To help navigate the sometimes alien world of city-based production, we’ve compiled a quick-reference guide to some of the most common urban manufacturing terms and definitions used by the Cities of Making project and in CityChangers.org articles. Got another to add? Let us know.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
A
Acoustic attenuation
Making a noise quieter. E.g., soundproofing using insulation or manufacturing in structurally detached units.
Additive manufacturing
3D printing. A component of Industry 4.0. Allows the cleaner and less noisy production of parts compared with traditional manufacturing. It is more accessible for micro-manufacturing and enables high levels of customisation. Can increase productivity by up to 30% by reducing wood and metal off-cuts and downcycling.
Agglomeration economies
Saving costs by minimising distance and time needed to access skills, resources, and transport.
Anaerobic digestion facility
Energy plant that runs on organic waste. For more information, click here.
C
CNC Machines
High-accuracy manufacturing is achieved by the likes of computer programmed mills, lathes, and 3D printers. After data input, no manual operator is required. CNC stands for ‘Computer Numerical Control’.
D
Densification
Maximising the efficiency of land use by increasing the presence of similar activities on a given site. Sometimes called industrial intensification.
Distributed manufacturing
Production at small-scale, disparate sites, as opposed to centralised factories. Made possible by the emergence of Industry 4.0 technology, such as 3D printing and cloud-based computing, allowing manufacturing to be much more flexible.
Division of labour
Splitting activities into individual component tasks. By repeating these micro-activities, unskilled workers perform at increased speed. Multiple people combined, each concentrating on a single task, result in larger scale, faster, cheaper production, in turn being more affordable to more consumers.
Drosscape
An area of land characterised by dereliction. Possibly the result of now-defunct economic/industrial activity. As a space of waste, this may be land that can be redeveloped and repurposed for urban manufacturing.
E
Economies of scale
Consolidating and optimising multiple business functions in one place and/or under the umbrella of a single business entity is more efficient and a cost-saving compared with disparate locations, the sharing of operations, or reliance on multiple manufacturers. However, businesses are more vulnerable to changing market forces.
Energy cascading
Cascading is the sequential and consecutive use of resources. It’s a potential method to add value in circular economy (CE) practices. Cascading maximises resource effectiveness by using biomass in products that create the most economic value over multiple lifetimes. This approach to production and consumption states that energy recovery should be the last option, and only after all higher-value products and services have been exhausted.
Energy recovery
Heat, fuel, or electricity generated through the processing of waste materials. Reuse and recycling should be considered before waste products are used in energy recovery.
Externalities
Nuisances caused by manufacturing, e.g., noise, dust, fumes, traffic flows.
F
Fablab
A collaborative space where small-scale manufacturers can design and produce goods using digital technologies.
Foundational economy
Provides the most basic products required for life in the city, making it robust and resilient to competition, change, and innovation. Infrastructure maintenance, construction, and food production are all part of the foundational economy. The largest form of manufacturing in terms of employees.
I
Import replacement
Products now produced locally that were once manufactured further afield, especially abroad. Buying local materials and making and selling locally leads to a multiplier effect of investment. Benefits extend to better-quality and more affordable goods, and more choice, but problems with supply chains can be tricky. Not to be confused with reshoring.
Industrial activities
Used to describe a specific manufactured product or service provided (such as curtains, sandwiches, etc.). Not to be confused with industrial trades.
Industrial commons
Transferable skills and knowledge that can be used to generate and innovate ideas and products. A city’s industrial commons can be a unique ‘fingerprint’ not shared by any other urban centre due to the local historic and cultural manufacturing landscape. The resultant developments are therefore likely to be equally unique.
Industrial trades
Used to describe a type of industry (such as clothing, food, etc.). Not to be confused with industrial activities.
Industry 4.0
Modern technologies such as 3D printing (see ‘additive printing’), robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and 5G communication networks. Enables flexible, smaller-scale, customisable, and distributed manufacturing. Can be expensive, therefore inaccessible without financial support and appropriate policy.
