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Transit Deserts in the New York–New Jersey Metropolitan Area
No full textSustainable and equitable urban development relies on fair access to reliable public transportation, especially for communities that depend heavily on transit. However, public transit services remain unevenly distributed in many metropolitan regions, creating areas known as "transit deserts." These areas are defined by significant mismatches between transit demand and available services. This thesis investigates the spatial distribution and socioeconomic characteristics of transit deserts within the New York–Newark–Jersey City Metropolitan Statistical Area (NY–NJ MSA), focusing specifically on accessibility to bus and rail transit.
The research employs Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and spatial statistical methods, including Kernel Density Estimation (KDE), Local Indicators of Spatial Association (LISA), and K-means clustering, to identify fine-grained patterns of transit service inequity at the census tract level. Separate analyses for bus and rail transit highlight distinct accessibility issues often hidden by aggregate measures. Additionally, qualitative field observations in representative underserved neighborhoods of Newark, Jersey City, and Ocean County validate the spatial analysis and illustrate the everyday impacts of inadequate transit service.
Transit deserts disproportionately affect low-income households without cars, elderly residents, and communities of color, further exacerbating existing socioeconomic vulnerabilities. Areas identified as "double transit deserts," with critically low access to both bus and rail, represent zones of compounded disadvantage. Yet findings indicate that many transit deserts are adjacent to more transit-rich areas creating opportunities for connection. This thesis highlights these spatial inequities and recommends targeted, equity-oriented transportation interventions aimed at enhancing mobility and fostering inclusive regional development
The Covenants of Queens: Exploring Covenants as an Alternative form of Land Use Control in Queens, NYC
No full textIn NYC, property deeds and covenants still explicitly exist. These covenants affect land use by regulating what can be built and where it can be built. Covenants in properties today, while they don't restrict the groups of individuals who can live in a certain area, continue to control land use. Covenants are a portion of a deed that is passed to each successor of property. They control how property is used, the density, and in the past, explicitly were used to restrict individuals based on their racial and ethnic group. The results of these exclusions endure in the locations today by establishing a certain character of a neighborhood. Covenants are a secondary source of land use control, above and beyond that of what the city controls through zoning. This, in turn, has consequences for the physical landscape of an area.
Zoning is the main form of land use control in NYC. However, I will research how covenants act as an alternative form of land use control in NYC. My research will investigate how covenants in Queen's property deeds perpetuate land use controls by controlling the characteristics of a home or neighborhood. I will explain how this differs from zoning, which controls land uses (i.e., the type of building that can be built on a plot of land) and building bulk/density.
Covenants primarily control land use by regulating things like yardage, building character, architectural details, or home value. The result of these restrictions and regulations is the establishment of a specific neighborhood character and feel. In Queens, the result of the covenant restrictions and regulations are the creation and maintenance of exclusive, private, garden-style suburban neighborhoods each with its own specific appeal
Planning Beyond Boundaries: Creating Pathways Forward for Regional Housing and Climate Resilience Planning in New York
No full textCities across the United States continue to grapple with a deepening housing crisis—one that is increasingly compounded by the impacts of climate change. In the New York metropolitan region, there is a growing disconnect between the scale of housing and resilience challenges and the pace at which local jurisdictions are collectively responding. While the shortage of affordable housing is a regional issue, governance remains fragmented due to locally controlled zoning, creating a patchwork of regulations that often impedes housing development, reinforces exclusionary patterns, and undermines the region’s ability to respond effectively to climate-related risks like flooding.
In collaboration with RPA (Regional Plan Association), this capstone seeks to elevate the conversation around the need for a bold, statewide framework to address New York’s housing crisis in tandem with the growing pressures of climate change. The research begins by examining the proposed New York Housing Compact, the state’s most recent attempt at state-led intervention, and analyzing the structural and political shortcomings that ultimately prevented the proposal from materializing. To provide comparative insight, the study draws on New Jersey’s more established statewide planning framework, which illustrates the critical role of state governance in aligning local zoning with regional housing and climate resilience goals.
