Watertown, MA – The Sasaki,Rutgers University, and Arup team announced their selection by the Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force to move on to Stage Two of Rebuild By Design—a design competition that will develop projects to protect and enhance Sandy-affected communities. US Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Shaun Donovan, who chairs the task force, launched the competition this June in partnership with the Rockefeller Foundation.
“The ten teams we selected stood out because of the talent they bring to the table, their pioneering ideas and their commitment to innovating with a purpose and competing not just to design but to build something,” said Secretary Donovan.
Over 140 potential teams from more than 15 countries submitted proposals, representing the top engineering, architecture, design, landscape architecture, and planning firms as well as research institutes and universities worldwide.
The Sasaki, Rutgers University, and Arup team is made up of designers, researchers, and engineers. “Our conceptual design approach facilitates a regional conversation about the rippling effects of rising tides and increasing storm surge,” says Jason Hellendrung, Sasaki principal in
charge of the project.
With a focus on the coastal communities of New Jersey’s northern shore, the team will research regional vulnerabilities and implement local solutions, designing multi-functional scalable strategies at the intersection of ecological and economic reinvestment.