The Urban Construction Laboratory (UCL) is an independent research “think-tank” on urban issues that initiates it own projects, and also consults and advises outside clients.

U.C. Berkeley Professor Richard Bender, Dean of its College on Environmental Design, and John J. Parman founded UCL in May 1989 in Tokyo, where Bender was the inaugural GC-5 Chair at RCAST, the research campus of Tokyo University. In 2025, Elham K. Hassani, Ph.D. joined Parman as UCL’s Co-Director for the EU.

Among its projects, UCL studied the feasibility of a “super-high-rise” tower at Makuhari, a new town at the edge of Tokyo (for Shimizu); advised on trends relevant to urban-scale development (for Kajima); led study tours to California, New York City, and western Europe (jointly sponsored by the five largest Japanese construction companies, also including Obayashi, Taisei, and Takenaka); consulted on aspects of the Mori Roppongi development, including the Mori Art Center, with Tokyo developer Minoru Mori; and advised the Mori Memorial Foundation on its Mori Global City Index, a leading city-ranking index. UCL consulted with Intep, a pioneering integrated resilient planning firm based in Zurich and Munich, and advised on Expo 2000 in Hanover, Germany. After UCL’s Richard Bender advised on the future growth of Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, we shared our research on university/city co-development at three international Univer-Cities Conferences in Singapore and Newcastle Australia, 2013–2019, with U.C. Berkeley Campus Architect Emily B. Marthinsen, FAIA. Our papers were published in proceedings by World Science and Imperial University (Singapore and London).

Since 2019, UCL’s work has focused on urban regeneration in the San Francisco Bay Region and elsewhere. Collaboration with Dr. Hassani has prompted an interest in applying artificial intelligence (AI) to city-making as a more holistic and resilient process.