Philippe Bihouix

Philippe Bihouix is an engineer and the Managing Director of AREP, a multidisciplinary design agency under the French National Railways Company (SNCF) Group (covering architecture, design, engineering, urban planning, and environmental studies). For more than fifteen years, he has been working on environmental transition, non-renewable resources, and related technological challenges. He is the author of several widely recognized works, including The Age of Low Tech: Towards a Technically Sustainable Civilization (Seuil, 2014), The Stationary City: How to Put an End to Urban Sprawl (Actes Sud, 2022), and, in collaboration with illustrator Vincent Perriot, the graphic novel Resources: A Challenge for Humanity (Casterman, 2024).

Carbon dioxide emissions, material consumption, and urban sprawl: the current “making” of cities is largely unsustainable. In response, three main avenues are being explored to “reinscribe” cities within planetary boundaries: densification, intensified technologization, and eco-construction.Yet densification is often difficult to implement and make attractive; the environmental benefits of the smart city remain uncertain, given rebound effects and the impacts of digital infrastructures; and large-scale eco-construction faces constraints linked to the availability of bio-based materials. Even hyper-technologized, even “renaturalized,” metropolises may never truly become carbon-neutral or “green.”Might it be that the key lever to activate in already urbanized countries is not building better, but building less? This would mean fully exploiting the potential of the existing built heritage, intensifying its uses, rehabilitating and transforming it, and making the city more adaptable to profound changes to come. It would also require fundamentally rethinking spatial planning and metropolitan dynamics—fostering a more balanced distribution of populations, services, and jobs, with decentralization towards medium-sized cities, small towns, villages, and rural areas. All this would serve the purpose of strengthening territorial resilience.

Room D1, College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University

Prof. Zhuang Yu丨College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University

Mr. Benjamin Demiere丨Education Consul, Consulate General of France in Shanghai

Mr. Zheng Jian丨Former Chief Engineer of China State Railway Group Co., Ltd.;Dean, Institute for High-Speed Rail and Station-City Integration, Tongji University

Mr. Jiang Xingxing丨General Manager, AREP Group China

Prof. Wang Lan丨Dean, College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University

Mr. Wei Wei丨Chief Architect, Institute for High-Speed Rail and Station-City Integration, Tongji University

Assoc. Prof. Wang Yi丨Director, Department of Architecture, College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University

Prof. Zhuo Jian, Director丨Department of Urban Planning, College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University

Assoc. Prof. Liu Kan丨Deputy Director, Department of Architecture, College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University

Prof. Chen Yi丨College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University

Prof. Chen Weizhen丨College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University