Through expert interviews with planners, policymakers, and housing advocates, this research captures on-the-ground perspectives and uncovers key implementation barriers and opportunities. Building on RPA’s work, the capstone underscores the urgency of a coordinated, statewide response that confronts the region’s housing shortfall and mounting climate vulnerabilities. It concludes with recommendations for reimagining state-led housing policy in New York—one that integrates climate resilience, advances zoning reform, and proactively plans for climate-informed development and shifts in regional growth patterns
Traveling with Asian American Gen Z Youth: Constructing Otherwise Identities in, through, and across Digital Spaces
No full textThis dissertation seeks to understand how six Asian American Gen Z youth navigate digital spaces to construct, craft, and negotiate their identities against a backdrop of narrative scarcity and the complex politics of (in)visibility. Through a nine-month digital ethnography employing multimodal, participatory methods, this work “travels with youth” into their digital lifeworlds, revealing the nuanced practices by which they mobilize digital tools, platforms, and artifacts to author and perform complex, multi-layered identities. Framed by the theories of figured worlds and intersectionality, the study asks two central questions: How are Asian American Gen Z youth today navigating digital spaces to construct and craft expansive identities? What are the ways they mobilize digital tools and platforms to speak back to, refuse, and sometimes reproduce the stereotypes and dominant narratives shaping who they ought to be?
The study foregrounds a paradox central to these young people’s lived experiences: they inhabit a persistent liminal space marked by both invisibility and hypervisibility. On one hand, Asian American Gen Z youth remain unseen in their multiplicity; on the other hand, they are subjected to heightened scrutiny through racialized and gendered lenses. This dissonance is particularly evident among youth embodying queer, Southeast Asian, biracial, adopted, and/or later-generation identifications, illuminating the internal diversity and power dynamics that shape identity experiences within Asian American communities.
The findings suggest that digital spaces are not reducible to binaries of danger or liberation. Instead, they function as intricate ecosystems where cultural artifacts and personal narratives intersect to create critical social arenas for belonging, cultural preservation, and identity (re)construction. In these digital figured worlds, Asian American youth actively negotiate visibility politics—crafting opportunities for self-representation, interrupting silences, and contesting omissions in dominant discourses of youth experiences.
Ultimately, this dissertation contributes to the fields of youth studies, digital research methodology, and digital literacy by demonstrating how Asian American Gen Z youth craft complex intersectional identities and expand the narrative plenitude of Asian American youth experiences. Collectively, their stories not only nuance conventional discourses of youth activities within digital spaces but also highlight the ongoing, evolving process of identity-making that arises from inhabiting increasingly digital social spheres—a process that is as complex as it is transformative
Understanding Asian Americans’ Attitudes Towards Practices that Address Racial Inequality: The Role of Belief in the Model Minority Myth and Colorblind Racial Ideology
No full textThe 2023 Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action in higher education (Students for Fair Admissions vs. President and Fellows of Harvard College, 2023) as well as the 2025 executive order instructing the termination of all Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion-related work within the federal government (Exec. Order No. 14151, 2025) have been two major recent examples of large-scale opposition to practices that seek to address racial inequality in the United States.
Asian Americans, who have been labeled as the “model minority” of the different racial groups in America have especially been portrayed within the affirmative action conversations as being monolithically opposed to this practice in higher education (Poon et al., 2016), despite survey results suggesting a wider variety of opinions within this population regarding both affirmative action and race-based workplace DEI practices (Pew Research Center, 2023; Pew Research Center, 2024). The present study seeks to understand the different factors driving the variance in beliefs within the Asian American population regarding these practices that address racial inequality.
