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Difficult problems do not always require far-fetched solutions, but in order to arrive at the solution a change of perspective may be in order. The City as a System advocates such a change of perspective in the study of the urban environment. It posits that designers who wish to truly improve the functioning of the city and solve tricky urban problems cannot afford to only focus on the spatial manifestation of the city, but should also conduct thorough research into the underlying system, into the operation, use, and performance of the urban fabric. The authors view the metabolism of the city as that of a living organism. The urban body—as the place where much of our resource use culminates—plays a crucial role in the transition towards a more sustainable living environment.

Environmental planning --- Architecture --- Stadtplanung. --- Metabolismus. --- Forschung. --- Aménagement urbain --- Prospective --- Villes et groupements habités --- Ecosystème --- urban planning --- durability --- sustainable architecture

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Something good about the smart city: a human-centered account of why the future of electricity is local. Resilience now matters most, and most resilience is local--even for that most universal, foundational modern resource: the electric power grid. Today that technological marvel is changing more rapidly than it has for a lifetime, and in our new grid awareness, community microgrids have become a fascinating catalyst for cultural value change. In Downtime on the Microgrid , Malcolm McCullough offers a thoughtful counterpoint to the cascade of white papers on smart clean infrastructure. Writing from an experiential perspective, McCullough avoids the usual smart city futurism, technological solutionism, policy acronyms, green idealism, critical theory jargon, and doomsday prepping to provide new cultural context for a subject long a favorite theme in science and technology studies. McCullough describes the three eras of North American electrification: innovation, consolidation, and decentralization. He considers the microgrid boom and its relevance to the built environment as "architecture's grid edge." Finally, he argues that resilience arises from clusters; although a microgrid is often described as an island, future resilience will require archipelagos--clusters of microgrids, with a two-way, intermittent connectiveness that is very different from the always-on, top-down technofuture we may be expecting. With Downtime on the Microgrid, McCullough rises above techno-hype to find something good about the smart city and reassuring about local resilience.

Aménagement urbain --- Réseau --- Villes et groupements habités --- Electricité --- Microgrids (Smart power grids) --- MGs (Smart power grids) --- Micro-grids (Smart power grids) --- Mini-grids (Smart power grids) --- Electric power distribution --- Smart power grids --- Small power production facilities --- Smart cities --- Minirésaux électriques intelligents --- Petites centrales électriques --- Villes intelligentes --- Social aspects --- Aspect social --- Social aspects. --- Cities and towns --- Small-scale power production facilities --- Electric power-plants