Concrete Cities: Why We Need to Build Differently

Description

Global building and construction cultures are hard-wired to constructing too much, too badly, with major social and ecological consequences. Rob Imrie calls us to build less and to build better as a pre-requisite for enhancing welfare and well-being. This accessible critique of urban construction reimagines city development and life in an era of unprecedented building. Exploring the proliferation of building and construction, Imrie sets out its many degrading impacts on both people and the environment. Using examples from around the world, he illustrates how construction is motivated by economic and political ideologies rather than actual need, and calls for a more sensitive, humane, and nature-focused culture of construction. This compelling book calls for radical changes to city living and environments by building less, but better.

Rob Imrie was previously Professor of Sociology at Goldsmiths University of London and retains a Visiting Professorship there. He has published widely on issues relating to architecture, urban design, and urban politics and regeneration.

"Rob Imrie's book puts the modern building industry's uncaring nature under critical scrutiny...Scattered with images of architecture to supplement the text, it provides fascinating visual material to think with. Imrie's Concrete Cities exhorts the general public to demand more transparency and accountability for public and private sector building projects." Buildings & Cities