Lower Lea Valley

Lower Lea Valley Housing + Urbanism AA 2010/11

Lower Lea Valley p.05 Industrial Urbanism p.21 Work + Live p.39 Infrastructure Urbanism p.57 Conclusion p.73

Husna Ahmed Flo Dirschedl Angela Jeng Aida Mofakham Nurit Moscovich Mithila Satam Yo Han Shin *** tutors: Hugo Hinsley Elad Eisenstein

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Lower Lea Valley

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The city in the 20th century has been subject to a transformation of dispersion: At the latest with the financial boom of the 1980s, cities have evolved from a community that relies upon a service economy, to one that depends upon an economy driven by global business and communications technology.1 They have evolved from local conditions, to a city that is part of a system of global city regions.

The cities’ urban fabric can hardly be described topographically and morphologically: it is a system of effects whose conditions continuously change. The result is a multi-centred and dispersed urban landscape, often contradictory and hard to perceive as a whole.2

The Lower Lea Valley in London’s East has to be understood against this background. A peripheral site today, LLV is predicted to occupy a prime and highly coveted central location with the expansion of London along the River Thames as proposed by the Thames Gateway3 development scheme by the year 2050. The completion of the Crossrail and Eurostar lines will provide excellent connectivity and accessibility within London as well as with other places far beyond.

Surrounded by the mega financial arenas of Canary Wharf in the South and London’s City in the West and the Olympic development with Stratford City in the North, LLV is situated within a triangle of major urban

London 2050

developments and thus shifts into the focus of economic and financial desirousness. It occupies a valuable piece of land in London and possesses great potential for a germane use to the city. Various industries, logistics, creative businesses all have spread out along the network of waterways formed by the river, already. However, adjacent city quarters such as Bromley by Bow or West Ham are some of London’s most deprived areas.

Hence, a successful regeneration of LLV will have to address local conditions and exert its influence on the surrounding areas as well. Only a suitable and appropriate integration into the immediate urban fabric will help harness its highest potential. MS+FD ExPANSION + INTEGRATION LLV

EUROSTAR CROSSRAIL LLV

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1750

2010

The River Lea has always been a natural divide between (inner) London and the ancient Becontree hundred in the East. Subjected to flooding, it was exempted from settlements for a long time. Only with the emerging Industrial Revolution and the use of the river and canal system as navigable waterways the Lower Lea Valley became a major centre of productivity.

Ever since, the LLV has been shaped by a long history of industrial use. Industries such as sugar refining, printing ink manufacturing and building trades used to be the main economic force in the area.4 The decline of manufacturing industries resulted in a great loss of jobs as these industries moved further away

to other parts of the country or were outsourced to other countries. The LLV as well as most of East London still suffers from a high unemployment rate and prevalence of social deprivation.

The spatial quality of the area is very diverse from large industrial plots, derelict factories, postwar social highrise developments as well as low-rise housing communities. In this urban landscape, the different social and morphological territories form an heterogeneous urban fabric. Some abandoned areas and large monofunctional estates don’t seem to be part of this fabric and its collective interaction. As spaces, they are hardly perceived within the city. They don’t take place. AJ+FD

Urban Landscape

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SOCIAL, ECONOMIC, PROGRAMMATIC TERRITORIES

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Territories

INFRUSTRUCTURAL ISLANDS

MORPHOLOGIC ENTITIES

SHOPPING CENTRE, STRATFORD

BROMLEY BY BOW COMMUNITY CENTRE

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Abercrombie

Patrick Abercrombie’s Greater London Plan (including the 1943 County of London Plan) from 1944 was a plan for the development and improvement of the city, illustrating a strategic reading of and spatial conception for the metropolitan area of London.

It was comprised of a large number of “villages”, each sharply separated from all adjacent communities. Abercrombie’s intention was “to emphasize the identity of the existing communities, to [even] increase their degree of segregation, and where necessary to recognize them as separate and definite entities.”5 The communities themselves consisted of a series of subunits, generally with their own shops and schools and were reflective of typical neighbourhood unit plans. The city envisioned by Abercrombie was like a tree with two principal levels. The first level representing communi-

ties that are the larger units of the structure. The second level consisting of neighbourhoods that are the smaller subunits. The territories of these units never overlapped, however.

Abercrombie describes the degree of this separation by understanding the scale and nature of, as well as the relationship within each community. Thus, the plan helps to explain the different physical, social and economical territories of the city in comparison to one another.

The Abercrombie Plan can be used as a tool for understanding the fragmentation of the Lower Lea Valley.

