Welcome to Urbinary!
Here, we discuss the everyday and the extraordinary in urban studies.
Urbinary is a dissemination platform – centred around the creation and structuring of a podcast – developed by a diverse team of students, alumni, PhD Candidates and early career researchers from the Department of Architecture and Urban Studies and the Design Department at the Politecnico di Milano. The title Urbinary tries to encapsulate this message by being composed of three main words: dictionary, urban, and ordinary. The combination of these three words helps with the creation of a common understanding of the urban, in a sort of dictionary, for the ordinary aspects of our daily experiences.
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Podcast
During the first three seasons, Urbinary interviewed professors, researchers and early-career academics on topics including environmental justice, mega-events, migration, refugee camps, urban regeneration and planning theory. During Season 2024-2025, the project underwent restructuring, establishing working groups (coordination, creative communication, post-production) and launching thematic cycles. From 2025 onwards, Urbinary adopts a hybrid editorial model, structured around three main episode typologies: long-form standalone episodes; Urban10; and special episodes.
S252604 / Flows of Power. How water treaties produce water scarcity
Written by Toka Elsayed, Laila Kouta, Alexia Lara, Lucy White
S252605 / Gating the Lagoon. The conflictual decision-making process of MoSe
Written by Quentin Baladi, Chiara Caruso, Sanjana Shankar and Emma Veneziani
S252606 / Below the Surface. Power, Groundwater, and BNBOs in Denmark
Written by Yasemin Alma, Ali Ghanbari, Thomas Riise and Esther Swaap
Blog
The blog is a space of freedom. It’s a place where both Urbinary members and external contributors who wish to join our platform and research network can share reflections in the form of posts. This is a space for thinking about our urban environments, our research, our discussions, and our roles as researchers in urban studies. We advocate for reflections free from academic impositions and embrace an open, critical space for debate, one that resists the neoliberal logic of today’s publishing system.
Futuri Digitali Urbani. Un dialogo interdisciplinare sui mutamenti urbani contemporanei
Written by Luca Gaeta, Otello Palmini, Marco Pistore
May 2026
The Car That Stayed: Waste, Displacement, and the Slow Violence of the Scrapyard
Written by Saad Halawani
April 2026
Movie nights
This series of public screenings and discussions invites the broader community to explore urban studies through the lens of film and documentary. Each evening presents a thoughtfully chosen film, showcasing various facets of urban life, urban transformation, and social dynamics. Join us for a discussion on urban stories, where audiences – whether experts or newcomers – are encouraged to share insights, reflections, and questions, creating a vibrant space for exchange and fresh perspectives on urban experiences.
