British Council Researcher Links: Workshop on managing complex social housing urban redevelopment through improved project management and value generation
UK coordinator: Professor Patricia Tzortzopoulos Fazenda (University of Huddersfield, UK)
Brazil coordinator: Professor Carlos Torres Formoso (Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil)
Disciplines: Built Environment, Construction Management, Urban Planning
Dates and venue: 16th May – 20th May 2016, campus of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil
Under the Researcher Links scheme offered within the Newton Fund, we held a workshop on the above theme in Porto Alegre, Brazil, from 16th of May to the 20th of May 2016.
The workshop was coordinated by Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos Fazenda from the University of Huddersfield, UK, and Professor Carlos Torres Formoso, from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, with contributions by other leading researchers.
Grant
The British Council covered the costs related to the participation to the workshop, including: travel (both international and local), accommodation and meals.
About the Workshop
There is significant evidence that urban redevelopment programmes for social housing are often inappropriate for users’ needs and fail to deliver the expected socio-economic benefits. Issues in managing such complex programmes set back economic development and directly affect the most vulnerable in society. Causes include inadequate planning; limited collaboration and excessive focus on low initial cost solutions. Improvement strategies are needed to enable better housing, infrastructure, safety and job opportunities. Better platforms for knowledge sharing will enable stakeholders to collectively understand these challenges, to improve integration between different projects, and to critically reflect on existing experiences.
This workshop brought together Brazilian and UK early career researchers to build capacity, contributing to innovative research on such issues. The workshop will stimulate long-term collaboration to tackle this critical challenge by sharing results of previous studies and devising a research roadmap. The workshop focused on the complexity of social urban redevelopment programmes and social housing provision. A research roadmap for the management of complex urban redevelopment programmes and for the evaluation of social housing projects will be developed, setting out the major challenges and opportunities for improvement and better value creation for users. This includes considering the needs of target communities, which today live in conditions below minimum standards. Also, the need for a framework to support the integration of programmes that are fragmented into different projects will be discussed, including considerations of how tools such as Building Information Modelling can support the visualisation of complex urban level data.
Features of the workshop included:
- Keynote presentations by leading academics and by practitioners involved in the management of social housing projects and urban redevelopment programmes
- Early career researcher presentations on current and emerging research
- Group work and activities aimed at sharing knowledge and promoting international and multi-disciplinary research
- A collection of abstracts published as the workshop proceedings
- Development of outline action plans for immediate (within one year), short-term (one to three years) and long-term (three to five years) research work
- A research road map based on the working group discussions, inter-disciplinary work required and major challenges and opportunities.
- All materials delivered during the workshop will be made available as open education resources permitting no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others.
- Online sessions for participants will be organised after 6 months and one year after completing the workshop.
Coordinators and Mentors

Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos
Director of the Innovative Design Lab research centre
University of Huddersfield

Professor Carlos Torres Formoso
Professor in Construction Management
Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul

Prof Mike Kagioglou
Dean of Engineering
Western Sydney University

Prof Lauri Koskela
Professor of Construction and Project Management
University of Huddersfield

Dr Luciana Miron
Department of Architecture and Graduate Program in Urban and Regional Planning (
Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul

