The Urban Large by Hetali Patel

The Urban Large Hetali Patel

PRATT INSTITUTE, SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE Graduate Architecture & Urban Design (GAUD) David Erdman, Chairperson GRADUATE ARCHITECTURE AND URBAN DESIGN (MSAUD) Ariane Lourie Harrison, Coordinator Emilija Landsbergis, Book Design 2019-2020

The Urban Large by Hetali J. Patel

Received and approved:

_______________________________________________________ Date_June 29, 2020 Thesis Advisor Signature Ariane Lourie Harrison _______________________________________________________ Thesis Advisor Name

Introduction Program Introduction Research Seminar Investigations

12 - 33

Surging Seas of Tomorrow Project Statement

34 - 51

Hybridizing Tomorrow Map Studies

52 - 56

Project Statement

57 - 65

Street for Tomorrow Project Statement

66 - 79

References & Image Citations

80 - 82

The Urban Large

Megastructure Relating the megastructure to the issue of the commons is useful to understand the success and the disappearance of what Peter Reyner Banham called the “dinosaurs of the Modern Movement”. All these large-scale constructions suffered the same fate: a conflict between the promise of a large shared space and the temptation of its fragmentation. Megastructures can be an essential way to tackle the various problems that have been surging and hence, exploring ideas of densification in a similar manner.

The Urban Large

Introduction Megastructure is an architectural and an urban concept of the post-war eras that recognizes a city which can be encased in a single massive man-made structure or in a relatively small number of interconnected structures. In a megastructural project, orders and hierarchies are created with large and permanent structures supporting small and transitional ones where structure could be used as a frame to which infrastructure, utilities and additional units could be interconnected and expanded upon, almost as a self-contained ‘city’. Formal definitions According to Fumihiko Maki’s investigation in Collective Form Shinjuku Redevelopment project defines Megastructure as a large frame in which all the functions of a city or a part of a city are housed whereas, Kenzo Tange proposes megastructure as a mass-human scale form which includes a Mega-form, and discrete, rapidly-changing functional units which fit within the larger framework. Later, Ralph Wilcoxon in his book Megastructure Bibliography proposed megastructure in a four part definition as not only a structure of great size but…. also a structure which is frequently: 1. constructed of modular units. 2. capable of great or even ‘unlimited’ extension, This type of framework allows the structure to adapt to the individual wishes of its residents, even as those wishes change with time. 3. a structural framework into which smaller structural units (for example, rooms, houses, or small buildings) can be built or even plugged in or clipped on after having being pre-fabricated; and 4. a structural framework expected to have a useful life much longer than that of the smaller units which it might support.

The Urban Large

Megaform

Megastructure

Bigness

- form potential of horizon-

- a large frame struc-

- a form that is big in scale,

tial urban fabric and basd

ture comprising of a

big in its value, big in its

on existing topography.

part or all the func-

social and political conse-

tions of a city.

quneces.

5 characteristics

5 parts

5 theories

1. effect of strong topographi-

1. constructed of modu-

1. a big building parts be-

cal character.

lar units.

comes autonomous but remain together as a whole

2. a boundary between the

2. a structural frame-

2. facade no longer re-

form and the context.

work comprising small-

veals what happens in-

er units.

side.

blending in the contextual to-

units plugged in or

the outside has nothing to

pography

clipped on together

do with the inside.

Megaform

Megastructure

Bigness

3. a complex form without

3. human scale form and

3. social relevance, structural

any series of mechanical and

dynamic fuctions which fit

and mechanical systems more

structural subsets (unlike mega-

within larger framework.

important than program and

structure).

space.

4. large form extending hori-

4. capable of unlimited

4. size matters and big size

zontally.

extension.

means big impression.

5. a form densifying the urban 5. consisting a part or all func- 5. no longer part of urban fabric.

tions of city.

tissue.

The Urban Large

Inferences

Figure 1: Megaform, Relation with context at same level

Figure 2: Megastructure, Downside relation with streets and public spaces.

Figure 3: Bigness, Upper relation to internal networks and autonomous relations.

