Hasil untuk "Aesthetics of cities. City planning and beautifying"

Zilin Wang, Saeed Rahmani, Daphne Cornelisse et al.

While autonomous vehicles have achieved reliable performance within specific operating regions, their deployment to new cities remains costly and slow. A key bottleneck is the need to collect many human demonstration trajectories when adapting driving policies to new cities that differ from those seen in training in terms of road geometry, traffic rules, and interaction patterns. In this paper, we show that self-play multi-agent reinforcement learning can adapt a driving policy to a substantially different target city using only the map and meta-information, without requiring any human demonstrations from that city. We introduce NO data Map-based self-play for Autonomous Driving (NOMAD), which enables policy adaptation in a simulator constructed based on the target-city map. Using a simple reward function, NOMAD substantially improves both task success rate and trajectory realism in target cities, demonstrating an effective and scalable alternative to data-intensive city-transfer methods. Project Page: https://nomaddrive.github.io/

Paul Gölz, Jan Maly, Ulrike Schmidt-Kraepelin et al.

In citizens' assemblies, a group of constituents is randomly selected to weigh in on policy issues. We study a two-stage sampling problem faced by practitioners in countries such as Germany, in which constituents' contact information is stored at a municipal level. As a result, practitioners can only select constituents from a bounded number of cities ex post, while ensuring equal selection probability for constituents ex ante. We develop several algorithms for this problem. Although minimizing the number of contacted cities is NP-hard, we provide a pseudo-polynomial time algorithm and an additive 1-approximation, both based on separation oracles for a linear programming formulation. Recognizing that practical objectives go beyond minimizing city count, we further introduce a simple and more interpretable greedy algorithm, which additionally satisfies an ex-post monotonicity property and achieves an additive 2-approximation. Finally, we explore a notion of ex-post proportionality, for which we propose two practical algorithms: an optimal algorithm based on column generation and integer linear programming and a simple heuristic creating particularly transparent distributions. We evaluate these algorithms on data from Germany, and plan to deploy them in cooperation with a leading nonprofit organization in this space.

Shahaf Donio, Eran Toch

While local governments have invested heavily in smart city infrastructure, significant disparities in adopting these services remain in urban areas. The success of many user-facing smart city technologies requires understanding barriers to adoption, including persistent inequalities in urban areas. An analysis of a random sample telephone survey (n=489) in four neighborhoods of Tel Aviv merged with digital municipal services usage data found that neighborhood residency influences the reasons why residents adopt resident-facing smart city services, as well as individual-level factors. Structured Equation Modeling shows that neighborhood residency is related to digital proficiency and privacy perceptions beyond demographic factors and that those influence the adoption of smart-city services. We summarize the paper by discussing why and how place effects must be considered in further research in smart cities and the study and mitigation of digital inequality.

Daniele Nicolosi

Art is an inspiration of the idea—an atmosphere that allows the artist to share with others what characterizes him as a subject. Art, despite being the closest thing to the translation of the nou- less, remains immeasurably distant from it. In measuring myself in writing about it – which is an action for others, as Sartre argues, reminding us that being-for-others leads to a subjectivity that becomes an object for the other (Being and Nothingness, 1943) – it is worth saying right away that, although we may share this communal mission, it remains impossible to use an exact abstract scheme, i.e., one that is maximally objective, to describe my subjectivation in relation to the idea. But it is the very nature of the dualistic aspects (subject/object) underlying this reflection that is antithetical to a harmony with communicative purposes, directly external to the subject.