Professor Eduardo Isatto
Associate Professor
Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul
Organisers and funding
Innovative Design Lab
University of Huddersfield
United Kingdom
Organiser
NORIE
Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul
Brazil
Organiser
British Council
Newton Fund
United Kingdom
Funding body
Book of Abstracts
Day One: 16th May 2016 - Getting to know each other (Hotel Embaixador)
From | To | Co-ordinators | Activity | |
---|---|---|---|---|
09:00 | 09:15 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos and Prof Carlos Formoso |
Opening Session (1.6MB) Opening Session (689KB) |
|
09:15 | 10:15 | Prof Lauri Koskela | Keynote presentation: The management of complex projects (828KB) | It will address shortcomings in the management of complex projects in construction and identifies existing theories and practices in other sectors |
10:15 | 10:45 | Speed networking session | Participants to get to know each other | |
10:45 | 11:00 | Coffee break | ||
11:00 | 12:00 | Dr Eduardo Isatto | Pecha Kucha: Brazilian ECRs | Brazilian ECRs will present their research, using a PechaKucha 10x20 presentation format, in which each participant shows 10 images, each for 20 seconds |
12:00 | 13:00 | Lunch | ||
13:00 | 14:00 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos | Pecha Kucha: UK ECRs | UK ECRs will present their research, using a PechaKucha 10x20 presentation format, as explained above |
14:00 | 15:00 | Prof Mike Kagioglou and Dr Luciana Miron | Developing your research profile (954KB) | Individuals will outline their career stage, what their aspirations are and how they aim to develop their career. Mentors will facilitate focusing on how to improve individual profile |
15:00 | 15:15 | Coffee break | ||
15:15 | 16:15 | Prof Lauri Koskela and Prof Carlos Formoso |
Skills development session (4.7MB) |
Focusng on selection of a research topic and method; academic writing and successful journal publications |
16:15 | 16:45 | Prof Márcio Valença | Keynote presentation: Social Housing and Urban Development in Brazil (8.9MB) | Prof Márcio Valença will outline the main challenges in social urban redevelopments, followed by a discussion with ECRs |
16:45 | 17:00 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos and Prof Carlos Formoso | Close |
Day Two: 17th May 2016 - Seminar on Social Housing and Urban Redevelopment Projects (3rd Floor, Centenário Building, School of Engineering, UFRGS Main Campus)
From | To | Co-ordinators | Activity | |
---|---|---|---|---|
09:00 | 09:15 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos, Prof Carlos Formoso, Prof Luiz C.P. Silva Filho and Prof Mike Kagioglou | Opening Session | |
09:15 | 11:00 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos and Dr Luciana Miron | Panel: Challenges and current landscapes of urban development projects in Brazil |
Minha Casa Minha Vida Programme and National Housing System by Marcio Valença (UFRN) (479KB) Regularization of Urban Land in Vila Hípica, Cristal District, Porto Alegre/RS by Miriam Fernandes (DEMHAB) (3MB) Brazilian Institute of Architects view on the Social Housing in Brazil by Tiago Holzmann (IAB/RS) (3MB) Minha Casa Minha Vida by Nivea Oppermann (WRI) (767KB) |
11:00 | 11:15 | Coffee break | ||
11:15 | 12:00 | Dr Carlos Formoso | Keynote presentation: Value generation in social housing developments (3.3MB) | This session examines methods to assess the impacts of social housing urban developments. It emphasises the inadequacy of traditional project management practices for complex projects |
12:00 | 14:00 | Lunch | ||
14:00 | 14:45 | Prof James Barlow | Keynote presentation: The new healthcare agenda - why housing matters (2.9MB) | This session explores the challenges in delivering the twin benefit of better housing and better healthcare |
14:45 | 15:30 | Prof Mike Kagioglou | Keynote presentation: How can benefits be realised in highly changeable/flexible (1.1MB) | Discusses projects delivering expected benefits to communities, presenting a framework which supports teams to focus on delivering benefits |
15:30 | 16:00 | Coffee break | ||
16:00 | 16:45 | Prof Luiz A. Bressani and Prof Luiz C. P. Silva Filho |
Keynote presentation: Disaster risk management in urban areas in Brazil Landslides in urban areas types causes interventions (3.8MB) |
This presentation will present an overview of the activities carried out by the Disaster Risk Management Lab (GRID), UFRGS |
16:45 | 17:00 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos | Close |
Day Three: 18th May 2016 - Building capacity for the delivery of benefits through social housing programmes (Hotel Embaixador)
