Greg Chatfield MArch Dissertation - High-Rise Mobility by Greg Chatfield

HIGH–RISE MOBILITY Exploring advances in human mobility systems for high-rise architecture and the influence of science fiction

“Dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Architecture”

GREGORY CHATFIELD 201051331

School of Architecture The University of Liverpool January 2016

Fig. 1: Cover page image created by Author Composition of PLP Architectureâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 888 Tower and overlaid image

INTRODUCTION

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my dissertation supervisor, Richard Koeck, for being so accommodating in providing advice and arranging meetings particularly over Skype whilst I studied in the University of Arizona as part of the graduate exchange program. His expertise within the field of architecture and film and his encouragement have been greatly appreciated. A special mention also goes to Lars Hesselgren, Head of Research at PLP Architecture, who provided me with such an extensive interview that was the building block for this dissertation.

I would also like to thank my family for being supportive whilst I wrote this dissertation and helping me with all the other arrangements concerning my studies in the United States.

INTRODUCTION

ABSTRACT Currently mobility systems in and around high-rise structures are constrained, vertically by the conventional elevator and horizontally to street and underground systems. These exert an influence over the form of high-rise structures. Although science fiction film is more focussed on the aesthetic, it provides a playground for futuristic architectural ideas. These principles of being more innovative and expressive should occur to a greater extent in high-rise architecture and its related mobility. An exception, the 888 Tower demonstrator by PLP Architecture and Tyréns, is explored in detail. This utilises a combination of architectural and engineering design with influence from science fiction. Through studies of 20th Century architects’ visualisation of the future, science fiction films’ portrayals of high rise architecture and mobility, a cyclical influence is evident.

INTRODUCTION

CONTENTS - INTRODUCTION - Acknowledgements

- Abstract

- Setting the Scene - High-Rise and Mobility through the prisms of Architecture and Science Fiction

- Commonality of Film and Architecture

- Production Designer

- Development in High-Rise Structures

- Development of Human Mobility in and around High-Rise Structures

- A Brief History of Science Fiction - From Literature to Film

- Relationship of Architecture in Science Fiction

- Case Study Films

- Research Questions

- Research Methods

- Literature Review

- Background Research

- PLP Architecture Case Study: The 888 Tower

- 20th Century Architectural High Rise Futures

- Cinematic High Rise Futures

- Summary of the Literature Review

- CHAPTER 1 PLP Architecture Case Study: The 888 Tower

- Identifying the Components of Human Mobility

- Identifying the Problem

- Defining the Matrix

- 1.1 Connectivity

- 1.2 Horizontal and Vertical

- 1.3 Structure

- 1.4 The Vehicles

- 1.5 Limitations and Constraints

- 1.6 Densification and Social Aspects

- CHAPTER 2 20th Century Architectural High Rise Futures

- 2.1 Connectivity

- 2.2 Horizontal and Vertical

- 2.3 Structure

- 2.4 The Vehicles

- 2.5 Limitations and Constraints

- 2.6 Densification and Social Aspects

- CHAPTER 3 Cinematic High Rise Futures

- 3.1 Connectivity

- 3.2 Horizontal and Vertical

- 3.3 Structure

- 3.4 The Vehicles

- 3.5 Limitations and Constraints

- 3.6 Densification and Social Aspects

- CONCLUSIONS

- BIBLIOGRAPHY

- Literature

- Internet Sources

- Lectures

- Unpublished Sources - Interview

- Filmography

- List of Figures

- APPENDIX

- Transcript of Interview with Lars Hesselgren

9 INTRODUCTION

Fig. 2: Hugh Ferriss - Metropolis of Tomorrow

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION SETTING THE SCENE High-Rise and Mobility through the prisms of Architecture and Science Fiction The scope of the dissertation is to investigate the relationship between architecture and science fiction film (SF film), using the medium of high-rise architecture. ‘When discussing science fiction’s relationship with architecture, the usual practice is to look at the architecture ‘in’ science fiction – in particular, the architecture in SF films’.1 This dissertation aims to demonstrate that the influence between the disciplines is not uni-directional rather it is reciprocal and to an extent cyclical.

SF, particularly through film, has become increasingly ingrained within society’s culture and provides visions of the potential future of high-rise architecture. Mobility and high-rise architecture are closely related and their portrayal in SF film is an intriguing prospect for their future development.

PLP Architecture, an architectural practice in London, and Tyréns, a global consultancy firm, have designed a hypothetical skyscraper with an innovative mobility system that has a strong resemblance to SF in its futuristic portrayal. Through the prism of architecture and SF, this dissertation will analyse futuristic architects’ visions and conceptual ideas portrayed in SF film, and evaluate the influence on the 888 Tower. The chapters are structured as follows:

Chapter 1

PLP Architecture Case Study 888 Tower

Chapter 3

Cinematic High Rise Futures

Chapter 2

20th Century Architectural High-Rise Futures

1 Nic Clear, “Architecture,” in The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction, ed. Rob Latham (Oxford: The Oxford University Press, 2014). 277.

Commonality of Film and Architecture There are many commonalities between film and architecture. Each require creative flair from the filmmaker / architect and each evoke comparable emotions from the film goer / building user. â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;The relationship between film and architecture has been extensively documented with a formidable array of analytical texts that deconstruct the socio-political influences within film and also explore the technical detail involved in making of an urban imageâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;.2 Both disciplines utilise teamwork and leadership to accomplish the desired film or building. A building requires a lead architect to guide the team which, depending on the size and budget of the construction, requires several other professionals to participate through the project stages. This is equivalent to the film making process, which also requires a good team leader, the director and equally a great team. In both cases, this process often results in many iterations and careful collaboration to achieve a successful project. Architects and filmmakers exercise the use of light and space to evoke a mood or expression. Each uses light, natural or artificial, as a key construction material. The impact of light may be illustrated by Fig. 3 below.

Fig. 3: Still of Minority Report

2 Christine Hawley, Transitions: Concepts + Drawings + Buildings (London: Ashgate, 2013). 165.

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The composition of elements is a crucial concept in both architecture and film, and influences the appeal that the final product has upon us. The composition created by the director / cinematographer to frame a specific shot in a film, has a direct parallel with that of an architect framing a view using a window or using the architectural form to address an entrance. Both architects and filmmakers often direct the viewer but through different mediums, using the physical environment and using the screen, respectively.

Alex McDowell, a leading Production Designer involved in high budget mainstream films such as Minority Report and Man of Steel, stated in an interview relating to the narrative relationship between both disciplines that there is a ‘sense of the power of architecture and the power of the environment in the narrative space’.3 He continues that there is a strong ‘relationship between the film frame, depth of space and how small the human is in this vast environment’.4 Christopher Nolan, the director of the film Inception which relies heavily on architecture as a method of storytelling, expresses similar notions about architectural space and film: ‘The only job that was ever of interest to me other that filmmaking is architecture. And I’m very interested in the similarities or analogies between the way in which we experience a three-dimensional space that an architect has created and the way in which an audience experiences a cinematic narrative that constructs a threedimensional reality from a two dimensional medium - assembled shot by shot. I think there’s a narrative component to architecture that’s kind of fascinating’.5 Both fields may be limited by bureaucratic bodies such as councils and government regulations for architects, and by producers and the studio for filmmakers. The budget can be a double edged sword for both professions, limiting the scope of the project, alternatively it can create truly inspiration pieces of work especially in the confines of tight resources.

3 Deutsche Kinemathek Museum für Film und Fernsehen, Exhibition Ken Adams at Deutsche Kinemathek, http://www.deutschekinemathek.de/en/exhibitions/2014/bigger-than-life/inspiration-and-impact (accessed May 5, 2015). 4 Ibid 5 Robert Capps, Q&A: Christopher Nolan on Dreams, Architecture, and Ambiguity, 29 November 2010, http://www.wired. com/2010/11/pl_inception_nolan/ (accessed December 13, 2015).

Production Designers The role of the Production Designer in film is comparable to the design element of an architect’s job; ‘the broadest possible definition is that the Production Designer is the one responsible for the look of the film’.6 An increasing number of Production Designers have trained in architecture as students and have made the transition to film such as Anshuman Prasad and Tino Schaedler, who have worked on many blockbuster films such as Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and 300: The Rise of an Empire; and Prince of Persia and the Immortals, respectively.7 This shows the close relationship between the disciplines and that skills and expertise are easily transferable.

Developments in High-Rise Structures Beedle, Ali and Armstrong outline in their book, The Skyscraper and the City, that historically the tallest structures were places of worship, ‘the word ‘tower’ usually designated the church and the town hall until the birth of the skyscraper. The main evolutionary change has been in function, from a Campanile watchtower of the Renaissance or minaret of Islamic architecture to the office building’.8 The 20th Century saw a drastic change the urban fabric of cities and this continual transformation is still an important issue to society. During this period, the world’s population increased by 400% from 1.5 to 6.1 billion,9 and is predicted to rise approximately by 50%

Fig. 4: Visualisation by Hayes Davidson predicting the London skyline in 20 years time 6 Andrew Horn, Interview with Alex McDowell - Part 1 , 8 July 2013, https://www.realeyz.tv/en/blog/filmnews/interview-mitalex-mcdowell-teil-1.html (accessed December 26, 2015). 7 Erik Butka, Meagan Calnon & Kathryn Anthony. ‘Star’ Architects: The Story of 4 Architects who Made It in Hollywood’ 19 Jun 2013. ArchDaily. http://www.archdaily.com/388732/star-architects-the-story-of-4-architects-who-made-it-in-hollywood/ (accessed 26 December 2015). 8 Paul J. Armstrong, Lynn S. Beedle and Mir M. Ali, The Skyscraper and the City: Design, Technology, and Innovation (Lewiston New York: NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2007). 9 Max Roser, Future World Population Growth, 2015, http://ourworldindata.org/data/population-growth-vital-statistics/futureworld-population-growth/ (accessed November 10, 2015).

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peaking at 11 billion at the end of this century.10 The combination of rapid population growth due to medical advances and better standards of living, urbanisation, the increase in demand for space in the city (the bid-rent theory) and construction advances has resulted in an increase in size and height of many cities. This change is represented in a visualisation of London in 20 years’ time by Hayes Davidson shown in Fig 4. Traditional techniques for constructing high-rise structures had used conventional load-bearing masonry walls with relatively small punched openings.11 Lighter and faster construction techniques were required to reach higher with a more efficient use of structural materials. The result was utilising an ‘iron/steel frame structure which minimized the depth and width of the structural members at building perimeters’,12 allowing for an independently hung facade. This enabled larger glass panels to be used in high-rise structures, allowing more natural light to penetrate into the building, making it a more attractive proposition.

Development of Human Mobility in and around High-Rise Structures The development of elevators/lifts and high-rise are directly linked. Primitive elevators dated back to Ancient Greece, where Archimedes devised a hoisting device using a system of ropes and pulleys.13 Elisha Graves Otis, revolutionised the elevator industry with the invention of the ‘safety elevator’, resulting in these elevators being installed in many high-rise structures. The Otis company asserts that without the introduction of the ‘safety elevator’ buildings would have been limited to six storeys.14 On the other hand, horizontal mobility has remained relatively unchanged, with the majority of transportation systems utilising the street and underground systems, the latter which first opened as an ‘Underground Railway’ in London in 1863.15

Fig. 5: Otis and the Safety Elevator

10 Max Roser, Future World Population Growth, 2015, http://ourworldindata.org/data/population-growth-vital-statistics/futureworld-population-growth/ (accessed November 10, 2015). 11 Kyoung Sun Moon and Mir M. Ali, “Structural Developments in Tall Buildings: Current Trends and Future Prospects,” Architectural Science Review (University of Sydney) 50.3 (2007): 205-223. 12 Ibid 13 Roy Rivenburg, “Going up: 150 years of advances in elevators,” Los Angeles Times, 5th April 2003, http://articles.latimes. com/2003/apr/05/entertainment/et-rivenburg5 (accessed December 26th, 2015). 14 Otis, ‘About Elevators’, Otis WorldWide, http://www.otisworldwide.com/pdf/aboutelevators.pdf (accessed December 28th, 2015). 15 Transport for London, A Brief History of the Underground, 2016, https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/about-tfl/culture-and-heritage/

A Brief History of Science Fiction - From Literature to Film SF is commonly attributed to Hugo Gernsback who coined the term ‘scientification’ in 1916, however the term ‘Science Fiction’ was first used by William Wilson in 1851.16 Gernsback has been argued by some as the ‘Father of Science Fiction’,17 and by others as ‘one of the worst disasters ever to hit the science fiction field’.18 Although works of SF existed previously such as Argosy and Weird Tales,19 they were never defined as a distinct genre, whereas Gernsback’s work established this. As the influence of moving pictures became more prominent in 20th Century society, SF became established as a film genre, from Metropolis in 1927 through to the Star Wars franchise whose most recent film Star Wars: The Force Awakens worldwide box office grossed over $1 billion mark in record time for its opening weekend.20 The SF genre has grown immensely during the 20th and 21st Century, dividing into an array of sub-genres such as Cyber punk, Tech Noir and Gothic SF. Many critically acclaimed films are accredited as SF including Blade Runner, The Terminator, Alien, and 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Fig. 6: Still of 2001: A Space Odyssey

londons-transport-a-history/london-underground/a-brief-history-of-the-underground (accessed January 30th, 2016). 16 Mark Bould and Sherryl Vint, The Routledge Concise History of Science Fiction (New York: Routledge, 2011). 17 Sam Moskowitz, Explorers of the Infinite: Shapers of Science Fiction (Cleveland: World Publishing, 1963).242 18 Brian Aldiss, Billion Year Spree: The History of Science Fiction (London: Corgi, 1975). 19 Mark Bould and Sherryl Vint, The Routledge Concise History of Science Fiction (New York: Routledge, 2011). 20 Scott Mendelson, Box Office: ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens Snags $153M Weekend, Tops $1 Billion Worldwide, 27th December 2015, http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2015/12/27/box-office-star-wars-the-force-awakens-snags-153mweekend-tops-1-billion-worldwide/ (accessed December 28th, 2015).

INTRODUCTION

Relationship of Architecture in Science Fiction The verticality of high-rise architecture is promoted by economic factors and occasionally monumental and state machismo. High-rise a result of a highly organised society, yet in SF the verticality produces dystopian images particularly through de-humanisation, typically authoritarian or anarchic, employing high-rise as devices to convey social breakdown, alienation and threat. This can be expressed in a multitude of ways through the portrayal of greed and wealth of a capitalist society, totalitarianism or male dominance in society. This paradox is reflected in SF in which the buildings are used to manipulate the characters thus creating the emotional journey. It is not only interesting to consider how SF has portrayed futuristic cities through the years to reflect current societyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s status, but also how the structures designed in the celluloid have been influential in real life building developments.