Such approach may help to dissect the multiplicity of the site and allow for opportunities of intervention to be made by revealing a segment’s character and intricate internal relations, and the potential of each unit or entity for enhancing the Lower Lea Valley. HA+FD

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X

The City as Rhizome

What Abercrombie’s London Plan neglects, however, is the multiple relationships that exceed the limits of the described units or entities.6 The concept of a city as a rhizome is based on a philosophical reasoning by Félix Guattari and Gilles Deleuze that apprehends multiplicities: It allows for a liberation from rather authoritarian systems and thus offers the possibility to link many perspectives and approaches without subjecting them to a rigid structure.7 Thus, cities - just as any other system within a world of simultaneity and multiple layers that is held together by a number of apparently chaotic alliances - can be seen in a more positive light: The city as a hybrid assemblage, whose structures rely on multi-layered - often contradictory principles of orders.

Modernist urban planning has failed to understand urban complexity by describing it as a hierarchical system whose elements and units successively build upon each other. “Tabula Rasa” approaches and self-sufficient master plan developments seem tempting solutions, the autarkic truism of their universality hardly offer any interfaces towards their environs and do not address urban plurality, however.8 In order to re-integrate LLV into the surroundings, its constituent parts have to be identified, strengthened where needed and reinvented where possible. Yet, understood as a part of a rhizomatic structure, LLV and its individual entities need to (re-)establish a heterogenous system of spatial, social and economic alliances that relinks the area into East London’s urban fabric. FD

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Industrial Urbanism p.21

Work + Live p. 39

Three projects attempt to establish new relationships within the Lower Lea Valley and together form an integral approach that takes into account the area’s heterogeneity and fragmentation.

An industrial urbanism is developed for a monofunctional estate in order to reconnect it to the urban fabric and

Infrastructure Urbanism p.57

make it part of a greater system. The omnipresent web of infrastructure elements are taken as opportunity and potential to reconnect adjacent areas and to enable new spatial qualities. A Work + Live concept addresses the programmatic fragmentation of the area by establishing new forms of work/live clusters for the creative class.

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Industrial Urbanism

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Enclosed between the River Lea and tube and DLR lines, a 89 hectare industrial estate - the “Prologis” site - is a typical example of a peripheral urban condition. It is an assemblage of logistic companies and some small dirty industries that have been planned as self-sufficient entities. Predominantly accommodated in sheds of every scale, they create a spatially heterogeneous but yet programmatically monotonous environment.

Hardly connected to its surroundings, the site is a clear discontinuation of the urban fabric. As private property, it is a monofunctional piece of the city that is shielded from any public use and therefor has no collective meaning as urban place. “Place” (in contrast to space) can be considered as “rhetorical territory”9, a space in which

codes are shared. This understanding of place describes a realm where both individual and collective identities, as well as their relationships and history are legible and hence allow for a communication through insinuation and silent agreement. In that sense, the Prologis site is therefor a non-place that has lost - or never had - this common language. A space that is not heard within the hum of the city.10 In contrast to common peripheral industrial estates, the Prologis site is located in a favourable central position in London, however. By re-establishing a social and morphological complexity, it can become a constituent place of a greater system again and a test ground for a new industrial urbanism.

Central Periphery

89.000 : 21.000m2

PROLOGIS + context

Olympia sugarhouse lane

Tube

Tube

Park

Westham

DLR Bromley BB

Pitches

Waterfront

Canary Wharf

DLR

EuroStar CrossRail Industrial Estates LLV

Sto ra

Dis

tri bu ti

Sto ra

on

Dis

tri bu ti

ge

on

ge

So rti ng

Lo ad ing

So rti ng

Lo ad ing

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Interiorities

With the shifting of goods traffic onto the street and rail networks, the manufacturing sector - and in consequence industrial estates - no longer had to be adjacent to waterways, thus populating along the periphery of cities.11 The Lower Lea Valley is one of the few lasting industrial zones that is still within the central realm of London.

Nevertheless, the street system of the Prologis site follows the logics of road based transportation and logistics. As mere means to an end it was designed entirely in

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respect of a highly efficient connection of companies of a similar type. Accessible from only two entries, the road system fans out from a central spine and thus directly links to every individual plot.

In between the streets, each industrial compound itself is organised around its own system of handling of goods.

As economised interiorities, those self-sufficient entities with their distinct inner logic turn the entire area into a monofunctional field of impenetrable solids, aligned along empty and deserted voids: the streets.

The Legacy of Monofunctionality

COMPLETION OF THE GRID

QUEENSCOLLEGE,CAMBRIDGE

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MURER PLAN, ZÜRICH

SOMERSETHOUSE,LONDON

BERLIN PRENZLAUER BERG

FITZROVIA / BLOOMSBURY

PROLOGIS LLV

The Deep Block and Worlds Apart A first step is taken by completing the open fringes of the streets so as to create an inclusive and comprehensive grid, thus eliminating the constrictions of cul de sacs and dead end roads.