Intensification
Also called industrial co-location, this is the process of diversifying the range of activities in a single location. Most suited to manufacturers who create limited ‘nuisances’ (or ‘externalities’) like noise, dust, and odours.
L
Localisation economies
Complementary businesses are clustered together, making collaboration easier and minimising transport and space requirements. Aside from suppliers and makers, this includes knowledge-based companies such as consultants and specialists.
M
Mass-customisation
Products are tailored individually. They can be produced locally and at scale.
Material inputs
Resources needed for the production process and/or finished product. For instance, material inputs required by curtain pole manufacturers include wood, metals, resins, and paint.
Material outputs
Waste at the end of production.
Micro-manufacturing
Production of goods by a single person or handful of people in a space no larger than a typical domestic room. To save on renting additional space, this may take the form of making from home – the manufacturing equivalent of working from home – the small scale making it compatible. Gaining popularity due to online marketplaces offering affordable sales platforms. However, some industries require investment to ready the space, such as cooling or air purifying devices.
Multi-actor collaboration
Describes an approach to address complex challenges through cooperation between actors from civil society, politics, the private sector and academia. They acknowledge the vast complexities and interconnectedness of issues.
Multiplier effect
Replacing overseas manufacturing with local making leads to city-scale reinvestment. Locally sourced, sustainable products, like wood, can be bought, used in production, and sold within the city. All agents involved in the process will profit, in turn spending income locally on further goods and services. In this way, it is reported that manufacturing generates $1.33 in profit compared to $0.66 in retail and $0.61 from professional and business services.
O
Off-gassing
Many products (e.g., building materials, furniture, electronic devices) continue to emit harmful chemicals after they have been finished/installed. This process is called off-gassing.
Offshoring
Manufacturing goods in another country, where labour is cheaper, before shipping them to the destination market (i.e., Europe).
P
Planned obsolescence
The practice of designing goods with a limited shelf life and which are more expensive to repair than to replace. Especially prevalent in electronics.
R
Raising autarky
A term used in economics to denote self-sufficiency as a method to protect the local economy from external shocks, e.g., in changes to supply lines and policy. Reliance on local resources offers greater flexibility, such as adapting to climate change mandates. This reassurance may come at a price: it can be more costly than importing goods.
Regional processing
Where making is rooted locally (i.e., not based on exports). Manufacturing that needs to take place close to its destination market, maybe because goods have a limited shelf life or due to interdependency between business-to-business client and producer. Repairs, food, and waste management are prime examples. Because of this dependency on proximity, it suffers little from international competition.
Re-industrialisation
Establishing an industrial base again where it had once existed but had either dwindled or been replaced, possibly by the service economy.
Reshoring industry
The move to re-establish manufacturing locally, shifting production from abroad so that the geography of production and sales are together.
S
Secondary raw materials
Secondary raw materials are recycled materials that can be used in manufacturing processes instead of or alongside virgin raw materials. They are typically obtained either from production waste or from End-of-Life (EoL) products, sent to recycling plants at the end of their lifespan.
Servicification
The increase of service-tilted jobs in the manufacturing industry as opposed to production. These range from design to logistics and from sales to management.
Stagnation
A dominance of services, the financial incentive of giving land over to residential development, and the “financialisation of the economy” have caused homogeneity within cities. Risk-taking SMEs are unable to access space. Research and innovation of products decline with negative consequences for the local economy and a city’s ability to compete.
T
Take-back systems
When manufacturers accept the return of products that have reached the end of their life or purpose. These can be refurbished, repaired, or recycled, thereby reducing waste.
U
Urban regeneration
Renewal of an urban area deemed to be in decline. The objective is to restore the area’s (economic) viability, mainly by improving its built environment. Also known as urban renewal or urban development.
Note: This article is commissioned by and produced in collaboration with JPI Urban Europe, a European research and innovation hub founded in 2010. The original version of this article is published here.