IOC Affiliates Published and Presented Research on Housing and Eviction Protections

Recently, Boston University Initiative on Cities affiliates Dr. Molly Richard, a Postdoctoral Scholar at Boston University’s Center for Innovation in Social Science (CISS), and Dr. Kenton Card, an IOC Visiting Urban Scholar and current Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs (CURA) at the University of Minnesota, prominently shared their insights […]

New Publication: “From heat racism and heat gentrification to urban heat justice in the USA and Europe”

A new article published in Nature Cities examines urban heat issues through new lenses of inequality, calling for researchers to bridge the gap between heat management and institutional discrimination. Focusing on the Global North, the authors, including IOC Director Loretta Lees and External Advisory Board Member Isabelle Anguelovski, argue that researchers and planners must consider […]

2024 Greater Boston Housing Report Card

The Initiative on Cities Co-Authors the 2024 Greater Boston Housing Report Card Special Analysis on Using Public Land to Develop Affordable Housing Greater Boston’s well-publicized housing challenges continue, even as communities work to change zoning rules to comply with the state’s new MBTA Communities requirements. A lack of new construction, high interest rates, and changing […]

IOC Co-Authors New Commentary on Highway Reclamation Impacts on Population Health

Boston University Assistant Professor of Epidemiology and IOC BU Urbanist Mary Willis (SPH), alongside co-authors Fintan Mooney (SPH), Professor of Epidemiology Jennifer Weuve (SPH), IOC Director Loretta Lees (CAS), and IOC Executive Director Stacy Fox, contributed to a new commentary in the Journal of Urban Health that proposes a framework for evaluating the multidimensional impacts of […]

Initiative on Cities Releases 2024 Annual Report

The Boston University Initiative on Cities (IOC) is proud to release its 2024 Annual Report — marking 10 years since our founding and commitment to the betterment of cities.  The achievements over the past year underscore our center’s dedication to serving as an interdisciplinary hub for urbanists, bridging research and practice, and leading place-based experiential […]

New Publication: “Operationalizing climate justice in the implementation of Boston’s Building Performance Standard”

Dr. Claudia Diezmartínez, Professor Benjamin Sovacool, and Associate Professor Anne Short Gianotti have published a new paper on Nature Cities that analyzes the politics and processes of implementing climate justice plans in urban governments. Read the full abstract here: “Cities are moving toward the implementation of more just urban climate actions, but the politics and […]