Andrei Khurshudov

Cities worldwide are rapidly adopting smart technologies, transforming urban life. Despite this trend, a universally accepted definition of 'smart city' remains elusive. Past efforts to define it have not yielded a consensus, as evidenced by the numerous definitions in use. In this paper, we endeavored to create a new 'compromise' definition that should resonate with most experts previously involved in defining this concept and aimed to validate one of the existing definitions. We reviewed 60 definitions of smart cities from industry, academia, and various relevant organizations, employing transformer architecture-based generative AI and semantic text analysis to reach this compromise. We proposed a semantic similarity measure as an evaluation technique, which could generally be used to compare different smart city definitions, assessing their uniqueness or resemblance. Our methodology employed generative AI to analyze various existing definitions of smart cities, generating a list of potential new composite definitions. Each of these new definitions was then tested against the pre-existing individual definitions we have gathered, using cosine similarity as our metric. This process identified smart city definitions with the highest average cosine similarity, semantically positioning them as the closest on average to all the 60 individual definitions selected.

Jaime Dalberto Barreto Carranza

El presente artículo de investigación tiene como objetivo analizar y evaluar la evolución de las capacidades humanas de los beneficiarios de las políticas de generación de ingresos en Chaparral, Tolima, durante el periodo 2015-2018. Se intenta no reducir el fenómeno de la pobreza en el municipio a criterios exclusivamente monetarios, sino complementarlo a partir del análisis de las capacidades humanas y diversas dimensiones, a través de la observación participante. Para esto, se emplea una metodología cualitativa con fines evaluativos, haciendo uso del método de la investigación acción participativa para analizar el discurso de diez líderes sociales del municipio de Chaparral, registrado en diez entrevistas a profundidad.

Rita Cachado

Gede Windu Laskara, Ni Made Mitha Mahastuti, Anak Agung Ngurah Aritama

The Candidasa Tourism Area and Tenganan Village are well-known tourist objects in Karangasem Regency, Bali, and are adjacent. Both have the potential to be integrated into pedestrian-friendly tourism areas. However, there are several problems regarding pedestrians and their paths that need to be addressed, such as safety, connectivity, and integrated transportation modes. Therefore, a study is required in order to formulate a strategy for developing a pedestrian-friendly tourism area in the Candidasa tourist area and Bali Aga Tenganan Village. This study uses a qualitative descriptive method by collecting data through surveys, field observations, interviews, and questionnaire distribution. The analysis was carried out in both areas, which were divided into 13 segments, discussing issues of land use, safe traffic, protection from possible crimes, pedestrian facilities, accessibility, aesthetics, and social support. Within, it is concluded that the development of a pedestrian-friendly tourist destination needs to pay attention to the development of tourist attractions, pedestrianised environment, and the overall management of the area. The proposed development strategy is based on the relationship between pedestrians and walkable-tourist neighbourhoods. The strategy focuses on increasing connectivity between the two areas and creating facilities to encourage tourists to walk. It is further recommended to develop a walkable tourist neighbourhood based on local genius and enhance the cultural characteristics of the area.  Keywords: Candidasa; development; pedestrians-oriented; strategy; Tenganan; tourism                                         Abstrak Kawasan Wisata Candidasa dan Desa Tenganan merupakan daerah tujuan wisata (DTW) yang terkenal di Kabupaten Karangasem, dengan lokasi yang saling berdekatan. DTW tersebut memiliki potensi untuk diintegrasikan menjadi kawasan pariwisata yang ramah pejalan kaki. Namun, terdapat beberapa permasalahan yang perlu diatasi, seperti faktor keselamatan pejalan, konektivitas jalur pedestrian, dan integrasi moda transportasi. Oleh karena itu, diperlukan suatu penelitian yang bertujuan untuk merumuskan strategi pengembangan kawasan pariwisata berbasis pejalan kaki di kawasan wisata tersebut. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode deskriptif kualitatif dengan pengumpulan data melalui survei, observasi lapangan, wawancara, dan pengisian kuesioner. Penelitian dilakukan pada 13 segmen dalam kawasan dengan analisa aspek antara lain guna lahan, keselamatan, keamanan, fasilitas pejalan, aksesibilitas, estetika lingkungan, dan dukungan sosial. Pengembangan kawasan pariwisata berbasis pejalan kaki perlu memperhatikan pengembangan daya tarik wisata, lingkungan pejalan kaki, dan pengelolaan. Strategi pengembangan diusulkan berdasarkan hubungan pejalan kaki dan lingkungannya, dengan fokus pada peningkatan konektivitas antara kedua kawasan. Strategi yang direkomendasikan adalah mengembangkan lingkungan wisata pejalan kaki berdasarkan kearifan lokal dan meningkatkan karakteristik budaya daerah tersebut. Kata kunci: Candidasa; pengembangan; pejalan kaki; strategi; Tenganan; pariwisata

