Gerd Albers Award (GAA) was established in 1999 in honour of Professor Gerd Albers, a co-founder and past president of the Society, who placed a particular emphasis on the task of publishing as a means of elucidating both the current debate and practical achievements in the planning field. This reputable award is bestowed for the best publication (book, book chapter, journal article and/or published project report) of ISOCARP members.

Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez , 2025 GAA Winner for Best Article
©Riyadh Region Municipality

In 2025, a total of 5 GAA high academic standards entries were submitted:

1. From Segregation to Inclusion: Children’s Engagement in Urban Public Spaces by Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez
2. Facilitating climate change action across built environment life stages – perspectives from built environment professionals by Anna Hurlimann, Sareh Moosavi, Georgia Warren-Myers, Alan March, Judy Bush, Laura Cutroni
3. Walkable and Sustainable City Centre Greenway Planning by Carlos Balsas and Neale Blair
4. Dammam metropolitan area: Advancing the pursuit of urban resilience by Abdulaziz I. Almulhim and Patrick Brandful Cobbinah
5. Autonomous Urbanism: Towards a New Transitopia by Evan Shieh

The jury consists of two members of the ISOCARP Scientific Committee and experienced academics: Sky Tallman, Hadeel Abuzaid, Dushko Bogunovic, Nasim Iranmanesh, and Rajendra Kumar

Best Book

Autonomous Urbanism: Towards a New Transitopia by Evan Shieh

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) are appearing on our roads, representing the next technological disruption to our mobility systems. While their long-term spatial implications remain largely underestimated, this book argues that AVs offer a major opportunity to rethink our city’s built environments—with profound implications on urban life since automobiles transformed the design of cities in the prior century. However, AVs also risk reinforcing many negative effects of auto-based urbanism including urban sprawl, single-function infrastructure, congestion, and environmental degradation. Instead, this book explores a driverless mobility paradigm shift that moves cities away from automobile dependency towards automated mass transit and mobility-as-a-service—using the city of Los Angeles as a testbed. It outlines the blueprint for a future city that is not dictated by technology, but one where technology is strategically deployed to make our built environments more multi-modal, humancentric, and spatially vibrant—one where any technological advances are fore-fronted by the public good. It unpacks how changing the way we move about a city fundamentally changes the type of city that emerges.

In this two-volume monograph, Book 1 (The Framework) grounds driverless futures in urban mobility history, transportation policies, and multi-scalar typologies that offer a guide for designers, policymakers, and mobility companies to impact a driverless revolution. Book 2 (The Experience) deploys the unique narrative format of a graphic novel to visualize to the dayin-the-life experiences of moving around in a future city in which its transportation options have become more multi-modal and pluralistic, empowering citizens to shape collective mobility futures. By envisioning this future guided by design and policy actions, this book contends that cities can transition from the Autopias of today, to the Transitopias of tomorrow.

Best Article 

From Segregation to Inclusion: Children’s Engagement in Urban Public Spaces by Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez

This study demonstrates that the design and integration of public spaces profoundly influence children’s capacity to engage creatively and independently with urban environments. Through comparative case studies in Venice and Auckland, the research revealed stark contrasts in the diversity and frequency of children’s unstructured activities—termed temporary appropriation.

In Venice’s car-free campos, children engaged fluidly in a wide range of spontaneous practices, including playing football, drawing, caring for plants, and socialising across age groups. Over 6,300 instances of temporary appropriation were recorded, reflecting high diversity (Shannon–Weiner Index H’=2.325). These findings show that integrated, multifunctional spaces foster agency, resilience, and community connection.

By contrast, Auckland’s fenced playgrounds and suburban, car oriented urban form severely limited children’s experiences. Only 135 instances of temporary appropriation were observed, mainly confined to resting or eating within designated areas (H’=1.460). This demonstrates that risk-averse, highly structured design unintentionally isolates children and reduces opportunities for exploration, problem-solving, and social learning.

The study concludes that safety-focused environments alone are insufficient to support healthy child development. Instead, it calls for hybrid public spaces blending structured play with open-ended, flexible zones. Such spaces can balance safety and autonomy, promote intergenerational interaction, and contribute to more inclusive, regenerative urban futures.

Ultimately, the findings emphasise that children must be recognised as active participants in city life, not passive recipients of adult-controlled spaces. Enabling temporary appropriation is essential to fostering vibrant, equitable urban environments where children can thrive.

Special Mention (Article)

Facilitating climate change action across built environment life stages – perspectives from built environment professionals by Anna Hurlimann, Sareh Moosavi, Georgia Warren-Myers, Alan March, Judy Bush, and Laura Cutroni

The Graphical Abstract communicates the key findings: https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0264275125004135-ga1_lrg.jpg

Paper Abstract: Built environments are not implementing the scale of action needed to adequately address climate change – zero net emissions by 2050 to limit warming to 1.5 °C. This paper aims to provide a comparative and integrated understanding of how different sectors experience barriers and facilitators of climate change action (mitigation and adaptation) across built environment life stages: from ‘change initiation’, through to ‘renewal/recovery and decommission.’ In-depth interviews were conducted with 111 Australian built environment professionals working across five professional sectors including: urban planning, architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, and sustainability. The interviews provide detailed insights into professional practice. The greatest barriers to climate change action identified across all sectors were at the ‘costing and approvals’ stage where economic savings/profit were prioritised over climate change initiatives. Architects and urban designers identified greatest opportunity for action in the final life stages. For professionals from other sectors, greatest opportunity was identified in the ‘change initiation’ stage. The most frequently identified barrier to climate change action across professionals from all sectors was perceived lack of influence. Results indicate that to achieve the required climate change action, an integrated approach to tackling climate change across built environment life stages and professional sectors is needed. Building the agency and capacity of built environment professionals to facilitate climate change action is critical. Sixteen priorities for climate action across built environment life stages are identified. These include embedding required climate actions into regulation across life stages. The paper provides new insights to progress climate action in cities.

Congratulations to the winners and a big thank you to all authors who submitted a book or a paper!

We look forward to successful GAA submissions the next year, too.