The 15-minute city model, a visionary approach to urban planning, envisions neighbourhoods where residents can access all essential daily needs – work, education, healthcare, shopping, and leisure –within a 15-minute walk or bike ride. This study assesses the challenges and opportunities of implementing the 15-minute city model in Downtown Cairo, Egypt. The study examines the current state of public spaces, transportation, and walkability in the area through ethnographic research, including extensive field observations and frequent attendance at design workshops with developers, as well as numerous site visits and in-depth semi-structured interviews with diverse stakeholders. Stakeholders included the developer of the Cairo House project, the Cairo Bike project manager, urban researchers, tourists, residents and business owners within the study area. Data were analysed using thematic coding to identify recurring patterns and conflicting perspectives. The findings reveal significant challenges, including traffic congestion, limited public spaces, and inadequate pedestrian and cycling infrastructure. The study explores potential solutions, including enhancing public transportation, creating safe and accessible environments for pedestrians and cyclists, promoting mixed-use development, and developing vibrant and accessible public spaces. The main findings underscore the significance of community engagement and participatory planning in ensuring the successful and equitable implementation of the 15-minute city model within this unique and historic urban context.

This review article tackles Urban Acupuncture Theory to address the consequences of COVID-19 affecting today’s cities through various forms of people’s low presence and boredom in public spaces. After several rounds of lockdowns and applying social distancing policies in a wide range of places across the globe, there might be a need for catalytic action to restore public spaces to livable conditions. To address the argument, this review conducted a bibliometric analysis of articles indexed in databases and books published in the last eleven years, then a thematic content analysis. The collected sources determined the catalyst for humans’ daily use of public spaces and the role of pandemics that changed their function. A literature review was conducted to map the theory used in the literature. The results figured out the principles and capabilities of urban acupuncture that can help humans interact with urban spaces. Out data mining shows this theory can convert un-functional spaces into livable places. The contribution of this research may assist urban designers and planners in designing public areas of the future.

After the COVID-19 pandemic, human thoughts have changed in all fields worldwide. People started discovering different activities and realizing the essential role of urban spaces. Human needs and behavior changed through interaction with urban spaces. This article examines the importance of urban spaces in pandemics and how minor interventions can significantly impact urban spaces. We analyzed the city’s different zones in New Cairo City, Egypt. This research determined the application of urban acupuncture theory to the residence of a non-expert and listed the key focus areas for a practical acupuncture response. This study analyses the daily human uses of urban spaces and the role of pandemics that changed the functions of these urban spaces, observing and designing a survey evaluating urban spaces’ efficiency before, during, and after the COVID-19 lockdown. The research results came out with the actual role of urban spaces as unfunctional, that concludes a fast and quick intervention after the reclaiming urban acupuncture principles that influential in transforming urban areas into liveable places. The results present a spatial visual analysis highlighting the challenges and benefits of urban acupuncture. The findings of our study can assist desicion-makers in evaluating samll nterventions that can create liveable places for all.

Perceived travel time plays an important role in the subjective wellbeing of the commuters. Recent studies have focused on the relationship between spatial characteristics and wellbeing, and the relationship between transportation and mobility with subjective wellbeing of the people. However, few studies tackled the influence of the urban form and the elements of built environment on wellbeing during commuting in the city. This manuscript discusses the concept of urban form, and perceptual qualities of urban design. Afterwards, it proceeds with delineating the research variables (i.e., Spatial and Perceptual). The case study selected is South 90 Street, New Cairo, Egypt, which serves as an urban corridor that accommodates various transit modes, diverse land uses, and variety of urban facades. The analysis is carried out utilizing the built environment dataset and collected responses about users' experience via a questionnaire. This manuscript attempts to answer two main questions: (1) What is the influence of urban form on commuters' travel time perception? (2) How do the elements of the built environment impact the subjective wellbeing of commuters? Descriptive analysis is conducted to understand the relationship and influence of the built environment on the perceived travel time during mobility and individuals' wellbeing. The manuscript further discusses the results, depicting which built environment elements are associated with either positive or negative effect on commuters' subjective wellbeing. The manuscript concludes with highlighting the potentials for maintaining the overall wellbeing of individuals and their perception during urban mobility. Thus, facilitating the design of functional, efficient, and reliable cities.