History

Urban antecedents The emergence of megastructural characters in built forms may be found in pre-industrial built forms like Ponte Vecchino in Florence, Italy. Milan Central Station project, which was designed by Antonio Sant’Elia in 1914, is one amongst the foremost influential antecedents of post-war megastructure movements. As Reyner Banham mentioned in his book Megastructure: Urban Futures of the Recent Past, Milan Central Station not only invented a spatial arrangement of an enormous building connecting to urban traffic arteries, but also developed an A-frame structural system that had then been widely used in megastructural proposal.

Megastructure movements in the early 1960s The rise of megastructure movements happened in 1959 when the Japanese architect Kenzo Tange published the Boston Harbor project. This project is widely regarded as the first true megastructure (Lin, Zhongjie 1).

Figure 4: Andreas Tille. Great Wall near Beijing in Winter Figure 5: Merydolla. Egypt Cairo - Giza. Generala view of pyramids

The Urban Large

At the 1960 World Design Conference in Tokyo, a group of Japanese architects launched the Metabolism manifestoes with their megastructural approaches for architecture and urbanism. According to Project Japan Metabolism Talks, the main approach of megastructure under the Metabolism is to create artificial land equipped with infrastructure. At the same time, European architects also initiated megastructure movements, one of the most influential groups among them was Archigram who advocated a megastructural approach for buildings and cities which emphasizes technology, infrastructure, and dynamic movements within megastructures. Projects by Archigram, such as the Walking City (Ron Herron, 1964) and Plug-in-City (Peter Cook, 1964), illustrated the future of city where modular structures and movable urban entities resemble fun and flexibility (Lin, Zhongjie 16).

The Expo 67 The Expo 67 world fair held in Montreal, Quebec is a significant event for megastructure movements. During the Expo, various pavilions exhibited megastructure features, such as the USA, Netherlands and Theme pavilions, as well as Habitat ‘67 (Lin, Zhongjie 200).

After the 1960s After the avant-garde movements of the 1960s, the megastructure was mainly proposed and practiced in academe. Reyner Banham has however identified some university and hospital designs derived from megastructural approaches, with modular, interconnected buildings and pedestrian-oriented environments (Lin, Zhongjie 233).

What is it for? This question was never raised in the 1960s when megastructures were a hot topic, but it was Denise Scott Brown said what is being omitted is a view of a city as a state of interrelated activities, there must be physical relationship, economic, social, political, otherwise what is everybody doing up there together with everybody else in those megastructures (Banham, Reyner 11)?

Taxonomies of Megastructures Reyner Banham has loosely defined megastructure as the concept of a giant, adaptable, multipurpose building that contains most of the functions of a city hence, Banham characterises these varied architectural forms as “Dinosaurs of the Modern Movement”, in his book Megastructures: Urban Futures of the Recent Past. There are various megastructures that can not only be categorised according to their creators, history or timeline they are built or proposed in but also in discrete other ways. One way is study the Nature of the Megastructures.

The Urban Large

Along the Public Realm The structures that are responsible for shaping not only a project’s program, but also its larger civic role of enriching and enlivening the community, and fostering public life. The design buildings that are accessible, welcoming, and punctuated with spaces for both programmed and spontaneous community activity.

Ponte Vechio

Old London Bridge

Lower Manhattan Expressway

This multi-level bridge has nu-

The Old London Bridge

It was supposed to bring

merous housings and shops

had a drawbridge to al-

an expressway to connect

on its structures above the

low for the passage of tall

the East and Hudson River

river.

ships.

Crossings.

Figure 6: Ponte Vechio. Sche-

Figure 7: Old London Bridge.

Figure 8: Paul Rudolph. Low-

matic Diagrams

Schematic Diagrams

er Manhattan Expressway

It was built as a defense

The structure was long

Ultimately an increase in

system and Paul Rudolph

supported by irregularly

carbon monoxide levels in

regarded the Vechio bridge

spaced arches with the

the vicinity of the roadway

as the best model of mega-

buildings that were a major

was one reason that shelved

structure.

fire hazard.

the project.

