insight is vital in addressing the sustainability of the built environment, which encompasses the complex intersection of resources, infrastructures, institutions, communities and citizens. In recognizing this Buildings and Cities is set to become one of the foremost journals supporting innovative research in sustainability across diverse urban settings and scales. With an experienced editorial team at the helm it offers a valuable resource for students, scholars and practitioners interested in inclusive and integrated approaches to sustainable development.
Does built environment research and practice need a new, international, independent, authoritative and openly accessible resource? Buildings & Cities offers a timely and exceptionally relevant response to this question because it is designed to inspire dialogue, engage debate and promote robust evidence, ideas and knowledge. It is founded on principles of rigorous peer-review, relevance, integrity, and inclusiveness, and driven by the recognised competence of it editorial team.
Not only is the evaluation of buildings’ and cities’ performance through time and across scales more possible than ever before, it is more necessary. The journal Buildings and Cities, with its experienced editorial team led by Richard Lorch, is poised to be a leader in this important role.
Latest Peer-Reviewed Journal Content
Cooler streets for a cycleable city: assessing policy alignment
C Tang & J Bush
Understanding the embodied carbon credentials of modern methods of construction
R O’Hegarty, A McCarthy, J O’Hagan, T Thanapornpakornsin, S Raffoul & O Kinnane
The changing typology of urban apartment buildings in Aurinkolahti
S Meriläinen & A Tervo
Embodied climate impacts in urban development: a neighbourhood case study
S Sjökvist, N Francart, M Balouktsi & H Birgisdottir
Environmental effects of urban wind energy harvesting: a review
I Tsionas, M laguno-Munitxa & A Stephan
Office environment and employee differences by company health management certification
S Arata, M Sugiuchi, T Ikaga, Y Shiraishi, T Hayashi, S Ando & S Kawakubo
Spatiotemporal evaluation of embodied carbon in urban residential development
I Talvitie, A Amiri & S Junnila
Energy sufficiency in buildings and cities: current research, future directions [editorial]
M Sahakian, T Fawcett & S Darby
Sufficiency, consumption patterns and limits: a survey of French households
J Bouillet & C Grandclément
Health inequalities and indoor environments: research challenges and priorities [editorial]
M Ucci & A Mavrogianni
Operationalising energy sufficiency for low-carbon built environments in urbanising India
A B Lall & G Sethi
Promoting practices of sufficiency: reprogramming resource-intensive material arrangements
T H Christensen, L K Aagaard, A K Juvik, C Samson & K Gram-Hanssen
Culture change in the UK construction industry: an anthropological perspective
I Tellam
Are people willing to share living space? Household preferences in Finland
E Ruokamo, E Kylkilahti, M Lettenmeier & A Toppinen
Towards urban LCA: examining densification alternatives for a residential neighbourhood
M Moisio, E Salmio, T Kaasalainen, S Huuhka, A Räsänen, J Lahdensivu, M Leppänen & P Kuula
A population-level framework to estimate unequal exposure to indoor heat and air pollution
R Cole, C H Simpson, L Ferguson, P Symonds, J Taylor, C Heaviside, P Murage, H L Macintyre, S Hajat, A Mavrogianni & M Davies
Finnish glazed balconies: residents’ experience, wellbeing and use
L Jegard, R Castaño-Rosa, S Kilpeläinen & S Pelsmakers
Modelling Nigerian residential dwellings: bottom-up approach and scenario analysis
C C Nwagwu, S Akin & E G Hertwich
Mapping municipal land policies: applications of flexible zoning for densification
V Götze, J-D Gerber & M Jehling
Energy sufficiency and recognition justice: a study of household consumption
A Guilbert
Linking housing, socio-demographic, environmental and mental health data at scale
P Symonds, C H Simpson, G Petrou, L Ferguson, A Mavrogianni & M Davies
Measuring health inequities due to housing characteristics
K Govertsen & M Kane
Provide or prevent? Exploring sufficiency imaginaries within Danish systems of provision
L K Aagaard & T H Christensen
Imagining sufficiency through collective changes as satisfiers
O Moynat & M Sahakian
US urban land-use reform: a strategy for energy sufficiency
Z M Subin, J Lombardi, R Muralidharan, J Korn, J Malik, T Pullen, M Wei & T Hong
Mapping supply chains for energy retrofit
F Wade & Y Han
Operationalising building-related energy sufficiency measures in SMEs
I Fouiteh, J D Cabrera Santelices, A Susini & M K Patel
Promoting neighbourhood sharing: infrastructures of convenience and community
A Huber, H Heinrichs & M Jaeger-Erben
New insights into thermal comfort sufficiency in dwellings
G van Moeseke, D de Grave, A Anciaux, J Sobczak & G Wallenborn
‘Rightsize’: a housing design game for spatial and energy sufficiency
P Graham, P Nourian, E Warwick & M Gath-Morad
Implementing housing policies for a sufficient lifestyle
M Bagheri, L Roth, L Siebke, C Rohde & H-J Linke
The jobs of climate adaptation
T Denham, L Rickards & O Ajulo
Structural barriers to sufficiency: the contribution of research on elites
M Koch, K Emilsson, J Lee & H Johansson
Disrupting the imaginaries of urban action to deliver just adaptation [editorial]
V Castán-Broto, M Olazabal & G Ziervogel
Nature for resilience reconfigured: global- to-local translation of frames in Africa
K Rochell, H Bulkeley & H Runhaar
How hegemonic discourses of sustainability influence urban climate action
V Castán Broto, L Westman & P Huang
Fabric first: is it still the right approach?
N Eyre, T Fawcett, M Topouzi, G Killip, T Oreszczyn, K Jenkinson & J Rosenow
Social value of the built environment [editorial]
F Samuel & K Watson
Understanding demolition [editorial]
S Huuhka
Data politics in the built environment [editorial]
A Karvonen & T Hargreaves
Latest Commentaries
Integrating Nature into Cities
Increasing vegetation and green and blue spaces in cities can support both climate change mitigation and adaptation goals, while also enhancing biodiversity and ecological health Maibritt Pedersen Zari (Auckland University of Technology) explains why nature-based solutions (NbS) must be a vital part of urban planning and design.
Co-ordinate Built Environment Research for the Public Good
Gavin Killip and Kate Simpson (Nottingham Trent University) propose a coordinated research programme of field trials to create a focus for iterative learning about outcomes in the built environment, for the public good. They explain why a transdisciplinary programme is needed and seven key characteristics of the programme are proposed.