UMD Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/3
New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a given thesis/dissertation in DRUM.
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item Interwoven Communities: Reconnecting the Generations Through Forgotten Suburban Landscapes(2021) Dayao, Philip; Akinsade, Olumide; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The focus of this thesis looks to explore the use of dying shopping malls as a vehicle for creating multigenerational placemaking.Item Geodesign and the Expression of Environmental Values: A Mixed Methods Evaluation(2020) Kuniholm, Matthew Whitney; Geores, Martha; Geography; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)There is a stark contrast between professed environmental values and actual action taken to express those values. This ‘value-action gap’ limits the extent to which individuals enact both simple and collective actions to address critical and declining environmental trends ranging from global climate change to species loss and habitat degradation. While conceptual models positing individual and institutional approaches to overcome the value-action gap do exist, they minimize the complexity of socio-environmental challenges, on the one hand, or the importance of individual action, on the other. This dissertation evaluates an alternative approach to overcoming the value-action gap using a participatory form of environmental design and planning known as geodesign. Despite its apparent benefits, the geodesign approach remains under-theorized and largely unevaluated from the geographic perspective. Using a taxonomic review of geodesign practice and two case studies, this dissertation critically evaluates geodesign practice, identifies opportunities to improve its participatory characteristics, and positions the geodesign framework for use in participatory action research. The results show that the geographic concept of place and theory of place making can improve geodesign practice, account for its current limitations, and explain its hypothesized role in overcoming the value-action gap.Item Ledroit Park, A Portrait In Black And White: A Study Of Historic Districts, Social Change, And The Process Of Neighborhood Placemaking(2016) Henry, Christine Rae; Linebaugh, Donald W.; Urban and Regional Planning and Design; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This research examines the process of placemaking in LeDroit Park, a residential Washington, DC, neighborhood with a historic district at its core. Unpacking the entwined physical and social evolution of the small community within the context of the Nation’s Capital, this analysis provides insight into the role of urban design and development as well as historic designation on shaping collective identity. Initially planned and designed in 1873 as a gated suburb just beyond the formal L’Enfant-designed city boundary, LeDroit Park was intended as a retreat for middle and upper-class European Americans from the growing density and social diversity of the city. With a mixture of large romantic revival mansions and smaller frame cottages set on grassy plots evocative of an idealized rural village, the physical design was intentionally inwardly-focused. This feeling of refuge was underscored with a physical fence that surrounded the development, intended to prevent African Americans from nearby Howard University and the surrounding neighborhood, from using the community’s private streets to access the City of Washington. Within two decades of its founding, LeDroit Park was incorporated into the District of Columbia, the surrounding fence was demolished, and the neighborhood was racially integrated. Due to increasingly stringent segregation laws and customs in the city, this period of integration lasted less than twenty years, and LeDroit Park developed into an elite African American enclave, using the urban design as a bulwark against the indignities of a segregated city. Throughout the 20th century housing infill and construction increased density, yet the neighborhood never lost the feeling of security derived from the neighborhood plan. Highlighting the architecture and street design, neighbors successfully received historic district designation in 1974 in order to halt campus expansion. After a stalemate that lasted two decades, the neighborhood began another period of transformation, both racial and socio-economic, catalyzed by a multi-pronged investment program led by Howard University. Through interviews with long-term and new community members, this investigation asserts that the 140-year development history, including recent physical interventions, is integral to placemaking, shaping the material character as well as the social identity of residents.Item Intervening in place: A response to evolving urban coastlines.(2013) Joerdens, Eric Guest; Noonan, Peter; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The beginning of the Anthropocene signals awareness of human's ecological impact on the planet. With emerging technology, knowledge, and theory how can we re-design our built environment to align with ecological parameters? This thesis studies how architecture meets the needs of humans while honoring a place's environment. Through studying sea-level rise and urban areas, a hypothetical program emerges. A new institution is form around the Chesapeake Bay's rising seas and loss of heritage. A new museum of archaeology is sited in Annapolis, Maryland. Around Ego Alley ideas of place-making and regeneration are examined. The place formed around the institution is intended to adapt and utilize rising waters, while attempting to mitigate its' own greenhouse gas emissions.Item Sustainable Placemaking: Restoring the Vitality of Underutilized Infrastructure(2013) Taylor, Michael David; Bovill, Carl; Simon, Madlen; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)A city experiences natural manipulation through time as the demographics, economy, technology, and industry evolve. As a result, formally prominent sites and buildings become neglected. This thesis explores a model of sustainable placemaking that adaptively reuses currently underutilized infrastructure to sponsor a restored definition of place for a community. I will illustrate how a small town has the opportunity to inform the larger society that living in a self-sustaining localized environment is achievable. The model of sustainable placemaking is illustrated through a case study in Frederick, Maryland. This historically sensitive, yet progressive, city offers exemplary circumstances of how a modest sized town, attentive to preserving its historical heritage, can incorporate sustainability. My study focuses on a blighted area, adjacent to a newly developed pedestrian creek front, to demonstrate how the City of Frederick can revitalize its sense of place with the sustainable redevelopment of existing underutilized infrastructure.