Geneviève Vachon

Implementing Transdisciplinarity: Architecture and Urban Planning at Work

In the chapter “Implementing Transdisciplinarity: Architecture and Urban Planning at Work”, Carole Despres, Genevieve Vachon and Andree Fortin develop the aforementioned argument that architecture and planning are predisposed disciplines and professions for implementing transdisciplinarity. They argue this by describing how GIRBa (Interdisciplinary Research Group on Suburbs in Quebec City, Canada) has managed to make operational this mode of knowledge production by issuing back and forth between practice-based research and evidence-based design through collaborative processes, in order to identify strategies for countering urban sprawl and its negative consequences on sustainability. This chapter relates how a transdisciplinary program of research and action gradually and almost naturally emerged as GIRBa’s understanding of the complexity and multidimensionality of this space-related problem accumulated. The group went from the distinct production of interdisciplinary research, architectural and urban design schemes, and contractual applied research, to an integrated program of research and action where each type of knowledge nourishes each other in a truly transdisciplinary manner. The limitations and strengths of GIRBa’s work are highlighted; namely its limited power within academia to implement design solutions and policies, in contrast with its assured capacity to empower decision-makers and future generations of architects, planners and social scientists with an understanding of the complexity of urban problems, and a concrete experience of how to operate within a transdisciplinary mode of knowledge production to identify solutions. Challenges facing both academic programmes and professional organisations in terms of revising teaching models and training methods conclude the chapter.

Retrofitting Postwar Suburbs: A Collaborative Design Process

This chapter reports on the transdisciplinary process initiated, structured and orchestrated by the Interdisciplinary Research Group on Suburbs (GIRBa) between September 2002 and November 2003 with the goal of redefining the future of postwar neighbourhoods in the City of Quebec.