For roughly a century, cities have shifted industrial sites to the peripheries of their metropolitan regions and have erected barriers between places of production and places where residents live and go about their day-to-day lives. Technological advances in production methods have made it possible to reconsider the relevance of these barriers and to question whether the preferred location of industrial sites is on the periphery. With several industrial sites – for heavy and light industry, including high tech. manufacturing – and its large port, the most important in all of Israel, Ashdod is poised to exemplify a truly 21st century relationship between industry and the city.  In drafting a strategic plan for Ashdod’s industrial areas, central questions are:

• What is the relationship between Ashdod’s industrial areas? What should it be?

• What is the current relationship between Ashdod’s industrial areas and its housing quarters? How might the two be better integrated?

• Where might the links be between Ashdod’s circulation network and its industrial areas – for trucks and, even, bicycles?

• What should be the relationship between Ashdod’s industrial areas and its “Green Ring”?

​

This project aims to understand the spatial effects and dynamics of 21st century manufacturing, and to recommend policies that respond to these effects and dynamics. In doing so, this project will support the city’s ongoing efforts to attract innovative manufacturers, traditional manufacturers, and technology start-ups. It further aims to use Ashdod as a pilot project for research that identifies new approaches to designing next generation manufacturing areas. These approaches may relate to the physical planning of the city, to the use of technology or the drafting of technology policy, or to the drafting of economic or industrial policy. This research will support Ashdod’s and other cities’ efforts to cultivate sustainable growth and to build responsibly.