What About Clark’s Common

Sunbathing

Kite Flying

Watching Movie

Amphitheater Outdoor Kitchen Storage Camp re Fish Pond Bath Basin Garden Tree

Public Park Internal Courtyard Rock Climbing Friends of the Whau Club Art Installation Performance Stage

Sea Scouts Club Section Friends of the Whau Club Section

Public Park Sunken Seat Residential Tennis Court Multipurpose Court Ramp Park Rock Climbing Residential Boat Shed Sea Scouts Club Friends of the Whau Club Performance Stage Art Installation

4 Much Ado About Pylons

Sophia Whoi Seung Kim

Left:

Proposed new interactions with pylons .

Power pylons were built along the Whau River corridor in the 1940s to transmit power from Otahuhu to Henderson, and remain as a crucial part of the national electricity grid.1 These pylons have always been associated with an unfriendly, hostile undertone but the fact is they will stay here for the next 30 years. Why not look at how we can create uses for these ‛pylon parks’?

The aim of this project is to generate a plethora of urban scenarios, produced as a catalogue for sample pylon sites. These potentials are developed under tactical strategies to reimagine the spaces through permanent, adaptive, and temporary interventions.

Permanent interventions regard the project with long-term strategies. This type of tactic can deal with potentials for remediating ecological space with infrastructure. International research has shown that birds breed at significantly higher rates amongst vegetation under pylons than in an open field.2 One of the proposals looks at introducing a bird conservation area underneath the pylons and in this manner promotes activation of the Whau River waterscape by reprogramming specificities of the natural environment. Adaptive interventions deal with changing interfaces. Why don’t pylons generate alternative sources of power rather than just transmitting electricity? One design speculates on the use of solar panels installed on the arms of the pylons so that micro solar energy is generated. This could offer small communities access to free local power and provide a multiplicity of uses rather than monofunctionality.

Temporary intervention involves impermanent activities or seasonal typologies to ensue on-site. This could mean installing LED lights onto the structure of the pylon to create a decorated Christmas tree in the days leading up to Christmas, presenting a potential for it to become an annual event that could be popularly recognised and become uniquely associated with New Lynn.

All these propositions range from the serious to the eccentrically provocative, and are categorised into an assortment of possibilities. A series of ideas are drawn from this research in order for these marginal spaces to be considered differently as potential assets for the neighbourhood.

1 Auckland Council, “The Unitary Plan,” Auckland Council, accessed May 28, 2013, http://unitaryplan.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/pages/plan/Book. aspx?hid=37540&s=buffer%20corridor. 2 P. Tryjanowski , “A Paradox for Conservation: Electricity Pylons may Benefit Avian Diversity in Intensive Farmland,” Wiley Online Library, accessed April 23, 2013, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ conl.12022/abstract

Content

An illustration introduces the idea of each item

Open objective marginal open space

Index Icon

These icons describe the kind of tactical strategies involved

Caption

Title for each idea of the catalogue

Up management establish margin[al] space value Mimicry Close objective Natural/artificial manipulation marginal closed space to imitate

Outdoor art class

Ruin Process View management Action that allows time to govern preserve views/ make visible the change of landscape Parasite micro-architecture that is dependant on the pylon

Keep Out Construction of barriers/limits by structure and/or vegetation

Making spaceMaking space

Increasing the area of Increasing the area of a space around a pylona space around a pylon

Open objective Open objective marginal open spacemarginal open space

TransportingTransportingEcology Contributing to the environment by effective practical use.

Mimicry Close objective Close objective Natural/artificial manipulation to imitate marginal closed spacemarginal closed space

Solar access Conservation Preserving natural light viewshafts Special protection of a space

Parasite Media micro-architecture that is Involving media technology dependant on the pylon Aural Quality Giving significance to the presence of sound

Art Scene Raising interest in pylons by creative initiatives

Up management Up management establish margin[al] space valueestablish margin[al] space value View management preserve views/ make visible View management preserve views/ make visible Ruin Process Action that allows time to govern the change of landscape

Ecology Conservation Contributing to the environment by Special protection of a space effective practical use.

Ecology Conservation Contributing to the environment by Special protection of a space effective practical use. Solar access Preserving natural light viewshafts Surveillance Keep Out Construction of barriers/limits by structure and/or vegetation

Aural Quality Giving significance to the presence of sound

Security Protection by utilising the pylons

MimicryMimicry Natural/artificial manipulation Natural/artificial manipulation to imitate to imitate Media ParasiteParasite micro-architecture that is micro-architecture that is Involving media technology dependant on the pylondependant on the pylon Art Scene Raising interest in pylons by creative initiatives

Ruin ProcessRuin Process Action that allows time to govern Action that allows time to govern the change of landscape the change of landscape Keep OutKeep OutSurveillance Construction of barriers/limits Construction of barriers/limits by structure and/or vegetationby structure and/or vegetation

Security Protection by utilising the pylons

Left:

Tactical strategies organising the interventions through typologies.