However, the comparison of street grid patterns between the Prologis site, Gründerzeit Berlin and Georgian Bloomsbury and Firtzrovia in London reveals the enormous scale of the site’s width of mesh and the challenges involved.

Whereas Berlin’s block is a mere effort of making the depth of the grid accessible, the dense grid of Fitzrovia allows for a variation of block typologies. In Bloomsbury, the block size obviously exceeds an “appropriate” scale: a new layer of movement is added through sequences

of courts, creating a world of its own within the blocks.

In medieval cities, cloisters and immunities formed distinct worlds apart within the urban fabric. Protecting religious communal life from the pagan environment, they were introverted worlds isolated from the exterior but yet well embedded in the urban tectonics and economic environment.

Somerset House in London and the morphology created by colleges in Cambridge provide similar worlds apart in dense urban environments. Sequences (unfortunately priviliged, though) of court yards connect through deep blocks and establish a spatial quality that is in sharp contrast to their surroundings. Thus, they provide a spatial coherence to a number of different programs.

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The completion of the street grid establishes independent fields in between the streets on Prologis site. As a result, a strip of relatively small “islands” is created in the middle of the site. Their dimensions are favourable for conventional development as the width is reasonably short for easy passage and accessibility across it.

The other fields have to deal with an extreme width and a conventional approach of building would not be complimentary to the circumstances. Large sheds seem impenetrable obstacles and form an unaccessible solid.

A sequence of public spaces is carved into these solid fields offering a world apart from the surrounding “evil” of logistic enterprises and dirty industries. Thus, an inbetween is established, introducing a spatial coherence and quality to a number of new programs.

As pioneers, these sequences trigger the emergence of a new urban fabric, that gradually erodes the Prologis site. Introverted worlds of their own at first, they later can link to their surroundings. A new layer of movement and also spaces is added.

Inside Out - Outside In

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Interiors Rather a spatial tool than a clear architectural type, this cloistral apparatus primarily offers two diverse features: Firstly the deep block is made accessible with an inverted approach providing a new layer of public space as a starting point and thus establishes a network of pathways and courtyards.

Secondly, in conjunction with this inward looking architecture, the ideology of a shared void with the built space wrapped around it provides a highly determined spatial coherence to a range of undefined programs.

Housing, commercial and recreational activities, even industrial uses are held together by a spatial spine: the courtyards.

The envelope of built space around the voids is seen as a potential: Offering a variety of different spaces it can be inhabited by most various functions.

The quality and mix of functions it might offer without any intrusive projections in unison with a dynamic and vibrant interior void can prove to be a tempting and beneficial solution to the problem of these fields.

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WORk + LIVE UNITS

INTERPRETABLE SPACES

2020 SUPERMARkET

BOARDING HOUSE 2015 LOGISTIC ENTREPRISE

Talent migration and a highly mobile creative elite cause a tremendous demand in adaptable spaces and favourable, well-connected living conditions. New forms of cohabitation and a suitable environment are asked for that offer a potential to answer this needs.

Specific, predetermined types of dwelling cannot provide a sufficient solution, however. Living spaces have to be adaptable not only in their use but also provide a high spatial quality at the same time. They need to

have the potential to perform in different ways: Thus, they can become interpretable spaces that make various forms of cohabitations and co-working imaginable.

This spatial configuration corresponds to our contemporary urban condition: “In the same way that the city is no longer an ensemble of harmoniously grouped and cohesive elements (...) the dwelling moves from being an ensemble of carefully distributed rooms to a space ‘destined to be equipped’.”12 AJ+FD+MS

Interpretable Spaces

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Work + Live

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The Lower Lea Valley reveals conditions which are unique to its site not only programmatically through the physical divide between commercial and residential areas but also morphologically. It is through this conglomeration of fragmented areas created by the LLV topographically which enhances the division of the site programmatically and creates areas of concentration specific to those conditions.

It is also this disconnect between zones that set up the perimeters for internal growth of LLV and particularly for those of housing. Of importance was the observation for the lack of a design strategy for dealing with areas that are prone to flooding. The housing in the surround-

ing areas is a vivid reflection of this problem as each residence is treated equally whether in a flood plane area or not.

A design strategy which was ideal for the LLV topography and gave the opportunity for a new typology was generated - one that responded to conditions of flooding and would maximize the potential for its surrounding areas was that of resilience.

The idea of resilience, as an approach, was sought to enhance the condition of LLV not only ecologically but economically and socially as well.

