Research | Department of Urban and Regional Planning

Outdoor restaurant seating with colorful umbrellas lines both sides of a street in a lively urban area. People are dining, palm trees line the street, and old brick buildings and blue sky are visible in the background.

Reclaiming Urban Spaces in the COVID-Era and Beyond

Dr. Ruth Steiner views COVID-related challenges as an opportunity to reimagine the use of public spaces.

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Two small wooden houses with peeling paint stand near a large tree draped in Spanish moss. The houses are on a patchy grassy area beside a paved road, with more trees and buildings in the background.

Shimberg Center for Housing Studies Employs URP Students

At the Shimberg Center, URP doctoral and master’s students manage statewide housing data and conduct studies about the housing-transportation relationship, the pandemic’s impacts on housing vulnerability, and housing flood risk.

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A group of people stands on a wooden pavilion, listening to a man speaking. The group faces the speaker, and a nature scene with green grass and trees is visible outside. A poster is displayed behind the speaker.

Green Infrastructure in Planning Curricula

URP’s Dr. Christopher Silver and scholars from the United Kingdom make the case for planning programs to teach about green infrastructure (GI) to advance sustainability goals. They found UF’s School of Landscape Architecture and Planning stands out for providing interdisciplinary education about GI.

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The sun rises over the curved horizon of Earth, casting a bright golden glow against the planet’s blue edge, with stars visible in the dark space above.

Microsoft AI for Earth Grant

A team led by URP doctoral candidate Wei Zhai and Professor Zhong-Ren Peng received a prestigious Microsoft grant to understand human mobility during extreme weather events.

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A woman with long brown hair, wearing a navy blue and white floral blazer, white top, pearl necklace, and pearl earrings, sits indoors in a well-lit room with tan walls and modern furniture.

ACSP Diversity Award Given to URP Doctoral Student

Afsheen Sadaf is the recipient of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning’s 2020 Marsha Ritzdorf Award for Best Student Work on Diversity, Social Justice and the Role of Women in Planning.

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A person with short black hair and glasses smiles outdoors, wearing a beige trench coat and a black turtleneck. Green grass and leafless trees are in the background under a clear blue sky.

Meet Dr. Yan Wang

Assistant Professor Wang develops data-informed planning for smart resilient cities.

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A tablet screen displays Google search results for COVID-19 map, showing news articles and maps tracking the spread of the coronavirus. A smartphone screen is partially visible on the left side.

NSF Funds Covid-19 Misinformation Study

Dr. Yan Wang received a grant from the National Science Foundation to study misinformation and risk communication during the coronavirus pandemic.

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People wearing face masks wait at a crosswalk on a city street lined with tall buildings. Traffic lights are red, and a one-way sign is visible. The sky is cloudy, suggesting an overcast day.

Investigating Covid-19 Patterns in Cities

Dr. Emre Tepe is studying the spatial and temporal relationships between Covid-19 cases and urban characteristics.

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A painting depicts an early 1900s rural road with old cars, a horse-drawn hay wagon, an electric streetcar, and people gathered along the roadside holding American flags under a partly cloudy sky.

Rural Planning in the Early 1900s

Dr. Kathryn Frank examined rural planning during the United States Progressive Era to see how planners simultaneously built communities and increased economic efficiency.

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A busy city street lined with tall buildings, several yellow taxis in traffic, street signs, and traffic lights. The sky is overcast and pedestrians are visible on the sidewalks.

Measuring Citywide Transportation Efficiency

Doctoral students Wei Zhai and Xueyin Bai, and Dr. Zhong-Ren Peng, developed a bottom-up approach to measuring transportation efficiency with a case study of New York City taxis.

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