LA 401-FALL 2015
U t rb o he an pe n i n ee sm sp d a ac o n es f d
ABSTRACT With the growing of cities and increase in population, one thing is at a still, and that is open spaces, which is harder to come by. It is like freeways, the same freeways are around while the increase of vehicles increases, parks are the same while the population and cities just keep growing without filling up the demand and the need for them. The fact that spaces aren’t made, even though there are abandoned places around, makes vegetation claim this places instead, therefore vegetation knows where it grows best, by claiming it their own. In this case designers should take this as an advantage, as a stepping stone of making better open spaces where the spaces are claimed by nature, but shaped for human interaction, the High Line as a fine example of it.
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Emelio Castillo LA 401 Lecture Wilcox Cal Poly Pomona Landscape Architecture
table of contents
Can Designers Improve Life in Non-Formal cities
1-4
1st word- Urbanization
5-6
2nd word- Squatters
7-8
Defining Urban Sites
9-12
3rd word- Boundaries
13-14
4th word- Urban Constellation
15-16
Spontaneous Urban Vegetation: Reflection of Change in a Globalized World
17-20
5th word- Anecophyte
21-22
6th word- Ruderal Vegetation
23-24
The High Line Wandering
25-28
Repurposing
29-30
Central Park Wandering
31-34
Sanctuary
35-36
Mia Lehrer Lecture
37-40
Sustain
41-42
Bob Perry Lecture
43-46
Ecology
47-48
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Can Designers Improve Life in Non-Formal Cities While reading this article, it took me back to the place where I used to live before, there was no place of gatherings that were built to improve life, instead we made our own improvement where we could gather and play. One would think the place of where I lived was of bad quality, but my experience of where I was living was of high quality to me therefore I was happy. We didn’t have an urban setting, but here in ever growing cities, is all about the urbanism. While many things are being build the urban fabric is taking up everything leaving very little behind to be use. The working class in low income areas tend to lack the essentials of what is known as an urban environment, that consists of having good infrastructure, a reliable transportation, services, amenities and open space. This last one is what came to mind while visiting West Philadelphia, since they didn’t had that many open spaces, as for transportation they were proud of how they could walk to everything from their location, everything was within a short walk distance. They have problems as well, just as the reading explained with Latin America where politicians talk about slums and how they should be eradicated and that they should be upgraded somehow. Gentrification is a fearful word, “plan or be planned for” as one of the speakers of our field trip said, if they don’t make good profit they get replaced with something better, or more profitable. 01 LA 401-FALL 2015
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In order for people to overcome this, they have to adapt to the circumstances at hand. Whether is either in economic or monetary situations or adapting to the new laws that keep changing the way they live, and mostly favor the rich. In order to get a middle ground between the haves and have-nots is to create some places that can serve as middle ground between both formal and informal cities, which will be used by residents from both sides, creating a bridge and connecting both sides into one place. There is culture in everything we see, cultural behavior not only shapes our lives but shapes the public spaces we tend to gather at and those spaces also tend to shape those cultural behaviors. We create a place where we tend to feel safer, a place besides home that one can go and enjoy the friendly, community environment around us. A community is built in place such as slums, it doesn’t matter where, a designer can improve life in formal cities as well, they can improve them by creating something that the people actually want, something that they actually need, not something they think is what they want but something they actually need. This is one thing us as designers don’t understand, we are better at designing our own spaces then designing what others want and need, I say this as a person who took a place with friends and made it into a play area for us, without any formal design, the things that change are just the rules and the way of life. 03 LA 401-FALL 2015
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URBANIZATION Urban meaning ‘relating to or characteristic of the city’ The urbanization of land in which buildings appear as a morphological phenomena and as a social phenomena, when people with their experiences and behavior change the land. The process in which cities keep growing and societies change, becoming more urban, as more people come and begin to live in there places and working in them, they grow becoming urbanize Urbanization tends to go hand and hand with the advances in technology. Urban environments represent open space, transportation, infrastructure, services and amenities. “In the developing world, urbanization has made linear process since the middle ages” (Urban Connectors 26)
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SQUATTERS When a building or piece of land become occupied or taken up by people that make it their own unlawfully. A person who under regulation by the government settles on the land in order to acquire the title for it. “The discriminatory term squatter settlements and informal settlements represent self-defeating characterizations that only reinforce separateness.� (Urban Connectors 26) The places where people had to design themselves to occupy them, no designer was needed for this spaces, yet they were built, when the need is great every place can be use as a place to gather and in this case a place which they call home. Although the conditions might be horrible, they still manage to create it and make it their own.