No extensive demolition of existing districts The kind that does not require the extensive demolition of the existing districts or the urban fabric. Compacting the city, as building above the existing city, could also diminish expanding the city outwards. Constant’s Babylon

Yona Friedman’s

Archigram’s

Villa Spatiale

Plug-in-city

Constant Nieuwenhuys held

Yona Friedman expanded

Archigram’s Plug in city by

tight to a revolutionary vision

the principles for Mobile

Peter Cook suggests a hypo-

of a new world and a whole

Architecture to create an

thetical fantasy city, contain-

new way of life. The goal was

a city where people could

ing modular residential units

creating alternative life expe-

live and work in housing of

that “plug in” to a central

riences, called ‘situations’.

their own design.

infrastructural mega machine.

Figure 9: Den Haag, The

Figure 10: Villa Spatiale.

Figure 11: Plug-in city. Archi-

Hague, The Netherlands;

Schematic Diagrams

gram (Peter Cook), 1963

New Babylon was a series

With this idea he hoped

The Plug-in City is a constant-

of linked transformable struc-

to introduce a methodical

tures, some of which were the

approach to enable the

that incorporates residences,

size of a small city--what ar-

growth of cities while re-

transportation and services,

chitects call a megastructure.

straining the use of land.

all movable by giant cranes.

New Babylon by Constant

evolving

megastructure

The Urban Large

Not on the ground, but in the air The kind that are not on the ground but in the air.

Yona Friedman’s

Spatial City, Eckhard

City of Ragnitz,

Villa Spatiale

Schulze- Fielitz

Eilfried Huth and Günther Domenig

Friedman combined his prin-

Eckhard Shulze-Fielitz tried

The project consists of an

ciples: the flexibility of hous-

his structural approach on

industrially

ing to enhance the freedom

urban reality by presenting

infrastructure where housing

of choice for the individual,

a flexible urban structure,

units made of synthetic mate-

the multilayered city space.

adaptable to all locations.

rials embedded in “clusters”.

Figure 12: Villa Spatiale.

Figure 13: Raumstadt (space

Figure 14: Plan for Ragnitz-

Schematic Diagrams

city), Eckhard Schulze-Fielitz

Graz City [1963-1969]

the idea that an unconven-

which was based on a

As the structure frees most of

tional approach yields good

modular system made up

the terrain underneath, extra

solutions for the ongoing

of bars, main structures and

space is out there for leisure

problems of modern cities.

standardized units.

activities and green spaces.

prefabricated

Typical formal elements of Megastructures The Megastructures that are derived from the typical formal elements. From the early stage of the Japanese Metabolist movement, to the formal flexibility of contemporary architecture, architects have progressively enshrined the principle of space plasticity.

Moshe Safdie’s

Kisho Kurokawa’s

Habitat 67

Nakagin Capsule Tower

Frei Otto

Created as part of Expo

The tower exemplifies the

Frei Paul Otto was noted for

67, Habitat 67 is a reflexion

application of the scheme

his use of lightweight struc-

on function and the role of

in a best way. U sing pre-

tures, particularly tensile and

architecture in a very high-

fabricated units, that would

membrane structures using

density urban environment.

fit on transportation trucks.

lightweight plastics strung

Figure 15: Habitat 67. Sche-

Figure 16: Close Capsule

Figure 17: Hall at the Inter-

matic Diagrams

Unit. 1970, Kisho Kurokawa

national Garden Exhibition (1963)

The

principal

quality

The square concrete core

between hardware frame-

Moshe Safdie’s entire work is

hosts an elevator and a

works to create huge volumes

to confer to the building de-

stair case, that give access

that are easily assembled

sign character of eternity.

to each capsule.

and disassembled.

The Urban Large

Tokyo Bay Plan Kenzo Tange ‘ 1960 plan for Tokyo was proposed at a time when many cities in the industrial world were experiencing the height of urban sprawl. Tange attempted to impose a newphysical order on Tokyo, which would accommodate the city’s continued expansion and internal regeneration which can be an alternative way od development. Tokyo area at that time did not exceed 622 sq meter (Lin, Zhongjie. Kenzo Tange and the Metabolist Movement: Urban Utopias of Modern Japan, Routledge 2010, 138-146).

