THE CLOUD FOR THE CITY
ALEX ALAIMO/
NOLAN/ DESIGN 8/ NYIT/ SPRING 2013/ 5.13.13
@archiprenuer #popix WWw.alexalaimo.com alex alaimo/ alex.alaimo.01@gmail.com Professor mike nolan/ arch 502/ may 13 2013 /nyit
Point of Presence internet exchange (POPix) intends to bring the internet to life in the city. Conceptually it reveals the physicality of the internets subterranean fiber optic network. Functionally it is where your E-mail is routed through in the nanosecond before it is delivered to your recipient. It also inverts the typical rural ‘datacenter’ which are fortresses in countryside hidden from public view. Located at Canal and Varick Streets it is highly visible and invited the public in through an interactive and technology infused public space at the ground plane. Formally the concept is a tube that runs through a cloud. The tube drives everything. Using parametric design tools the shape of the tube defines each floor plate and facade surface. The tube also contains mechanical systems and acts as a ventilation chimney to cool the hardware. The public space is designed to engage the public with the object they stand beneath. There are three discrete public spaces, the interactive Kinect wall, POP temporary retail space and the media scape forum. These spaces take a technological approach to traditional space. Programmatically POPix has 16 floors 25% of which is mechanical space. Routers and servers consume vast amounts of energy and need cooling. The building only needs a handful of employees to run which have a level of administration offices. The public does not have access to the server levels but can gain a glance up the symbolic and functional tube. Aesthetically it looks like a floating cloud with a bubbly ETFE facade resembling clouds and use of reflective material wrapping the lower portion of the structure to ‘float the cloud’.
the cloud for the city
Email, Facebook, blogs, all contained in the mythical ‘cloud’ divorced from any sense of a brick and mortar world. The ‘Internet’ by nature does not evoke a physical image or sense of place yet millions of people are dedicated hours of their attention everyday online. This a social and cultural phenomena yet to be grappled by architecture. How would the internet feel like if it was a physical experience? How can the virtual manifest in the physical media of architecture? Dataplace attempts to slow down the digital age into a physical experience and form as an
timeline of the image of the computer
The datacenter
Internetworking History Antiquity 1971 Single network
Maturity? today Internetwork of internetworks
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es
ea
re p
ho
ne
lin
es
Teenage years 1990 Network of networks
MAE WEST
MAE EAST viginia
California palo alto ix one wilshire, LA
regional network exchange point internet exchange point internet exchange point datacenter/ users longline FiOP cables
Fi OPcables
ARPANET
MAE EAST/WEST
CLOUDY
Developed for dept. of defence for nuclear resistant communications
Internet exchange points developed, places where networks could plug into other networks efficiently. Long line fiber became prevelant as it was more cost effective.
Internetworking continues. Long line fiber connects major port cities. Datacenters develop as people begin to use the cloud.
rear
front in out cooling router
power
The truth is the internet is physical. Every bit of data exists in a real place usually two, connected by an extensive and elaborate series of fiberoptic networks. Data is located sporadically throughout the world and accessed ubiquitously. In this sense the internet is like Superstudio’s Continuous Monument project is realized, a common culture and infrastructure spread all over the world. Today, you cannot escape this technology yet its infrastructure is hidden from the everyday life. Datacenters can be located anywhere, but recently algorithms have been developed to locate new datacenters in the most climate and cost effect locations. In the United States this is the high deserts in Oregon. This rural datacenters are usually isolated and protected. The public has no awareness of what is inside and as a user of the cloud you rarely know where your data is. Dataplace inverts this mysterious and private reality making the Datacenter an urban intervention, that interacts and broadcasts to the public.
rural/ low population (cool climate)
urban/ high population
secure
open access
‘warehouse’
transparent volume
cheap electricty
electricty (generate?)
centralized (in a dispersed network)
dispersed (in a centralized network?)
invert the typology
Urban datacenters exist but do not act any more urbanistically. Usually housed in former telegraph building, their facades are blank and uninviting. New York City and other major cities play a different role in the internet. Just like the port days of the past, port cities developed because of their strategic geographic location and the internet follows the same game. New York although the humidity makes it problematic for data serves it is ideal for the interconnection of networks. Many US to Europe cables come into New York and then have to connect to another network, like transferring on the subway. This happens at Internet exchanges and New York is ideal for this.