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DEFINING URBAN SITES
Urban sites, what defines an urban site? One would say it is just a place where it is surrounded by buildings and nothing else. However, these kinds of sites are on a much more complex situation. As Andrea Kahn describes in her essay they are sites where a variety of movements and interactions are in place in the specific site. There are boundaries set that can be apparent on paper, but are they really boundaries that stop anything from coming in or out of the site. I say no and have to agree with Kahn that urban sites are defined by the permeability of it where the surroundings come together and interact with each other to make this special identity within each space. Just like in Times Square where that space is identified by all the entertainment, commerce and other engagements where people from all over the world can come together and interact with this space. So in reality the boundaries are made by these entities that happen in the space by which how far they extend and interact with the neighboring area. That in itself is how the boundary is concluded to see where these interactions start and end. These urban sites are made to be active instead of being stationary since there is a melting pot of many activities and connections being held in a site. There are many things that are taken into consideration within these sites that are important 09 LA 401-FALL 2015
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to the place like social, economic, historical, physical, political and haptic. These things are always present, especially in the urban setting because in directly involves the public that live in these urban areas. Urban sites are an intricate form of a complexity through representation in a way that it is not directly representation of an object, but of an idea. I feel that this offers the opportunity where open spaces come into play because they can correlate with the urban site in that it offers that dynamic sense to the place. Whether it is a place where people use the space for physical activities like playing sports or simple passive activities like meditation these spaces can be used for anything that the urbanism usually lacks. When thinking about designing these spaces within the urban compound you have to think about the public because ultimately they are the ones that are going to use this space and experience it. It all goes back to incorporating and letting the entities that are already there in the surrounding area to permeate into these urban sites so that the interaction can work on its own. Thus its own identity will be born into what the immediate public can call their own. In the end what dictates these events are what can penetrate these sites and how it can be influenced by the public and other things that will make these spaces active and a unique place where anybody can enjoy and feel what it is like to live in that kind of urban setting. 11 LA 401-FALL 2015
Space
City
urban spaces boundary
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BOUNDARIES A line dividing something, in this case a piece of land, or piece of property. Also a line that serves a the limiting mark for a specific area. “The point is not that drawing boundaries is somehow impermissible...but that the permeability of those boundaries has to be constantly reasserted” (Kahn 283) The thing that stops growth is the divisible part of the site. Boundaries most of the time don’t bring anything good. Design wise it is good to have boundaries but it doesn’t mean that it has to stop the design there, the design should continue on, without any stopping it, it should bleed into the community to enhance and enforce the relationship between them. Boundaries only divide, nothing else.
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URBAN CONSTELLATION Context- the circumstances that have created the setting for an idea, statement or event. Associated with coherence and the activity of weaving. Context and place related notions.
Open Spaces
“Context is what the site is not” (Kahn 294) “Urban constellation blurs the line between context and site demarcating site interactions across multiple fields of urban operation” (Kahn 294) Urban constellation is not just making the canvas bigger, in order to enlarge the contextual frame with one a one viewed place, rather it is a concept that requires urban sites with not only one, but several contextual frames that happen simultaneously.
Unifying Weaving
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Urb
People
City
ban
Boundary
Neighborhoods
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Spontaneous Urban Vegetation: Reflection of Change in a Globalized World There have been various arguments in these recent years about global change with ecosystems and climates. Clearly we can see that in many cases it is true because we are feeling it in the climate where it is hot almost all year round in recent years. So how does this affect vegetation, well it gives way to different type of vegetation that adapts to this type of climate. In an urban setting this vegetation that will withstand a lot of heat, carbon dioxide and ground conditions that many may think it is not possible for plants to grow correctly. However, this essay is discussing about that type of urban vegetation that has been surging in response to all the movement of development. I believe that this vegetation is important to an urban setting because it gives it more life to a place where is taken over like in the essay describes with asphalt and buildings. Vegetation is important for the people as well because it helps their psychological needs to see some nature after being in an urban setting for a long time. It gives that connection back to our ancestral ways of living with nature with a long range of vegetation. Although there is a lot of the vegetation that is not maintained because of economic problems there can be ways that can be come up with that can be inexpensive. This essay argues that this vegetation that just comes up without anybody planting any seeds or anything can be that way that will populate these urban settings with vegetation and be inexpensive. 17 LA 401-FALL 2015
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It is important for the resurgence of vegetation in urban settings which will be a great benefit to the cities. It will bring healthier environments like better breathing quality. It can be an opportunity for kids of this generation and upcoming generation to learn about vegetation so they can be considerate of nature and see how important it is for the general population to be able to encounter and experience vegetation in these urban cities. Seeing what kind of vegetation native plants to southern California and any other city around the US can be useful for them to know the natural order of nature. These cities would be more vibrant and have a fresher look with more vegetation around. Although many people look at the randomly appeared vegetation as an ugly aesthetic that just makes the place look like it’s neglected and forgotten. However, the people view it as such because they don’t really understand what a real natural vegetation growth is about. All they are used to see is high maintained vegetation that is controlled by man with plants that are mostly not even of the region and are planted and forcefully made into working in a landscape that these plants do not originate from. So if people starting learning about the original look of vegetation they might just be interested in taking part of the movement to vegetate the urban cities with more native plants and have a different perspective that is different from manicured vegetation. 19 LA 401-FALL 2015
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ANECOPHYTE Any plant that could be found only in human created places or habitat. “These anecophytes, as they are known, have mainly arisen through the process of hybridization and show specialized adaptations to habitats associated with agriculture, urbanization, and/or industrialization” (Del Tredici 304) Having a ration that shows nonnatives being more than natives indicates how there is a high concentration of “aliens” inside the urban areas that have vegetation. So is basically vegetation that was transported by people in areas that are not supposed to be for them, since they seem to do a lot better, but after a while they over take the native species.
