Tyler Caruso and Erik Facteau explain their scientific study of the value of urban farms, an effort to produce hard data that can challenge nay-sayers and inform policies and regulations that support agriculture in the city.

Peter Syrett introduces Transparency, an online database of the health effects of building materials, and reflects on architectural responsibility, scientific uncertainty and buildings as instruments of public health.

Introducing Making Room: a research, design and advocacy project to shape New York’s housing stock to address the changing needs of how we live now.

A new undergraduate major in urban design prompts us to sketch a history of urban design education and to discuss its future with the new program’s director, Victoria Marshall.

A living city is always in Beta. Let’s Play. Carl Skelton discusses how an open source, multi-player environment for cities can expand the participatory toolset of engaged urban citizens.

Nevin Cohen shares the process of developing a citywide plan for urban agriculture and talks about its promise as both social justice movement and model for community development.

Kazys Varnelis discusses the temporary “newspaper of public space” he created with Joseph Grima for the New Museum exhibition “The Last Newspaper.”

Carol Coletta and Jake Barton discuss an interactive project that seeks to reinvent public participation in America for the 21st century.

Our economy consists of both goods and services. Traditionally, design has focused on one, not the other. Laura Forlano talks to leading practitioners in this emerging field.

Janette Kim and Erik Carver discuss Underdome, an ambitious attempt to classify contending energy agendas and to examine their implications for public life.