The design concept was based on longitudinal, linear series of interlocking loops expanding across the Tokyo Bay. And the individual islands are connected by a new work of tunnels and the bridges, rail and even the highway. Tange incorporated urban concepts such as mobility, urban structure, linear civic axis, and city as process into a powerful architectural language and tried to elevate them to a new notion of the relationship between the whole and the part, and between the permanent and the transient (Lin, Zhongjie. Kenzo Tange and the Metabolist Movement: Urban Utopias of Modern Japan, Routledge 2010, 138-146).

Figure 18: The urban plan for Tokyo; A plan for Tokyo 1960 / Kenzo Tange, January 26, 2016, Japanese Architecture, Urban Design, Utopian Projects, January 26, 2016

Brooklyn Navy Yard under the concept of Tokyo Bay Plan At the urban scale, analyzing the potential of alternative massing strategies and address building volume in the context of the surrounding city. At the building scale investigating study the potential for building systems, building envelopes, and structural systems to inform the building design and urban block development. The Megastructure projects tackle the complexity of the large urban building in order to envision and propose new forms of spatial occupation and experience. The buildings where the dichotomies of public and private, live and work, inside and outside, maybe re-defined.

Figure 19: City plan of proposed highway connecting Brooklyn Navy Yard -Manhtattan

The Urban Large

Habitat 67 Habitat 67 comprises 354 prefabricated stacked concrete modules arranged in various geometric configurations to reach 12 storeys in height. The interlocking forms are connected via walkways and include landscaped terraces. By creating a series of properties that each feature its own roof garden and access from an external ‘street’, the idea was to combine the urban garden residence with the modular high-rise apartment building (Gili Merin).

Figure 20: The urban plan for Tokyo; A plan for Tokyo 1960 / Kenzo Tange, January 26, 2016, Japanese Architecture, Urban Design, Utopian Projects, January 26, 2016

Brooklyn Navy Yard under the concept of Habitat 67

Figure 21: Megastructure. Hybridization at the Brooklyn Navy Yard

Figure 22: Moshe Safdie. Habitat 67. Retrospective modernism

Figure 23: Megastructure. Hybridization at the Brooklyn Navy Yard

Figure 24: Moshe Safdie. Habitat 67

The Urban Large

Yona Friedman Yona Friedman expanded on the principles for Mobile Architecture to the idea to create an elevated city space where people could live and work in housing of their own design, the Ville Spatiale. With this idea he also hoped to introduce a methodical approach to enable the growth of cities while restraining the use of land; Friedman, Yona. The Dilution of Architecture. Park Books, 2015.

Friedman combined many of his principles: the flexibility of housing to enhance the freedom of choice for the individual, the flexible multilayered use of city space, and the grip of city dwellers to give meaning to their environment; Friedman, Yona. The Dilution of Architecture. Park Books, 2015.

Figure 25: Schematic diagram; alternate housing to have open spaces Figure 26: multilayer use of city space by building on top of existing structures. In these diagrams we can see the Spatial settlement which he says is an overall Homogenous distribution in comparison to the present centralised distribution and the space mobility with the homogenous network of circulation, then he expresses how there is crowd formed instead of community groups. In Figure 27: Homogenous distribution of com-

the end, the most important is the ratio-

munity groups.

nal distribution of the spaces.

