"What If, N.Y. City..." housing design competition launched

Office of Emergency Management (OEM) commissioner Joseph Bruno and I launched the "What If New York City…" housing design competition, which seeks innovative approaches to sheltering victims in the aftermath of a disaster. If a catastrophe impacted New York City, thousands of residents would be displaced from their homes. Because fully rebuilding communities could take several years, the competition seeks designs for the provisional housing that could be used in the interim. The competition scenario focuses on a fictional neighborhood called Prospect Shore that has just been hit by a Category 3 hurricane, leaving 38,000 families without housing. Entrants are asked to design a provisional housing plan for the community that could be used by emergency planners in real life. The judging criteria recognize that traditional post-disaster housing, such as mobile homes, is not suitable for New York City's high population density and concentrated infrastructure. The competition is being sponsored by OEM, the Rockefeller Foundation, and Architecture for Humanity - New York. New York City has exceptional emergency response capabilities, but we can always do more to better prepare ourselves. If a storm were to hit, our immediate need for shelter would be met. The greater challenge is to provide longer-term, provisional housing for what could be thousands of displaced families while their communities are rebuilt. New York is home to great colleges and universities; we're hoping that students will enter this competition as part of their course work. The design competition complements the city's Coastal Storm Plan (CSP), which dictates how New York City would respond to a coastal storm emergency. The plan details the protocol for informing, evacuating, and sheltering New Yorkers in the event of a devastating hurricane. The city intends to incorporate aspects of the competition's winning submissions into the sheltering component of the plan. Seven prominent figures with expertise in government, urban planning, design, architecture, engineering, and emergency management will sit on the competition jury to evaluate and guide submissions. The jury is chaired by Department of Design and Construction (DDC) commissioner David Burney and includes OEM commissioner Bruno; Paul Freitag of Jonathan Rose Companies, LLC; artist Mary Miss; Guy Nordenson of Guy Nordenson and Associates; Enrique Norten of TEN Arquitectos; and Richard Plunz of the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. Judging criteria include capacity, the possibility for rapid installation, site and unit flexibility, reusability, livability, accessibility, security, sustainability, and cost efficiency. The design competition is a two-part process with an open competition stage and a project development period. The jury will review all submissions and select ten that best meet the judging criteria. These 10 winners will be awarded $10,000 each to revise their projects and prepare presentation materials. The jury will favor submissions that are useful to emergency management and urban planning officials in the aftermath of a disaster. Further information on the competition, including details on eligibility, schedule, and judging criteria, is available at www.nyc.gov. Michael Bloomberg is mayor of New York, N.Y.