Formal background in economics is not required. A review of the basic concepts and methods of urban economics, with a major emphasis on location and land-use economics. Examination of both equilibrium-based models and the new critical models derived from analyses of the production process and spatial organization.
Developments in architectural history during the modern period. Emphasis on moments of significant change in architecture (theoretical, economic, technological, and institutional). Themes include positive versus arbitrary beauty, enlightenment urban planning, historicism, structural rationalism, the housing reform movement, iron and glass technology, changes generated by developments external or internal to architecture itself and transformations in Western architecture.