Scanned with CamScanner

Brooklyn Navy Yard under the concept of Yona Friedman

Figure 28: Explanatory diagram of multilayer density at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Figure 29: Explanatory site plan of multilayer density at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

The Urban Large

Failure of 1960’s Megastructure Relating the megastructure to the issue of the commons is a useful exercise to understand the success and the disappearance of what Peter Reyner Banham called the “dinosaurs of the Modern Movement”. All these large-scale constructions suffered the same fate: a conflict between the promise of a large shared space and the temptation of its fragmentation. This quantitative quandary is also raised in another field by Garrett Hardin in 1968 as the ‘enclosure dilemma’. By assessing a number of theoretical correspondences, and reexamining the impact of megastructures on the interdisciplinary debates of the time. It also considers the relationship between architecture and property as one of the possible–and tragically coincident–reasons for their success and dissolution (Van der Ley 146-152). At the end of the sixties, a rising awareness of the limits of the planet’s resources emerges. And it paradoxically intersects a craze for an endless above-ground urbanization. The consciousness of the earthly limits leads the gaze toward possible futures, even elsewhere. The conquest of space hence animates all the hopes and all the fantasies. It also appears as the vector of a collective celebration: celebration of progress, of the machine, of science. The delighted extension of human limits occurs at the very moment when the environmental crisis warns of “the limits to growth” (Van der Ley 146-152).

Figure 30: G Hardin. The tragedy of the commons, ‎1968; Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, Jørgen Randers, and William W. The Limits to Growth (LTG), 1972. 32

Megastructures mobilize an architectural language charged with this innovative and progressive hue: their structures are tubular, extensible, providential because technological; their elements are prefabricated, autonomous and replaceable; compositions are weightless, isotropic and suggest mobility. Megastructures are the symbol of human control and cultural resistance against an established environment, held at a distance by a sense of escape, arrogance, and because of attention. Such a language claims to be unifying, as it is particularly powerful in its evocative power. It highlights the possibility of a unitary cohabitation, able to be exported beyond the finite limits of its terrestrial conditions. Apart from the strictly quantitative and limiting point of view, megastructures also oppose their visions to the unequal distribution of resources, particularly those of the soil (Van der Ley 146-152). Why were the Megastructures considered Failures? - Megastructures: for which ‘common space’? There is no explanatory purpose for the large ground - To the support of cohabitation and the community clusters - To re-evaluate the contemporary legacy of megastructures means formulating a double failure. First, its salutary impact on the democratic conception of the urban realm is tragically limited - Hospices of privatization, Renunciations of public action

Figure 30: KooZA/rch, Inside-out Panopticon Utopia, 2017, Pg 01.

The Urban Large

Surging Seas of Tomorrow ‘Urban Design 1’ is the first in a sequence of three design studios from Summer 2019 led by Jonas Coersmeier, which focus on the problem of densification in New York City. The studio approaches densification through the study of urban interiorities and guides students through a design project at the scale of a city block. Urban Sprawl is already problematic and planners are faced with new challenges as they aim to build towards the sky rather than the horizon. In addition, cities are increasingly faced with climate change, resource scarcity, rising energy costs, and the possibility of future natural or man-made disasters. When sea levels rise as rapidly as they have been, even a small increase can have devastating effects on coastal habitats farther inland. Sea level rise and flooding can impact essential services such as energy, transport, and health. In a response to the prediction that by 2050, 90% of the world’s largest cities will be exposed to rising seas, resulting in mass displacement, and the destruction of homes and infrastructure. Hence, the design envisions a habitable settlement, which harnesses the resources of the water to allow it be entirely self-sufficient. The conceptual metropolis consists of two main elements. The first could be a labyrinthine of living pods, within which it accommodates houses and workspaces for people. The second element could be a structure that connects this with a base station on the bottom floor. This element is designed to provide the habitat with essential resources such as energy, fresh water and food. Speculative composite drawings are employed to study material effects, and to inform the organization of urban interiority proposals. Material qualities was analyzed by extracting main features of the material studies and tracing them as aesthetic and organizational systems. The features were then mined for their intelligence in deriving novel arrangements of urban interiority.

Figure 32: Material Massing castings, Summer Studio, Jonas Coersmeier

The Urban Large

Figure 33: Casting of material

Figure 34: Drawing from material studies

Figure 35: Material Collage

Figure 35.1: Material Collage. Black and White

The Urban Large

Aggregation strategies developed in the linked media class (via precedent studies of urban typologies) are introduced to the studio project. While material effects of the original material studies were so far used to inform spatial and organizationalmodels, they are now revisited and mined for their material collage on the previous page.