Case Study Films The key SF films that have been chosen to analyse have common traits. All are set on Earth, not in space or on an alien world, and mostly depict a future reality of existing cities. Although they are futuristic portrayals they are capable of relating to the real world. These films are not just mindless portrayals of a future reality, but were the result of a detailed thought process and research backing their visions. The case study films selected are from throughout the 20th and 21st Century, however a greater emphasis is given to the examination of more recent films due to their potential relevance to todayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s society.

The case study films are as follows: Metropolis (1927) Just Imagine (1930) Blade Runner (1982) The Fifth Element (1985) Minority Report (2002) Total Recall (2012)

Research Questions This initial research into the background of high-rise architecture, mobility, SF, and their relationship, has informed the research questions that this dissertation aims to answer. The research questions are as follows:

- What is the relationship between architectural design in the real world and in SF? - To what extent is high-rise architecture and mobility influenced by SF? - How could architects benefit from any influence of SF in the design stage?

19 INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION RESEARCH METHODS The main research methods are to review academic literature and other sources, analyse selected SF films, conduct an indepth interview and visit cities with iconic high-rise architecture. There is a substantial body of work in academic literature and other sources, analysing the influence of high-rise architecture in the real world and through the medium of SF film. To a lesser extent is the reverse, the influence of SF on architectural practice, which will be the aspect supplemented by original research.

There are several SF films that are key for illustrating the interaction between the urban fabric and the SF world which include strong elements concerning human mobility. As well as analysing the films and using literature concerning them, there are additional sources in articles and lectures in video format by the World Building Institute, TyrĂŠns and PLP Architecture. In some instances non academic sources is used to supplement the research. I consider these sources to provide valid insight to the subject matter through their authorsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; experience and standing in their fields of architecture and SF film.

Previously, I have benefitted from some experience in working for the film industry as an Extra and acquired an understanding in the filmmaking process. Through Richard Koeckâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s (University of Liverpool) connections, contact was made with PLP Architecture to arrange an interview with a leading architect, Lars Hesselgren, involved with the 888 Tower project. This indepth structured interview and the 888 Tower project is the foundation for considering the influence of SF film and in particular the role of mobility in high-rise structures.

SF film viewed in western society is dominated by US produced films which commonly feature American cities as the backdrop for the narrative. Whilst preparing this dissertation I studied in the USA (semester at the University of Arizona) and used this opportunity to immerse myself in American cities such as New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington D.C. as well as the transportation infrastructure within these cities. 21

Fig. 7: Title Cover of Scenes of a World to Come The War of the Future, Aleksandr Rodchenko (1930)

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION LITERATURE REVIEW Background Research There is a significant body of academic work on which to draw, that considers the relationship of architecture in SF film. The academic study of SF per se is now well established in providing context and commentary on the real world: a prism of what might be. A wide selection of literature regarding this dissertation topic is held at the University of Liverpool which holds Europe’s largest collection of science fiction works1. I was also able to utilise the University of Arizona’s library during my semester abroad. A leading source is The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction,2 a compilation of texts, in which this dissertation pays particular attention to the chapter contributed by Nic Clear entitled Chapter 21 - Architecture. Although this chapter does not directly provide observations into human mobility within high-rise SF, it does provides an insight of how SF can be used as a conceptual tool for imagining a speculative novel architecture. The chapter also provides the history of the relationship between SF and architecture in the 20th Century. To further my research into the production of science fiction film, I have studied Dietrich Neumann’s book; Film Architecture From Metropolis to Blade Runner.3 This provides a detailed account of the production and design process involved in creating the sets for some of my chosen case study films.

Richard Koeck’s book, Cine | Scapes: Cinematic Spaces in Architecture and Cities,4 identifies and analyses the link between the cinematic experience and the postmodern cityscape in relation to contemporary architectural debates. Koeck provides detailed insights through an array of films including Minority Report and Blade Runner that demonstrate the relationship between the film’s narrative and cinematic techniques, and the urban landscape. Koeck demonstrates an alternative method of analysis, instead of following the status quo regarding how architecture is portrayed 1 The University of Liverpool, Special Collections & Archives - Science Fiction Hub, 2015, http://www.sfhub.ac.uk/ (accessed May 7th, 2015). 2 Nic Clear, “Architecture,” in The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction, ed. Rob Latham (Oxford: The Oxford University Press, 2014). 3 Neumann, Dietrich, trans. Film Architecture: Set Designs from Metropolis to Blade Runner. Munich: Prestel, 1999. 4 Richard Koeck, Cine-Scapes - Cinematic Spaces in Architecture and Cities (Routledge, 2013).

within film, he uses film as a prism for analysing the city spaces. This sets a precedent for this dissertation by exploring architecture and mobility from a different perspective, using SF as the lens for analysis. These sources have furthered my general understanding of SF film and relationship to architecture, providing a detailed comprehension of the history, production and a method in which to analyse. The following texts and sources support the chapters within the main body of the dissertation.

PLP Architecture Case Study: The 888 Tower This chapter explores current concepts by the architectural community using the 888 Tower by PLP Architecture whose featured innovative mobility system appears to have strong parallels with SF. The majority of the research in this chapter has been gathered in an interview with Lars Hesselgren, Director of research at PLP Architecture and supplemented with literature, articles and videos from the architectural firm and Tyréns. PLP Architecture and Tyréns are exploring this future reality, through investigations into transportation pods rather than elevators and alternative structural systems, by designing the 888 Tower. The proposed systems are expressed through reports, videos and lectures by Tyréns concerning the Articulated Funiculator and the Tubed MegaFrame which was unveiled in 2012 at the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat 9th World Congress in Shanghai.5 The extensive research in the reports into these proposed systems is credible as Tyréns is a large consultancy firm specialising in urban planning and infrastructure solutions.6 The research is directed by two experienced structural engineers specialising in large complex structures, Fritz Lang and Mats

Fig. 8: The 888 Tower

Lundstrom.

5 Articulated Funiculator and the Tubed MegaFrame, performed by Dag Wingstrand and Fritz King, Shanghai World Financial Center, Shanghai, 19-21 September 2012. 6 Tyréns, About Tyréns, Tyréns, 2015, http://www.Tyréns.se/en/About-Tyréns/ (accessed May 13, 2015). 7 Tyréns, ‘Published Papers’, Articulated Funiculator and Tubed Mega Frame, 2015, http://articulatedfuniculator.com/wp-content/

INTRODUCTION

Tyréns’ commissioned PLP Architecture, a major architectural firm, to apply this system to a high-rise proposal resulting in the 888 Tower. As a consequence Lars has also produces a series of video sources and lecture for PLP Architecture. These sources have obvious and subtle cinematic references to Minority Report and Blade Runner, in the format of the sources themselves.8

20th Century Architectural High-Rise Futures This chapter researches the futuristic visions of architects concerning high-rise architecture and human mobility. Comparing these predictions with subsequent reality illustrates whether any of the proposals were influential on the architectural community or even came into fruition in the real world.

A highly influential architect and delineator, Hugh Ferriss, expressed his ideas in his 1929 book, The Metropolis of Tomorrow,9 inspiring subsequent pieces of science fiction including the film Just Imagine in 1930. Addressing the topic of human mobility, Ferriss provides an early projection of future transportation systems; ‘the increasing traffic congestions which follows in the wake of the mounting skyscraper provoked thought that more than one traffic level, or numerous traffic levels must indeed be eventually introduced’.10 Ferriss was a trained architect and therefore his interpretations and predictions may be considered credible.

Fig. 9: Hugh Ferriss - Metropolis of Tomorrow

The book, Scenes of a World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge 18931960 by Jean-Louis Cohen was published in tandem with an exhibition at the Canadian Centre for Architecture in June 1995.11 The book and exhibition reviewed a collation of previous

uploads/2014/01/CTBUH1.pdf (accessed May 9th, 2015). 8 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). 9 Hugh Ferriss, The Metropolis of Tomorrow (New York: Ive Washburn, 1929). 10 Hugh Ferriss, The Metropolis of Tomorrow (New York: Ive Washburn, 1929), 66 11 Jean-Louis Cohen, Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge 1893-1960, ed. Christa Weil, trans. Kenneth Hylton (Paris: Flammarion, 1995).

futurists’ visions of the expanding vertical city in the USA, addressed the idea of skyscrapers and mobility, and their subsequent influence in the western world. The book includes a wide range of futuristic illustrations and renderings from the USA and Europe depicting such works of famous architects for example Ferriss, Corbett and Archigram. The chapter, Images of the Modern Metropolis, is particularly relevant providing a good description of architects’ proposals of the advancement of human mobility in the high-rise metropolis.

Fig. 10: Harvey Willey Corbett Illustration

A key source is Archigram - Architecture Without Architecture.12 Sadler’s book provides a critical analysis of the work by the avant-garde architectural group from the early 1960’s until their demise in the 1970’s, displaying the enormous diversity of their projects. This includes detailed insights into the works of Ron Herron and Peter Cook’s, Walking City and Plug-In City, respectively. In addition, King’s Views of New York published in 1915 by Moses King,13 illustrates the anticipated difference in the skyline of New York at the beginning and end of the 20th Century. King includes futuristic illustrations by visionary artists such as Harry M. Pettit, who imagined a modern metropolis with soaring skyscrapers, interwoven elevated walkways and new technologies of airships and landing platforms.

Cinematic High-Rise Futures This chapter concentrates on analysing human mobility in and around high-rise architecture in SF film. Although literature will not be required directly for the critical analysis element, it provides a general understanding into the production of the key case study films; Minority Report and Blade Runner. Although not academic literature, the production of Minority Report has been heavily documented in interviews with the director, Steven Spielberg and production designer, Alex McDowell and his team. Since the release of film, Alex McDowell has hosted SF seminars 12 Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture Without Architecture (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005). 13 Moses King, King’s Views of New York (New York, 1915).

INTRODUCTION

at the ‘World Building Institute’ at the University of Southern California which frequently delved into questions concerning Minority Report.14 These interviews and talks consider the transition of the movement in space through film and the real world. ‘Minority Report was an unusual film, first of all a science fiction film but Steven Spielberg thought of it as an investigation into the future reality’.15 There is validity in these sources, as prior to filming, Steven Spielberg assembled a selection of futurist experts for a three-day ‘think tank summit’ in California,16 to create a plausible ‘future reality’ for the year 2054.17

Additionally, Blade Runner is one of the most extensively documented SF films to date, the most notable, Future Noir - The Making of Blade Runner,18 provides a detailed account into the production of the film from first hand experience by the author, Paul M. Sammon. The book describes the influence of Syd Mead, the concept artist, in conjunction with Ridley Scott, the director, on the transportation systems in the film and the idea of retrofitting high-rise facades. Despite there being substantial information on the film, only a few sources exhibit the influence on today’s architecture and transportation systems. There is less respected literature and sources on Total Recall and The Fifth Element, however there are numerous blogs and internet sources that discuss the films in depth, providing concept art and information about the making of the film.

Summary of the Literature Review There is a significant body of work regarding the role of architecture in SF film, however there is little academic research into the influence of SF on architectural practice. To a lesser extent is the role of mobility in SF film an area of academic focus. This dissertation aims to highlight these particular areas using the available literature as a foundation, supplemented with original research from an interview conducted with Lars Hesselgren and critical analysis of certain SF films.

14 University of Southern California, World Building Institute, October 2008, http://worldbuilding.institute/ (accessed May 9th, 2015). 15 Alex McDowell, Building Virtual Worlds - USC Global Conference, performed by Alex McDowell, USC, 2014. 16 Ian Rothkerch, Will the future really look like ‘Minority Report’?, 10 July 2002, http://www.salon.com/2002/07/10/ underkoffler_belker/ (accessed May 9, 2015). 17 Joel Garreau, Washington As Seen in Hollywood’s Crystal Ball, 21st June 2002. 18 Paul M Sammon, Future Noir - The Making of Blade Runner (Orion, 1996).

Fig. 11: PLP Architecture & TyrĂŠns - 888 Tower

CHAPTER 1 PLP ARCHITECTURE CASE STUDY: THE 888 TOWER PLP Architecture, an architectural firm in London, and Tyréns, a global consultancy firm, have developed an innovative mobility system for a hypothetical skyscraper as part of a technology CHAPTER 1

demonstrator.1 The building rises one kilometre into the sky with the top floor being at 888 metres, hence the name.2

Although not necessarily admitted or realised, there are strong SF influences in the 888 Tower which sparked my interest and resulted in an interview with Lars. Considering that the majority of research investigates how architecture is portrayed in film, it is intriguing to reverse the roles. The influence of SF is compared and contrasted with the influence of architects portraying futuristic visions of architecture, and then synthesised in the conclusion revealing which field has had the greater influence on this project.

Others have proposed systems of a similar nature but have not acknowledged or referenced SF. In 1884 J. E. Hall developed the first Cyclic Elevator or Paternoster that slowly rotated elevators in a loop.3 It gained the nickname The Death Elevator due to having an open shaft and never stopping which resulted in a number of fatalities.4

MovvéO, a lift consultancy firm in the UK, developed the Skytrak in 2010 using a looped track to show how vertical transportation can be combined with the horizontal plane to increase efficiency and reduce cost.5 ThyssenKrupp have recently (2014) developed two system, Twins and Multi. Twins utilises two elevators in one shaft resulting in 25% space saving, whilst the Multi allows the elevator to move horizontally and vertically.

1 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). 2 Lars Hasselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hasselgren , London (29th June 2015). 3 Elevator History, Paternoster History - Invention of Paternoster Lift, http://www.elevatorhistory.net/elevator-history/history-ofpaternoster/ (accessed January 20th, 2016). 4 Ibid. 5 MovvéO Lift Consultants, Skytrak - A New Era in Vertical Transportation, 2010, http://www.movveo.com/innovation/skytrak/a_ new_era_in_vertical_transportation (accessed January 20th, 2016).

Identifying the Components of Human Mobility Before addressing human mobility within the context of SF and architects futuristic portrayals, it is important to consider the fundamental components of mobility itself. At a macro level looking at the city network, the transportation infrastructure promotes public or private transportation or both.