The live and work concept was applied to a specific area that had opportunities for both and was ultimately en-

visioned to be a tool used to maximize the potential for these surrounding areas in making a new urban condition within a live work cluster, ultimately a new productive part of the city.

In our analysis of the existing conditions of live and work spaces, it became apparent that the extreme conditions found in LLV, specifically those between commercial and residence, were most profound at the border conditions of the site and, because of this, created fragmentation.

Much like conditions found in LLV, there was a very unusual piece of land which was disconnected physically but very well connected programmatically.

A low-income residential neighbourhood linked by business and transport was found to be the most ideal place to introduce this new type of living. The adaptability of such a space, which would cater to changes in live work patterns along with encourage new types of, mixed use.

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concentration of activity

distribution of work and live

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comparative analysis: grain

comparative analysis: void

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sugar house lane

three mills

The extreme arrangement of the neighbourhood grid emphasized by the back-to-front housing condition can be seen as the most problematic. It creates longitudinal barriers alongside the river, and as a result has an adverse impact of isolation within the whole site. This kind of repetitiveness in parallel to the river also creates dead zones through a “speed bump” type of condition from the elevated parkscape (Green Way) to river.

Having the striking potential of waterfront, due to the proximity to the river, waterways are channelized and conducted to the neighbourhood. Combining the water channel and the existing grid, a new “live and work” neighbourhood pattern will occur.

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existing Housing

In contrast to the rigid existing grid, the new pattern of housing offers more permeable live and workspaces, in which the waterfront is increased for each unit. Simultaneously, the lower levels are resilient to the flood risk plane and are dedicated for more vulnerable spaces and uses such as, studios, workshops and also collective activities, which are temporary.

The shifting of the grids not only serves live and workspaces for the neighbourhood itself, it also opens up the isolated condition of the site to its surroundings, which in turn enlarges the range of opportunity for the nearby creative and business industries. And ultimately would contribute to the rise of new creative industries.

12 50

POTENTIAL HOUSING

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Infrastructure Urbanism

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Infrastructure Urbanism

The main idea of ‘Infrastructure Urbanism’ has to do with proposing infrastructure as the groundwork for urban development; finding the potential for new spatial qualities within the realm of infrastructure.

In the Lower Lea Valley there is a particular condition in which multiple layers of infrastructure are crossing the

landscape to serve other areas of the city. Historically, this exposed layering condition was created due to the development of new systems of movement such as rails and roads. To keep away from the flood plain and minimise the conflict, these networks were introduced above the historical river and canal systems.

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PLAN

SECTION

Looking at the infrastructure intersections in plan may suggest that the different networks simply cut the landscape into isolated entities, creating edge conditions.

However, a sectional view of the intersecting layers reveals a physical complexity, a three dimensional net comprising of different sequences of linear movement systems and spaces created in between them. The hidden spaces defined by continues infrastructures mark an opportunity for intervention.

This raises the question of whether the ‘in between’ spaces can be inhabited by infilling and thickening the ground to transform these dead zones into spaces serving new values and needs.

Existing / Proposed

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Existing

Elasticity

Introducing a volume

Having a closer look at one of the existing intersections (in this case water, sewage line and road) shows that the ‘in between’ spaces are quite constrained in terms of the possibility to infill and inhabit them. The infrastructure layers are impermeable, creating a relatively shallow section.

Considering the existing conditions, the ‘in between’ spaces would need to be adjusted and enlarged. This can be achieved through ‘stretching’ the linear infrastructure systems. Playing with the infrastructure’s elasticity would enable introducing inhabitable volumes into the new spaces created.

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Then we can start thinking about the infrastructure intersections as a network of volumes or structures, a series of nodes suggesting a new reading of the Lower Lea Valley.

The idea is that the structures introduced at each of the intersections is able to adapt itself to the artificial heavy concrete topography created by the infrastructure.

As a response to the challenges faced in the Lower Lea Valley, such an intervention would potentially be able to overcome the infrastructure as a divisive system as well as humanise it through mediating the separation between its different layers.

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The new nodal network created could be looked at as new infrastructure system – a series of gateways to the Lower Lea Valley, each node serves as an anchor which can unlock the potential for nearby sites.

This network can be potentially extended to link the Lower Lea Valley to other parts of the city.

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Conclusion

Located in a favourable position in London, the Lower Lea Valley boasts of immense potential coupled with an abundance of possibilities of change. Comprehending and analysing these circumstances of operation and acknowledging the intrinsic site qualifications, the approaches undertaken aim to cope with the problems posed with a strategic outlook and spatial logic.

