Cities

Construction

A real apartment complex was built like a LEGO set

Renco, a system combining LEGO-like blocks and color-coded building plans, could be the future of construction.

Kristin Houser

Series| Future of Cities

These cities are working alongside nature to become flood-proof

40:58

Barriers, floodgates, aqueducts, empty wells — how these cities are adapting to floods and droughts.

A picture of a coffee grinder refining whole coffee beans.

Construction

Researchers brew a stronger concrete using — coffee?

Researchers and engineers from RMIT University made concrete 30% stronger in the lab by incorporating aggregates made from coffee grounds.

Kevin Dickinson

Sustainability

Nature-based solutions are cleaning up cities

Nature-based solutions can be radical — think covering a highway with a park — but offer meaningful ways to address pollution.

Chris Hamill-Stewart

Urban Living

Open-source map could empower pedestrians in car-filled cities

Most cities don’t map their own pedestrian networks. Now, researchers have built the first open-source tool to let planners do just that.

Peter Dizikes | MIT News Office

Urban Living

Watch: London’s “rolling bridge”

London’s unique Cody Dock “rolling bridge” can be moved by hand winches.

B. David Zarley

3D Printing

Could 3D printing help solve the US housing crisis?

3D printing could help solve the nation’s housing crisis, as it's cheaper, faster, and more sustainable than conventional construction methods.

Stefan Ellerbeck

a group of 3d-printed houses still under construction

3D Printing

World’s largest 3D-printed affordable housing project launches in Kenya

Construction of the world’s largest 3D-printed affordable housing development is underway, with the first 10 houses going up in just 10 weeks.

Kristin Houser

Urban Living

How Singapore’s “Garden City” vision fused nature and urban design like nowhere else

Singapore's green thumb developed from its recent history. Its small size meant that staying independent required protecting its resources.

Stefan Al

a large artificial island shaped like a palm tree off an urban coastline

Engineering

Coastal cities created 40 Manhattans’ worth of new land since 2000

The first global assessment of land reclamation found that people have added 900 square miles of land to Earth’s coasts this century.

Kristin Houser

Climate Crisis

You can build a house out of this super-grass material

Plantd is turning to fast-growing grasses to decarbonize construction.

B. David Zarley

Urban Living

Extreme heat is changing habits of daily life

Researchers found that extreme temperatures actually have a much larger effect on human activity than the previous estimations.

Peter Dizikes | MIT News Office

3D Printing

Two-story 3D-printed house is first of its kind in the US

The US’s first two-story 3D-printed house is being built in Houston, Texas, from a mix of concrete and wood.

Kristin Houser

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