Retrofitting heritage buildings for energy efficiency is not always easy where cultural values are highly concerned, which requires an integrated approach. This paper aims to assess the potential of applying passive retrofitting scenarios to enhance indoor thermal comfort of heritage buildings in North Africa, as a hot climate, a little attention has been paid to retrofit built heritage in that climate. A mixed-mode ventilation residential building in Cairo, Egypt, was selected as a case study. The study combines field measurements and observations with energy simulations. A simulation model was created and calibrated on the basis of monitored data in the reference building, and the thermal comfort range was evaluated. Sets of passive retrofitting scenarios were proposed. The results (based on the ASHRAE-55-2020 adaptive comfort model at 90% acceptability limits) showed that the annual thermal comfort in the reference building is very low, i.e., 31.4%. The application of hybrid passive retrofitting scenarios significantly impacts indoor thermal comfort in the reference building, where annual comfort hours of up to 66% can be achieved. The originality of this work lies in identifying the most effective energy measures to improve indoor thermal comfort that are optimal from a conservation point of view. The findings contribute to set a comprehensive retrofitting tool that avoids potential risks for the conservation of residential heritage buildings in hot climates.

Creating a new capital city is a critical decision, yet it has happened across the globe and across the years. Due to various reasons, capital cities were created and transformed their countries and affected their overall worldwide presence. This paper derives a comparison between the capital of Kazakhstan, Astana and the new Egyptian Administrative Capital that is currently under construction. This review article showed that despite the differences, similarities can be pointed out in relation to political, social, and economic aspects. The results figured out that both capitals are major initiatives for nation-building as well as regional and economic development. The authors conclude from the similarities between the two capital cities’ approaches that Egypt’s new administrative capital can follow the well-off steps of Astana aside from the contextual differences and challenges that should not be underestimated. The authors also derive a set of elements that create a significant capital city.

This study aims to develop an integrated classification methodology for retrofitting that preserves both energy use and cultural value aspects in hot climates, especially, in North Africa, as a hot zone, which lacks retrofitting initiatives of built heritage. Despite the number of existing methods of classification for energy purposes, little attention has been paid to integrate the perceptions of cultural values in those methods. The proposed methodology classifies heritage building stocks based on building physical characteristics, as well as heritage significance levels, and then later integrates the outcomes into a matrix to propose sustainable retrofitting scenarios based on three dimensions, i.e., heritage value locations, types, and heritage significance level. For validation, the methodology was applied to the heritage residential building stock along with a microscale analysis on a building in Khedivial Cairo, Egypt. The findings include extracting twelve building classes, providing a reference building for each class, and a detailed catalogue of the extracted reference buildings that includes retrofitting scenarios for creating energy models. The originality of this work lies in integrating cultural values in a building classification methodology and providing a list of sustainable retrofitting scenarios for reference buildings. The findings contribute to fill the gap in existing building classifications, more specifically in hot climates.

Retrofitting “nearly-zero energy” heritage buildings has always been controversial, due to the usual association of the “nearly-zero energy” target with high energy performance and the utilization of renewable energy sources in highly regarded cultural values of heritage buildings. This paper aims to evaluate the potential of turning heritage building stock into a “nearly-zero energy” in hot, dry climates, which has been addressed in only a few studies. Therefore, a four-phase integrated energy retrofitting methodology was proposed and applied to a sample of heritage residential building stock in Egypt along with microscale analysis on buildings. Three reference buildings were selected, representing the most dominant building typologies. The study combines field measurements and observations with energy simulations. In addition, simulation models were created and calibrated based on monitored data in the reference buildings. The results show that the application of hybrid passive and active non-energy generating scenarios significantly impacts energy use in the reference buildings, e.g., where 66.4% of annual electricity use can be saved. Moreover, the application of solar energy sources approximately covers the energy demand in the reference buildings, e.g., where an annual self-consumption of electricity up to 78% and surplus electricity up to 20.4% can be achieved by using photo-voltaic modules. Furthermore, annual natural gas of up to 66.8% can be saved by using two unglazed solar collectors. Lastly, achieving “nearly-zero energy” was possible for the presented case study area. The originality of this work lies in developing and applying an informed retrofitting (nearly-zero energy) guide to be used as a benchmark energy model for buildings that belong to an important historical era. The findings contribute to fill a gap in existing studies of integrating renewable energy sources to achieve “nearly-zero energy” in heritage buildings in hot climates.