Rosa Arma

A partir do relato sobre os processos de realojamento dos moradores do Bairro da Cruz Vermelha (bairro de habitação social em Lisboa) e do Bairro da Torre (bairro autoproduzido em Camarate, Loures), refletimos sobre a abordagem participativa a processos de realojamento de populações vulneráveis, comprometida em garantir o seu Direito à Habitação e ao Lugar, tal como descrito por Borja, que inscreve o Direito à Habitação no Direito à Cidade. O relato passa pela ‘voz’ dos sujeitos do estudo, que expressaram suas perceções e seus anseios em entrevistas, bem como no espetáculo de teatro comunitário Mágua di Nôs Partida (Bairro da Cruz Vermelha) e no mais recente processo de fotografia participativa com as crianças do Bairro da Torre.

Caterina Quaglio, Elena Todella, Isabella Lami

This article proposes an integration of methods and sources from the field of architectural design, on the one hand, and evaluation disciplines, on the other. By analysing some emerging trends in the residential demand, highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic but referable to phenomena characterised by much longer trajectories, the research aims to highlight certain criticalities and shortcomings in the current design and evaluation practices and to shed new light on the potential value of spaces that are typically underused – and underestimated – but highly transformable. The text thus introduces a critical-methodological reflection, which offers a new perspective for the study of neighbourhoods characterised by a high level of “peripheralisation”.

Scott W. Hegerty

U.S. metropolitan areas, particularly in the industrial Midwest and Northeast, are well-known for high levels of racial segregation. This is especially true where core cities end and suburbs begin; often crossing the street can lead to physically similar, but much less ethnically diverse, suburban neighborhood. While these differences are often visually or "intuitively" apparent, this study seeks to quantify them using Geographic Information Systems and a variety of statistical methods. 2016 Census block group data are used to calculate an ethnic Herfindahl index for a set of two dozen large U.S. cities and their contiguous suburbs. Then, a mathematical method is developed to calculate a block-group-level "Border Disparity Index" (BDI), which is shown to vary by MSA and by specific suburbs. Its values can be compared across the sample to examine which cities are more likely to have borders that separate more-diverse block groups from less-diverse ones. The index can also be used to see which core cities are relatively more or less diverse than their suburbs, and which individual suburbs have the largest disparities vis-à-vis their core city. Atlanta and Detroit have particularly diverse suburbs, while Milwaukee's are not. Regression analysis shows that income differences and suburban shares of Black residents play significant roles in explaining variation across suburbs.

Scott W. Hegerty

Decades of deindustrialization have led to economic decline and population loss throughout the U.S. Midwest, with the highest national poverty rates found in Detroit, Cleveland, and Buffalo. This poverty is often confined to core cities themselves, however, as many of their surrounding suburbs continue to prosper. Poverty can therefore be highly concentrated at the MSA level, but more evenly distributed within the borders of the city proper. One result of this disparity is that if suburbanites consider poverty to be confined to the central city, they might be less willing to devote resources to alleviate it. But due to recent increases in suburban poverty, particularly since the 2008 recession, such urban-suburban gaps might be shrinking. Using Census tract-level data, this study quantifies poverty concentrations for four "Rust Belt" MSAs, comparing core-city and suburban concentrations in 2000, 2010, and 2015. There is evidence of a large gap between core cities and outlying areas, which is closing in the three highest-poverty cities, but not in Milwaukee. A set of four comparison cities show a smaller, more stable city-suburban divide in the U.S. "Sunbelt," while Chicago resembles a "Rust Belt" metro.