The study focuses on two main predictors, the internalization of the model minority myth by Asian Americans and colorblind beliefs regarding race and racial dynamics in society. Results suggest that internalizing the model minority myth predicts greater opposition to both affirmative action and DEI, driven by the belief that Asian Americans have achieved greater success than other racial minorities due to individual merit-based explanations such as hard work and persistence. Holding more colorblind beliefs, particularly those that deny the existence of racial privilege and institutional discrimination in society, is also associated with greater opposition to both practices that address racial inequality. Colorblind beliefs also serve to mediate the relationship between internalization of the model minority myth and support for practices that address racial inequality.
Results also indicated that all of the relationships identified between the model minority myth, colorblindness, and support for practices that address racial inequality were significant above and beyond the impact of political orientation and gender. Additional factors such as generational status, perception of the integration between racial minority identities, and the perception of practices being seen as helpful or harmful to Asian Americans also appeared to shape beliefs about the model minority myth, colorblind racial ideology, and the support for practices that address racial inequality.
The present research contributes insights about the Asian American population which is still a burgeoning demographic in empirical research, particularly under-represented in organizational research. By understanding the wide and complex array of demographic factors and personal beliefs that are associated with the degree of support for practices that address racial inequality, Asian Americans and their colleagues across different organizational contexts can have more nuanced and constructive conversations instead of being pigeon-holed into sweeping stereotypes
Diana Karenne
No full textA previous version of this material can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.7916/d8-4rjf-2m17.
Diana Karenne was one of the most interesting personalities in the Italian and European filmscenes of the early 1900s. Star, actress, intellectual, artist, director, screenwriter, and producer,she is representative of an effectual coexistence between two different ways of considering awoman’s role in both the film industry and in a society that was undergoing deep changes as togender boundaries (Guerra 2008, 39; Pravadelli 2014, 5; Vicarelli 2007, 13). Through her artisticcareer, she supported demands concerning female identity, widely felt between 1800 and 1900(Bianchi 1969, 190): in this very period, Europe was facing a process of modernization and largetransformations at every social level. Karenne never took sides towards women’s emancipationmovements, yet she opposed conservative morals and social conventions of that time through herpersonal, aesthetic, and professional choices (Gaines 2008, 20), and helped to update the idea ofcinema thanks to her bold artistic proposals and acting style (Bianchi 192)
Spaceshifting: On Inhumanity as Shaping Resistance
No full textThe ontological violence of being confined to categories of the Inhuman (especially the “Animal”) is often resisted by appealing to acceptance into “common humanity,” a desire to be recognized as "human,” validating and working within this category. Through the creation of this exploratory, sticky, tangled website, I construct emerging connections and contrasts in BIBI's "Animal Farm" (가면무도회), INIKO's "Jericho," Rina Sawayama's "XS," and horsegiirL's "f0rbiidden l0ve$tory," and the ways each project occupies and employs the Inhuman, interrogating and challenging appeals to acceptance and expansion in the category of the “human.” These projects are created by artists who themselves are subjected to historic and present processes of de"human”ization, warping and transforming their own physical matter, as well as transgressing space and time around them—visibly, lyrically, audibly—through embracing and inhabiting Inhumanity as robot/cyborg, alien, monster, and/or nonhuman animal(s). Through this website, I tear open questions of racialized, gendered violence and "survivor"-hood; capitalist excess, co-optation, and consumption; and other interconnected, overlapping layers of violence of fixed and fixing notions of “the Human.” I additionally question the limitations of these projects, exposing contradiction and tension, as well as asking what is at stake in Inhumanity—and what this means in immediate organizing and resistance work.