The Urban Large

Figure 36: Isometric renderings and section derivation

The spatial proposals developed are tested toward their organizational and programmatic potential. The Programmatic investigations into the formal proposals are based on speculative future urban scenarios. Coming up with massing units in a few dfifferent ways for the block and then creating families of the system by connecting those units.

Figure 37: Isometric renderings of clustered units

New forms of densification are tested at the scale of the urban block by connecting the units in varied ways while at the same time forming public connections and recreational spaces inbetween the habitable units. While first programmatic allocations are considered, the primary focus of this study is on the spatial aesthetics of immersive urban interiorities. Hence, using hte units to fomr volumetric spaces at the urban block scale. The primary media are schematic renderings and line drawings derived from 3d digital models.

The Urban Large

Figure 38: Zoning of programmatic spaces and circulation at the city block level

Programmatic analysis of the block in terms of the interaction of the recreational spaces with the housing programs and the research labs with water storage facilities.

Figure 39: Section of the block showing the interior and the shared recreational spaces

There is a form of interiority that is created inside of the block that house the recreational, cultural and public spaces.

The Urban Large

Figure 40: Light diagram

The porosity of the block facades becomes proficient in bringing in the natural light, in a way lighting up the public spaces.

Figure 41: Light diagram

Whereas, on the otherside, the light refracts in throught the terrace and kitchen gardens to the cultural spaces.

The Urban Large

Densification of the habitual units creates spatial sensation through aesthetic categories of interiority which thereafter builds an aberrant quality of the block. Hybridized programs include elements of urban housing and one typologically unrelated system (cultural, commercial, machinic function). The image shows the organic formation of the livable units with the interior spaces and exterior environment. Figure 41: 3D printed and casted physical model. 3D printed using UV reactive pla

The Urban Large

Figure 42: Physical model built through 3D printer using UV reactive Pla, changing the aesthetic appearance of the model with spotting or pointing at different issues.

The Urban Large

In a world where all the seven continents are battling the rising water level, there is a need to address the living conditions. As New York and Brooklyn are located near riverside because of their geographic locations the living conditions would be inhabitable. In this scenario, the idea of amphibious and a self-sustaining structure is a better solution. Figure 43: Rendered Section of the block

The Urban Large

Hybridizing Tomorrow The second of three studios Fall 2019 led by Oliver Schaper and Emilija Landsbergis (co-teacher), this course elaborates upon design proposals from Urban Design Studio 1 on a specific urban site and scale. The focus of this investigation is to establish context and conditions of further speculation in the urban spatial conditions of the city. Subjects of densification, conservation, urban ontology and their specific design methods are the focus of the course. The future form of cities and the parameters that drive the disciplinary boundaries to create the spaces that include the ideation, creation, and maintenance of the complex systems underlying our contemporary economy and society. Densification and dealing with the 100 acre site with 52 million built area. Understanding the site, surrounding through varied map sets and coming up with a densifying method. A new form of joinery system derived from the play of solids and voids that makes a habitat creating major four levels of public that merges with the modes of circulation (elevator pods and pedestrian) on a larger scale.

Figure 44: 10% of total sq ft of program

Figure 45: 100 % program (52 million sq ft)

The Urban Large

Governing Approach Studying the existing modes of approach around the Brooklyn Navy Yard that people access which makes the site a dark patch through which there is no circulation, hence, re-raouting the existing Naval Shuttle route and coming up with a new proposal of a shuttle connecting F line and J line which is a connection to the LIRR.

Figure 46: Governing Approach. Mapping diagram Figure 47: Proposed Infrastructural connectivity 54

Surging Seas The project talks about phasing and hence the surging condiitons in the future affecting the surrounding facilities cannot be avoided, hence, building and desiging physical barriers that in a way becomes a leisure space for the community.