the real internet
the tube starts with you
the real cloud
underground
the delivery
the big switch subterranean fiberoptic network
inversion
typical wedding cake
floating
+ factory
+ silo
+ retail
+
+
library bank office
+
+ warehouse
+
=
showroom public space blend
let’s find out
so what is POPix?
internet buildings of new york
siting
site located over major new york fiber lines Canal, Varick, 6th Ave and Grand St
hudson sqaure hudson sqaure
soho
$$$
soho
tribeca
ls na ca
t
ls na ca
tribeca
t
$$$
chinatown $
chinatown crux of four neighborhoods
TheInternet @RIP_Ted The #internet is a series of #Tubes!
Permanent POPup
@ElonMusk
#paypal needs a ground game E-commerce store are totally web based. What if there was a retail space for ‘virtual stores’. It would be an immersion space for startups to make a presentation and sell a product. Lessees would change every few hours. This would benefit startups looking for real
SHOW STREAMLINED MECHANDISING
iRoom Scape
@Jack
dl the app!
SHOP
12m
Its like #walking in #Google! Social media plays a big role in everyday life for many. What if there was a public space dedicated to a ‘social media scape’. Individuals can sync via an app to a digital wall where they can choose what to display. If real people walk by and ‘like’ them they will gain more time or more ‘wall space’. Popular walls will turn into rooms. Its a space that plays the game of social media. Markets can be set up with individual evendors an Job fairs can happen with LinkedIn.
dl the app!
Environmental @Al_Gore I invented the #cloud!
Priv/Pub @REMkoolhaas #Private will be #public private->public
It is estimated datacenters use 4% of electricity in the US. The demands of running valuable servers include running backup generators which, emit a black smog. The ‘cloud’ is a black fog of CO2. Raised floors are necessary.
Massing @L_Sullivan_arch #Form follows #function o
In the effort to make the internet legible servers which are usually concealed will be brought to the public eye. Reversing the private nature into the public awareness.
cooling tower entry
startup
structure
follow the project!
@Archiprenuer tumblr.com/Archiprenuer alexalaimo.com
Routers and servers get hot and constantly need to be cooled and do not need light like people. Potential cooling tower strategies were explored. series of tubes
side openings
megatube
cafe
serve r
ud
The cloud is real! The internet is not an amorphous blob but a handmade crafted quilt of physical connections.
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pas si
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vie
________ _ _
Fib
ta Re
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Optics
POPix seeks to explore the potential of an ‘internet’ building. To date there are no monuments to the internet. POPix explores what is virtual and what is physical and combines them into place.
er
________ __
HudSq_ a+
the tube
POPupe
ta _s
ca pe
r tu p s p a
cooling ve
ed rais floo
ows
router
d in
s
clo
s!
This includes designing for routers in the form of a ‘internet exchange’ (IX) a huge room of 19” racks of equipment that constantly need electricity and great mechanical cooling.
The project will also include a space for internet startups to incubate, in the form a co-working space.
ho+tribec So
The project also engages the public in the form a permanent pop-up space for internet based companies to have a (temporary) physical presence in New York. Finally a
the cloud concept
Dataplace seeks to take the interactivity of the internet and mix it with a didactic component revealing the true nature of the cloud. There are three discrete components of the building, the ground level, office space and data servers. These parts relate to the components of the internet, the public user, website platform and data storage. The building is lifted off the ground revealing a public surface for interaction. This quasi-social media public park is meant to be an immersive experience simulating walking through Google. Lined with screens for public broadcast for individuals it embraces the temporary individuality enables by the internet. Pop-up shops temporarily act to materialize and showcase services or products for start-up companies. Making reference to Archigrams Plug-in City it imagines the experience of surfing the web a physical media moving through space and not only time.
data tree and content farm
what program? Lot info Area: Zoning: Bounds: Use: Current land use: FAR: Area Total: Server floors: Mechanical: Administration: Retail: Public Plaza: Circulation: Miscellaneous:
31,000 sf Hudson square Special District Varick, Canal, 6th Ave and Grand Sts Industrial Vacant 10
the internet 310,000 sf 180,000 sf 60,000 sf 20,000 sf 5,500 sf 15,000 sf 16,000 sf 13,500 sf
the office the interface the public mechanical circulation datacenter patching/ cooling admin office public plaza pop retail uninhabitable lobby employee entrance
vault room
the tube connects
section
systems
section
WINTER
The upper levels are simple, industrial routers and servers. This population of computers ironically does not need the same criteria as humans do. They do not need light, just electricity and ventilation. A huge tube, air shaft acts as a live patching room, where robotic arms fly up and down making the necessary net work connection automatically. Huge mechanical equipment for cooling and ventilation are necessary to keep the building operating 24/7.