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RUDERAL VEGETATION A species, usually and specially a plant, or some sort of small vegetation, that colonizes a disturbed area and makes it its new home. A plant that grows in waste ground or places. “Ruderal landscapes are typically associated with the margins of transportation infrastructure, abandoned or vacant residential, commercial, and industrial property, and the interstitial spaces that separate one land-use function from another.� (Del Tredici 300) Vegetation that grows on its own and fills an area that is usually not molested by humans since it was last abandoned or touched. A good example was the High Line where native grasses were growing on their own on the tracks before Corner came and re-did the whole area.
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THE HIGH LINE WANDERING While looking at the readings and looking back at how New York is, the High Line is a perfect example or reusing something where urbanism has taking over almost every piece of the urban fabric. The place was a really amazing experience, since it is a high open space, being suspended in the air by beams that once held a train, from moving a piece of metal from being use to move people, walking and giving private nodes along the way is just an amazing feat done by James Corner. I didn’t realize how long it was until, I just got half way through it and realize I wasn’t going to have time to cover the whole thing, with the limited time we had. It was urban vegetation grown on urban transportation tracks, where grasses that were already growing by themselves prior to the area being touched, so by using native vegetation that site kept some of its value, since the vegetation was claiming a piece of land that was abandoned for some time. The lookouts that the linear park had, gave it a sense of connection to the surroundings instead of isolating the site, it has become a connection between nature and the urban environment that surrounds New York and its busy daily lives. They were private areas, but since the view frames were clear people can see you from the outside and vice versa, so it was private without being private. We need these places in order to connect to both, nature and the city. Urbanism. 25 LA 401-FALL 2015
THE HIGH LINE WANDERING Images
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THE HIGH LINE WANDERING Images
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THE HIGH LINE WANDERING Illustrations 34th Street
26th Street
Chelsea
Fulton Houses
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REPURPOSING re-pur-pose To use or convert for use in another form or product. “To change (something) so that it can be used for a different purpose� (Merriam Webster) The High Line was repurposing into an open space where the railroads now serve as a design principle where it transitions from hardscape into softscape. The railroad became something more useful after its abandonment, where it reshaped the place with its natural vegetation, it was started to grow on its own. Everything serves a purpose and once that purpose is over things can change and made into something completely new, or make something that embraces the old with the new as the High Line does, by reusing the railroads and designing from them.
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CENTRAL PARK WANDERING Central Park, is a monster of its own, such an incredible piece of art. It looks like a heart within a massive structured body and filled with heavy flow of populated veins that transport many people at once every day and night. It is necessary to have an escape route, and an actual place to arrive to after taking that escape route, that place in such a busy city is Central Park. A green dot in a gray city is what Central park seems to be. The need for these urban spaces is really necessary. The fact that this piece of landscape is submerged, being access by going down, and suppressing the noise from the busy city makes this place feel like a sanctuary for the body and soul. The views it creates does not interfere with nature, but it connects a natural panorama with a cityscape views behind it, it borrows the scenery from beyond, but unlike Japanese borrowed views where it borrows natural views to extend the gardens of landscapes, it borrows a different more robust view, buildings on the background. It is a sanctuary, for those who want to immerse themselves with a landscape that seems to continue on, being placed down in the landscape it takes away those unwanted traffic noises which only make the day much more chaotic. There were a lot of people there, which makes you, know they use the space, and therefore shows that we do need more spaces that can help, get away from the daily urban life. 31 LA 401-FALL 2015
CENTRAL PARK WANDERING Images
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CENTRAL PARK WANDERING Images
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CENTRAL PARK WANDERING Illustration
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SANCTUARY sanc-tu-ar-y noun “a place of refuge or safety” “a nature reserve” “a sacred or holy place” (dictionary.com) A sanctuary whether being religious related or not, it still is place where one can go to feel better, feel at ease and free in a way. Those who don’t have their own place need a place to call their own, and I don’t mean their homes but a place where they can interact with nature and nature can interact with them. The problem is finding these places and designing them, although they are needed, there seems to be a lack of development from such places, but the need is there, I feel lucky since I have a small park near me where although is next to street, it is an escape, my sanctuary, out of my worries at least from the stress of everyday life, more so when we live in a tiny apartment where there is no space for us to go out to, that we can call our “backyard”, our open space that we can feel that green, and not green as in vegetation but green as a place where we feel green, a place to enjoy feel that freedom of the same repetition of life.
