Ferruccio Trabalzi Assistant Professor, Community and Regional Planning
Education I studied Architecture and Urban Sociology at University of La Sapienza in Rome where I received my bachelor degree. I moved to Los Angeles to study urban and regional planning at UCLA where I earned my Master's and Doctorate degrees under the supervision of Professors Edward Soja, Michael Storper, and John Agnew. Currently I teach urban design, community development, urban form and urbanism for the Department of Community and Regional Planning at Iowa State University
Research Interests My research agenda in the last four years has focused on two main areas: urban planning and design, and community social systems. This agenda is a continuation of my long-term interest in design and community development, which I have pursued since my years as an undergraduate student in Rome. The objective of my research is to promote a more actor-oriented design and planning practice at the interface of expert knowledge and community knowledge.
The research on urban planning and design addresses two broad concerns. The first regards the physical form and design of communities. In particular, I explore ways to include the different modalities in which people conceive, build and live space into my practice of designing and planning communities. The second area focuses on the urban margin as a specific expression of contemporary urbanism. Following an established path in spatial disciplines and in cultural studies since the early 1990s, I conceptualize the margin as a place of opportunities rather than simply of despair. This research builds upon the analytical approaches of advocacy planning, cultural geography, social networks, communicative planning, and social mobilization. The second area of research explores the capacity of community social systems to generate sustainable, long-term, and equitable development. In my research, forged over the years on three continents (Europe, Africa, and North America), I advocate for a approach to sustainable development that integrates local food production and traditions, cultural identity, the natural and the built environment, and tourism. This approach evolves from my current research on comparative development in Italy and in Iowa, and my doctoral dissertation, Regional Networks in Southern Italy: Innovation and Adaptation in the Buffalo Mozzarella Industry, in which I analyze the relationship between the globalization of local food products and local development.
In my forthcoming book, Hot Cheese: Mozzarella, Organized Crime, and Regional Development
in Southern Italy, I deepen this investigation by bringing into the picture the role of organized
crime as an underestimated agent of development. This area of research emphasizes the ways in
which the fabric of the built environment is interwoven with and infiltrated by complex and
sometimes clandestine power relations.
Current Projects
Informal Design and Community Identity In The Periphery of Rome
Comparative Development Strategies In Two Rural Communities: Amana Colonies, IA, and Val Comino, Lazio, Italy.
Contact Information
Phone: (515) 294-8393
Email: trabalzi@iastate.edu
Office: 376 Design
Mailing Address
Community and Regional Planning Department 146 College of Design Ames, IA, 50011
