At the Harvard University Graduate School of Design
Healthy Places Design Lab Co-Director Ann Forsyth teamed up with Arthur Kleinman, Hong-Tu Chen, and Fawwaz Habbal in a recent podcast by the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Focused on China the podcast examined how collaboratively developed technologies might help enable older people to age in place.
Healthy Places Design Lab Co-Director, Jennifer Molinsky, has been writing about multigenerational housing and the German Experience.
Healthy Aging Speaker Series | Fall 2021
A GPS Survey in an Aging Community in Shanghai
Using data to reveal the characteristics of the older people’s daily mobility and the impact of the built environment
Speaker: Yifan Yu, Professor of Urban Planning, Director of Age-friendly Community Lab, Tongji University
When: 7:30 PM EST, November 16th, Tuesday, Where: ZOOM
Link to recorded presentation.
Moderator: Ann Forsyth, Ruth and Frank Stanton Professor of Urban Planning, Harvard University
Hosted by, Healthy Places Design Lab, at the Harvard Graduate School of Design
Abstract
The spatial behavior of older adults is essentially the result of interactions between the people and the environment. Different from the traditional demographic-based measurement, this research attempts to reveal the temporal-spatial behavior characteristics of the older people with an individual-based trajectory analysis. Seventy-six older residents from a typical public housing neighborhood in Shanghai were asked to carry an Android Phone and wear Fitbit health bands. By collecting and analyzing the trajectory data through 102 consecutive days, we explored their mobility pattern and activity sequence, discovered the spatial anchor points that have an important impact, and looked into the possibility of using spatial intervention to promote healthy behaviors inside and outside the neighborhood.
Bio
Dr. YU Yifan is a professor of urban planning and the director of Age-friendly Community Lab at Tongji University. She obtained her PhD from Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, in Paris, France in 2003, visited GSD at Harvard University as a senior research fellow during 2013 and 2014. She serves as an overseas research fellow at Paris Sorbonne University, as well as a member of the Planning Standardization committee of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, also serving as vice president of the Shanghai Urban Planning Association.
Speaker: Conor J. Walsh, Paul A. Maeder Professor of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University
When: NOON (12 PM EST), November 4th, Thursday, Where: ZOOM
Click here or scan the QR code to register and receive the zoom link.
Moderator: Ann Forsyth, Ruth and Frank Stanton Professor of Urban Planning, Harvard University
This talk will give an overview of our work on developing disruptive soft wearable robot technologies for augmenting and restoring human performance and how we characterize their performance through biomechanical and physiological studies so as to further the scientific understanding of how humans interact with such machines. Our efforts are the result a multidisciplinary team of students and research staff with backgrounds in engineering, materials science, apparel design, industrial design, biomechanics, and physical therapy, in addition to valuable collaborations with colleagues from Harvard, Boston University, and beyond. Our long term vision is for ubiquitous soft wearable robots that can be worn all day, every day, in the community, home, sporting and workplace environments.
About the speaker:
https://biodesign.seas.harvard.edu/conor-walsh
In the first half of 2021, the D-Lab has been active in debates about healthy places, including issues of aging, livability, and climate change.
Article: A. Forsyth and J. Molinsky. What is Aging in Place? Confusions and Contradictions. Housing Policy Debate 31, 2: 181-196, 2021.
Blog: W. Airgood-Obrycki, J. Molinsky. Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities Score Lower on Livability, January 2021.
Talk: Education of Future Public Health Spatial Planning Workforce, Panelist, Public Health England, Ann Forsyth, July 2021.
Article: Y. Lyu, A. Forsyth, and S. Worthington. Built Environment and Self-rated Health: Comparing Young, Middle-aged, and Older People in Chengdu, China. HERD: Health Environments Research and Design, 2021.
Article: Y. Lyu and A. Forsyth. Attitudes, Perceptions, and Walking Behavior in a Chinese City. Journal of Transport and Health, 2021
Talk: Meaningful Ageing: Shaping a better Future for China’s Elderly, Discussant, Harvard University, Ann Forsyth, June, 2021.
Talk: Health and Cities, Sir Peter Hall Lecture, Bartlett School of Planning, University College London, Ann Forsyth, May 2021.
Report: J. Molinsky, W. Airgood-Obrycki, R. Harrell, S. Guzman, Which Older Adults Have Access To America’s Most Livable Neighborhoods? An Analysis Of AARP’s Livability Index, Harvard JCHS.
Blog: J. Molinsky, W. Airgood-Obrycki, Housing and Livable Neighborhoods, February, 2021.
Article: A. Forsyth and R. Pesier. Lessons from Planned Resettlement and New Town Experiences for Avoiding Climate Sprawl. Landscape and Urban Planning 205: article 103957, 2021.