Public transportation networks may include different forms such as buses, trains, trams, and planes and their interconnectedness is a key issue. Roads are hybrid systems being able to host both private and certain forms of public transport for example the bus and the car. For optimal utility, the transportation infrastructure must have the capacity to cater for the number of vehicles and people that flow through it.

The transportation infrastructure directly depicts the shape and layout of the city, for example Los Angeles’ emphasis is on private transportation, the car. This has resulted in large freeways sprawling across and around the city. In contrast in New York and London there is a less extensive road network due to a greater emphasis on public transportation, most notably the Subway/Underground.

From a micro perspective, the relationship between the direction in which the human travels, whether in the horizontal or vertical plane, is an important factor. The connections between the two axes must flow in a methodical and natural manner to successfully navigate through the city. Humans navigate through a combination of cognitive mapping and following physical sign posting.6 Horizontal interchanges largely rely on people to walk, which has the advantage of each navigating their own route with the smallest amount of space per person. Vertical movement of more that a limited amount requires mechanical intervention, hence the challenges faced by high-rise buildings.

6 Lucia F Jacobs and Françoise Schenk, “Unpacking the Cognitive Map: The Parallel Map Theory of Hippocampal Function,” Psychological Review 110, no. 2 (2003): 285–315.

Identifying the Problem In today’s world the transportation infrastructure

Inter-

between high-rise structures requires the use of different systems and transitions between these. For

to the 30th floor of another, requires descending to the street level by elevator, potentially walking or being

CHAPTER 1

example, to get from the 30th floor of one building Fig. 12: Transferring between the high-rises

transported to the destination building and then taking an elevator to the required floor. The route requires interchanges of transport networks. The routing is indirect, always requiring movement in the horizontal plane at or around street level.

SF film and architects presenting futuristic ideas provide glimpses into hypothetically more efficient and fluid transportation systems through the proposition of innovative new networks and vehicles. This is turn can be used as inspiration into changing our current transportation infrastructure. Conversely, it could be argued that a ‘door to door’ system would remove human participation in making the journey.

Defining the Matrix To successfully analyse the 888 Tower and the influence of architects’ futuristic visions and SF, a matrix has been devised to compare them through common themes: - Connectivity - Horizontal and Vertical - Structure - The Vehicles - Limitations and Constraints - Densification and Social Aspects

This first chapter critically analyses the 888 Tower against this matrix.

1.1 Connectivity Super high-rise structures cannot have elevators that travel from the base to the highest floors as they are limited by the weight of the steel cable,7 hence the need to transfer between elevators on a transfer floor or sky lobby.8 One of the primary issues that the 888 Tower addresses is removing interchanges. The elevator system is particularly revolutionary being sequential like a train, which combines vertical and horizontal movement into one fluid motion: ‘It is completely insane how lift systems work, reserve space for a single object to go up and down, incredibly inefficient use of that volume of space’.9 A sequential system allows for multiple carriages / pods to be on the track simultaneously, therefore making one track far more efficient. Investigations started with Tyréns developing the Funiculator, a system commonly seen in theme parks and to ascend steep hills, which resulted in the Articulated Funiculator that could be applied to a high-rise building.10 This system has been named the Sky / Vertical Subway and Tyréns’ Fritz King has applied for a patent.11 There is a commonality

Fig. 13: Sequential System

between the Articulated Funiculator’s ancestry, theme parks, and cinema as both are types of entertainment.

For human traffic flowing through the building, an ‘extremely important aspect is the dynamic scheduling which plans the movement of the pods, and sorting of passengers by destination’.12 An 7 Kone, a Finnish company, have developed ‘UltraRope’ made of carbon fibre that would allow a single run of 1000 metres. Source: Rory Hyde, The new lift technology that will let cities soar far higher, 1st August 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/aug/01/new-lift-technology-ultrarope-cities (accessed January 25th, 2016). 8 Rory Hyde, The new lift technology that will let cities soar far higher, 1st August 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/aug/01/new-lift-technology-ultrarope-cities (accessed January 25th, 2016). 9 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015). 10 Articulated Funiculator and the Tubed MegaFrame, performed by Dag Wingstrand and Fritz King, Shanghai World Financial Center, Shanghai, 19-21 September 2012. 11 Google, Google Patents - Articulated funiculator , 15th December 2012, http://www.google.co.uk/patents/ WO2013159800A1?cl=en (accessed January 14th, 2016). 12 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/

intelligent computer program is used to configure the system (see Fig 13) to anticipate where passengers are coming from and their destinations, with the intention that no passenger will need to change to a different pod.13

The underground metro runs underneath the 888 Tower, CHAPTER 1

with a station allowing passengers to interchange to the building, shown in Fig 14. It could be argued that this connection is not seamless, however this would address the issue of transferring between private and public, which are difficult to integrate into one system. Fig. 14: 888 Tower and the subway

1.2 Horizontal and Vertical Transportation The Vertical Subway is woven in a figure of eight up the building facade culminating in a loop at the top of the tower, which would provide panoramic views of the surrounding city. The track is attached to the exoskeleton structure and seamlessly transitions from the vertical to horizontal axis. The sequential system is asymmetric to allow access to all the required areas and floors. To allow the pod to transcend between the two axes, the track twists to keep the pod in an upright position. ‘You can’t turn over in a top loop manner, you have to turn over with the track turning over sideways instead’.14

Fig. 15: 888 Tower, Horizontal to Vertical

Whereas other systems that blend horizontal and vertical transportation are more restrictive and confined, such as the Skytrak loop concept, the Articulated Funiculator is not bound by a rigid track system and meanders across the building facade providing choices of routes to the pods. watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). 13 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). 14 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 2, YouTube, February 26th 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=yasXzkXPRjo (accessed April 20th, 2015).

1.3 Structure Structurally the 888 Tower differs radically from conventional construction, ‘conceptually [it is] very different, we turned the tower inside out’.15 In placing the circulation on the external facade of the building, this turned the structure from an endoskeleton to an exoskeleton. Conventional high-rise structures hang floor slabs from a central core. Lars describes how ‘lift shafts can be the main constraint on a 1km building or shorter ones’,16 resulting in a large percentage of the floor plate being consumed by the core. By using the sequential system, six external tracks are only required instead of 60 internal elevator shafts. These external shafts are also hollow concrete enabling space for service ducts.17

This allows the building to have a slim profile as the internal bulky core is removed and also stiffens the structure more than using conventional methods. The height of the 888 Tower exceeds the current tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, and due to its exoskeleton structure it is 50% stiffer.18 Having the structure on the outside of the building enables large open plan internal spaces with a megaframe every 16 floors from which the other floors are hung.19 ‘The key thing was the structure, when you take the lift out of the centre of the building and put it somewhere else like on the outside of the building, suddenly the structure moves from being the centre core to the columns on the outside. That means that

Fig. 16: Structure & Circulation of 888 Tower

15 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 2, YouTube, February 26th 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=yasXzkXPRjo (accessed April 20th, 2015). 16 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). 17 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015). 18 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). 19 Ibid

your structure is far, far more efficient because you have the structure doing the workâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;.20 A deep floor plan allows for occupation with functions that use such areas like swimming pools, tennis courts and gyms. Deep floor plans are not required for residential, retail or CHAPTER 1

hotel purposes and therefore the tower splits into two to create reasonable sized floor plates separated by what PLP Architecture call the Central Park.

1.4 The Vehicles A key concern of using the Articulated Funiculator system is keeping the pod in a consistently upright position despite the undulating track. When the track twists to transition from horizontal to vertical, the pod rotates in two planes to maintain a constant upright position for the passengers. When rotating, a computer controlled counterweight is used with gravity sensors and servos to take into account acceleration, oscillation and gravity.21 Lars and colleagues have calculated that around 150-200 pods will be required to serve the population within the 888 Tower.22

Fig. 17: Articulated Funiculator Pods

Due to the height of the 888 Tower, the pods need to travel as fast as possible which is at 10 m/s so that wind resistance is minimal and passenger comfort optimised.23 A criticism of the circulation is that by placing it on the external facade this can result in problems such as overlooking and possibly noise pollution. Many people suffer from vertigo, and whilst normal lift systems are enclosed preventing the users from experiencing this, having elevator pods travelling on the facade will subject the occupants to it. As the system is an Articulated Funiculator inspired by roller coasters, which many people fear, they may suffer similar effects.

20 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015). 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid. 23 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015).

1.5 Limitations and Constraints Whereas SF film may show, such as in Minority Report, pods using public routes and on a highrise building, in reality this could prove problematic such as in the case of the 888 Tower due to the mixture of public and private realms. Public transportation such as underground rail and street level road networks are owned and usually maintained by government bodies, whereas transportation within high-rise architecture is owned by the private sector. Lars states that: ‘If you build high buildings then suddenly the transport moves from the public realm to the private realm because it is consumed by everybody and the building owner pays for the vertical transport’.24 Unlike in SF, there are further barriers to entry, as the elevator industry is an oligopoly with five major companies; Otis, Mitsubishi Electric, Schlinder, Kone and ThyssenKrupp.25 Although there have been some developments by ThyssenKrupp, there is little incentive to develop new systems as the majority of their revenue is from maintaining the elevators leading to ‘Industrial drag’.26 Unlike the train or car industry which is constantly in a state of innovation, the elevator industry has remained rather stagnant for the past 160 years.27 ‘The industry at large there are five companies that dominate the industry led by Otis, their business model generates most of its turnover/income from maintaining lifts. Their business model does not want innovation and it is working fine, doesn’t need innovation to disrupt the status quo’.28

24 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). 25 The Stastics Portal, Leading companies worldwide in the area of elevators and escalators in 2014, based on revenue (in billion U.S. dollars)*, 2014, http://www.statista.com/statistics/281179/leading-companies-in-the-area-of-elevators-and-escalatorsby-revenue/ (accessed January 19th, 2016). 26 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015). 27 ThyssenKrupp, MULTI – the world’s first rope-free elevator system, 1st December 2014, https://www.thyssenkrupp.com/ en/mediaplayer/MULTI-%E2%80%93-the-world%E2%80%99s-first-rope-free-elevator-system-271.html (accessed January 20th, 2016). 28 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015).

1.6 Densification and Social Aspects It is important to consider the social ramifications of such a project. PLP Architecture’s ambition is to create a mini city within this tower with a population ranging from 25,000 – 40,000 people.29 Multi-purpose buildings are not an alien concept, with many high-rise buildings hosting a wide range of functions including retail, leisure and residential. However there have been CHAPTER 1

warning signs in creating a such self contained environment particularly the high-rise council tower blocks of the 1960’s in the UK resulting in social drawbacks despite being heralded as the future of living. The 888 Tower could lead to the occupants becoming too insular confining themselves to this one tower given its range of functions. This is considered more fully at Section 2.6.

29 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015).

Fig. 18: Harvey Willey Corbett Illustration

CHAPTER 2 20TH CENTURY ARCHITECTURAL HIGH-RISE FUTURES The 20th Century saw a significant change in architecture, with an increase in verticality in cities occurring at the same time that human mobility was increasing. Society was receptive to ideas of the future and visions of a Utopia through technologically speculative architecture.1 Currently our society does not hold to this notion, being rather dismissive of Utopian ideas due to their failings in the past. For example Le Corbusier first proposed the Ville Radieuse (The Radiant City) in 1924 which expressed an idealised ordered city,2 which many architects and CHAPTER 2

urban planners now deem would have been a failure and grateful that it never came to fruition. Nevertheless in the 1920’s many architects were predicting structures that were technologically not possible and largely unbuildable.3 ‘It was not until the emergence of the architectural avant-gardes at the beginning of the twentieth century that the conditions to create technologically inspired speculative architectures arose’.4 As noted, compared to the early 20th Century, architecture has become more commercial and business orientated, with the intent to sell designs as quickly as possible. The early 20th Century therefore provides a rich period of study that also allows one to consider its influence on architectural design.

2.1 Connectivity With the introduction of the motor car at around the beginning of the 20th Century, it was anticipated that this would become the predominant method of transportation. This happened to a greater extent, for example as mentioned Los Angeles, where the urban planning is orientated around the car. 1 Nic Clear, “Architecture,” in The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction, ed. Rob Latham (Oxford: The Oxford University Press, 2014). 278. 2 Gili Merin, AD Classics: Ville Radieuse / Le Corbusier, 11th August 2013, http://www.archdaily.com/411878/ad-classics-villeradieuse-le-corbusier (accessed January 29th, 2016). 3 Nic Clear, “Architecture,” in The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction, ed. Rob Latham (Oxford: The Oxford University Press, 2014). 278. 4 Ibid. 279.

With this expected increase, and densification in the inner city areas, Ferriss predicted that: ‘The increasing traffic congestions which follows in the wake of the mounting skyscraper provoked thought that more than one traffic level, or numerous traffic levels must indeed be eventually introduced’.5 There was a strong notion that cars and pedestrians would be separated from one another in the future, set on different planes as shown in the works of Ferriss’ book: Metropolis of Tomorrow6 in Part Two, Projected Trends and Part Three, An Imaginary Metropolis. Although his vision can be perceived as rather fantastical, drawing strong parallels with cinema and set design, due to his training as an architect, they are a practical solution to the increasing heights and circulation of and around the skyscrapers.7 In light of the 1916 Zoning Regulation in New York, Harvey Wiley Corbett, a skyscraper architect, commissioned Ferriss to draw a series of massing studies showing the combinations of setbacks on a skyscraper to maximise the building volume and enable light

Fig.19: Hugh Ferriss Overhead Traffic Ways

to reach the street level.8 Not only did this help promote the tiered Art Deco Style, the International Style and allow more light to the street, it also encouraged external circulation and interaction between people in these stepped back upper areas.9 Ferriss experimented with the idea of multilevel connections that link together these set back areas, providing greater lateral circulation in different horizontal planes. Ferriss even Fig. 20: Hugh Ferriss Apartments on Bridges 5 6 7 8 9

Hugh Ferriss, The Metropolis of Tomorrow (New York: Ive Washburn, 1929), 66 Ibid. Neumann, Dietrich, trans. Film Architecture: Set Designs from Metropolis to Blade Runner. Munich: Prestel, 1999. 112 Ibid. Hugh Ferriss, The Metropolis of Tomorrow (New York: Ive Washburn, 1929),

reverses the purposing and incorporates apartments within the structure of his suspension bridges.

