Future Ground - Call for Participants!

Future Ground is a design competition inviting multidisciplinary teams to generate flexible design and policy strategies to reuse vacant land in New Orleans, transforming abandoned landscapes into resources for the current and future city.

In October 2014, three teams will be awarded $15,000 to participate in a six-month research and design process. Working closely with local stakeholders and national experts, teams will forecast changes in density, demand, and climate over the next half-century in New Orleans, and will tackle the social, economic, and ecological challenges underlying reuse of the most prevalent types of vacant land in the city. The project will produce implementable, replicable solutions that NORA can apply to specific sites citywide, and can help catalyze change in cities around the world.

Future Ground will develop strategies to bring small, piecemeal projects to scale at the neighborhood and citywide level; craft policy to support promising design strategies; make these strategies flexible and participatory enough to be sustained into the next generation; and share resources with a growing network of innovators who are reusing vacant land in cities around the country.

Teams will be selected from an international open Request for Qualifications process. Applications are due by September 29, 2014, and will be evaluated by a jury of national leaders in design and policy.

Please visit www.vanalen.org/futureground for a complete RFQ, including details on the submission process.