Notes on Contributor:
Gray is a multi-disciplinary artist making multimedia pieces often exploring—but not limited to—sonic analyses. Gray's research often reflects on soundscapes as ontology in practice, as well as the relationships that can result from these practices. Outside of their art-work, Gray spends time community organizing
Google is Free: Moral Evaluations of Intergroup Curiosity
Get PDFTwo experiments investigated how evaluations of intergroup curiosity differed depending on whether people placed responsibility for their learning on themselves or on outgroup members. In Study 1, participants (n=340; 51% White-American, 49% Black-American) evaluated White actors who were curious about Black culture and placed responsibility on outgroup members to teach versus on themselves to learn. Both Black and White participants rated the latter actors as more moral, and perceptions of effort mediated this effect. A follow-up pre-registered study (n=513; 75% White-American) asked whether perceptions of greater effort cause greater perceptions of moral goodness. Replicating Study 1, participants rated actors as more moral when they placed responsibility on themselves versus others. Participants also rated actors as more moral when they exerted high versus low effort. These results clarify when and why participants view curiosity as morally good and help to strengthen bridges between work on curiosity, moral cognition, and intergroup relations
Observations and Physical Modeling of the Near-Surface Ocean: Fundamental Insights into Solar Heating, Diurnal Warming, Precipitation, and Ocean-Ice Heat Flux
Get PDFThe interaction between ocean and atmosphere sits at the heart of the climate system, and the empirical parameterizations of air-sea fluxes required to couple models of the two media together typically rest on the assumption that the upper ocean is homogenized by turbulent mixing. However, there are a number of globally relevant phenomena that modify the density structure of the surface ocean at vertical scales of just a few meters, affecting the coupling between the ocean and atmosphere. Because of their limited vertical scale and intermittent temporal occurrence, the effects of near-surface processes can be challenging to represent accurately in both fundamental physical theory and computational modeling, and must be accounted for when making in-situ and remote sensing measurements of the ocean surface.
The four chapters presented herein address diverse near-surface phenomena – sea ice, precipitation, phytoplankton, and diurnal warming – through a consistent philosophy of using comprehensive observational datasets from above and below the air-sea interface to interrogate and improve upon our theoretical understanding of the processes at play. In each case, the comparison between observations and theoretical modeling reveals the strengths and limitations of the current models and motivates new modifications. Specifically, this work provides observation-based improvements to the accuracy of theoretical frameworks for the ocean-ice heat transfercoefficient, ocean skin temperature during precipitation, solar heating in the ocean’s upper meters in the presence of variable phytoplankton concentrations, and diurnal warm layer response to changes in wind forcing. Crucially, the proposed modifications avoid introducing unnecessary or prohibitive increases in complexity, so that, where appropriate, they may be readily implemented into the current generation of global climate models.
In Chapter 1, we present oceanographic and atmospheric time series from a heavily instrumented “ice-tethered observatory” located on landfast ice above the river outflow channel in front of Kotzebue, Alaska. This observing station was deployed as part of the Ikaaġvik Sikukun (Iñupiaq for “Ice Bridges”) project, in which hypotheses and subsequent observational programs were co-produced in partnership with an Indigenous Elder advisory council in Kotzebue. The measurements allow us to quantify the heat budget of the ice above the outflow channel, and identify the ocean as the primary source of heat contributing to thinning of the ice, while also revealing a fundamental limitation of the current approach to calculating ocean-ice heat fluxes from bulk properties.
In Chapter 2, we present radiometric observations of ocean skin temperature, near-surface (5cm) temperature from a towed thermistor, and bulk atmospheric and oceanic variables, for 69 rain events observed over the course of 4 months in the Indian Ocean as part of the DYNAMO project. We test a state-of-the-art prognostic model developed by Bellenger et al. (2017) to predict ocean skin temperature in the presence of rain, and demonstrate a physically motivated modification to the model that improves its performance with increasing rain rate. We also characterize the vertical skin-bulk temperature gradient induced by rain and find that it levels off at high rain rates, suggestive of a transition in skin-layer physics that has been previously hypothesized in the literature.