Mohammad Reza Besharati, Mohammad Izadi

Smart Cities, with their problems and challenges, is an emerging smart paradigm. To achieve better quality and usability levels, we need engineering solutions to support smart cities' soft-layer development. Statics, dynamics and generative semantics are involved, but segregating Coordination Protocols from the other semantics could act as a complexity management strategy to tackle the inherent complexity of smart city systems. Here we demonstrate how we could engineer the protocols layer of a smart city by using a Reo-Based solution.

Gyorgy Csomos

Since the mid-1970s, it has become highly acknowledged to measure and evaluate changes in international research collaborations and the scientific performance of institutions and countries through the prism of bibliometric and scientometric data. Spatial bibliometrics and scientometrics (henceforward spatial scientometrics) have traditionally focused on examining both country and regional levels; however, in recent years, numerous spatial analyses on the city level have been carried out. While city-level scientometric analyses have gained popularity among policymakers and statistical/economic research organizations, researchers in the field of bibliometrics are divided regarding whether it is possible to observe the spatial unit 'city' through bibliometric and scientometric tools. After systematically scrutinizing relevant studies in the field, three major problems have been identified: 1) there is no standardized method of how cities should be defined and how metropolitan areas should be delineated, 2) there is no standardized method of how bibliometric and scientometric data on the city level should be collected and processed and 3) it is not clearly defined how cities can profit from the results of bibliometric and scientometric analysis focusing on them. This paper investigates major challenges ahead of spatial scientometrics, focusing on the city level and presents some possible solutions.

Haroldo V. Ribeiro, Andre S. Sunahara, Jack Sutton et al.

The current outbreak of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an unprecedented example of how fast an infectious disease can spread around the globe (especially in urban areas) and the enormous impact it causes on public health and socio-economic activities. Despite the recent surge of investigations about different aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic, we still know little about the effects of city size on the propagation of this disease in urban areas. Here we investigate how the number of cases and deaths by COVID-19 scale with the population of Brazilian cities. Our results indicate small towns are proportionally more affected by COVID-19 during the initial spread of the disease, such that the cumulative numbers of cases and deaths per capita initially decrease with population size. However, during the long-term course of the pandemic, this urban advantage vanishes and large cities start to exhibit higher incidence of cases and deaths, such that every 1% rise in population is associated with a 0.14% increase in the number of fatalities per capita after about four months since the first two daily deaths. We argue that these patterns may be related to the existence of proportionally more health infrastructure in the largest cities and a lower proportion of older adults in large urban areas. We also find the initial growth rate of cases and deaths to be higher in large cities; however, these growth rates tend to decrease in large cities and to increase in small ones over time.

Chidubem Iddianozie, Paulito Palmes

Building Management Systems (BMS) are crucial in the drive towards smart sustainable cities. This is due to the fact that they have been effective in significantly reducing the energy consumption of buildings. A typical BMS is composed of smart devices that communicate with one another in order to achieve their purpose. However, the heterogeneity of these devices and their associated meta-data impede the deployment of solutions that depend on the interactions among these devices. Nonetheless, automatically inferring the semantics of these devices using data-driven methods provides an ideal solution to the problems brought about by this heterogeneity. In this paper, we undertake a multi-dimensional study to address the problem of inferring the semantics of IoT devices using machine learning models. Using two datasets with over 67 million data points collected from IoT devices, we developed discriminative models that produced competitive results. Particularly, our study highlights the potential of Image Encoded Time Series (IETS) as a robust alternative to statistical feature-based inference methods. Leveraging just a fraction of the data required by feature-based methods, our evaluations show that this encoding competes with and even outperforms traditional methods in many cases.