Energy retrofitting standards and guidelines, together with benefitting from best existing experiences, are effective in retrofitting heritage buildings towards low-carbon emissions. In Downtown Cairo, many heritage buildings are exposed to adaptive reuse practices, after moving to the ‘New Administrative Capital’. Integrating energy saving in said practices has become a crucial aspect. Therefore, the aim of this study is to evaluate a recent retrofitted heritage building called ‘La Viennoise’ as an example of best practice for retrofitting processes in Downtown Cairo. The study carried out a field survey for data gathering. A monitoring-based simulation model was created and calibrated, and the building envelope and energy use were evaluated. The simulation results are presented into two cases. The first includes the original state as a base case, showing a very low building envelope thermal performance. The second includes the current state as an improved case. A comparison of both cases shows that the implemented retrofitting scenarios in the case study effectively improved its building envelope and reduced annual energy consumption, and CO2 emissions. This paper allows further benefit from such example by setting a retrofitting guideline to expand this concept in other buildings with similar conditions to achieve a low carbon-built heritage.

Urban competitiveness has become an undeniable reality of our world. Cities around the world create strategies and development plans to enhance their competitiveness and reach worldwide fame and attraction for different segments. This competition has widened to reach different aspects of social, economic, physical and environmental aspects of cities. Along the years different methodologies and criteria were proposed to create a systematic assessment of cities worldwide and rank their competitiveness. The results of such assessments are published in indices; e.g. Global Power City Index, Global Power City Index, etc. Each index has its own set of indicators that cover different aspects of cities; e.g. economy, environment, accessibility. Sample cities from all over the world are graded and ranked accordingly. The cities that achieve top ranking in those global assessment lists are called global cities. This paper aims to investigate if being a national capital can be related to becoming a global city. This is through the study of two global city rankings; Global Power City Index (GPCI) and Global Cities Index (GCI), for three successive years; 2016, 2017, 2018. It is shown that around 50% of ranked cities are national capitals across both ranking system and over the three years covered in this research. European national capitals reach 66% of those featured, followed by Asian capitals with around 33%. The presence of capital cities is also evident in within each indicator of the Global Power City Index (GPCI). In general, evident presence can be linked to national capitals especially those of Europe and Asia.

Mega-projects are projects that require immense resources to create. This includes all different aspects; funding, labour, etc. These projects are meant to create a massive effect on the city or national level through providing job opportunities during construction as well as after completion. Moreover, these projects usually have an intercontinental effect that echoes worldwide and may affect other projects, cities or even countries either positively or negatively. Mega-projects are not restricted to certain project typologies; in fact they range from Olympic cities to water dams and channels. We can even claim that the first mega-project was the great pyramid. Mega-projects can also be linked to mega-events thus achieving more international acknowledgement. This paper discusses the creation of new capital cities as a mega-project typology. It analyzes different examples worldwide where a new capital city was created to act as a mega-project that would create ripples of economic and urban development through a country. The capitals of Brazil, Kazakhstan and Egypt are studied to display the authors view of them as mega-projects that have the same function but span across time, space and cultures.

Five decades since the word “gentrification” was coined in 1964, academics have approached gentrification as a haphazard process. From the turn of the twenty-first century, gentrification is not perceived as a haphazard process but rather a planned, well-defined and organized process. It has been recognized that gentrification does not proceed the same everywhere. While urban neighborhoods are exposed to gentrification, physical, economic, social and cultural changes take place. Gentrification can also proceed reversely that is called as “degentrification.” There is a common agreement between scholars and practitioners that gentrification leads to the improvement of urban life, facilitates urban neighborhoods and reducing the likelihood of future demolition and provides a practical solution for deteriorated neighborhoods, but it has also some negative consequences; the most significant is displacement. This paper deals with the problem of what so-called geography of gentrification, which suggests need to understand the dilemma of how gentrification evolves and develops within neighborhoods in different cities. Moreover, this paper explores the application of the gentrification indicators on Heliopolis district in Cairo in order to understand the process of gentrification.