Archigram, a prominent architectural avant-garde group in the UK, had ideas that differed radically from the work of Ferriss and Corbett using ‘science fiction as an attack on the banality of mainstream architecture’.10 Archigram’s Ron Herron questioned whether mobility should just be confined to a person or whether the high-rise city itself can move. Archigram proposed a mobile city named the ‘Walking City’ that was not restricted to a geographical location. The city itself could connect with other cities and in instances form larger walking metropolises.11 CHAPTER 2

‘Possibly because it was so implausible, Walking City became one of Archigram’s best-known images’12

Fig. 21: Archigram Walking City

This was developed in the SF book, Mortal Engines13 in 2001 by Philip Reeve which describes the adventures of Tom Natsworthy on the ‘Traction City’ of London. These ‘Traction Cities’ hunt and devour one another across the world to gain fuel and resources. The notion of a moving city on a train is conveyed in the post-apocalyptic SF French graphic novel by Jacques Lob, Le Transperceneige in 1982,14 which was subsequently adapted into the film Snowpiercer in 2013. 10 Nic Clear, “Architecture,” in The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction, ed. Rob Latham (Oxford: The Oxford University Press, 2014). 284. 11 Fredrik Hellberg, Manhattan Oneirocritica, 26th October 2009, https://dprbcn.wordpress.com/2009/10/26/manhattan-oneirocritica-fredrik-hellberg/ (accessed January 14th, 2016). 12 Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture Without Architecture (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005). 39 13 Philip Reeve, Mortal Engines (Scholastic, 2001). 14 Jacques Lob and Jean-Marc Rochette, Le Transperceneige (Casterman, 1982).

The general concept of Walking Cities can be seen in Norman Nixon’s ambitions in the 1990’s for a floating city of 50,000 people that would circle the planet every two years, complete with all amenities including schools, parks, hotels, hospital and even an airport.15 Although this did not come to fruition, there is still evidence of SF influence particularly by Archigram whose many ‘theoretical designs pioneered the high-tech approaches of the sixties’16

Fig. 22: Archigram Plug-In City

Like the Walking City, Archigram’s Peter Cook also examined mobility in a different light with the Plug-In City from 1964-66. The project was inspired by the Metabolist Movement and explored the idea of interchangeable pods that would plug into a megastructure to house residential, office, retail and leisure facilities.17 This allowed the circulation to be continually adaptable with the interchangeable pods: ‘A megastructure devoted to continual circulation, its functions scrambled, its boundaries blurred, it reprieved the promise of collective living from a creeping pessimism about urbanism’.18 Similar to the illustrations by Ferriss and Corbett, there is a vertical hierarchy and separation of different transportation systems within the megastructure. ‘Plug-In City was devised to prompt 15 Robert Trigaux, Water World / With 50,000 people on board, the world’s biggest ship would certainly make waves, 05 July 1999, http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Water-World-With-50-000-people-on-board-the-2920450.php (accessed January 15, 2016). 16 Jean-Louis Cohen, Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge 1893-1960, ed. Christa Weil, trans. Kenneth Hylton (Paris: Flammarion, 1995). 203 17 Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture Without Architecture (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005). 14 18 Ibid.

circulation and accelerate the city-in-flux’19 and the ‘journey to work could be very short, along weatherproof tubes’20

2.2 Horizontal and Vertical As ideas of vertical movement changed with the rising structures of the 20th century, many architects predicted that horizontal mobility would also alter and the idea of the street would be questioned: ‘Superimposed street levels appeared simultaneously in the designs of imaginative

CHAPTER 2

architects and in popular publications’.21 In 1909, Vernon House Bailey under the instruction of Charles R. Lamb proposed ‘height differentiation for Manhatten’ with streets suspended high up and interwoven between the high-rise architecture.22 Multi level connections are also portrayed in the works of Ferriss, who separated the transportation systems with pedestrians on upper levels and motor cars on the lower. Ferriss integrated the transportation levels into the structure of the tiered architecture. Corbett later elaborated on Lamb’s ideas

Fig. 23: Harvey Willey Corbett Illustration

in his illustration, La Ville Future: Une solution hardie du problème de la circulation (The city of the future: an innovative solution to the traffic problem) in 1913 (Fig 23) which also emulates this idea of separation.23

19 Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture Without Architecture (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005). 16 20 Ibid. 21 Jean-Louis Cohen, Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge 1893-1960, ed. Christa Weil, trans. Kenneth Hylton (Paris: Flammarion, 1995). 31 22 Ibid. 23 Ibid. 32

Corbett believed in a classification of traffic flow and that the separation of transportation systems would result in a greater efficiency of human and vehicular traffic, hence the name of the illustration. This image was printed in Scientific American which publicised these ideas and set off an ‘immediate echo in Europe’, with similar proposals being published in L’Illustration in response to vehicular congestion in Paris.24 These visions of high level connections continued in the 20th Century inspiring Italian futurists such as Antonio Saint’Elia and Filippo Tommaso.25 The short film documentary To New Horizons in 1940 shows how visions of utopian thinking by separating the transportation systems were envisaged by General Motors: ‘In the metropolis of 1960, elevated sidewalks give a new measure of safe and convenience to pedestrians. They actually double the available traffic within the street’.26 Dividing transportation networks through horizontal planes has been unpopular in some instances particularly to provide additional road capacity. The A4400 or Queensway in Birmingham UK, prioritised the car which was perceived as the ‘symbols of wealth and instruments of personal liberation’27 and alienated pedestrians to over and underpasses. It was perceived as a planning failure known commonly as the ‘Concrete Collar’ preventing urban expansion, and has undergone modification to be more friendly and inviting to pedestrians.28

Fig. 24: Harry M. Pettit - Future of New York

24 Jean-Louis Cohen, Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge 1893-1960, ed. Christa Weil, trans. Kenneth Hylton (Paris: Flammarion, 1995). 32 25 Ibid. 33 26 To New Horizons, directed by General Motors, 1940. 27 Stephen Bayley, It’s all change in the second city... again - Central Birmingham is being dramatically made over and this time they’re determined to get it right, 29th June 2008, http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2008/jun/29/architecture.regeneration (accessed January 17th, 2016). 28 Albert Bore, ‘EASTSIDE – Masshouse Redevelopment’, http://pes.cor.europa.eu/NEWS/Documents/News/2007/01%20Example%20by%20Albert%20BORE_EN.pdf (accessed December 14th, 2015).

King’s Views of New York29 published in 1915 by Moses King, (see Fig 24) shows illustrations by visionary artist Harry M. Pettit, of elevated rail bridges connecting the high-rise structures. There is an emphasis on transportation by train as an extension of the subway system vertically on elevated horizontal connections and by air using airships and planes.

From the 1860’s, elevated train networks were constructed in some cities, including in the USA the New York West-Side, and Yonkers Patent Railway followed by the Manhattan Railway,30 The Chicago ‘L’ (Elevated) and the Boston Elevated Railway.31 There have been closures to certain sections of these elevated networks as they became obsolete, cost too much to maintain or CHAPTER 2

created too much noise pollution or considered visually intrusive. However systems have been constructed in recent years such as the London Docklands Light Railway.

2.3 Structure Ferriss and Corbett’s illustrations express a monolithic and heavy architecture which has a powerful presence. The facade of the structure steps back to incorporate the high level linkages, however Corbett uses lightweight steel / iron bridges to connect the high-rise architecture. There are two reasons for this bridge construction technique, either to be lightweight and to span the distance with minimal support, or because these connections were added years after the buildings were erected, an idea of retrofitting. With the latter, this shows an understanding of the history within the city, and its build through time. Archigram’s Plug In City structure, the Megastructure, differs being composed of a grid framework that the circulation slots into.32 Archigram along with Le Corbusier believed that architecture should become a machine, with the circulation being expressed and not hidden away.33 Similarly architects such as Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano externalise the infrastructure services and circulation in the Pompidou Center (1977).34 29 Moses King, King’s Views of New York (New York, 1915). 30 nycsubway.org, Fifty Years of Rapid Transit (1918), http://www.nycsubway.org/wiki/Fifty_Years_of_Rapid_Transit_ (1918)#Chapter_VII._Inception_of_the_Elevated_Railroads (accessed January 03, 2016). 31 nycsubway.org, Boston Elevated Railway Company, Main Line Elevated Structure, HAER, http://www.nycsubway.org/wiki/Boston_Elevated_Railway_Company,_Main_Line_Elevated_Structure_(HAER) (accessed January 03, 2016). nycsubway.org, nycsubway.org, 32 Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture Without Architecture (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005). 33 Nic Clear, “Architecture,” in The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction, ed. Rob Latham (Oxford: The Oxford University Press, 2014). 34 P. S. Sreekanth, Futuristic Architecture in Movies - Imagining the future of architecture the Hollywood Way, February - May 2011, https://futuristicarch.wordpress.com/ (accessed October 15th, 2015).

The 888 Tower also expresses its circulation by placing it and the structure on the external envelope, resulting in a slimmer profile and additional stiffness. This lightweight structure contrasts with Ferriss and Corbett’s monolithic architectural illustrations, however both are expressing the prevalent architectural style of the time.

2.4 Vehicles The vehicles used in the illustrations by Ferriss, Corbett and Pettit were mostly contemporaneous with precedence given to the car. Archigram adopts a different approach with the Walking City, where the city was the vehicle itself despite seeming implausible.35

Pettit’s Future of New York shows flying vehicles such as airships and planes in the illustration.36 These ideas are elaborated in SF and SF film as the typical method of transportation such as in Just Imagine, The Fifth Element and Blade Runner.

Currently there is a little integration between the high-rise and air transport, with a few specific skyscrapers hosting helicopter landing pads. However due to the noise pollution and potential risks operating in built up areas, air transport is a not a feature of the inner city. The 1930’s, alluded to the promise of greater air traffic by architects’ illustrations. This is perfectly encapsulated by the famous fake photograph in 1930 (see Fig 25) of the Navy dirigible Los Angeles docking

Fig. 25: Navy LA docking at the Empire State Building

at the Empire State Building.37

The pods in the 888 Tower are more comparable with Pettit’s illustration, as both use rail systems. Pettit uses elevated horizontal railway links as opposed to the 888 Tower, which utilises 35 Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture Without Architecture (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005). 39 36 Moses King, King’s Views of New York (New York, 1915). 37 Christopher Grey, Streetscapes, 23rd September 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/26/realestate/26scapes.html?_r=0 (accessed January 29th, 2016).

an Articulated Funiculator, a relative of the railway, to transcend between horizontal and vertical planes.

2.5 Limitations and Constraints Although these fantastical illustrations display a rich layering of high level connections in a city network, however in reality only a few buildings are connected above ground due to structures being erected at different times for different clients. There are instances of buildings that comprise of two or more towers that are linked horizontally such as the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and Marina Bay Sands Hotel in Singapore however each is part of one masterplan and not an additional after thought. There is no incentive for an owner of a piece CHAPTER 2

of land within the city to connect their building to another. Although these have been adopted in some cities such as Hong Kong - the Central Elevated Walkway, the Minneapolis Skyway System and Plus 15 in Calgary, the concept is not extensively applied. In the interview with Lars Hesselgren he outlines: â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;It is beginning to happen however you need to have adjacent owners who are separate owners to collaborate together. The model that happens in western cities is underground, there is a whole system for moving underground. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s where the city has decided upon this policy to provide a transportation system and they are forced to build underground due to all the building elements aboveâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;.38 Many of the illustrations shown in this chapter, have a consistency in utilising a one point perspective, allowing an easy comparison to be made between them. However the architecture portrayed in these images is homogenous, depicting a city that has been constructed at the same time as part of a masterplan. These illustrations do not address what is the reality and likely to remain so, that cities are built over time with a complex layering of architectural styles. This limits the inspiration that these images can provide. There is a simplicity in their composition, aided by linear streets vanishing into the distance, but seemingly do not consider the implications of traffic cross sections.

38 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, , An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015).

2.6 Densification and Social Aspects High-Rise has been heralded by architects, planners and developers as the solution to the growing population from the early 20th Century. This has had a chequered history in relation to social housing,

Fig. 26: Destruction of Pruitt-Igeo

Pruitt-Igoe is an example of a concentrated modernist social block housing schemes in St Louis, USA,39 that resulted in the social and racial tensions generated by the nature of the high-rise. Councils and government bodies, especially in the UK, have now steered away from housing families in high-rise buildings due to the potential social consequences. However for wealthy individuals apartments in high-rise towers in central locations are much sought after. A key example of this is London, as illustrated in a variety of articles including those of Simon Jenkins from the London Evening Standard,40 who discusses how the demand driven by market forces for prime locations especially from the Asian markets.

Ferriss and Pettit elevate vehicular traffic onto high levels, integrated into the stepped building facade. As demonstrated by elevated railways earlier in the chapter, there are negative consequences of noise pollution and some consider them an eyesore. Elevated railways are only at one level above the ground whereas Ferris and Pettit projected transport systems at much higher levels. This could introduce the very reasons for the unpopularity of elevated railways to the occupiers of high-rise buildings. 39 Sofia Balters, The Pruitt-Igoe Myth: An Urban History, 29 July 2011, http://www.archdaily.com/153704/the-pruitt-igoe-mythan-urban-history/ (accessed May 15, 2015). 40 Simon Jenkins, All I see is chaos when I look at this city skyline, 1st October 2013, http://www.standard.co.uk/comment/ simon-jenkins-all-i-see-is-chaos-when-i-look-at-this-city-skyline-8851041.html (accessed May 3rd, 2015).

49 CHAPTER 2

Fig. 27: Still of Minority Report

CHAPTER 3 CINEMATIC HIGH-RISE FUTURES This chapter focuses on the influence of SF, particularly SF film, to address whether the architecture and mobility in SF is purely to dramatise the sequence or whether it can provide architectural inspiration. This is specifically considered by the application to the 888 Tower, and if there is evidence of SF influence. To consistently analyse human mobility within SF films, a matrix outlined in Chapter 1 is used to compare the case study films, listed in the introduction.

3.1 Connectivity Minority Report and Total Recall show roads and freeways as the primary transportation for the general public in their futuristic visions of Washington D.C. and The United Federation of Great Britain, respectively. The fictitious networks show continuous transportation removing the disjointed nature of current networks having to stop to transition from vertical to horizontal CHAPTER 3

movement. This draws parallels to the 888 Tower’s Articulated Funiculator integrated into the external envelope of the building replacing the inefficient conventional vertical elevator.