Paul Kilgarriff, Rémi Lemoy, Geoffrey Caruso

Seen from a satellite, observing land use in the daytime or at night, most cities have circular shapes, organised around a city centre. A radial analysis of artificial land use growth is conducted in order to understand what the recent changes in urbanisation are across Europe and how it relates to city size. We focus on the most fundamental differentiation regarding urban land use: has it been artificialised for human uses (residence or roads for instance) or is it natural, or at least undeveloped? Using spatially detailed data from the EU Copernicus Urban Atlas, profiles of artificial land use (ALU) are calculated and compared between two years, 2006 and 2012. Based on the homothety of urban forms found by Lemoy and Caruso (2018), a simple scaling law is used to compare the internal structure of cities after controlling for population size. We firstly show that when using the FUA definition of cities, a kind of Gibrat's law for land use appears to hold. However, when we examine cities internally, this is no longer clear as there are differences on average between city size categories. We also look at further city groupings using regions and topography to show that artificial land use growth across European cities is not homogeneous. Our findings have important implications relative to the sustainability of cities as this evidence is pointing towards increasing urban sprawl and stagnant growth in urban centres across cities of all sizes. It also has theoretical implications on the nature of sprawl and its scaling with city size.

Surya Putra, I Nyoman Widya Paramadhyaksa, Tri Anggraini Prajnawrdhi

Non-permanent trading activities in the area around Badung Market, Denpasar City, Bali Province caused several problems such as obstructed vehicle traffic and pedestrian access, as well as giving a poor visual impression. The aforementioned problems form the basis of this research so that it can be studied how the pattern of non-permanent trading occurs, and how the background of non-permanent trading activities around Badung Market formed. This study aims to determine the pattern of non-permanent trading activities in the area around the Badung Market and factors underlying the non-permanent trading activities around Badung Market. The research method used is a qualitative research method with a naturalistic approach. The results of this study indicate the pattern of non-permanent trading activities which is concentrated in a particular function and the background of how non-permanent trading activities formed caused by several factors such as licensing factors. This research is expected to be useful as a reference for the Denpasar City Government in drafting local regulations in the future so that it can realize temporary trading activities in the area around the Badung Market which has visual beauty and does not impede the flow of vehicle traffic. Keywords: public space; non-permanent traders; Badung market Abstrak Kegiatan berdagang tidak tetap di area sekitar Pasar Badung, Kota Denpasar, Provinsi Bali menyebabkan beberapa permasalahan seperti terhambatnya lalu lintas kendaraan dan akses pejalan kaki, serta memberi kesan visual yang kurang baik. Permasalahan tersebut menjadi landasan penelitian ini dilakukan agar dapat dipelajari bagaimana pola berdagang tidak tetap terjadi, serta bagaimana latar belakang kegiatan berdagang tidak tetap di sekitar Pasar Badung terbentuk. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui pola berdagang tidak tetap di area sekitar Pasar Badung serta faktor-faktor yang melatarbelakangi kegiatan berdagang tidak tetap di sekitar Pasar Badung. Metode penelitian yang digunakan adalah metode penelitian kualitatif dengan pendekatan naturalistik. Hasil penelitian ini menunjukkan pola berdagang tidak tetap yang terkonsentrasi pada suatu fungsi tertentu dan latar belakang terbentuknya kegiatan berdagang tidak tetap disebabkan oleh beberapa faktor seperti faktor perizinan. Penelitian ini diharapkan dapat bermanfaat sebagai acuan Pemerintah Kota Denpasar dalam menyusun peraturan daerah kedepannya sehingga dapat terwujud kegiatan berdagang tidak tetap di area sekitar Pasar Badung yang memiliki keindahan visual dan tidak menghambat kelancaran lalu lintas kendaraan. Kata kunci: ruang publik; pedagang tidak tetap; Pasar Badung