Figure 48: Flood prone areas. Mapping diagram Figure 49: Proposed barried for the surging seas 55

The Urban Large

Pollution The location of industries in the neighbourhood brings in alot of polluted air which makes it unhealthy for the community to reside, hence, responding in a way by coming up with urban farming not only on the ground but also into the system formed.

Figure 50: Air Polluted areas. Mapping diagram Figure 51: Proposed purifying techniques. Terrace Gardens and Urban farming 56

Joinery System Joinery is to be a mode of operation to link two or more (program) elements together and will be translated into an understanding of how connectedness is organized and explained as a circulatory system or a means to define thresholds between public and private space.

Figure 52: Volumetric area breakdown

The Urban Large

Solid-Void play in the joinery system of different programs

Starting with a cubical volume (in white) and carving out the open spaces (in yellow); the outcome was a functionable volumic spaces that later blends in with repetitive volumes but at the same time growing each volume in order to blend the open spaces of different programs together. Figure 52: Exploded system for densification of various programs

Elevator and circulation

Figure 53: Elevator and Pedestrain Circulation connectivity

Levels of Public Space

Figure 54: Levels of Public Space

The Urban Large

Figure 55: Semi-Exploded axon of the wokring of the chunk; close ups (on the right)

Public level 2 has a recreational setup with a large cut out along the residential having terrace gardens and farms.

Elevator pods on the public level 3 boosts interaction between residents and greenhouse users.

Terrace farming being setup above the commercial programs becoming an extended space for them.

The Urban Large

System of densification creates 4 major levels for public which merges with the elevator pods, mode of circulation, running horizontally and vertically. The identified vertical pod which are “circulatory system joint” are introduced to define connectivity between assemblages that establishes a clear hierarchy between public and private spaces in a 3-dimensional land-use diagram. Figure 56: Working of the Section at a larger scale with elevator pods (on the right)

The Urban Large

Streets for Tomorrow The final studio of the UD program Spring 2020 led by Ferda Kolatan and Emilija Landsbergis (co-teacher), titled “Urban Hybrids”, builds on the studio investigations of the prior two semesters but with a focus on the Brooklyn city block and the transformations it undergoes through the introduction of new technologies. Specifically, the studio will examine how autonomous vehicles (AV’s) can reshape our understanding of “urban street life” and open up new ways of thinking about building envelopes, sidewalks, and streets as spatio-architectural units with their own emerging functionality and aesthetics. In the future, cities will become saturated with a variety of autonomous transportation technologies. We can already see the quick proliferation of rental scooters and bikes in most large-scale cities -and the impact they have on sidewalks and streets. Soon, partial or fully self-driving vehicles will make up a sizable portion of urban traffic and eventually transform the way we commute from the ground up. In the face of these changes, it is critical for cities not only to prepare for the logistical ramifications of an AV dominated streetscape (zoning, safety, etc.), but also to develop deeper visions for how these changes might transform urbanity and bring it more in tune with the political, ethical, ecological, and aesthetic realities of the 21st century (Staying with the Trouble). Focusing on the Waverly Avenue where existing street condition shows varied buiding uses like residential blocks and storage spaces. However, one aspect that characterizes the condition of the street is the traffic flow that blocks the streets and the walkaways. Hence, understanding the sensors used in the AV’s and how an Autonomous vehicle works i.e., tracking the surrounding buildings, pedestrians, walkaways, street signs. This study helps exploring the ways that an AV will help reshape the urban street life.

The Urban Large

Kinetic System Sensor Track One such aspect that can simplify the street condition is by coming up different tracks built with sensors which helps lighter vehicles to move around. And these tracks will in turn capture the kinetic energy being produced by the motion and then converting it to

Figure 57: System of Kinetic Tracks

electrical energy to supply it to the charging bars. Introducing a new system of tracks for the AV’s that senses their way of motion and a new different system (first from left) for pull overs.