Talk: Healthy Communities, Urban Planning, and COVID-19, Tongji/ADB (Virtual), Ann Forsyth, December 2020.
The Healthy Places D-Lab continues to address COVID-19. For earlier work see our June 7, 2020 posting.
J-Term Workshop: Small Farm to Food Insecure: Matching Needs with Surplus. Harvard Graduate School of Design, Kira Clingen, MLA/MDes’21, Tessa Crespo, MDes ’20, and Amy Thornton, MDes ’20, January 2021.
Talk: Healthy Communities, Urban Planning, and COVID-19. Asian Development Bank/Tongji University, Ann Forsyth, December 2020.
Panel: Four Paths, Post COVID-19: Lessons for Planning Future Cities. ACSP Conference, Ann Forsyth, November 2020.
Editorial: Speaking to the Future: COVID-19 and the Planning Community. Journal of the American Planning Association 86, 3: 281-283, Ann Forsyth, June 2020.
Blog: Designing Senior Housing for Safe Interactions in the Age of COVID-19, Jennifer Molinsky, August 2020.
Blog: As Economy Reopens, Guidance Must Consider Older Adults’ Living Situations, Jennifer Molinsky, June 2020.
Enrollment is open for up to 12 GSD students to engage in a workshop on the food environment on Monday January 4 from 9am-12 noon Eastern. Enroll here. Find more about the project on their web site, What We’ve Gleaned.
Instructors: Kira Clingen, MLA/MDes’21, Tessa Crespo, MDes ’20, and Amy Thornton, MDes ’20
Zoom Link:
Max Enrollment: 12
In the late winter of 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic threw the United States into a state of chaos an acute dual and contradictory crisis caught our attention. Due to the closing of institutions and restaurants, farmers across the country tilled under crops and poured milk down the drain, unable to sell their goods. Simultaneously, the percentage of the food insecure rose dramatically. Prior to the COVID-19 crisis, it was estimated that 1 in 11 Massachusetts families or 9% faced food insecurity. Due to COVID-19, that number increased to 38% according to Project Bread President Erin McAleer. Aware that food surplus and food insecurity was already existent; we were still stunned by the magnitude during this crisis. How was it possible that food was thrown away while so many did not have enough to feed themselves?
As designers, we believe our skills can serve the challenges faced by small local farmers and the food insecure in New England, exacerbated by COVID-19, climate change, and other crises yet unknown. However, we know our answers must come from those already engaged in this work otherwise assumptions made are not only arrogant but irrelevant and inapplicable. Thus, we interviewed small farmers, institutional food producers, distributors, Food Bank employees, gleaning organizations, food skills educators, and food shelf volunteers to discover from those doing the work of growing, distributing and consuming the food where successes and challenges lie, to amplify the work already in action, and discover where change is best made to collectively create solutions. Through these interviews we found that the COVID-19 crisis amplified broader, long-standing issues within our food system such as the stranglehold of large food distribution companies, the challenges of storage and timely transportation, the difficulty in providing nutrient-rich fresh food to the food insecure, the insufficient crop yield and time of harvest data for small farms, and the undervaluing of fresh local food, the small farm, and skilled food work.
This course will be one 3-hr session starting with a discussion period about how scale and distance impact the design process, especially in regards to rural, agricultural landscape, followed by a short lecture on our key findings and the ways in which we believe designers might help. We will then hold a collaborative sketching and brainstorming session and come together to share and critique our concepts and ideas to move forward.
This project was funded through the 2020 COVID-19 Participatory Budgeting process.
| Date | Mon, Jan 4 |
| Time | 9am – 12pm |
The Participatory Budgeting Companion is now online. Learn how to do PB! For more information go the the Participatory Budgeting part of the site.
A collaboration between the Healthy Places D-Lab and the GSD Student Services, Summer Peer-Learning Sessions contribute to student heath and well-being by building community. They were funded through the Spring 2020 COVID-19 PB Process.
The Healthy Places D-Lab has been involved with the pandemic through a series of activities:
Blog: Older Adults in the Workforce: Facing Economic and Health Risks During the COVID-19 Pandemic, JCHS, Alexander Hermann and Jennifer Molinsky, June 2020
Keynote Panel: Writing the Next Chapter: Possibilities of the Post-pandemic City. University of Washington, Ann Forsyth, May 2020.
Blog: The Pandemic is Stress Testing Aging in Place, Milken Institute, Chris Herbert and Jennifer Molinsky, April 2020.
Open House Lecture: What is a Healthy Place? Harvard GSD, Ann Forsyth, April 2020.
Feature: What Role do Planning and Design Play in a Pandemic? Ann Forsyth, March 2020