It can be argued that the transportation concept in Minority Report would be an extension of the 888 Tower system, projecting the network out into the city from the character’s high-rise apartment to the bustling freeway known as the Ribbon Road. Lars references toys such as Hot Wheels as inspiration in his Demonstrator Videos, ‘we harken back to games we play’.1 There are strong parallels as Industrial Light and Magic’s2 (ILM) Art Director, Alexander Laurant states the similarities even though the production design team were trying to move away from the toy. ‘The Ribbon Road had to have a realism to it and to not look like a Hot Wheels toy, it needed to look like it could have been constructed with cement and steel’.3

1 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 2, YouTube, February 26th 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=yasXzkXPRjo (accessed April 20th, 2015). 2 ‘An American motion picture visual effects company that was founded in May 1975 by George Lucas. It is a division of the film production company, Lucasfilm.’ Wikipedia, Industrial Light & Magic, 26th January 2016, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_ Light_%26_Magic (accessed January 27th, 2016). 3 Minority Report DVD Extras. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002.

Fig. 28: Still of Minority Report’s Ribbon Road

The 888 Tower system is just for the building with an interchange beneath the structure to a conventional underground network. Lars argues that the ‘transport infrastructure [takes the] cost away from the public realm and puts it into the private realm’,4 which he considers would reduce the cost to those operating public systems.

There is evidently a separation between the private and public transportation infrastructure in the 888 Tower, however when questioning Lars about whether the logical natural progression would be to extend the elevator into a macro system, he replied: ‘Absolutely, it is precisely designed to incorporate that’.5 Although this would provide greater resemblance to Minority Report, this would introduce issues regarding ownership and access to the network. This is not addressed within SF film, because it does not need to deal with such practicalities.

Total Recall also differs in displaying high level links that weave through the high-rise architecture (Fig 29) and in some cases the architecture is hung from the freeway structures. This bears a resemblance to cities today, such as Hong Kong and the intertwined road networks through the city chasms (Fig 30).

4 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren , London (29th June 2015). 5 Ibid

Fig. 29: Still of Total Recall

Fig. 30: Hong Kong

This idea of increased transit through high-level linkages is also displayed in the highly regarded 1927 SF film Metropolis by Fritz Lang (shown Fig 31 overleaf). This separates the transportation networks with high-level pedestrian walkways and bridges with vehicular traffic on the ground plane. The film was revolutionary in its time, at being able to convey a future reality on screen CHAPTER 3

that was so plausible and realistic. The 1930 SF comedy, Just Imagine, whose fantastical portrayal of the New York skyline in 1980 (shown Fig 32 overleaf) also draws similarities to Metropolis and Total Recall, whilst contrasting with the 888 Tower, with its use of high level bridges and setback facades which incorporate transportation linkages.6 This however was an idealised view of a future reality, as the USA was plagued at the time by depression, and this film was used as escapism by projecting a prosperous future to the people.7 Although there are commonalities between Metropolis and Just Imagine with the 888 Tower in promoting an increased fluidity in the traffic and number of connections, this is achieved through different means. These SF films separate the transportation systems into a series of horizontal planes which can be cited as a response to Ferriss. Metropolisâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; set designer Otto Hunte drew illustrations that were remarkably similar to Ferrissâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; sketches.8 Conversely the 888 Tower and Minority Report combine the vertical and horizontal planes into one fluid system.

6 Neumann, Dietrich, trans. Film Architecture: Set Designs from Metropolis to Blade Runner. Munich: Prestel, 1999. 112 7 Ibid 8 Jean-Louis Cohen, Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge 1893-1960, ed. Christa Weil, trans. Kenneth Hylton (Paris: Flammarion, 1995). 89

Fig. 31: Still of Metropolis

Fig. 32: Still of Just Imagine

The Fifth Element displays a different but intriguing transportation system around high-rise architecture within New York, 250 years from now. As opposed to the typical expectation of high-rise architecture ascending to ever greater heights, The Fifth Element explores the concept of extending the verticality downwards into the earth and adding new buildings beneath the old. In an architectural sense, this keeps the romanticism of the existing skyline remaining visibly recognisable as New York, however the circulation between the high-rise structures is affected: ‘This changed the notion of a single street and ground plane for circulation, so hovering craft were envisioned to roam into stratified layers throughout the verticality. With the street layer stripped back, once-hidden infrastructures of subway shafts and city utilities are suddenly revealed giving the city a sometimes chaotic machine-like appearance’ and ‘the metro transportation system is forced to be integrated vertically into the building’.9 There are similarities with the 888 Tower, whose elevator system has been described by Tyréns as the Sky / Vertical Subway however, The Fifth Element’s transportation concentrates more on flying vehicles as the most prominent form. 9 P. S. Sreekanth, Futuristic Architecture in Movies - Imagining the future of architecture the Hollywood Way, February - May 2011, https://futuristicarch.wordpress.com/ (accessed October 15th, 2015).

Due to the nature of film, SF loses some of the practicalities of mass transit systems. At an interchange requiring a small distance of travel between modes, walking is a very efficient method due to the small amount of space required per person. In the networks in SF films, there is little consideration into this, with passengers each having lavish amounts of space which would not be practical or efficient in the real world.

3.2 Horizontal and Vertical Transportation SF films and the 888 Tower display a transportation network that functions in all three dimensions, although of different types. This results is a greater efficiency at managing congestion due to the number of possible routes provided by the additional dimensions.10 Minority Report and the 888 Tower display the closest parallels as both utilise a combination of horizontal and

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vertical routing woven together and integrated into the facade of the high-rise structures.

Fig. 33: Still of Minority Report

In the case of Minority Report it could be considered that the merging of these transportation systems into one fluid system is to increase the action and intensity rather than the social utility. However, prior to filming, Steven Spielberg assembled a selection of experts to a three-day ‘think tank summit’ in California, to create a plausible ‘future reality’ for the year 2054.11 12 Alex McDowell concludes that ‘Minority Report was an unusual film, first of all a science fiction film but

10 P. S. Sreekanth, Futuristic Architecture in Movies - Imagining the future of architecture the Hollywood Way, February - May 2011, https://futuristicarch.wordpress.com/ (accessed October 15th, 2015). 11 Ian Rothkerch, Will the future really look like ‘Minority Report’?, 10 July 2002, http://www.salon.com/2002/07/10/underkoffler_belker/ (accessed May 9, 2015). 12 Joel Garreau, Washington As Seen in Hollywood’s Crystal Ball, 21st June 2002.

Steven Spielberg thought of it as an investigation into the future reality’.13 By considering commuting within the film, this adds a depth of realism creating a ‘happy medium between sci-fi and realism’,14 resulting in a potentially greater influence on architecture due to its practical considerations: ‘In the case of transportation, looking at the entire urban system, starting off as an urban planning exercise, then thinking how do you move around this space, how does Tom Cruise get to work in the morning? If it is a very vertical city because people have raced into this city to be under the umbrella of the protective pre-cogs in this murder free society, a massive vertical city springs up, so you’ve got a lot of surface to negotiate vertically and horizontally and that led to thinking differently about transportation’.15

Fig 34: Total Recall Maglev Car Elevators Concept Art

Minority Report and the 888 Tower use ramps to transition from the horizontal to the vertical, whereas Total Recall uses a more conventional vertical elevator system (Fig 34). Although this may not appear to be as seamless as Minority Report or the 888 Tower, this is feasible, as car lifts are already an existing technology today, despite being used predominantly for parking. However it can be argued that in reality this would be an inefficient system and unable to cater for the traffic levels.

13 Alex McDowell, Building Virtual Worlds - USC Global Conference, performed by Alex McDowell, USC, 2014. 14 Minority Report DVD Extras. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. 15 Alex McDowell, Building Virtual Worlds - USC Global Conference, performed by Alex McDowell, USC, 2014.

The Fifth Element and Blade Runner explore the fluid transition between the horizontal and vertical in a different manner with flying vehicles. This is similar to the 888 Tower by allowing the transportation system to utilise all three dimensions, but whereas the 888 Tower, Minority Report and Total Recall are still confined to a track or road system, the Fifth Element and Blade Runner allow a complete freedom of movement between high-rise structures.

3.3 Structure The 888 Tower, seamlessly integrates the circulation into the structure of the building facade. With an exoskeleton rather than an endoskeleton structure this results in a stiffer building enabling it to soar to greater heights. Minority Report also portrays the transportation on the external elements of the building and it can be assumed that there is a structure there to support it (see Fig 33). However the film does not allow one to establish whether this is an

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exoskeleton structure.

Total Recall is similar to the 888 Tower as the structure of the freeway system is used to support houses and other building types, as seen in Fig 35 below. This does differ however from the 888 Tower, as in Total Recall this transportation system is for a city network whilst the 888 Tower circulation is just contained within the building structure.

Fig 35: Still of Total Recall

The integrated relationship of the transportation in the city network is apparent in Minority Report, but Total Recall draws stronger parallels to Metropolis and Just Imagine which both utilise high level horizontal connections to connect the high-rise city together. The latter two films have comparable transportation networks to those proposed by Ferriss and his work Metropolis of Tomorrow. 57

3.4 Vehicles Both the 888 Tower and Minority Report feature a sequential transportation system, however the vehicles in this system are powered differently. Minority Report utilises Maglev technology, but despite the extensive research in preparation for the film,16 there are still practical considerations that were not addressed. Even though Maglev elevators are currently being developed by ThyssenKrupp,17 Lars considers that: ‘When you start to look at how to implement that in reality, one of the issues is that you need some sort of physical track as people are really worried about it falling off. So if we are looking at magnetic propulsions; Maglev, but to allow Maglev to also hold it up, in every conceivable way and circumstance it would be slightly foolhardy’.18 PLP Architecture with Tyréns based the 888 Tower’s transportation on an Articulated Funiculator.19 The system of combining both vertical and horizontal transportation was in development since the 1970/80’s by Otis Elevator Company, however it did not gain any traction due to the lack of demand. Lars presumes that this was due to the system been developed in secret without any public promotion.20 ThyssenKrupp21, have since developed two elevator systems, the Twin, ‘that can be retrofitted to a building’22 allowing two carriages to operate in one lift shaft and the Multi that can move in the vertical and horizontal axis. ThyssenKrupp cite that ‘building development is constrained by the future of mobility available’,23 and therefore have developed the Multi so that the architecture of high-rise is not confined by mobility which influences the shape of the building. The idea of 16 Ian Rothkerch, Will the future really look like ‘Minority Report’?, 10 July 2002, http://www.salon.com/2002/07/10/underkoffler_belker/ (accessed May 9, 2015). 17 ThyssenKrupp AG , ThyssenKrupp develops the world’s first rope-free elevator system to enable the building industry face the challenges of global urbanization, 27th November 2014, https://www.thyssenkrupp.com/en/presse/art_detail.html&eid=TKBa se_1417074157421_1378444349 (accessed January 12th, 2016). 18 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren , London (29th June 2015). 19 Articulated Funiculator and the Tubed MegaFrame, performed by Dag Wingstrand and Fritz King, Shanghai World Financial Center, Shanghai, 19-21 September 2012. 20 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren , London (29th June 2015). 21 ThyssenKrupp AG, 2016, https://www.thyssenkrupp.com/ (accessed January 12th, 2016). 22 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren , London (29th June 2015). 23 ThyssenKrupp, MULTI – the world’s first rope-free elevator system, 1st December 2014, https://www.thyssenkrupp.com/ en/mediaplayer/MULTI-%E2%80%93-the-world%E2%80%99s-first-rope-free-elevator-system-271.html (accessed January 20th, 2016).

retrofitting as in the Twin system is also applied in Blade Runner to structures and transportation modified for future use. Whereas the 888 Tower’s transportation pods are confined to a singular track, the Maglev system in Minority Report allows the vehicle to transverse across a wide freeway both in the horizontal and vertical planes, similar to moving between car lanes on a road. Similarities can be drawn between Total Recall and Minority Report, not only are they film adaptations from novels by Phillip K. Dick, but both use Magnetic Levitation transportation vehicles. Total Recall’s Maglev system differs with a mechanism that allows the vehicle to utilise both top and undercarriage of the freeway for travel, doubling the efficiency of a freeway structure which could be used in the

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future, shown in Fig 36 below.

Fig 36: Total Recall Maglev Vehicle Concept Art

Both the 888 Tower and Minority Report require the pods to rotate in order to keep the passenger upright. Minority Report’s maglev vehicles have two outer points that are magnetised to the freeway with a rotating inner cabin to achieve this.24 It is impressive that the production team have addressed the practical and safety considerations of this. Harold Belker, the lead Vehicular Designer describes that: ‘The problem was to create a vehicle that goes up those buildings, goes the normal horizontal way and goes up those buildings without the passenger sacrificing safety. So we finally came up with a design that has end pods moving whilst the centre cabin will always stay in the horizontal position. The end pods turn around and levitate you up the building’.25 24 Minority Report DVD Extras. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. 25 Ibid.

The 888 Tower differs from Minority Report and Total Recall in that 888 Tower presents a more flexible sinuous approach to routing including movement between horizontal and vertical planes. Transitions between the two planes in Minority Report and Total Recall are fewer. In my interview with Lars, he pondered about the development of drones in recent years, stating ‘The drones are coming’,26 and whether the drones will be a viable option instead of the Articulated Funiculator, ‘It may well be that the drones get there before I develop my track. It is perfectly possible’.27 These are comparable to the flying vehicles in a multitude of SF film including Metropolis, Just Imagine, Blade Runner and The Fifth Element. These films provide no explanation to how the vehicles are powered, as it is not required and would be a distraction from the plot. However the advances in drone technology shows parallels between the SF film and reality.

3.5 Limitations and Constraints Although some films such as Minority Report and Blade Runner, have benefited from extensive research into potential future realities, due to the nature of film not all practicalities are addressed, instead the focus lies on the aesthetic. Minority Report can be considered an exception. Alex McDowell, the production designer consulted urban planners about the Height of Buildings Act of 1910,28 which limits the heights of buildings in Washington D.C.: ‘They said you can’t build skyscrapers in the middle of DC it will never happen, so we imagined across the river, across the Patomac there is none of that zoning restriction so those buildings developed vertically very fast - a very modern vertical city right across the city’.29 Although this film did consider the limitations of the real world, there are few films that do. Despite this creating a more realistic portrayal of the future, SF is used as a form of escapism for the viewer and has no need to consider practicalities other than to make the cinematic experience plausible. 26 Minority Report DVD Extras. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. 27 Ibid. 28 Wikipedia, Height of Buildings Act of 1910, 31st January 2016, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Height_of_Buildings_Act_of_1910 (accessed February 1st, 2016). 29 Minority Report DVD Extras. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002.