Figure 58: System of Kinetic Tracks with the wokring of Autonomous Vehicles

The Urban Large

Figure 59: When technology is into play it won’t only have supremacy upon the infrastructure but how natur people with a landscape which is a blend of reflections, technology, and nature. 74

re will change its behavioral pattern under the influence of technology. Hence, the existing street caters to the 75

The Urban Large

Figure 60: The street becomes an extended lounge for the people where they sit, play, walk on the screens o 76

or just enjoy the projections on the screen as if they are sitting in their living room watching television. 77

The Urban Large

Making a canopy on the existing street, that expands onto and into the buildings forming new interstitial spac

like the lights from experiential screen, trackers of AV’s and the lights from private spaces of the building are i 78

two levels.

ces. The canopy during the day creates a form of drama that is laid out on the street whereas at night it seems

interacting and exchanging notions of their nature which makes the streets not isolated in itself but a hybrid of 79

The Urban Large

Resources; Research and Investigations Alter, Lloyd. Plug-in Cities Making a Comeback, Article, October 29, 2010 B Mighty. Kenzo Tange, 9 February 2018 Banham, Reyner. Megastructure: Urban Futures of the Recent Past. harper & Row, 1976 Lin, Zhongje. Kenzo Tange and the Metabolist Movement: Urban Utopias of Modern japan. Routledge 2010 Banham, Reyner. “The New Brutalism,” in a Critic Writes: Essays by Reyner Banham (University of California, 1996), p14. Essay originally published in Architectural Review 118 (December 1955) Berger, Paul. The Wall Street Journal, by February 13, 2018 Chatelain, Phillipe Martin; The NYC That Never Was: Robert Moses’ Lower Manhattan Expressway (LOMEX) on Untapped New York- Rediscover your city. Constant, “New Babylon, Ten Years On,” 235 Fresco, Jacque. The Venus Project - The future: underwater skyscraper in Architecture and Design- May 22, 2013 Friedman, Yona. The Dilution of Architecture. Park Books, 2015 Günther Domenig et Eilfried Huth Ragnitz, 1969 - 2001 Collection Frac Centre, Orléans. Image Courtesy of FRAC Centre Mosquera, Joaquin. From Megaform to megastructure, Published on Jul 31, 201. Song, Inseon. Megastructures are our future, 3 July 2013 Van der Ley, Sabrina, and Richter, Markus, Editors. Megastructures reloaded: Visionary architecture and urban design of the sixties reflected by comtemporary artists. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, c2008

Image Citations; Research Figure 1: Megaform, Relation with context at same level Figure 2: Megastructure, Downside relation with streets and public spaces. Figure 3: Bigness, Upper relation to internal networks and autonomous relations. Figure 4: Andreas Tille. Great Wall near Beijing in Winter Figure 5: Merydolla. Egypt Cairo - Giza. Generala view of pyramids Figure 6: Ponte Vechio. Schematic Diagrams Figure 7: Old London Bridge. Schematic Diagrams Figure 8: Paul Rudolph. Lower Manhattan Expressway Figure 9: New Babylon – DEN Haag (New Babylon – The Hague) © Collection Gemeentemusem Den Haag, The Hague, The Netherlands; New Babylon, signed lithograph by Constant Figure 10: Villa Spatiale. Schematic Diagrams Figure 11: Plug-in city. Archigram (Peter Cook), 1963 Deutsches Architekturmuseum) Figure 12: Villa Spatiale. Schematic Diagrams Figure 13: Raumstadt (space city), by Eckhard Schulze-Fielitz Figure 14: City As A Vision: Tribute to Michel Ragon Günther Domenig et Eilfried Huth Ragnitz, 1969 - 2001 Collection Frac Centre, Orléans. Image Courtesy of FRAC Centre Günther Domenig and Eilfried Huth, plan for Ragnitz-Graz City [1963-1969]

The Urban Large

Figure 15: Habitat 67. Schematic Diagrams Figure 16: Close Capsule Unit. 1970, Kisho Kurokawa Figure 17: Hall at the International Garden Exhibition (1963) Figure 18: The urban plan for Tokyo; A plan for Tokyo 1960 / Kenzo Tange, January 26, 2016, Japanese Architecture, Urban Design, Utopian Projects, JANUARY 26, 2016

The Urban Large