cooling modes SPRING
structure
SUMMER
POPix
The form of the building plays on the perceived language of the internet, bits. The building disintegrates into the ground. The reflective glass of the administration space gives the impression of the upper stories floating like ‘the’ cloud. LED laminated glass can portray messages to the public below. The mass of the building literally inverts the typical New York setback zoning. The public roaming the ground floor can draw towards the bottom of the mega tube having a real glimpse of the live automatic patching operations that illustrate the real nature of the internet. The façade’s LED lighting can be programmed to broadcast a hidden binary message of broadcast an advertisement in an 8 bit like image.
typical router floor The cloud has recently become a popular ‘symbol’ in the architecture world. The image of the ‘cloud’ has become an aesthetic element for many contemporary architects trying to take a snapshot of the phenomena of the internet. Diller Scofido and their project Blur actually atomize water where steam becomes a building and experience making the cloud a literal concept. The Cloud project for 2012 Olympics by Carlo Ratti, explores the cloud in a differently where it is a symbol of achievement enabling people to climb to the clouds. The POPix building combines Ratti’s formal notion with the mysteries of the internet inverting his aesthetics. POPix reflects the reality of the ‘cloud’ where the public can interact to a certain level yet, he upper stories of the ‘cloud can only be accessed by those privileged to understand the cloud, while the public can only look up, like cloud watching on a sunny day in Central Park. The internet is accessible to all but its inner workings are controlled by an industry and infrastructure unknown to most of the public.
the tube
The POPix plays with many ironies of the digital world in physical form. Programmatically it acts like a huge computer, with an interface, processor and memory. Aesthetically it acts to simulate the interactive experience of surfing the web and develops a language playing on the transferring of bits of data. As an experience it reveals the true nature of the internet. It inverts for the first time the traditional datacenter making it public. Dataplace, some kind of monument to the digital age as a ‘pretend’ center of the internet, exploits the preconceived notions of data and the information age through the media of physical space and architecture.
reflection and transparency
The tube drives grasshopper parametics
form diagram
bounds
ellipse
tangent
ellispse tran
nsformations
floor plans
derivitive tangents
difference
floor plates
admin offices
up the tube
typical floor
mechanical floor
router floor
skin virtual model
UV grid
randomization
ETFE panel
glycerine model
mammatus clouds
elevations
facade
LED illumination pixilated facade
social media scape
“indoor plumbing replaces the public fountain… the wristwatch replaces the clock on the public clock on the tower, records and CD’s replace live music…TV replaces movies (. .replaced live drama)” pp18
concept collage
bitty in city
ground plan
FRI
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TRIBECA
VIL
LA GE
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sub grade plan
CA
PUBLIC CIRCULATION
NA
LS
OF
FIC
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EMPLOYEE CIRCULATION
a virtual village
Technology has replaced or changed the functions of public space. POPix attempts to invert this making technology the focus of public space as a cultural dialog. Finkleman’s seems to be written at the dawn of the internet and asserts the interne causes loneliness. I think the last 15 years the internet has evolved into something else as everyone is online. With the advent of the smartphone and internet usage, according to the logic of Finkleman the world has got even more private yet, th internet actually is a public forum making formally private things public.
et
he
interactive wall
social media forum Public space is a ‘stage’ for the pedestrian to see and be seen. Just as your facebook wall or twitter feed may be a stage in the virtual space, the dataplace public space allows the dialog to continue in real space. I would say there are three objectives of the public space in my thesis; first, as previously mentioned act as an ‘interface’ and blur the virtual and real space ‘stage’. Two provide an instantaneous ‘participatory art’ environment utilizing technology where the public interacts and creates images. Finally the public space gives pedestrians a ‘real view’ of the internet through didactic experience.
kinect wall
POP modern Retail space for startups
SH
HOW
SHOP