3.6 Densification and Social Aspects The 888 Tower promotes the idea of densification with the building being able to contain a population equivalent of a typical town. The theme of self contained communities is often included in SF, for example Dredd which presents social breakdown within a megablock. Such warnings to social equilibrium are explored in SF in J.G. Ballard’s book, High-Rise.30 Soon to be released in a film adaptation, this portrays a tale of urban disillusionment within this dystopian microcosm. High-Rise considers ‘how these spaces are socially produced, how they materialize relations of power and how inhabitants engage in struggle to change these spaces’.31

Ballard is known for his use of architecture in which he drapes the narrative, coined Ballardian Architecture. Ballard uses the verticality, density and architectural aesthetic to inflict hostility onto the characters and display how the microcosm regresses from ‘civilisation to tribalism to huntergatherer savagery’.32 Although these are works of fiction, SF is a reflection of potential social

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issues, and therefore creating a mini-city contained within one building could result in these concerns.

30 J.G. Ballard, High-rise (Jonathan Cape, 1975). 31 André Spicer, Philip Hancock and Zhang Zhongyuan, “Hyper-Organizational Space in the Work of J. G. Ballard,” Organization Articles (SAGE Publications) 15, no. 1350-5084 (2008): 889-910. 32 Chris Hall, Why JG Ballard’s High-Rise takes dystopian science fiction to a new level, 3rd October 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/03/jg-ballards-high-rise-takes-dystopian-science-fiction-to-a-new-level (accessed February 2nd, 2016).

CONCLUSIONS SF is part of mainstream culture, as a medium for storytelling through imagined alternative or future worlds. Yet these have resonance with the audience as moral parallels of the real world or dystopian warnings for the real world, and an exploration of potential architectural and technological advances. Considering a spectrum, with one end the practical and the other the pure aesthetic, SF allows one to travel further to the pure aesthetic given SF does not need to address the practicalities of design. Whilst acknowledging that architecture requires a fine balance as projects start with the aesthetic, with a sketch or idea, the influence of SF film may result in more creative architecture.

SF film is used as a playground for futuristic architectural ideas, and these principles of being more playful and expressive should occur to a greater extent in current architecture. There are too few pieces of architecture that display true creativity with much, especially in the commercial sector, bound by strict client objectives and budget resulting in being too confined and unexpressive. Both architecture and film are forms of artistic expression, and therefore they

CONCLUSION

should both be used to inspire and embrace creativity.

High-rise architecture has been shackled for 160 years by conventional mobility systems particularly the Safety Elevator,1 and connections between structures confined to the street and underground levels. However architects have questioned the boundaries of human mobility in and around the high-rise with creative illustrations of futuristic cities. Although the idea of large scale separation of pedestrians and vehicular traffic through horizontal planes and high level transit routes only came to fruition in a few instances such as in Hong Kong and Calgary, Ferriss and Corbett’s illustrations were particularly revolutionary in contributing and inspiring SF film.

1 ThyssenKrupp, MULTI – the world’s first rope-free elevator system, 1st December 2014, https://www.thyssenkrupp.com/ en/mediaplayer/MULTI-%E2%80%93-the-world%E2%80%99s-first-rope-free-elevator-system-271.html (accessed January 20th, 2016).

Ferriss’ influence is evident in New York and the cinematic futuristic portrayal of the city, with his illustrations that popularised the set back style of the New York 1916 Zoning Regulation2 and in Metropolis and Just Imagine which expanded this notion in a grander and more lavish way. Metropolis has be cited as one of the most inspirational SF movies of all time.3

SF successfully allows one to disaggregate architectural functions within the futuristic worlds and test alternatives for common functions such as human mobility. ‘A sort of science fiction that the digital era is bringing in is this whole idea that you can begin to disaggregate functions’.4 SF not only tests architectural ideas but popularises them on the screen, resulting in a process of development within mobility and that can affect high-rise design. However there will always be the factors that high-rise are constrained by, such as budget and severely limited land in favoured locations.

Whether there is a direct influence by SF is hard to prove. Nothing is ever directly reflected otherwise that is just imitation, and a project whether architecture or film is a synthesis of ideas. Lars described how he began research into sequential lift systems in the 2001, citing ‘the starting point was a research paper that I did back in 2001, pointing out that the essential stupidity of ordinary lift systems’.5 Whereas Minority Report was released in 2002, there are definitely grounds to postulate that SF and the film were influential and even if the film cannot be directly attributed, it was certainly used to promote the concept of the tower as Lars references the film in his lectures and videos.6

2 Neumann, Dietrich, trans. Film Architecture: Set Designs from Metropolis to Blade Runner. Munich: Prestel, 1999. 112 3 Damon Wise, The Guardian, 21st October 2010, http://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/oct/21/metropolis-lang-science-fiction (accessed January 29th, 2016). 4 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, , An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015). 5 Ibid 6 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015).

Lars and the research team at PLP Architecture, use video game technology developed by Oculus Rift7 to visualise the experience in one of the pods, and even rendered the building in real time for an open event evening to the public with game software.8 There are strong connections between the world of video games and cinema and therefore this can be considered as an indirect influence. Even though probably unintentional there are subtle cinematic references in the video sources to an iconic Blade Runner shot, with large LED screens adorning building faรงades, shown in Figs 37 and 38 below.

CONCLUSION

Fig 37: PLP Architecture Demonstrator Video Part 1

Fig 38: Still of Blade Runnerl

Minority Report questions current mobility systems through expressing a seamless network by removing the transitions from the horizontal to the vertical. As this is a SF film, the sense of wonderment and fantasy is heightened to engage the viewer, and although there was a 7 Oculus Rift, Oculus Rift Homepage, 2016, https://www.oculus.com/en-us/ (accessed January 21st, 2016). 8 Lars Hesselgren, PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 2, YouTube, February 26th 2015, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=yasXzkXPRjo (accessed April 20th, 2015).

substantial amount of research for Minority Report, there are still some practicalities that were not addressed. Although it provided a seamless system, it would be inefficient only transporting one or two people per vehicle which would result in undue congestion as a consequence of the number of vehicles in the system. The 888 Tower can be seen as addressing this as it successfully incorporates the aspects of fluidity between the horizontal and vertical planes by using the Articulated Funiculator and still allows for mass transit with 25-50 people in each pod. Both Minority Report and the 888 Tower place the transportation system onto the external facade, and consequently for the latter this radically changed the structure to be an exoskeleton. This has positive externalities as it stiffens the structure allowing skyscrapers to ascend to greater heights. The structural elements in Minority Report were designed to look feasible and realistic and did not need to concern all the practicalities, but the mobility system still sparked an idea which was publicised through the screen to a widespread audience. This provides confidence for architects, engineers and designers in seeing it visualised although hypothetical. The 888 Tower and Articulated Funiculator has developed their transportation system and in turn this resulted in the structure changing as well.

PLP Architecture have designed a building that is purely speculative, promoting a technologically innovative transportation system that expands upon the directions that passengers can travel, from a 2D linear axis to the freedom of moving in 3D. This was intended as a study to progress the development of high-rise architecture. Such proposals are currently rare in architecture, compared with the early 20th Century, which is to the detriment of architectural imagination and progression.

The 888 Tower, however is not unique, with other proposed high-rise buildings using novel mobility systems also in development. An example is the Next Tokyo by Kohn Pedersen Fox and Leslie E. Robertson who propose a mile high skyscraper that adapts to climate change.9 This building also utilises the Multi elevator system by ThyssenKrupp, working in a similar fashion to the Articulated Funiculator being able to navigate in both the vertical and horizontal planes. This 9 Kaley Overstreet, Kohn Pedersen Fox + Leslie E. Robertsonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Next Tokyo 2045 Masterplan Features a Mile-High Skyscraper, 29th January 2016, http://www.archdaily.com/780457/kohn-pedersen-fox-associates-plus-leslie-e-robertson-associates-nexttokyo-2045-masterplan-features-a-mile-high-skyscraper (accessed January 29th, 2016).

shows that the development of such transportation systems are serious proposals that would increase efficiency, the form of the high-rise and radically alter the way in which high-rise is perceived.

One may consider this as a cyclical process, with the 1920’s architects influencing SF which indirectly influenced the work of innovative architects of today. The 888 Tower provides plausible indicators of an improved efficient system that allows for greater architectural freedom. Lars ponders about the future, stating that ‘The drones are coming’!10 and although one cannot be certain as to how exactly mobility will advance, these investigations through SF and by architects

CONCLUSION

have certainly contributed to the advancement of human mobility in high-rise architecture.

10 Lars Hesselgren, interview by Gregory Chatfield, , An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hesselgren, London (29th June 2015).

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ThyssenKrupp. MULTI – the world’s first rope-free elevator system. December 1st, 2014. https:// www.thyssenkrupp.com/en/mediaplayer/MULTI-%E2%80%93-the-world%E2%80%99s-first-ropefree-elevator-system-271.html (accessed January 20th, 2016). Transport for London, A Brief History of the Underground, 2016, https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/abouttfl/culture-and-heritage/londons-transport-a-history/london-underground/a-brief-history-of-theunderground (accessed January 30th, 2016). Trigaux, Robert. Water World / With 50,000 people on board, the world’s biggest ship would certainly make waves. July 05, 1999. http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Water-World-With-50-000people-on-board-the-2920450.php (accessed January 15, 2016). Tyrens. About Tyrens. Tyrens. 2015. http://www.tyrens.se/en/About-Tyrens/ (accessed May 13, 2015). —. “Published Papers.” Articulated Funiculator and Tubed Mega Frame. 2015. http:// articulatedfuniculator.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/CTBUH1.pdf (accessed May 9th, 2015). 73

Wax, Roxana. The Metropolis of Tomorrow - Hugh Ferriss. February 10th, 2015. http://www. graphicine.com/the-metropolis-of-tomorrow-hugh-ferriss/ (accessed May 16th, 2015). Wikipedia. Height of Buildings Act of 1910. January 31st, 2016. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Height_ of_Buildings_Act_of_1910 (accessed February 1st, 2016). —. Hindenburg disaster. January 29th, 2016. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindenburg_disaster (accessed January 30th, 2016). —. Industrial Light & Magic. January 26th, 2016. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Light_%26_ Magic (accessed January 27th, 2016). Wise, Damon. The Guardian. October 21st, 2010. http://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/oct/21/ metropolis-lang-science-fiction (accessed January 29th, 2016). Wood, Anthony, and Ruba Salib. “Natural Ventilation in High-Rise office buildings - An Output of the CTBUH Sustainability Working Group .” CTBUH Sustainability Working Group. 2012. https://store. ctbuh.org/PDF_Previews/Reports/2012_CTBUHNaturalVentilationGuide_Preview.pdf (accessed December 9th, 2015).

Lectures: Articulated Funiculator and the Tubed MegaFrame. Performed by Dag Wingstrand and Fritz King. Shanghai World Financial Center, Shanghai. September 19-21, 2012. McDowell, Alex. Building Virtual Worlds - USC Global Conference. Performed by Alex McDowell. USC. 2014. Underkoffler, John. Pointing to the future of UI. Performed by John Underkoffler. February 2010. University of Southern California. World Building Institute. October 2008. http://worldbuilding. institute/ (accessed May 9th, 2015).

Unpublished Sources - Interview: Hasselgren, Lars, interview by Gregory Chatfield. An Interview about the 888 Tower with Lars Hasselgren London, (June 29th, 2015).

Filmography: Alien. Directed by Ridley Scott. Produced by 20th Century Fox, Brandywine-Ronald Shushett production. 20th Century Fox, 1979. Blade Runner. Directed by Ridley Scott. Produced by Michael Deeley. Warner Bros., 1982. Captain America: The Winter Soldier, directed by Anthony Russo and Joe Russo, Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, 2014. Dredd. Directed by Pete Travis. Produced by Andrew Macdonald, Allon Riech Alex Garland. Entertainment Film Distributors, Lionsgate, 2012. Immortals, directed by Tarsem Singh, Relativity Media, 2011. Inception. Directed by Christopher Nolan. Produced by Legendary Pictures & Syncopy. 2010. Just Imagine. Directed by David Butler. Produced by Buddy G. DeSylva. Fox Film Corporation, 1930. Metropolis. Directed by Fritz Lang. Produced by Erich Pommer. UFA, Paramount Pictures, 1927. Minority Report. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, directed by Mike Newell, Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, 2010. The Fifth Element. Directed by Luc Besson. Produced by Patrice Ledoux. Columbia Pictures, 1997. Just Imagine. Directed by David Butler. Produced by Buddy G. DeSylva. Fox Film Corporation, 1930. The Terminator. Directed by James Cameron. Produced by Cinema â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;84 & Pacific Western. Orion Pictures, 1984. To New Horizons, directed by General Motors, 1940.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Total Recall. Directed by Len Wiseman. Produced by Neal H. Moritz and Toby Jaffe. Columbia Pictures, 2012. Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Directed by J. J. Abrams. Produced by Lucasfilm Ltd. & Bad Robot Productions. Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, 2015. Snowpiercer. Directed by Bong Joon-ho. Produced by Moho Films, Opus Pictures, Stillking Films, CJ Entertainment. CJ Entertainment, The Weinstein Company, 2013. 300: Rise of an Empire, directed by Noam Murro, Warner Bros. Pictures, 2014. 2001: A Space Odyssey. Directed by Stanley Kubrick. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1968.

