Engineering

Disasters triggered by environmental hazards impact urbanized areas worldwide to increasing degrees. There is an urgent need to deal not only with disaster, but climate change as well. The challenge is to ensure the sustainability of the built environment and the communities that inhabit it. Recent efforts such as the RBD competition, initiated after Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast of the United States in 2012, offer the opportunity to discuss this topic, its societal character, and its relevance for planning and design disciplines. REBUILD BY DESIGN MUNICH approaches the topic in an interdisciplinary way by presenting and discussing core aims, facts, and terms. The aims of the exhibition and symposium are to present current planning and design initiatives that deal with rebuilding after disaster, adaptation, and „building back better“, to illustrate international case studies that indicate why „context matters“ and to discuss the core themes of risk reduction, climate adaptation, resilience and vulnerability. Planners and designers need to better understand the interdisciplinary challenge of this topic in order to propose and develop projects that are sustainable and just. Peers and researchers in related disciplines as well as the general public need to know more on how planners and designers envision risk reduction and climate adaptation. Spanning practice and theory in an innovative and integrative manner, REBUILD BY DESIGN MUNICH is oriented towards a broad audience including the interested public, practitioners, scholars and students alike from disciplines in planning and design for the built environment.