I have a diverse academic background that includes a professional degree in Architecture (Jadavpur University, India, 1985) and another professional degree in Community and Regional Planning (Iowa State, 1987). My Ph.D. was completed at the University of California at Berkeley (1991) where I completed my transition from designing physical spaces to the scholarly arena of applied social science.
Many of my research and publications reflect my interest in pursuing three fundamental questions: 1) How do economic agents (people, firms, organizations, etc.,) respond and adapt to planned interventions? 2) How is this response reflected in both anticipated and unanticipated spatial patterns of activity location? And 3) what are the equity implications of such planned interventions? These questions are critical to planning because they inform us about the potential benefits as well as the limits to regulation and other forms of coercive regimes as tools for achieving the planned future. These are also global questions given that the variation in institutional, social and cultural settings would indeed mediate the outcomes of policy. I have explored these questions within a range of substantive areas in planning including economic development policies, transportation and land-use, housing and real estate, planning methods, and planning theory. In addition, I have also examined these issues both in the U.S. and in international contexts.
I began to analyze the effects of regulation on the behavior of small and large firms in two manufacturing sectors during my doctoral studies. Working in the (Asian) Indian context, I challenged the prevalent notion that unfettered competition between small and large firms lead to the demise of small industries, thus legislation protecting the markets of small industries is necessary. This body of work convinced me that achieving planned outcomes through inflexible regulation has serious shortcomings. This work was later cited and noted in Indian policy circles especially in the Ministry of Industry and in the Confederation of Engineering Industries in India (the fieldwork in India was supported in part by the latter organization). Parts of this body of work were subsequently also published in journals such as Economic Development and Cultural Change, World Development, and the Berkeley Planning Journal.
My interest in the spatial and behavioral effects of planned interventions on economic entities has evolved into a varied research program that has both empirical and normative components. Some significant examples include: 1) An examination of new tools for planning the most appropriate economic use of military bases that are slated for closure; 2) spatial and housing price effects of capital intensive public transit projects 3) A study of housing price diminution in a minority neighborhood in the aftermath of a fire in a printed circuit plant; and 4) An examination of inequities of taxation and capital investments in Phoenix that contributes to further suburbanization of wealthy taxpayers.
A more recent and dominant thread of my research involves the simulation and visualization of urban growth trajectories as perceived through computer based models. Although the actual implementation of such urban models is an important part of this research endeavor, a more interesting aspect of my contribution in this arena has been the theoretical examination of how mathematical models relate to inter-disciplinary communication, its methodological complementarities with “storytelling”, and with our conception of space and time (and space-time). My first article in this line of work was awarded the Chester Rapkin award for the best article in 1999 of the Journal of Planning Education and Research. Subsequently, I published an edited volume titled “Integrated Urban and Environmental Models: A Survey of Current Research and Applications” which highlighted the cutting-edge applications in urban and environmental modeling (Springer, 2003). Currently the implementation of “UrbanSim” (an urban simulation package) for the Phoenix metropolitan area is continuing with an interdisciplinary team that includes people from several Colleges at ASU and other community partners. These projects have been funded by the Environmental Protection Agency, Center for Environmental Studies, and now by the National Science Foundation MUSES program.
Another aspect of my research involves the examination of environmental conditions of U.S.-Mexico border communities. This body of work has included a study of hazardous waste transportation from Mexican maquiladora industries to the U.S., and collaborative project that developed a complex dynamic model of environmental impacts on quality of life in two U.S.-Mexico twin-city border communities. This model was developed by an interdisciplinary team from several universities where the component designed at Arizona State University included a number of quality of life indices that would be impacted by environmental conditions.
Of the many hats that I sometimes wear, my international development research seems to find their way most often to decision-makers in India. I have completed papers on the development of high-technology clusters in India and the relationship between trade and migration. My most recent co-authored article, published in the Journal of Contemporary Economic Policy (2004) explores the inter-linkages between trade and migration from the perspective of United States and its trading partners. I continue to have an active research interest in technological evolution and its global linkages.
On the personal front, I try to match my intellectual wanderings with my global wanderings. I have traveled extensively in Europe, Asia, North America, Australia and still looking for opportunities to go to Africa. I have held visiting appointments at the University College, London; University of Queensland, Australia; and the Indian Institute of Information Technology, Bangalore, India. Besides traveling, I enjoy the theatre (I continue to direct and act in plays) and I am also an avid hiker with an ambition to visit the base camp of Mount Everest in the summer of 2006.