In Chapter 3, we identify a need for a parameterization that is accurate in the upper meters and contains an explicitly spectral dependence on the concentration of biogenic material, while maintaining the computational simplicity of the parameterizations currently in use. To address this, we assemble simple, observationally-validated physical modeling tools for the key controls on ocean radiant heating, and simplify them into a parameterization that fulfills this need. We then use observations from 64 spectroradiometer depth casts across 6 cruises in diverse water bodies, 13 surface hyperspectral radiometer deployments, and 2 UAV flights to probe the accuracy and uncertainty associated with the new parameterization. We conclude with a novel case study using the parameterization to demonstrate the impact of chlorophyll concentration on the structure of diurnal warm layers.
In Chapter 4, we present co-located measurements of vertical temperature and turbulence structures in large DWLs made from a lagrangian float featuring a robotic lead screw T/S profiler and pulse-to-pulse coherent ADCP, yielding particularly revealing observations of the DWL response to variability in wind and solar forcing at sub-hourly timescales. Comparison of these observations with several upper ocean models reveals the importance of the solar heating parameterization developed in Chapter 3, and suggests a modification to the critical bulk Richardson number currently employed in the K-Profile Parameterization. Comparison to a simple scaling for DWL evolution highlights both the scaling’s potential and its limitations, and a new extension to the scaling is developed to remedy its inaccuracy in cases of wind decrease
Human Immune Memory to COVID-19 mRNA Vaccines
No full textThe human immune system is made up of cells and molecules distributed across the body, which provide protection from acute viral infection and can be maintained in diverse tissue sites as memory to protect against repeat viral exposure. Vaccine technology has leveraged our understanding of human immunity to induce immune memory in humans without infection. However, we continue to encounter novel infections, as evidenced by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic, which necessitates the development of new vaccines and formulations, including the mRNA vaccine platform. Vaccine development began with serendipitous discoveries and, even today, often relies on empirical approaches that prioritize clinical outcomes over immunologic ones. For the recently developed coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19) mRNA vaccines, we know that they confer clinical protection that wanes over time but have a more limited understanding of the immune memory they induce. Specifically, we do not know the tissue distribution of vaccine memory, these vaccines’ capacity to induce tissue-resident memory or various functional programs, and the relative role of B and T cells in protection.
Through a unique collaboration with the New York City area organ procurement organization, LiveOnNY, we collected blood, bone marrow, spleen, lung, and various lymph nodes (LN) from human organ donors who had received COVID-19 mRNA vaccines. Using these tissues, we employed multimodal, high-dimensional analysis tools to investigate the localization, phenotype, maintenance, and functions of COVID-19 vaccine-induced memory in the context of host factors such as age, time post-vaccination, and prior SARS-CoV-2 infection. In samples from 63 organ donors aged 23-86, we found that COVID-19 vaccine memory was distributed across tissues, especially in LN, and was more durable across time post-vaccination and age in tissues than in circulation. Vaccine-specific B cells were mostly class-switched resident memory, while vaccine-specific T cells were variably tissue-resident depending on infection history. Vaccine-specific T cell effector functions were diverse and site-specific with an enhanced regulatory profile in tissues compared to circulating populations.
To investigate the interaction between T and B cells in immune memory generation and their relative roles in protection, we also compared the quantity and quality of circulating COVID-19 vaccine induced memory from patients with multiple sclerosis taking B cell depleting (BCD) therapies to those taking other immunomodulatory therapies (non-BCD). In 281 samples from 216 subjects aged 24-78 we found that COVID-19 vaccine induced humoral immunity was completely diminished in the context of B cell depletion, but that cellular immunity, especially CD8+T cells, were enhanced in this context and maintained over time. Further, BCD subjects experienced equivalent numbers of infections following vaccination as non-BCD subjects. Together, these findings demonstrate that T cell responses can develop independently from, and may even be limited by, B cell responses, and that T cells but not B cells are critical for vaccine-induced protection. Ultimately, these findings provide critical insights for future vaccine development; studies must assess LN responses and aim to generate a robust cellular response that includes both regulatory and effector functional profiles within tissues