Urban science in the news

A writeup about GAPPS and GameLab in MetropolisMag … with a nice piece about Urban Science:

In an experiment to remedy this, the GAPPS group has forwarded the concept of “epistemic games,” which expose kids to the technical language and problems of a particular profession. Game Designer is based on this model, as is an earlier prototype designed by the GAPPS group’s David Williamson Shaffer that aims to introduce schoolchildren to the fundamental concepts of urban planning.

If SimCity achieves this partially as a by-product of a Robert Moses-like power trip over a Lilliputian world, Shaffer’s game, called Urban Science, explicitly sets out to ape the professional model. The game casts players as urban planners charged with the task of redesigning State Street, the main thoroughfare of Madison, Wisconsin, in a set of parameters defined by the actual profession. If, for example, the player chooses to bulldoze a civic center and build a giant parking lot, he’ll find the mayor on his doorstep complaining of angry letters from preservationists. Players have to deal with various constituencies, including the area’s environmentalists and those lobbying for more affordable housing; and once their redesign is under way they’re required to submit a report to a real urban planner for evaluation. The results have been impressive. “Suddenly,” Gee says, “the kids are using complicated language about urban planning.”