Right:

Catalogue that amalgamates tactical strategies to reimagine the spaces through time-based

interventions.

5 Te Waitahurangi Loop

Hannah Ryan

Left:

Critical mapping of current land use on the loop.

Overleaf:

Appropriation of the loop.

With a continually rising population (an expected increase of 10,000 people in New Lynn alone by 2031), the requirement for new open space is undeniable.1 New Lynn is anticipating the generation of one new park, but with population increase and consequential lack of area for open space, it is probable that this will be the last.

As there are currently many existing and diverse open spaces resting along the Whau River’s edge, it makes sense to utilise these and to create linkages between both the green spaces and the Whau River. This idea of linkage between soft and hard spaces is something that the Auckland City Council has identified as an objective in the New Lynn Plan.2

Essentially, Te Waitahurangi Loop is intended as a recreational corridor that connects existing recreational open spaces—many of which are vital for community and public activity—but crucially, it also encompasses another type of recreational volume—the Whau River.

Only a small quantity of land is needed to make Te Waitahurangi Loop. However, as the river is a vast open space and essentially another activity space, the overall effect is of a large expanse.

Te Waitahurangi Loop generates a lively and sensory experience, where materiality, colour, texture and gradient are in constant change. Different paths may be taken at high and low tides, allowing for multiple levels of interaction.

One may take a seated flying fox or pivot swing over certain places at high tide to avoid obstructing the path of water activity, or at low tide the path may even change in gradient and become non-slip. The loop is crucially completed by Herman’s Whau-Bridge River-Park, which allows one to cross the river through a multi-dimensional experience. Shake and KCV’s projects, Industrial Recreation and Amphibious Living respectively, can be accessed from Te Waitahurangi Loop, also enhancing the diversity of the overall experience.

Places of relaxation and reflection are created, where one may sit or rest away from the loop path and overlook the river and activity along the loop. It is a corridor that brings out the child in the adult, encouraging enjoyable physical activity, as well as time for reflection and relaxation, generating an enriched engagement with the water.

The loop will be accessible from multiple neighbourhoods, including many current deadend streets, green spaces, and from the river itself, where accessibility becomes an extension of the haptic experience of place. Essentially, Te Waitahurangi Loop will become an amenity in itself—supporting and linking areas of physical activity and playfulness, as well as heightening the users’ overall sensory experience.

The generation of Te Waitahurangi Loop creates opportunity for community engagement, where community voice becomes amplified and solutions localised in order to shift the perception of the Whau River as a muddy landscape to a landscape that is influenced, and embraced, by its neighbouring communities. It will generate new interfaces between the land, water and community as well as creating a new experience of the city, and is a potential model for generating new open space in other parts of Auckland.

Refer to related projects:

Whau-Bridge River-Park

Industrial Recreation

Amphibious Living A

B

C

D

6 Whau-Bridge River-Park

Herman Haringa

Left:

Critical mapping of the existing infrastructure on the Whau river.

Overleaf, above:

Activation of the river surface.

Overleaf, below:

Diagram of functional program on

the Bridge River-Park. Axonometric drawing. The Whau River has played a significant part in Auckland’s history, originally used by the Māori as a portage between the Waitematā Harbour and Manukau Harbour. It was later used by the early colonial settlers as a means of transporting goods to central Auckland from the industries set along the river banks. Since the introduction of better roads and the Auckland–Kaipara railway line, the industry has moved inland— neglecting the use of the river.

This proposal seeks to reactivate the Whau River as a vibrant recreational surface. To create stronger public connection, greater focus will be placed on contact with the river itself, hinging a public-realm initiative onto an already proposed roading project. In 2009, as part of their 30-year plan, the (now defunct) Waitakere Council, along with the New Zealand Transport Agency, proposed a bridge in this location in order to better connect the former Waitakere City to Rosebank.

This led to the rethinking of the monofunctionality of infrastructure. This expensive piece of infrastructure is only intended to do one thing: reduce congestion. An asset like this could do more for its community, opening up various questions: Can infrastructure organise complexity? Can infrastructure remediate ecological space? And can infrastructure encourage social exchange? These collectively led to the Whau-Bridge River-Park proposal.

The proposal becomes a threading together of two typologies: the transit bridge and public recreational space, creating a multiplicity of functions. The proposed Bridge River-Park will create not only a new east–west river crossing for vehicles, public transport, cyclists, and pedestrians, but also a new park typology. Threaded into the existing road networks and Hannah Ryan’s Te Waitahurangi Loop proposal, the bridge will allow people to cross and pause along the width of the river.

The interconnected pathways leading down to the water provide an opportunity for the public to meander their way down the sides of the bridge. This gives the public the unique opportunity to interact with the water, mangroves and river ecology below, which would otherwise be difficult to access.

Activating the surface of the water itself is to be achieved through a series of semi-permanent and freely floating infrastructure. These floating platforms are designed to move with the tides and accept multiple programs. As a result, the proposal allows the possibility to transform the unique water space into a stage for arts, music, sports and recreational purposes.