Council Meetings of ISUF, 1999

The 1999 Council Meetings of ISUF were held over two days, Friday 23 July and Monday 26 July, before and after the main activities of the conference in Florence.

The Council members attending the first meeting, on the Friday, were Jean Castex, Giancarlo Cataldi, Michaël Darin, Anne Vernez Moudon, Attilio Petruccioli and Jeremy Whitehand. Sylvain Malfroy (Ecole Polytechnique Fédéral de Lausanne) attended as proxy for Bruno Marchand and Karl Kropf (Urban Morphology Research Group and Stratford-on-Avon District Council) sat in as reporter. Apologies were received from Gian Luigi Maffei, Bruno Marchand and Elwin Koster.

The meeting began with a report from the conveners of ISUF 1999. The report covered a few general matters and operational details. At the time of the meeting delegates were still registering and paying fees. A full financial report was thus not possible. The conveners indicated they would be able to report the final figures during the week following the conference.

Concerning the procedures for election to the Council, it was pointed out that the Constitution specified that individual members may nominate themselves for election or be nominated by another individual member, providing that the candidate had expressed a willingness to serve if elected. Retiring members were eligible to stand for re-election. The Council was reminded that Bruno Marchand did not wish to seek re-election and that Sylvain Malfroy had been nominated to replace him. Since no other nominations had been received and all other Council members had agreed to stand for a second term, there was no need to hold an election at the General Meeting of ISUF.

Regarding the geographical spread of Council membership, Jeremy Whitehand voiced concern that the Council did not include enough members from outside Western Europe and North America. As a move to redress the imbalance, he recommended that the Council co-opt as a member Shigeru Satoh of Waseda University, Japan. There was unanimous agreement and it was left to Anne Vernez Moudon to discuss with Satoh whether he was willing to serve as a member.

Secretary-Treasurer Michaël Darin made a brief report on the state of ISUF finances. He first noted that a change to the banking arrangements had been made since the Council meeting in July 1998. The change related to the fact that virtually all of the money collected from subscriptions goes towards the production costs of the journal, which is presently produced in the UK. To avoid excessive transaction costs, members' subscriptions were remitted to him in Sterling or, if a different currency was sent, an additional amount was added to cover the cost of exchange. Cheques were paid into ISUF's account with Lloyds TSB in the UK. Just prior to the meeting, the ISUF accounts contained £3,934. The number of subscriptions to the journal was about 200, of which about one-quarter were those of institutions.

Discussion following the report focused on the fact that the amount received from members' subscriptions is a bare minimum for production of the journal. As outlined by journal Editor, Jeremy Whitehand, the journal relies on significant amounts of volunteer labour - including all editorial work, all production, excluding printing, and all packaging for posting. Subscriptions barely cover the cost of printing. Whitehand emphasized that it is critical that income is increased if the journal is to be viable. Efforts have been made to increase the number of institutional subscribers but have so far had limited success.

Discussion led to several conclusions. First it was agreed that further efforts should be made to attract more institutional subscribers. Secondly, there was unanimous support for the proposal to increase the institutional subscription. It was agreed that, as from January 2001, the institutional rate should be increased from £25 to £35. The subscription for individuals is to remain at £15.

Other news regarding the journal was reported by Jeremy Whitehand. He noted that Brenda Case Scheer had been appointed as Book Review Editor and Katharine Arntz as Assistant Editor. The printer of the journal had been changed, the third to be used since the journal began publication. On Jeremy Whitehand's suggestion, it was agreed that, beginning with Volume 4, the journal would be notched bound rather than saddle stitched.

The remaining items on the agenda for the Friday meeting concerned future meetings. A proposal that a New Researchers' Forum be held in 2000 did not receive significant support. On the matter of the venue of the next Council Meeting, Attilio Petruccioli suggested Tangiers, Morocco. Petruccioli, along with Giancarlo Cataldi, also suggested Como, Italy. In the former case, some assistance would be provided by the Moroccan Ministry of Housing and in the latter from the comune of Como. It was decided to defer further discussion of this matter until a decision had been taken concerning the next major conference.

Three venues were proposed for ISUF 2001 - Ljubljana, Groningen and Cincinnati. It was felt that Ljubljana would be unlikely to gain general support owing to the political instability of the region. It was agreed to defer a decision concerning the other two venues until later in the day, when a special meeting of the Council to discuss ISUF 2001 would be attended by representatives of the two candidate institutions, Brenda Case Scheer (University of Cincinnati) and Elwin Koster (University of Groningen). At that meeting it was agreed that the bid from the University of Cincinnati should be accepted. It was further agreed that the University of Groningen would host either the Conference in 2003 or the Council Meeting in 2000 or both.

The Council members attending the meeting held on the Monday were Jean Castex, Giancarlo Cataldi, Michaël Darin, Gian Luigi Maffei, Anne Vernez Moudon and Jeremy Whitehand. Apologies were received from Elwin Koster, Sylvain Malfroy and Attilio Petruccioli.

It was agreed that the Conference in Cincinnati in 2001 would take place in September. It would include both sessions whose contents would be determined by papers offered in response to a general call for papers and sessions based on themes predetermined by the Council. There would probably be an excursion to Chicago just before or just after the main part of the Conference. A major item on the agenda of the Council Meetings in July 2000 would be the themes of the Conference in Cincinnati. It was confirmed that those meetings would take place in Groningen.

Proposals were approved for the setting up of two commissions: a Commission on Theory and Methodology, and a Commission on the Role of History in the Study of Urban Form. After the Meeting, proposals were received for the formation of a Working Party on Legislation and Urban Form, and a Working Party on GIS and Cartography. Subject to satisfactory progress, these working parties would be formally constituted as commissions at the next meeting of the Council.

Formal recognition was given to the MA Course in Urban Morphology to be launched by the Department of Architecture and Planning History at the University of Groningen, Netherlands in association with the Urban Morphology Research Group in the University of Birmingham, UK, the School of Architecture of Versailles, France and the School of Architecture at the Polytechnic University of Lausanne, Switzerland.

It was agreed that the feasibility of creating a `virtual' library, linked to ISUF's Web site, should be investigated. In response to concern about the poor level of awareness of ISUF, it was agreed that, pending the outcome of the current publicity campaign to secure more library subscriptions to Urban Morphology, consideration should be given to the appointment of a Publicity Officer.

K.S. Kropf, Stratford-on-Avon District Council and Urban Morphology Research Group, School of Geography and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK. E-mail: ksk@compuserve.com