The site’s inherent qualities are explored and employed in a design strategy that attempts to (re-)establish a heterogenous system of spatial, social and economic alliances that re-links the area into East London’s urban fabric.

The vision of London 2050 where Lower Lea Valley shifts from its peripheral occupancy and assumes a central lo-

cation is recognised and utilised as a driver for this development.

The prevalent conditions of waterways, dirty industries and infrastructural junctions are emphasised upon and the composite design solution revolves around the appropriate elucidation and amendment of these key issues identified.

The industrial urbanism strategy ventures to reveal potentials of monofunctional industrial estates. In its endeavour to counterbalance the impact of the architectural and the lack of spatial logic, it formulates a distinctive approach to re-establish the site as a place of col-

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lective meaning within the LLV and thus as a constituent part of a greater system.

The infrastructure urbanism strategy offers a perspective focusing on networked infrastructures that interlace and infuse the city and the Lower Lea Valley in particular.

It addresses questions concerning the potential of infrastructure to become the groundwork for urban development and the ability of the architecture of the city to transform moments within the web of infrastructure in order to enable new spatial qualities.

Through examination of new scenarios for intervening and modifying infrastructure networks, this strategy suggests an approach leading towards a multi-performative system as both a conceptual and operative instrument

that may guide processes of urban transformation.

The Work + Live strategy takes into account the flood risk of the LLV by turning it into a spatial quality. The programmatical fragmentation of the area is addressed by establishing new forms of work/live clusters for the creative class.

The amalgamated project explores the intrinsic paths of growth and development on site and employs articulate and pertinent tactics to bring about a reformation of the Lower Lea Valley. Thus the overall project reads as a germane and practical methodology to combat the adversities of the site to create an agreeable place for living and working. MS+FD+HA

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1

Saskia Sassen, “The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo”, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1991.

2

Alex Wall, “The Dispersed City”, in: AD profile: The Periphery, No. 108, London, 1994, pp. 8-11.

3

Thames Gatway, 1981 - ongoing DCLG - Department for Communities and Local Government LDA - London Develop. Agency (part of Greater London Authority) EEDA - East of England Development Agency SEEDA - South East England Development Agency

4

Peter G. Hall, “The Industries of London”, Hutchinson, London, 1988.

5

Patrick Abercrombie, “Greater London Plan 1944”, HMSO, London, 1945.

6

Christopher Alexander, “The City is Not a Tree” in: J. Thackara (ed.), “Design After Modernism: Beyond the Object”, Thames and Hudson, London, 1988, pp. 67-84.

7

Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, “Principles of the Rhizome - A Thousand Plateaus”, Athlone Press, London, 1988.

8

Marc Angélil, “Urban Entropy-The City as a Rhizomatic Assemblage”, in: Harm Lux (ed.), “Humanity, Urban Planning, Dignity.”, Niggli Sulgen, Zürich, 2000.

9

Marc Augé, “Non-Places - Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity”, Verso, London, 1995, p.108.

10

Ibid., pp. 67f.

11

P. G. Hall, “The Industries of London”, l.c.

12

Manuel Gausa, “Voids, inhabited / equipped”, in: M. Gausa (ed.), “Metapolis Dictionary of Advanced Architecture”, Actar, Barcelona, 2003, p. 656.

Augé, Marc Non-Places Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity Verso, London, 1995.

Abercrombie, Patrick Greater London Plan 1944 HMSO, London, 1945.

Alexander, Christopher The City is Not a Tree in: Thackara, J. (ed.), Design After Modernism: Beyond the Object, Thames and Hudson, London, 1988, pp. 67-84.

Marc Angélil Urban Entropy-The City as a Rhizomatic Assemblage in: Harm Lux (ed.), Humanity, Urban Planning, Dignity, Niggli Sulgen, Zürich, 2000.

Deleuze, Gilles and Guattari, Félix Principles of the Rhizome - A Thousand Plateaus Athlone Press, London, 1988.

Gausa, Manuel (ed.)

Metapolis Dictionary of Advanced Architecture: City, Technology and Society in the Information Age Actar, Barcelona, 2003.

Hall, Peter Geoffrey The Industries of London Hutchinson, London, 1988.

Wall, Alex The Dispersed City in: AD profile: The Periphery, No. 108, London, 1994, pp. 8-11.

Sassen, Saskia The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1991

bibliography

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Lower Lea Valley Housing + Urbanism AA 2010/11

industrial / work + live / infrastructure urbanism

Husna Ahmed Flo Dirschedl Angela Jeng Aida Mofakham Nurit Moscovich Mithila Satam Yo Han Shin *** tutors: Hugo Hinsley Elad Eisenstein