Biography

I work at the intersection of urbanization patterns, local energy policy and equity. In my research, I seek to understand the motivations, intentions and plans of multiple actors endowed with limited capabilities, imperfect foresight and distributed authority, in urban settings. Lately, I have been studying these issues in the context of local energy planning. I routinely use high cadence, large geospatial and temporal datasets and novel quantitative methods in my research. I am also a planning theorist, specialising in organisational decision-making, institutional restructuring and the role of plans. In addition to my faculty appointments in the City & Regional Planning at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, I am also a faculty fellow at the Insitute for the Enviroment.

Interests
  • Energy
  • Plans
  • Networks
  • Urban Morphology
  • Institutional Analysis
Education

  • PhD in Regional Planning, 2008

    University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

  • MS in Applied Mathematics, 2007

    University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

  • Master of Urban Planning, 2004

    University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

  • B.Arch (Hons.), 2001

    Indian Institute of Technology at Kharagpur

Recent Posts

Geospatial Data in R
Introduction In this post, I am going to show how one might go about analysing the Bikeshare use in New York city.
Last updated on Sep 15, 2024 280 min read R, teaching
Geospatial Data in R
Transit Accessibility Using GTFS
Introduction Understanding the reach and effectiveness of public transit is important to understand how urban environments are accessible for different groups of people.
Last updated on Nov 18, 2022 20 min read transportation, R
Transit Accessibility Using GTFS
Cleaning Spatial Networks
Introduction Some transportation networks are intuitive to understand as networks. We can easily visualize intersections as nodes and roadways as edges in a road network.
Last updated on Oct 26, 2022 11 min read transportation, new-urban-analytics
Cleaning Spatial Networks
Isochrones from Routing Engines (OSRM)
Introduction In other posts, I have shown how to use external servers (google, craigslist etc.) to access information. You can also query a local (on your computer) server and your R session acts like a client (e.
Last updated on Jan 25, 2022 4 min read transportation, new-urban-analytics
Isochrones from Routing Engines (OSRM)
Exploratory Data Analysis and Visualisation
Some exploratory graphics using air pollution data in the US.
Last updated on Aug 26, 2024 546 min read new-urban-analytics, air-quality
Exploratory Data Analysis and Visualisation
See all posts

Recent & Upcoming Talks

Advanced Spatial Analysis in R
Spatial Analysis in R
May 11, 2023 8:00 AM — 9:30 AM
Advanced Spatial Analysis in R
Spatial Analysis in R
Spatial Analysis in R
May 4, 2023 8:00 AM — 9:30 AM
Spatial Analysis in R
Visualisation Principles
Principles and Practise of Data Visualisation
Apr 30, 2023 8:00 AM — 9:30 AM
Visualisation Principles
Introduction to R & Urban Analytics
Introduction to R
Apr 23, 2023 8:00 AM — 9:30 AM
Introduction to R & Urban Analytics
Data driven approaches to quantifying relationships between urban form & livability
Different Data Driven Approaches
Feb 24, 2023 1:00 PM — 1:10 PM Carolina Data Science Now
Data driven approaches to quantifying relationships between urban form & livability
See all events

Featured Publications

Growing Safely or Building Risk?
Growing Safely or Building Risk?
Removing Federal Subsidies from High-Hazard Coastal Areas Slows Development
Removing Federal Subsidies from High-Hazard Coastal Areas Slows Development
How does the removal of federal subsidies affect investment in coastal protection infrastructure?
How does the removal of federal subsidies affect investment in coastal protection infrastructure?
A Wrench in the Machine: How subsidy removal alters the politics of coastal development
A Wrench in the Machine: How subsidy removal alters the politics of coastal development

Recent Publications

Quickly discover relevant content by filtering publications.
Jordan Branham, Nikhil Kaza, Todd BenDor. Do development disincentives influence land conservation activity?. Frontiers of Ecology & Environment, 2024.
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K. Khanal, Nichola Lowe, Nikhil Kaza. Retraining for Energy Transition: A Workforce Development Approach Using Occupational Similarity and Unsupervised Clustering. Economic Development Quarterly, 2024.
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Betsy Donald, Shauna Brail, Nichola Lowe, C. DeLoyde, Kaitlin Heatwole, F. Hernandez, K. Hill-Tout, Nikhil Kaza, Kshtiz Khanal, Donald Planey, Jueyu Wang. The Dashboard Is Not Dead: Dashboards as Effective Tools in Skills Building, Sense-Making and Community Collaboration. Journal of American Planning Association, 2024.
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Julia Cardwell, Nikhil Kaza. Extension, Densification, Dispersion and Stagnation: Patterns in Urban Spatial Development in Metropolitan United States 2001-2021. Applied Spatial Analysis & Policy, 2024.
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Kshitiz Khanal, Nikhil Kaza, Miyuki Hino, Antonia Sebastian. Manufactured Housing in North Carolina: A Computer Vision Approach. 2024.
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Teaching

Full courses

I typically teach the following courses. Sample syllabus and schedules are linked. Please check the course schedules for term and registration information.

Short courses

From time to time, I offer short courses with differing durations. Stay tuned for updates.

Contact