Stefano Della Torre

«Cities are a product of time. They are the moulds in which men’s lifetimes have cooled and congealed» (Munford, 1938). This Munford’s sentence, divided in two short phrases linked to each other, puts Time at the centre of the reflections on the city. I deem it is quite legitimate and consistent with the kind invitation to comment, although maybe unforeseen to transfer this reflection from the topic of the city to architecture meant at all levels. The main reason of interest of the sentence can be found in the tight relationship that summing up the two phrases Munford establishes between Time and «men’s lifetimes»: put otherwise, between Time and the users, but also the soul of cities, and of architecture as well (Munford, 1938). Actually, the two parts of the sentence may even seem contradictory. In the second phrase, Munford uses an intriguing metaphor, that is city as a mould, the matrix that gives shape to men’s lives, because it builds limits and directs their attitudes. Men’s lifetimes, obviously in previous eras, in this mould took their shapes and apparently by their solidifying became something tangible, and a somehow monumental presence, as we are going to see. The idea of a mould evokes something definitely solid and complete, a concrete and almost nondeformable reference system.  If one reads only the second period, it would be possible to think that the shape given as the city was planned got the power to condition and rule the human activities. Undoubtedly, living in some urban environments designed by the architect with strong authorship (I am thinking of the Bicocca quarter in Milan) could produce alienation and depression. But according to Munford the city is produced by life itself, as time goes on. This idea that time can “produce” may sound amazing. In Greek mythology, that is in the basic foundation of Western thinking, Chronos was born as the god of seasons and fertility of agricultural cycles, but then became the one who eats his own children, the «all-subduing Time» (Simonides of Ceos) that threats memory. Nevertheless, writing this sentence Munford imagines a time that works positively, building and strengthening. This time is not even the mighty sculptor described by Marguerite Yourcenar, which ultimately seems more the power of the nature that carves, marks, sculpts «by taking away». (Yourcenar, 2005). Instead, Munford’s time rather works by addition, shape, models, casts, giving durable substance to men’s lifetime. Therefore, the shaping action of urban space works through a becoming, which thanks to the interaction between the urban structure and the life builds the city that human beings, the future citizens, will experience. Summing up, if the city is a product of time, the city, the mould itself, is born by becoming, and its shaping action has nothing deterministic. Indeed, if one goes on reading that page of “The culture of cities” it becomes clear that men’s lifetimes get their durable shape through art, generating moments which can be involving and long-lasting, but also renewable. In the city, time becomes visible: buildings and monuments engage many persons but above all, times stratify, clash, challenge each other until «modern man invents the museum» as a tool for order and apparently also for freedom from the burden of history. From Munford’s sentence, extracted from a seminal book, which inspired many of ours (including me), an important lesson can still be learnt, but today it is also possible to take some distance. The lesson I deem forever timely is about understanding the city as where the footprints of age, of several ages, stratify, challenge each other and clash. These dynamics are exactly what gives the city its character, exactly as a place is a city as it is open to the stranger, not suspiciously closed. Its openness makes the city where innovation happens; its density of memories makes the city an inspiring location.  In this perspective, on the basis of this understanding of the idea of city, the famous and often cited aphorism by Kark Kraus, saying that the great historic Vienna was once new, reveals all its brilliant vacuity: the process through which Vindobona’s urban plan became real took some time, and before the streets and parcels scheme could perform as a “mould”, the power of time already changed the plan into an experienced and alive reality; time’s shaping action in Munford’s sense had already been exercised, maybe even time’s sculpting action in Yourcenar’s sense already happened. One of the most enlightening games, whilst studying cities with ancient layouts, is exactly to go beyond the first recognition of the planned scheme, to detect old exceptions, the curved paths that signify the occupancy of previous voids or the privatization of large public structures. From these analyses, the city comes out as a product of «the great hope of an organic becoming», as Gianfranco Caniggia would say; a product of a typological process, in which spatial, cultural, juridical, economic relationships produce the configuration of the space and the construction of the whole and its parts.  (Caniggia, 1992). Thus understood, the physical structure of the city cannot be divided from the collective action of the citizens and their presence. The city is something that cannot be reduced to its form, it is built up by unforeseen human gestures, as well as by the presence of human beings. By the way, I’d like to take, from Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, the case of Bauci (Calvino, 1972), built on pileworks so that inhabitants could stay «contemplating with fascination their own absence». In my opinion, a warning on the absurdity of the city empty and metaphysical, which photographers of (metaphysical) architecture love so much, but gives an odd idea of city, or at least an idea pretty far from the concept of the open and alive city that Munford preached to generations, since 1938 till today.  Including users among the determinant factors of the urban scene is a crucial step, which taking some risk we can transfer from the urban to the architectural scale. Vitality, openness, dynamics, change: these are the keywords consistent with thinking cities as a product of time, appreciating their imperfection. Avoiding to give into the temptation to discuss the concept itself of time, the reasoning we are developing clearly evoke a quote by a popular scientist as Ilya Prigogine, who took the city as a metaphor opposed to the crystal, in order to explain some aspects of his vision, usually cited as «from Being to Becoming» (Prigogine, 1986). The disordered and productive vitality of the city is opposed to the determinism of the crystal: beautiful, immutable in its isomorphism, ready for a shooting session for a photographer specialized in still-life, or (metaphysical) architecture. The crystal is not affected by time and does not promise anything more than its own perfection. When Giò Ponti asked to love architecture saying that «architecture is a crystal», he was not laying, he was asserting a poetics, the vision of an architecture allergic to imperfection and change (Ponti, 1957). Here the change of scale is ambitious, but significant. Thinking the city as a place to live is easier, to give up thinking architecture as something to be forever conserved as brand new, made to challenge time and not to grow with it. Yet even the building gets substance by memories through time, by layered signs, by an evolving and growing sense of place. To think buildings as crystals turns into a limit, thinking them as cities opens to many opportunities, also for their future transformations, for a creative reuse, for a conservation not to be reduced to embalming or freezing. Going back to Munford’s metaphor, in Ponti’s and many others’ vision the mould is what matters, men’s lifetimes, because of their own creativity risk to impair the given perfection. The overlapping of many layers or periods makes conflicts, such as even according to Munford’s it turns into an insufferable burden: the excess of life and memory would become a threat for life itself, if a part of the memory would not be made harmless by closing it into the museum. As Munford says: «then, in sheer defence, modern man invents the museum». Modestly speaking, I am afraid I know directly and in detail several municipal museums, in various towns and cities, full of relics of old quarters demolished by the 19th and 20th century urban renewal. Museums for consolation, born to make illusion about conservation, pretending to keep alive through few selected exhibits the memory of much more complex stories. Or archaeological museums, which all around the Mediterranean Sea by some findings randomly gathered give the excuse to real estate speculative operations in protected areas. Therefore, I am not available to accept, not even in Munford’s book, the good old common sense, which supports sentences, such as «remembering everything, one goes crazy», or «conserving everything, it’s like getting plastered». Considering the footprints of the past, conserving them, doesn’t at all mean freezing the status quo: it means managing change in an open and farsighted way. In reality, the frequent conflicts between innovation and protection of heritage tend to vanish, if the past is understood with care and curiosity, and the new is evaluated on the long term and not on ephemeral needs. Most of the urban transformations we have witnessed proved to be inadequate after few decades, making everybody regret the demolition of what got lost or just represented in the museum. And I am not speaking of romantic nostalgia, but of serious evaluations of economic convenience. Lessons to be learnt, to free ourselves not from memories, but from common sense, which is the true insufferable straitjacket. Stepping again to the architectural scale, how many times did the approach to existing buildings have the target of reordering reality steering it to perfection? Well, if architecture as well is the product of time, if architecture as well becomes inspiring for life thanks to the layering in the lived spaces of the sings of so many periods, the capacity is needed to appreciate becoming and imperfection as values. It is mandatory to look elsewhere to find new metaphors: for instance, in natural history as Steven J. Gould told, and Telmo Pievani tells pointing out the signs of ongoing evolution as the promise of a future that will be determined not by the triumph of entropy, but by the progress of coevolution (Gould, 2012; Pievani, 2019).