Teaching

Module co-ordinator for:

- EVP 2003: Urban Space and Form

- EVP 2007: Site Layout and Desig

Contributor to:

- EVP 1012: Spaces, Places and Plans

- EVP  8020: Design and Regeneration

- EVP 3014: Themes in Spatial Planning

Urmi is trained as an architect (B.Arch., School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi) and urban planner (M.Sc. Urban Planning, University of Hong Kong as an Asian Development Bank fellow). She completed her Ph.D. from the Newcastle University, UK. She has received Hong Kong Institute of Planners award for her work on 'Squatters in Kathmandu'. Her PhD  evaluated the public sector housing in India ( Kolkata) using a set of housing indicators. She has a Postgraduate Certificate in Higher Education Teaching from Queen's University, Belfast. She worked as an architect and physical planner before switching to academia. Before joining Queen's, she was a researcher in the School of Built Environment, University of Ulster. Over the years she has extensively contributed in the study of housing, informal settlements and urban development process in different cities in South Asia.

Urmi has an interdisciplinary background in architecture, planning and housing studies. Her research interest/involvement ranges from studying the squatter/slum settlements in globalising south (informal economy, space and temporary housing) to housing and land markets in UK and elsewhere (part of the formal economy, urban space and housing/real estate). These spectrums though miles apart, belong to the same urban world and contribute to both local and world image and spatial characteristics. She believes  planning and development is not only a geographically interconnected phenomenon but it also encompasses spatial planning, place making, urban design, political economy, housing markets, affordability, real estate  and  urban development.

Since 2000 my work has focused on broad area of land and housing studies in South Asia. The research has taken several interrelated sub-forms such as public housing, squatter housing, public private partnership and state-led land development, use of urban indicators for performance evaluation. My research papers have been widely cited in different academic syllabus (For instance, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva) and national (Government of Nepal) and United Nations publications; and discussed in blogs. Recognition to the impact of my research in wider policy formulation came as an invitation from UNHabitat to join their Urban Development panel of experts for developing countries and subsequently, invitation for contribution in the special issue of Habitat International on Self-Help Housing. The special issue was launched in the World Urban Forum, 2010 in Rio.
I am also a consultant adviser in Bievenue research Centre- a non governmental research body based in Kathmandu ( established in 1983)

Selected citation list:

Housing for all in Kolkata - promises, promises; http://www.nowpublic.com/environment/housing-all-kolkata-promises-promises

UNHabitat, 2011, Nepal Urban Housing Sector Profile 2011, UNHabitat, Nairobi

UNHabitat, 2011, Affordable Land and Housing in Asia Volume 2, UNHabitat, Nairobi

Tibaijuka, Anna K, 2009, Building prosperity: the centrality of housing in economic development, UNHabitat

Government of Nepal, 2010, Safer and Affordable Housing for Urban Poor: A case for Kathmandu Valley, Government of Nepal, Kathmandu.