MIT_11|2022 - available in color

Carmelo Ignaccolo

PhDc’24 (MIT, DUSP), MAUD’17 (Columbia, GSAPP), B.Eng. + M.Arch.’15 (Catania University, DICAR + Tongji University, CAUP )




I am an urbanist and educator whose scholarly work focuses on urban morphology, design politics, heritage, and technology. I investigate cities through the lens of history and cartography, I unpack their socio-economic dynamics through urban analytics and GIScience, and I expose inequitable development practices through data visualizations and design tools.

My doctoral dissertation, Behind the Waterfront: The Masking of Inequities in the Reconstruction of Mediterranean Port Cities, unearths the enduring trope of inequitable development practices à la Haussmann along the shorelines of Naples and Beirut. Through a unique combination of methods, ranging from archival research to geospatial AI for historical maps, from participatory action research to urban analytics, and from ethnographic fieldwork to digital humanities my work scrutinizes the long-term effects of physical planning from the ground up.