2004 park Road Station
PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SPACE Erin Wheatley
The brief for this project was to create a transit-oriented development at the Park Road Station site. The existing station is located in close proximity to the historic Boggo Road Gaol and enclosed within a residential demolition control precinct, characterized by vernacular timber and tin houses. The aim was to propose a new form of density that informed new ways of living and travel. The project utilizes the existing vernacular as a mechanism for orientation, and the train station as a place marker in the city. The latter acts as a threshold, blurring the boundary between the individual parts of the city, integrating the precincts into a unique city fabric. A figure ground study of the area revealed the predominant pattern of planning based upon the desire for defined public and private realms— Brisbane’s public space is on the street; private space in the green backyard. So how does one increase density while retaining unique characteristics of the inner-city residential areas? How do you deal with issues of scale, privacy, and the Australian attachment to the backyard? Using the courtyard typology as a method of retaining the backyard, the design enables ownership of public space, one that mirrors the Australian mentality of home ownership. The detached form of the development mirrors the language of the single dwelling and allows for an increase in bulk and scale. The building folds down to break down the scale of a block. The rhythm of the vertical element and the reuse of timber help balance nostalgia and new forms. The raised backyard introduces new commercial and retail tenants at ground level. The strip is continued; the figure ground patterning of the area is repeated, and the area develops as part of a larger fabric from private realm to public street, precinct, and city.
“Genes prescribe epigenetic rules, which are the regularities of sensory perceptions and mental development that animate and channel the acquisition of culture.”5 Following Wilson’s thoughts, it seems reasonable to expect that genetic factors are pivotal in the cultural expression of cities, buildings, and design. Monadic Immanence Pure Immanence may then be considered a metaphysical key for discussing thoughts and extended phenotypes as natural forces. Amending Gottfried Leibniz’s 1814 theory of atomic-scale, particlemirroring consciousness (monads), I am using immanence via Deleuze to implant Leibniz’s The Monadology with properties of withholding/becoming, and further, as a component for thinking of “our nature” understood as part of nature not dependent on spirit, theology, or vagaries of the soul.6 Accordingly, we may surmise the environmental implications of Deleuze’s work and inject those strains of Pure Immanence into The Monadology for environmental and design theory. Not until Alfred North Whitehead hybridized monadism in the early 20th century, did Leibniz’s theory meet the context of modern physics and theories of consciousness. Later still, in 1995 Deleuze analyzed The Monadology in The Fold: Leibniz and the Baroque, bringing Leibniz’s work into focus for art and design.7 Following Whitehead’s and Deleuze’s splicing new ideas into the definition of monads, Leibniz’s old theory began to revive, currently helping us evolve our comprehension of nature (and the nature of our design in nature.) Today, with ongoing discoveries in psychology, physics, and biology, the potential of conceiving Deleuze’s Pure Immanence from a biologic/ monadic perspective, partially reflected from The Fold and reinforced with strands knotted in Leibniz, Whitehead, and Dawkins, eases monads into a design discussion as monadic immanence. The discussion’s outline factors mineral trace elements and