List of Figures: Fig. 1: Cover page image created by Author Composition of PLP Architecture’s 888 Tower and overlaid image Courtesy of PLP Architecture and overlaid image available from http://www.cnet.com/pictures/ spectacular-video-game-art-goes-into-the-pixel-pictures/4/ (accessed November 13th 2015) Fig. 2: Hugh Ferriss - Metropolis of Tomorrow Ferriss, Hugh. The Metropolis of Tomorrow. New York: Ive Washburn, 1929. Fig. 3: Still of Minority Report Minority Report. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. Fig. 4: Visualisation by Hayes Davidson predicting the London skyline in 20 years time Gye, Hugo. London enters the age of the skyscraper: 260 tower blocks set to transform the capital’s skyline... but are they ruining it?, 19th April 2015, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3032452/ More-200-tower-blocks-planned-London-s-skyline.html (accessed November 21st, 2015). Fig. 5: Otis and the Safety Elevator Available from http://media.tvrnews.ro/image/201504/w620/1853-expo-new-york_49692300.jpg (accessed November 15th 2015) Fig. 6: Still of 2001: A Space Odyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey. Directed by Stanley Kubrick. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1968. Fig. 7: Cover page of Cohen, Jean-Louis. Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge 1893-1960. Edited by Christa Weil. Translated by Kenneth Hylton. Paris: Flammarion, 1995. Showing picture by Aleksandr Rodchenko (1930) - The War of the Future Fig. 8: The 888 Tower Courtesy of PLP Architecture Fig. 9: Hugh Ferriss - Metropolis of Tomorrow Ferriss, Hugh. The Metropolis of Tomorrow. New York: Ive Washburn, 1929. 65 Fig. 10: Harvey Willey Corbett Illustration Available from http://41.media.tumblr.com/LRFQmWx6hmf2zah0b3XqXK4Ko1_1280.jpg (accessed January 20th 2016) Fig. 11: PLP Architecture & Tyréns - 888 Tower Courtesy of PLP Architecture Fig. 12: Transferring between the high-rises Drawn by Author Fig. 13: Sequential System Courtesy of PLP Architecture

Fig. 14: 888 Tower and the Subway Courtesy of PLP Architecture Fig. 15: The 888 Tower, Horizontal to Vertical Courtesy of PLP Architecture Fig. 16: Structure & Circulation of 888 Tower Courtesy of PLP Architecture Fig. 17: Articulated Funiculator Pods Courtesy of PLP Architecture Fig. 18: Harvey Willey Corbett Illustration Available from http://41.media.tumblr.com/LRFQmWx6hmf2zah0b3XqXK4Ko1_1280.jpg (accessed January 20th 2016) Fig. 19: Hugh Ferriss - Overhead Traffic Ways Ferriss, Hugh. The Metropolis of Tomorrow. New York: Ive Washburn, 1929. 65 Fig. 20: Hugh Ferriss - Apartments on Bridges Ferriss, Hugh. The Metropolis of Tomorrow. New York: Ive Washburn, 1929. 71 Fig. 21: Archigram Walking City Sadler, Simon. Archigram: Architecture Without Architecture. Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005. 39 Fig. 22: Archigram Plug-In City Available from http://www.dannilynden.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/peter-cook-archizoommaimum-pressure-area-plug-in-city-1962-64-section.jpg (accessed January 18th 2016) Fig. 23: Harvey Willey Corbett Illustration Available from http://41.media.tumblr.com/LRFQmWx6hmf2zah0b3XqXK4Ko1_1280.jpg (accessed January 20th 2016) Fig. 24: Harry M. Pettit - Future of New York King, Moses. King’s Views of New York. New York, 1915. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Fig. 25: Navy LA docking at the Empire State Building Available from https://artblart.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/11-_dirigible-docked-on-emp.jpg (accessed January 20th 2015) Fig. 26: Destruction of Pruitt-Igeo Balters, Sofia. The Pruitt-Igoe Myth: An Urban History. July 29, 2011. http://www.archdaily. com/153704/the-pruitt-igoe-myth-an-urban-history/ (accessed May 15, 2015). Fig. 27: Still of Minority Report Minority Report. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. Fig. 28: Still of Minority Report’s Ribbon Road Minority Report. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de 77

Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. Fig. 29: Still of Total Recall Total Recall. Directed by Len Wiseman. Produced by Neal H. Moritz and Toby Jaffe. Columbia Pictures, 2012. Fig. 30: Hong Kong Roadway Picture taken by Author, 2011 Fig. 31: Still of Metropolis Metropolis. Directed by Fritz Lang. Produced by Erich Pommer. UFA, Paramount Pictures, 1927. Fig. 32: Still of Just Imagine Just Imagine. Directed by David Butler. Produced by Buddy G. DeSylva. Fox Film Corporation, 1930. Fig. 33: Still of Minority Report Minority Report. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Produced by Bonnie Curtus, Walter F. Parkes, Jan de Bont Gerald R. Molen. 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Pictures, 2002. Fig. 34: Total Recall Maglev Car Elevators Concept Art Concept Art World, Total Recall Concept Art by Ed Natividad, 2012, http://conceptartworld. com/?p=15012 (accessed 16th January, 2016). Fig. 35: Still of Total Recall Total Recall. Directed by Len Wiseman. Produced by Neal H. Moritz and Toby Jaffe. Columbia Pictures, 2012. Fig. 36: Total Recall Maglev Vehicle Concept Art Concept Art World, Total Recall Concept Art by Ed Natividad, 2012, http://conceptartworld. com/?p=15012 (accessed 16th January, 2016). Fig. 37: PLP Architecture Demonstrator Video Part 1 Hesselgren, Lars. PLP Tower Demonstrator Part 1, YouTube, 5th February 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZO59bnRrms (accessed April 20th, 2015). Fig. 38: Still of Blade Runner Blade Runner. Directed by Ridley Scott. Produced by Michael Deeley. Warner Bros., 1982.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

APPENDIX Transcript of Interview with Lars Hesselgren The interviewer’s questions are highlighted in Bold Text.

Lars Introduction: Science Fiction: A funny one, which one drives which? Minority Report what happens it you take a car and make it go up. The starting point was a research paper that I did back in 2001, pointing out that the essential stupidity of ordinary lift systems. A lift track has one object on a track moving up and down. So when people design railways back in the 1870’s first railway in Germany, one locomotive on the track going back and forth, obviously more people wanted to ride, so lets have two locomotives to increase the number of people, then have two tracks, then lets make it a one way system. This is what people tumbled to at the end of the 19th century, all traffic systems are more efficient if they are one way systems because you can pile whole loads of vehicles on the track, that’s how all train systems work, when you want to increase the capacity you put more vehicles on the track, and that’s how lifts should work. It is completely insane how lift systems work, reserve space for a single object to go up and down, incredibly inefficient use of that volume of space.

I met with Tyrens and they had a similar idea, but they were thinking of trains going around vertically, probably had a look at their funiculator. Whole point of modern technology is that you no longer couple trains together, de-couple them so that they become individual units like cars and buses and taxis, individually addressable to take a certain number of people to a certain destination. This is really taking a completely standard transportation system and putting it into 3D. We have been working with cars for 100 years now. When you start to look at how to implement that in reality, one of the issues is that you need some sort of physical track as

APPENDIX

people are really worried about it falling off. So we are looking at magnetic propulsions , maglev, but to allow maglev to also hold it up in every conceivable way and circumstance would be slightly foolhardy. It just could not gain acceptance, but that could be proved wrong. There are already lift systems that are already been built with magnetic linear. ThyssenKrupp, an animation 81

on their website. They have taken on board the idea that there should be multiple systems on one track and are proposing linear motors for it. They are coming from the lift end of design, so they look like a normal lift but with more of them on the track. When they go up the track they have a mechanism to turn the lift sideways but in order to turn they have to stop the car. You are stopping and then you go down. There systems are designed to replace ordinary column lift systems, relatively low rise then they have this slightly mad idea that it is to go sideways. What they donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t seem to have figure out how to change plane, to go sideways.

There was a prototype built like this back in the 1970/80â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s by Otis, and Tyrens has got the man on board who was a consultant for that. Otis took over a Japanese firm, and the Japanese requested more research and development. Otis suggested the cab, what they were really interested in was to get lifts out into the car park because having to walk from your car into the building and go into the lift. So they thought to go sideways into the car park. They built a prototype with a reasonable amount of money and then they cancelled. Asked why did they cancel it, no body wanted to buy it, there was no demand. Asked whether he told people about it, of course not it was a secret development. Catch22! Have to publicise it in order to make something like this happen to get it on the public stage for people to put money into it. That is the reality. One thing that is interesting these days is very rich people take their cars up to their apartment, this one (indicating to 888 pod) is big enough to take cars up. Can drive your car into your apartment, which of course asks the question, why is the pod that shape? Could just be that it is just a platform which you drive your car onto, and the car in the vehicle to get you up there. Doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have to have an enclosure, as it is an enclosure in its own right. Thinking of a system then you think of all of the variants of that system, is the car strong enough to lift itself and so on and so on.

The other point that is very important is an economic point, the reason why high rises are so attractive in many places basically because you are taking the transport infrastructure cost away from the public realm and you are putting it into the private realm and for cities that is very attractive. You spend hundreds of millions to build underground railways, tracks and motorway infrastructure but as it is horizontally you have to build more and more of that stuff in the public 82

realm but if you build high buildings then suddenly the transport moves from the public realm to the private realm because it is consumed by everybody and the building owner pays for the vertical transport. I suspect that is why there are so many tall buildings but no one explicitly says so.

Q1. Could you explain to me the design process that you went through in designing the 888 Tower? That is an interesting one, if you are designing a 1 km tower, this was done with Kevin Flanagan, a partner at PLP. We had a meeting in one of these meeting rooms asking the question what should we do? What can this sort of system do for a 1 km tall tower? We thought let’s design a very tall building, someone suggested 888 metres as the Chinese like the number eight. So it was called the 888 Tower, of course there are several other buildings called the 888, a little bit pas se. The key thing was the structure, when you take the lift out of the centre of the building and put it somewhere else like on the outside of the building, suddenly the structure moves from being the centre core to the columns on the outside. That means that your structure is far, far more efficient because you have the structure doing the work. Your fourth load of inertia is bigger. When you put it on the outside it is much more feasible to do tall buildings, but this leads to the issue of how deep the building is? That’s a real issue, so he (K. Flanagan) proposed punching a hole in it, allowing two reasonable building depths. Of course in some portion of the building you will have very deep floors, and therefore you need to provide good functions for those deep floors, swimming pools, tennis courts, gyms etc. Because the lift system becomes different you can then think differently about the structure. That is an important component in the discussion.

Q2. Placing the transportation on the outside of the building with an exoskeleton seems logical for high-rise buildings, how come this has not been tried before, and if it has could you give me some examples? APPENDIX

The industry at larger there are five companies that dominate the industry led by Otis, their business model generates most of its turnover/income from maintaining lifts. Their business model does not want innovation and it is working fine, doesn’t need innovation to disrupt the status quo. That’s why in the 1970’s, a similar system could be designed but was not publicised. 83

The inertia in the industry. The industry does not have any competition from the outside the three players. Not interested in developing something that is radically new. Industrial drag as it were.

It is strange but if you think about it, if you think about trains or cars there have been dozens of new systems that have been proposed which have not been successful. The monorail is the classic one, there has been dozens of different monorail type proposals and because a train can have this gradual development of getting better and better incrementally within the given industry, radical departures haven’t had enough of an edge to make it through the dominance of the existing industrial departments. And I think what is interesting about today with digital technology that some of those breakthroughs will come in. The age of innovation has restarted. Some people have shown that you can revolutionise the industries, Tesla is the obvious one but there are also other ones as well. Apple and Google as well. When something enters that is so radical and new things can change very quickly, that is conceivable and could happen in this area to, that’s why now seems a good time to start with the 888 Tower. Thirty to forty years you would still be using rather clunky mechanisms but now because you can think about the digital piece, because it hinges so much about your organisation of the transportation system that’s the key behind it.

The Buraj Kalifa: As the main purpose was to build the tallest building in the world, why didn’t they invest in a new structural and lift system to do so? Because the individual building is just one object, not trying to create a brand new industry, the difference in mind set between each individual building that has been developed for that building being unique so there is relatively little point for someone to develop a structural and lift system that is only applied to that building. The only way that it is going to happen is by developing a typology that can be applied to many tall buildings which on the other hand means that you are up against these three major players who have real resources and can stifle any research except if it comes from outside their industry. Otis have expressed interest, and tried to keep an eye on the 888 buildings, however if we were to do it we would do it all in house. There is nothing patentable, its very straight forward geometry. Maybe if someone is pushed hard enough, it is 84

possible that one of the big manufacturers will make changes in the industry. Case in point, Thyssens Krupps are developing a sequential lift system to be ready by 2017 but they haven’t really publicised it yet so it may not be successful. Their tactic is quite interesting because they are designing something that can be retrofitted to a building which has two adjacent lift shafts. There are several others, e.g. in London, one of the chairman (can’t remember his name) for one of the big lift consultants has been trying to innovate the lift industry for 50 years and he has never managed to get anybody to invest.

Q3. Minority Report proposed the idea of vertical and horizontal transportation as a network through the city. The 888 Tower has a tube station beneath it, do you think that the logical extension is to extend the pod transportation system into a city network? Absolutely, it is precisely designed to incorporate that. In conjunction with another colleague we are designing the track system such that you can configure it to anything going diagonally, upwards, vertically. One of the ways in which we are thinking of making it popular, there is something called ‘My Mini factory’, there is one locally in London. ‘My Mini Factory’ does lots and lots of 3D models, you can download to print 3D prints and we are in discussion with them to state a competition and publish what would be needed for this track on their website and maybe do some sort of collaboration with them. The aim is to get it more popular and into the public eye, e.g. children will start playing with the toy, you might be able to encourage publicity in the area. Hopefully this will publicise it and will be out there for people to enjoy. Could become like Minecraft. Minecraft is incredibly simple geometrically, as it is just cubes, 3D pixels.

Q4. The London skyline is changing rapidly. In science fiction for example in the 1920’s in the work of Hugh Ferris and the film ‘Metropolis’ there is an emphasis on high-rise connections between the buildings – a multi level of transportation. This has manifested in underground transportation e.g. Subways, but like in Hong Kong, do you think that there will be high rise connections in the future of the cities, for example in APPENDIX

London? Kevin who worked on the 888 Tower, was investigating that. Fosters have been looking at linkage towers about 5 years ago. It is slightly beginning to happen obviously you have Marina Bay Sands in Singapore. It is beginning to happen however you need to have adjacent owners 85

who are separate owners to collaborate together. The model there is what happens in northern cities in the underground, there is a whole system for moving underground. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s where the city has decided upon this policy to provide a transportation system and they are forced to build underground due to all the building elements above, I suppose that it is possible building high-rise transport systems above ground is possible in the future. It is certainly possible, has it happened yet, it needs an extra bit of encouragement and pressure from the city planners. Most of them are a bit conventional to say the least. Planners are likely to submerge transport systems where it is hidden from site, where as if you propose to build an elevated railway. It is true that elevated transport systems have been built. Think of Boston and the big dig to submerge the motorway costing hundreds of millions. It was horrible when it was there. In that futuristic cinemas people assume that the structure would be very light and it isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t likely to be very light but I think that the interesting twist on that are drones. The drones are coming.

