Cities are among the most complex of all complex adaptive systems, and opportunities for research into how to make them sustainable are boundless. As climate change accelerates and energy and other environmental problems grow more acute, the need for research that can advance sustainable practices grows too.

Accordingly, we’re significantly scaling up our research in this area. Our aim is to promote cutting-edge studies that can benefit not only New York but cities around the world. Applied, not theoretical, research is our focus; interdisciplinary approaches are the norm.

Shaping our research agenda

A major conference we’ll host in fall 2008 will examine key sustainability issues for the real estate industry. It will also enable us to hear directly from real estate professionals about issues they’d like researchers to investigate. The Stakeholder Consortium formed by CUNY’s Building Performance Lab will help shape our research agenda, too.

A fall 2008 roundtable on our forthcoming report Downtown 2030 will examine how visions for Downtown Manhattan’s future – presented by distinguished experts in economics, transportation, valuation, population, logistics, urban design, and urban planning – can contribute to sustainability.  This roundtable, too, will identify research needs.

Our future research will also build on past work, such as a 2005 report, New York City Brownfields. Conducted for the NYC Department of Environmental Protection, it helped fine-tune brownfields policy and accelerate brownfields development. 

Our research “business model”

Our approach to research is flexible.  Studies may be undertaken for government agencies, corporations, or nonprofit organizations; funded by foundations, because the topics have wide applicability; or sponsored by the Institute per direction from our Board of Advisors.  Researchers may come from CUNY and other academic institutions, and from government and the private sector.

To assess specific proposals and requests for research and to define the most promising research agendas, our senior staff consult with outside experts.  Research findings will be shared with a wide public through many avenues:

• public events such as seminars, workshops, roundtables, symposia, forums,   and conferences
• reports published in hard copy and posted online
• podcasts and webinars in which researchers discuss their findings
• appearances by researchers on CUNY’s Channel 75 and other media outlets
• exhibits in our Pergolis Urban Gallery

We welcome suggestions for research topics that can meet your needs, and we invite inquiries from researchers interested in pursuing projects through our Institute.

For more information, please contact,

John Maher
Director of Administration and Finance
phone: 646.660.6976
John_Maher@baruch.cuny.edu