From | To | Co-ordinators | Activity | |
---|---|---|---|---|
09:00 | 09:15 | Prof Carlos Formoso | Opening session | |
09:15 | 10:00 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos |
Selecting a research topic (511KB) |
Discusses the concept of evidence based design and its application to social urban development projects |
10:00 | 11:00 | Prof Lauri Koskela and Dr Eduardo Isatto | Skills development session (623KB) | This session will encourage ECRs to consider challenges associated with multi-discipllnary working, as well as the advantages and issues in prescriptive and descriptive research |
11:00 | 11:15 | Coffee break | ||
11:15 | 12:00 | Prof Mike Kagioglou and Prof Carlos Formoso | Good practices for applying for research grants including funding opportunities will be discussed | |
12:00 | 13:00 | Lunch | ||
13:00 | 14:00 | All mentors | Roundtable discussions | Enables targeted discussions around areas of relevance to social urban development projects, led by all mentors. ECRs will be divided into groups based on their research interest, designed to encourage working across disciplines between countries |
14:00 | 14:30 | All mentors | Plenary session | Summary of discussions - to be further presented on day 5 |
14:30 | 14:45 | Coffee break | ||
14:45 | 16:45 | All mentors | Building the research roadmap | Mentors will form Working Groups for key research themes emerged earlier on needs and gaps identification. Participants will develop outline action plans for the short, medium and long terms |
16:45 | 17:00 | Close |
Day Four: 19th May 2016 - Site visit to social housing developments
09:00 | 11:00 | Visit to PIEC | This is a social housing urban redevelopment programme which has been on-going for over 10 years, with extensive research by UFRGS |
11:30 | 12:30 | Lunch | |
13:00 | 16:00 | Visit to MCMV projects | MCMV (My House My Life) has been the most important social housing programme in Brazil |
Day Five: 20th May 2016 - Research impact and future collaboration (2nd Floor, Centenário Building, School of Engineering, UFRGS Main Campus)
From | To | Co-ordinators | Activity | |
---|---|---|---|---|
09:00 | 09:15 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos and Prof Carlos Formoso | Opening session | |
09:15 | 10:15 | Prof Mike Kagioglou | Plenary session | Each working group will present the themes of the day 3 roundtable discussions. Mentors will identify and evaluate key emerging research needs and capacity gaps |
10:15 | 10:30 | Coffee break | ||
10:30 | 12:30 | Prof Lauri Koskela | Presenting the outline action plans to the audience | Working groups will present proposed future joint activities. Mentors will offer constructive advice, along with the input from practitioners |
12:30 | 13:30 | Lunch | ||
13:30 | 14:30 | Prof Mike Kagioglou and Prof Carlos Formoso | Panel: Pathways to impact | Open discussion on evidence based policy and research to improve the development of low-income commmunities |
14:30 | 15:10 | Camila Almeida | Opportunities for Research Funding for cooperation with the UK (1.3MB) | Representative of BCRL funding organization.: Introduction of the Newton fund in Brazil and researcher/institutional links |
15:10 | 15:20 | Coffee break | ||
15:20 | 16:30 | Dr Luciana Miron | Public engagement exercise and coffee break (1.7MB) | ERCs will be asked to produce short presentations/visual devices like posters to showcase the research roadmap to the wider audience |
16:30 | 17:00 | Prof Patricia Tzortzopoulos and Prof Carlos Formoso | Future collaboration and close |
Pecha Kucha: Brazilian ECRs
Pecha Kucha: UK ECRs
Speaker | Paper |
---|---|
Yufan Zhang | A Holistic View of Healthcare Buildings and its Impact on Occupants Wellbeing (1.1MB) |
Nuwan Tharanga Dias | Development of a community embedded sustainable urban design process framework (752KB) |
Ezri Hayat |
Evaluation of local governements capacity in the maintenance of post disaster... (630KB) |
Effiness C. Mpakati Gama | Life cycle analysis of embodied energy and carbon of urban residential ... (1.3MB) |
Gayan Wedawatta | Long term performance of post disaster housing (1.4MB) |
Helena Rivera | Medellin Urban Innovation (10.2MB) |
Martin Morgan Tuuli | Resilient infrastructure delivery (1.6MB) |
Amal Abuzeinab | Understanding social housing business models in relation to sustainability (1MB) |
Ioanni Delsante | Urban Quality assessment and Social Housing (623KB) |
Raj Kapur Shah | VR model for Road and Traffic planning of a housing regeneration project (8.4MB) |
Caterina Benincasa-Sharman | What do they think? A potential research methodology for understanding ... (1.3MB) |