As a transportation for people? There is a YouTube video on a drone bicycle. They could be used as a transportation for people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpko3CPHonQ

Q5. In Science fiction film, high-rise buildings commonly have docking stations for airships, although there are helipads on some tall buildings do think this will become more common practice? The drones are remarkable. The drone world has taken off in such a big way over the last couple of years. Ultimately its go to do with digital control as you can automate the flying of the drone. I have a drone which is difficult to control and I got rather angry the other day as I saw a child of about 12, flying a rather expensive one. It could hover at be set to stay in a certain location despite if the wind blows, and its got a real time feed to his Apple IPhone. The Germans have supplied one of the off shore islands which medicines and the like, with drones for the last three months. Obviously there are no boats going across as it was a bit rough. This is a trial they have been running for small things, e.g for medicines, and now this vision is growing into something larger in scale. 86

Will people ever trust a drone to get into and go up to into building? Well I don’t know this is the interesting thing you see. It may well be that the drones get there before I develop my track. It is perfectly possible. I don’t know it remains to be seen but it is trackless which is a huge part as there is no track, the track is virtual which implicitly means that you need to have control systems to prevent them from crashing into each other. That is the whole idea, that the track gets replaced by information, a good quote to put in. There is more of a fail safe with a track, the drones can just fall out of the sky. Of course, the track is not necessary as a means for propulsion but as a safety harness you can see.

Q6. Trying to argue in my dissertation that science fiction and high-rise architecture, it is not the case that one influences the other but that the influence is cyclical, even if it is subconsciously. Do you have insight into this? Well I think one of the main things is to understand some of the other driving forces, and one of the things that has just changed architecture radically over the last years is the advent of the computer as a design tool. That really has changed things dramatically. Suddenly the whole idea of building double curve surface buildings from being really hard that only really clever people could do to becoming almost trivial. Now everybody had Rhino and all the rest of it and lots of these are done. The interesting thing is that particular trend I think may have really dampened out with the financial crash. We discovered this fantastic way of doing all of these wonderful things, Zaha Hadid is the classic case and all of Frank O’Gehry’s buildings, but is it good architecture, that is a different question? That doesn’t come from science fiction that comes from actual application from science and I would argue more strongly than science fiction that the various types of science influences architecture much more than science fiction. But it is difficult to say. Sci-fi is not something that we do here but a lot of science fiction is not very adventurous about architecture. You kinda assume, even when they write sci-fi about alien species they still say that they live in towns with streets, what? Why? Because the assumption is that they have to have streets cause that is the only way we can conglomerate structures into APPENDIX

the way that we think of it.

Something we can relate to? Well the ideas have some sort of human concepts in there. I find that particularly odd in science fiction. There are some rather good ones but they still have the notion that even aliens build buildings, really? Can you think of a good science fiction that has some interesting concepts?

Well Minority Report film, based on the novel by Philip K Dick Well that has a huge influence on the computer industry as opposed to the architectural industry.

Also Blade Runner as well, another Philip K Dick novel It is interesting that you are quoting films more so than novels

I’m quoting films more so than books because I think I know films a lot better, and I’m trying to gear this dissertation more so to films rather than books. There is a film coming out which is based on the book called ‘High-Rise’ by J.G. Ballard. Oh yeah, I’m not familiar with that particular book

It’s about this microcosm in this tall building, its more about social aspects than transportation. There are books about very large buildings, where the buildings are so large they have got a complete town in them. That’s quite old stuff, 1970-80s. Architects seem to have this drive for designing buildings that are sufficiently large that they are actual cities. That’s the interesting thing with the kilometre tower is that when you actually do the maths, it is still only 25,000 - 40,000 people which in city terms is still a small district it is not a town. A town these days has 8 million people in it, it’s a different scale. London does, a city worth anything has 5 million people.

How many people can fit into that pod? If you pack them in the lift, which is about half a square metre or a quarter of a square metre you get 50 people in. I reckon because you need a bit more elbow room you need at the most 25 people which gives you about a square metre per person. There is a big range in what is 88

acceptable in a lift, 0.3-0.4 people per square metre to what is acceptable in a suburban train, to acceptable in a train – a long distance train. Once you get an ordinary train (long distance) you are looking at about 2.5-3 sqm. There is a whole range of possible capacities.

If you have 25,000 – 40,000 people in the 888 Tower how many of these little pods are required? We are looking into that, it depends how fast they move and the stacking of them. We did do a few rough calculations of about 150-200 pods.

Its trying to be tailor made to take you to where you want to go? How is that possible with 24 other people? Each pod may stop at 2-4 stops, so if you have 4 stops with 25 people with 5-6 people getting off at each stop. That’s the way it would work, you don’t pack them in so that they would just go to one floor, they go to multiple floors and you load them together. Half way up the tower in the middle we reckon that we will have something like 3-4 hotels. There will be quite a lot of situations where you will arrive to the hotel to check in. The whole issue about whether these pods will serve other floors not belonging to the hotel is something else, presumably they will but there will have to be security devises. If you arrive at the bottom and are in a specific hotel room, you will have a key card that will take you to that specific room. In that case there may not be that many people going to that particular floor because there might only be 50 rooms or so. This is the reason that we need to do proper simulations and that is something that we are in the process of doing in collaboration with various people. The other thing that is perfectly obvious when you look at the movies it that it is not necessarily optimal, it could well be that the track instead of being one loop it should be two, five loops who knows. This is why we want to engage with lots of other people who will be trying out these things and testing it.

What are the protocols for the emergency procedure, what happens if there is a fire? APPENDIX

We did have some fire people from Tyrens discussing this, the interesting things that came out increasingly now organisations are beginning to accept, fire protected lifts are a good way of evacuating a building and this is now actually the norm in Sweden, and Sweden is ahead of most people in that regard. I think that if we design these properly I would assume that we 89

would use the pods as a fire escape. In very tall building in China you have to put in an escape floor every 16th floor and the point of the escape floor is that it is fire proof, it has its own fire prevention system and will have water and lavatories so it is an escape hatch. So that is what we were proposing for the kilometre tower, all you would do is make your way to the nearest escape floor and as it is every 16 floors you can do that by staircase. There will be staircases, the big columns they are 4x8 metres, so every second one of those will have a staircase. The chances are that you probably wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t be escaping all the way down to the ground.

Will the structure be able to stand if there is a fire? Oh yeah, yeah. Including aircrafts flying through it. London is very lucky because at Ronan Point the rules are, if you look at Heron tower a 747 can fly into that one the wings would get knocked off and because it doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have a solid core, it would come out of the other side. A bit bad for the people on the other side of course, it will knock out several of the supports but should remain still standing.

Has that been implemented in a lot of high-rise buildings? Oh yeah, it is in the American rules as well, the only reason the World Trade Centre fell down was because of the bolts. It was a lightweight building with lightweight trusses, the lightweight trusses were bolted to the central core, I think they were about an inch bolts. Over time the insulation that was supposed to be protecting those trusses degraded and fell down, so when the plane crashed into the centre core and released all the fuel, the bolts melted and thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what collapsed the floor and collapsed the whole building. Basically a complete design error as the bolts were far too weak but to give them their due, the designers had designed it so that a 707 airplane could fly into it, and if it had been a 707 it would have survived. If fire proofing had been maintained it probably would have survived but it was just ceiling tiles. Tall buildings are surprisingly robust.

Using these pods, we have come full circle, start off with public transport – cars which especially came to provenance in the 1960s, and now we use a hybrid of cars and public transport – depending on the city, using the funiculator do you think this is a mash up of a car and public transport? That is a reasonable statement and the car is mutating itself sharing society and so on, cars are mutating very rapidly, the case for next generation of people owning a car is getting slimmer and slimmer. I expect that you probably don’t have a car, but when I was your age I had a car. If you were a lad you had to have a car, psychologically it is no longer needed and practically it is no longer needed. If you fly somewhere you rent a car – a hire car and with Uber and so on. This one needs to follow that model for sure.

[ Talking about the 3D printed pod for the 888 Tower: ] We have actually brought it into a game which you can fly around in.

So does this stay upright by having a weight at the bottom? Yeh, someone has already written a thesis in Sweden, with Tyrens we were sponsoring quite a lot of people doing their master thesis on it, writing the control code for doing it digitally. The reason is that when you start looking at it, the problem you have with a high speed train is oscillation something that you could easily have here so a weight upon its own is not enough for the full scale system. It would then start to wobble around, so you need to have a gravity sensor and servos to actual turn the pods so that it is horizontal, and of course it also will take into account as it would do with gravity, the acceleration, so that you are always standing vertically with respect to the acceleration, cause you are accelerating by gravity and by travelling.

[ Talking about a lecture he gave in Vietnam in 2013 ]

This is from a lecture that I gave in Vietnam last year, so here my argument about form is really APPENDIX

to do with the design technology as much as anything else. The design technology in the 14th century perspective which then imposes this whole idea of these metric systems that you can easily construct perspectives from and that sort of drives architecture for the next 300 years. 91

And then you come with Computer Aided Design, you can do these sort of things, not trivially easily but you can do them and that suddenly changes the direction of how you think about design and what you do and when you start to look at this sort of thing, what is different from this building and this building this was the original pinnacle design, they both use steel frame, they both have prefabricated facades and they both have lift systems. The thing that actual makes them different is that it is actually different sites, different scale. They call this a skyscraper, this thinking a little more about what happens with the aircraft revolution and how we have gone through the years from 110 horsepower to this object here which has something like 20,000 horsepower. This is what we are doing with air at the moment, aircrafting where you have nothing but the aircrafting which has something like 0.2 horsepower and you are actually controlling the wind in the way you control temperature then there will be happening in the next 100 years or so hopefully. Maybe it is a matter of controlling air. This is just some stuff about future and so on this is the written thing, but you know windows are interesting things because they are display systems as much as they are anything else. So these are some of things that we were doing about having the idea a set of fins that actually react to way things move around. So if it senses where you are it changes the geometry of the façade as you are moving around. So this is looking at from the inside, so you have perpendicular views. The idea with this one as the object reaches an observation point the façade changes around itself, so windows what happens.

What happens if you disaggregate the fashion and this is something that is patented: Video: This is a serious proposition by people who are designing supersonic aircraft. This is an ongoing discussion. That is a sort of science fiction that the digital era is bringing in this whole idea that you can begin to disaggregate functions. Oh you have to have windows, have to have daylight. Well maybe you don’t maybe you use optic fibres, you need a window to have a view out – you don’t maybe it is artificial so suddenly all these sort of things are playing into it. This is why I think technology is so important and really matters a lot. Talking a little bit about wind and wind simulation in this area so you begin to understand what you do by controlling wind. Dyson I think is very interesting, this is a green house we were working on in Saudi Arabia which was supposed to be ventilated naturally. They have a very hot and humid area along the seashore 92

using evaporative cooling systems you need to draw it up in chimney, so we were looking at having a particular form that did this, but it was also a blow up form ETFE type. This was the first pinnacle thing where the canopy is basically an aerofoil to change the wind and the wind direction. This is the whole idea where digital technology makes these things, you model this in Rhino by hand it takes you a week, you model it with a piece of software (e.g. Grasshopper) it takes 30 seconds to execute so suddenly you can evaluate lots and lots of different alternatives. This helic of a …., the maximum volume is if helic … is at 54 degrees then you have the maximum volume for the minimum amount of fibre. You can get the system to behave by pumping it up, pre-setting the angle and then pumping it up. Depends on which way round you do it, you can either get it shorter or longer depending on how you do the pre wiring. This is object technology, so I was involved in generative components, the pre curser to grasshopper really. We do lots of stuff this is the airport that I designed in Abu Dhabi as overlayed on top of London (in the image), so it’s a big place and this is one of the things that got us the job. We gave them a parametric model and showed that you can change all of these things and they will update immediately. That was the regional lift concept in 2005 I was proposing that. It needs queuing speed management.

This is something that we did with the New York office, so we got this track 3D printed and it exists over in Sweden, and this is just talking about the whole idea of the 888 Tower.

What computer programme was the 888 Tower designed in? We use Microstation 3D modelling. Rhino has some very unfortunate ideas in it, it will mesh things at the drop of a hat which is really horrible whereas Microstation is a proper solid modelling tool, it underlies all mechanical software and everybody uses it and when it models stuff it is proper, it doesn’t have gaps it doesn’t have empty holes. Doing something like this building, we remodel it about 5-6 times, each time takes about 2-3 days at the most and then we put it through analysis software, that is something that we would like to work more on with APPENDIX

engineers. This is the whole idea that it goes along and sits parallel to the underground railway. This is where you are right because you have two parallel pieces. As you have these large structures on the outside of the skin you begin to loose large amounts of window space. 93

The space around the lift shaft is limited due to privacy.. The only ones that are in between are the ones that stop, so not all of the lifts stop at the one floor which allows for more privacy. We are only using up certain spaces and the rest is windows. The shafts are hollow concrete, to carry service ducts up as well. Its quite fun that you get one track on the inside and another track on the outside, they turn over and cross over each other to the upper levels. Talking about 2 degree of freedom, the thing that people don’t understand easily is that it has to be allowed to take a twist so it you look at this model you will find that one of these ones has a slot, as the track twists it becomes non planer and all of the wheels have to be able to adjust out of the plane. You can’t possibly do this type of stuff (gestures to moving the model), obviously this is an exaggerated track but the track has to be allowed to twist in simply can’t change plane which is the reason why you need two degrees of freedom. Here is a prototype of one that we built and we haven’t assembled it but all of the pieces exist for it, so it will be about a metre by a metre. All of the pieces are sitting in Stockholm but they haven’t bothered to assemble it yet. It is in order to demonstrate simply how the pod moves in space in order to do this stuff. Here we are (looking at picture), here are all of the pieces assembled. This is what you already saw and we have been working on these kinda things and building in servos. We’ve been doing more work on that side with servos and electrics and the rest of it.

Is this all Microstation as well? Yeah. It’s trivial nowadays to render these sort of things. I mean this took me (gesturing to 3D computer model) a couple of hours to set up. This is both optimising the track and scheduling of it. This is one of the problems you see, a lot of people are arriving simultaneously, you need to rebuild the timetable very frequently and possibly as much as 10 times a second. But with model computing that should not be an issue because you could have as many as 10 people per second arriving asking for a destination then you have to rebuild the timetable. You can do that nowadays

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