The micro-level urban morphology of large cities in the Middle East and North Africa and southeastern Europe has not been thoroughly investigated, and its transformation during the past decades has remained less-studied. Hence, this study is meant to partially explain urban morphology of Istanbul, Cairo, and Tehran, three megacities of the region by focusing on the historical neighborhood typologies of the past century. The overall aim of this study is to address the feedbacks of historical urban transformations during the past 100 or 150 years to some important aspects of livability like mobility and social interactions. The objectives are to define the typologies of neighborhoods in the three cities and how they have changed over time, to clarify if the neighborhood-level urban form of the three cities have transformed in a similar fashion, and to address the differences between the cities. The variables of this study were population density, centrality, formation and location of facilities, and configuration of street networks, which were tested by T and Chi-square methods in a representative sample of 259 neighborhoods randomly selected from the case-study cities. The results of statistical hypothesis testing reveal a similarity of neighborhood transformations in the cities in terms of population density. Considerable similarities were found in case of historical changes in centrality (the centeredness of neighborhood amenities), location of neighborhood facilities, and street networks; however, the three cities have general similarities in trends, with potentially similar results for urban mobility. The most important identified planning, political, and societal trends that transformed the neighborhood morphologies were top-down interventions in the 1930s and 1940s, socioeconomic and lifestyle changes in the 1970s because of a jump in oil prices, Iran's 1979 revolution, the Iran-Iraq War for Tehran, internal migration triggered by industrialization, mass and formal housing production for Istanbul, and European inspiration in urban planning in the late 19th century, adoption of socialist ideologies in the 1960s, and the capitalist approach to urban planning in recent years for Cairo.

Since the 1960s, gentrification has been confused with other urban notions such as upgrading and renewal, regardless of its economic and political perspectives, whereas it has been processing and evolving in urban neighborhoods, especially in the Western countries such as the USA and the UK, away from the developing countries. It took place also in other countries outside the core cities of gentrification. Researchers and urban planners agreed that to re-energize the study of gentrification is to focus on its ‘geographies’ which are super-gentrification, third-world immigration—the global city, black/ethnic minority gentrification—race and gentrification, and livability/urban policy. To this point, the cultural diversity was omitted from the geography of gentrification, something that this paper will try to elaborate on and identify. Due to sociocultural differences between gentrification taking place in the developed world and that happening in the developing countries, the research suggests adding two new categories to the geographies of gentrification to reflect the specificities of Egypt. For instance, gentrification in Egypt is driven by other geographies of gentrification, namely historical-tourism gentrification and contracting/real estate gentrification. Thus, monitoring, observation, and analyzing of Heliopolis and Fatimid Cairo will be used to achieve the paper’s main objective; to adapt the gentrification process with the Egyptian case studies, and to fill the gap in the gentrification literature regarding the geographies of gentrification in developing countries, the theme that will establish a new level of gentrification and open new field of research in Egypt. Therefore, urban planning will have a different valid scope in Egypt and provide decision makers with a new tool to develop and maintain the urban planning approaches in Egypt.

The Arab Spring transformations have caused tangible impacts on the urban environment throughout the Middle East with varying levels. In some cities in countries like Libya, Yemen and Syria, deliberate and accidental destruction has taken place, resulting in severe transformations in the image of these cities that could be considered as lasting or difficult to amend. In some cities, the damage caused to urban built environment could be considered a co-lateral damage as a result of internal fighting between the people and their regimes, or the fighting between the different factions in the country or from external interference of regional or international powers. Urbicide, which is defined as a deliberate destruction of cities is also another form of damaging the built environment or the city image, in which parties in an internal conflict tend to destroy symbols or quarters of their rivals to inflict a tangible damage to their social and moral believes. The impacts on the built environment and the image of the city, can result as well from non-destructive measures, for example changes in land uses or decisions to demolish specific buildings that belong to the former era will also result in a clear change in the city image. This paper highlights the types of transformation of the city images that took place as a result of the Arab Spring revolutions. The cases discussed in this paper focus mainly on cities from both Syria and Egypt. This highlighting is done in regard to the nature of change, as mentioned above, the violent transformation in the case of Syrian cities and few cases in Egypt and the nonviolent transformation with the examples from Egypt. In case of the Syrian cities the transformation is caused and sparked by the civil conflict, however the course of reconstruction of these cities after the conflict ends is argued to take one of three paths; reconstruction, renovation or redevelopment. While in case of the nonviolent transformation that is taking place already in Egypt, the nature of change was affected by political, social and security aspects, which in turn had direct impacts on the images of the Egyptian cities after the Arab Spring revolutions.

The construction of the New Capital Cairo or the administrative capital, had caused critical debate on the necessity and adequacy of its construction during a very critical period in Egypt's History. within the planning related disciplines, three lines of thoughts emerged in relation to this issue. The first one, confirms the construction decision and the location chosen for the new capital. The second opinion acknowledges the idea of having a new capital yet, is concerned with the chosen location. While the third opinion stands firm against the whole principle of a new Capital. This paper attempts to review the three different lines of thought.

Online networking played a major role in the Arab Spring—but how did this translate into the ‘real world’? Yehya M Serag analyses the spatial impacts of Egypt's Lotus Revolution.