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Mia Lehrer Mia Lehrer being one of the top designers in LA is a person to follow closely more so knowing that she has been one of the last people to design a park in LA. It is also a park that is not only aesthetically appealing, but it severs a purpose. Los Angeles is a busy city, similar in a way to New York in the way of growing and keeping the same open spaces available to the people. In the lecture I learned many things such as how water relates to all of the designs being built here in CA, having to create more sustainable spaces and incorporate those traits into new designs, into new parks and new spaces for the people. Now not only does a park or open space needs to be aesthetically appealing, but it also has to take into account all the new requirements which water is the main important role. While urbanism is here, urban spaces are being needed and while they are built, slowly and rarely, they still have to match the existing conditions of the city and have to be more sustainable, more multipurpose, a space that has different aspects. Mia Lehrer focuses on what she believes are quality designs and trying to implement healthy environments for the communities. Their vision is one that has: “evoking emotion while transforming community place”, “creating places that matter”, “designing landscapes that inspire”, and “using technologies that sustain”. (mlagreen 2011) 37 LA 401-FALL 2015
Mia Lehrer Images
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Mia Lehrer Illustrations
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Mia Lehrer Images
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SUSTAIN sus-tain verb strengthen or support physically or mentally to bear, to undergo, to keep to supply, to provide for “Using technologies that sustain� (mlgreen) The meaning of the word is so much bigger, sustainable landscapes, are what shapes many places now, such as those design by Mia Lehrer and other designers who see the need for sustainable places, such as the park she designed, the Vista Hermosa Natural Park. Why we need this places you may ask, we need them because without them there is nothing that keeps from knowing our natural places, without nature we are nothing, cities are filling our environment and creating problems for it, there has to be a way to at least ease that problem and one of the problems we have here in CA is water, therefore that is one of the main focus when designing new urban spaces.
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Sustain, re-use, re-cycle
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BOB PERRY Open spaces are great, but vegetation also plays a big role, not only are the spaces needed, vegetation is also needed to come along with them. Without any vegetation how can a place clean, purify a better environment for the people, if there is no actual purifier, or at least a natural purifier such as vegetation. Bob Perry emphasizes these, since many designers don’t take into account what type of vegetation to place, they just use it as a means of directing people or as a method of creating interactions, which tends to be the only reason they use it, or at least that’s how the professors at school in our design courses have thought us, or at least that is how I have feel all of my quarters, up until now, with Ray Senes. Bob also sees the uses of plants and how they interact with people, such as having all the functional uses of them, but also how the vegetation interacts with the environment, from how each part of the plants interact with it, such as the leaf, stem, and roots of the plant, leaves. Everything shapes the land, everything builds the land as well, and it creates something better, every piece of detain from aesthetics, function and its ecological functions as well. Bob Perry takes all of these methods as a design principle, and has even created landscapes without any irrigation methods, this is what we need, spaces that serve a purpose and do not ask much in return, open spaces are needed and designers can make them happen. 43 LA 401-FALL 2015
BOB PERRY
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BOB PERRY Illustrations LEAF absorb sunlight energy, capture CO2
STEMS structural support for plant, transports water and nutrients. Distributue chemical energy
ROOTS obtain water and nutrients from soil, anchor and support plant stem
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BOB PERRY Images
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ECOLOGY e-col-o-gy noun the branch of biology that deals with the relations of organisms to one another and to their physical surroundings. the political movement that seeks to protect the environment, especially from pollution. Designing great spaces is not an easy task; a lot has to be taken into consideration, from the site to all of its surroundings, which includes the people who inhabit it as well as the things around. While urban spaces need to be there for the people as a place for them to congregate and enjoy the place, the environment has to be able to enjoy such a place, enjoy the things and traits the design brings to its health. Ecology is an important aspect which helps alleviate problems we have mostly because of the world evolving and creating many technological advances such as cars that wound the environment, there is a way to design better places with an ecological approach which is what Bob explained in his presentation, taking everything into account to create better places for the world as a whole.
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Ecology
Cira Green, greenroof
Greenroof
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