Implementation of the eco-system design method in urban environment. And how it could help deal with the interaction between social factors and the urban environment. 1. Introduction. As a result of the failure of the “top-down” approach in architecture and planning, architects today are more interested in prototypes of living environments which are formed by the “bottom up” process, that is to say, in those prototypes which are naturally evolved from interdependent and sustainable systems. Architects and planners are very interested in the application of ecological methods in their design and planning practice, because ecologists describe the nature of interdependence systems and define an eco-system as interacting assemblages of living components and their non living environment (1) Naturally-interdependent systems are continuously self-organizing and adaptive to changes in context. Architects can draw upon the principles by which these systems work to make new forms of material environments for living which are more sustainable . Ecologists point out that “Biology gave birth to village communities ten thousands years ago, starting from the domestication of plants and animals, the invention of agriculture, the breeding of goats and sheep and horses and cows and pigs, the manufacture of textile, cheese, and vine.” (2) An “eco-urban” example of such an interdependent system could be the traditional Chinese villages in the Pearl River delta which I have been studying for my design project. These villages are based on a system of patches. Each patch constitutes an interdependent system of a mulberry based fishpond. People plant a mulberry bush. They breed silkworms on the mulberry bush. They feed the fish with waste from the silkworm chrysalis. The waste from the fish falls to the bottom of the pond. That pond sludge is used to fertilize the mulberry tree. This interdependent system moves in circle forming a closed five stage agricultural system. The village development itself arises out of the patch pattern, because the system of roads and paths has to evolve along the edges of the patches. (3) This pattern of patches also allows flexibility in the kind of agriculture used on the patch because, for example once the patch been fertilized by the pond sludge, it can be converted to become a crop- growing field. The flexibility of this pattern allows for a very high stability in the agricultural process and life of the village. 2. The features of design method of an eco-system (in terms of interdependent system). In the article “Design for human ecosystem“ John T. Lyle describes the “organisational concepts” which are fundamentally important in the shaping of eco-system. One of them is scale , or the relative size of the system “in a question and its connections with the larger and smaller system and ultimately with the whole”. (4) Another important aspect is 3 modes of order each of “which binds ecosystems together and makes them work”. (5) He further identifies these modes as: - structure: “the composition of the biological community, including species, their biomass, life histories and spatial distribution” (6)
- function: “the flow of energy and materials”, which is closely intertwined with the structure, John T. Lyle presents it as a process where “respiration is fuelled by the flow of energy, and keeping this flow going, distributing energy to all the members of the community , is a basic propose of ecosystem function.” (7) - location: ecologists use this term to analyse the competing patterns of existing eco-systems which constitute the context of the new eco-system being designed. Examination of the location pattern involves a complex technique of defining the suitabilities of certain eco-systems into certain contexts. There is great interest in implementing this method within architectural and urban design. The principles of a naturally evolved eco-system could be prototypical principles for designing self-sufficient artificial urban systems and will help to build in them into existing contexts. The example of the traditional village of the Pearl River Delta shows almost all those principles of the organization of the interdependent system. The spatial organisation of the agricultural patches allows a flexible spatial change of the agriculture mode. The principles of interdependent share of energy are shown in the interdependent organisation of the agricultural process, so giving higher degree of adaptability. Finally the Chinese village shows a strong cohesion with the existing eco-communities which constitute the location pattern.
The role of social factors Ecologists in their eco-system modelling usually choose an eco-system which excludes human beings. They prefer to think of themselves as somehow set apart from ecosystem. In the urban design practice of self-sufficient systems we can see almost the same trend. Projects such as the combination of a water treatment system with fish farming or such as the combination of recycling, renewable energy and industrial process, often do not involve social factors at all, or these factors affects the project only indirectly. In his book “Cities and Natural Process” Michael Hough considers the notion that humanity and nature have long been understood to be separate issues, based on an understanding that there is a distinction between “the cities where the people live and the non-urban regions beyond the city where nature lives”. The resolution of this to achieve what in his opinion is the right approach is to adopt an “ecological view that encompasses the total urban landscape and the people who live there. This includes the unstructured spatial and social environments that are not currently seen to contribute to the city’s civic image as well as those that do.” (8) I am interested in the kind of interdependent systems which include the social factors. So in this paper I propose to examine how the natural eco-system design principles mentioned above of the can be applied to achieve social sustainability within the context of a contemporary city environment. 3. Specific ways that different contemporary social factors affect the city environment The main difficulty in the understanding of a city as a self-organised interdependent system and in examining human individuals as the part of such a system, is that humans “unlike atoms, plants or animals or animals are “free agents”, that is to say, they have a capacity to intend and point their actions”. (9) So there are very complex relationships between “the
behaviour of the free agent individuals [when it] participates in the process that shapers the global structure of the city” and when the global structure of the city “simultaneously participates in shaping the behaviour of the individuals.” (10) People, their activities and social institutions form the social environment of the city, by means not only their physical presence but also by the attitudes and values they express. (11) I will look now at how social factors, certain features of contemporary society, affect today’s urban environment, because of way they cause difficulties for the organisation of communities. These are the rise of virtual community, increasing social segregation, and loss of self-identification. The rise virtual community in contemporary society. In the old days, such as medieval times, or in less developed economies today, most people are present in the streets and squares because these are the gathering spaces and these are the spaces that form people into the local communities. These communities developed by so called “oral culture” so that people belonged to a community within which information was spread by immediate personal contact. However now days in the contemporary cities “oral culture” has been replaced by the “visual culture” which offered by mass multimedia such as TV and the internet. (12) The effect of this swing to visual culture has been to increase individualization which increases even more with the growing possibility of “getting wired up” to the internet etc. We seem to be seduced by the promise that new media and communication technologies introduce new virtual spaces of an international public community. However, in the article “Public space in a changing city” author ask the question “is it really a new public sphere emerging on the virtual level, or is it the failure of real public communities?” (13) Apart from the effect of the media and communication development there is another factor which is contributing to the formation of a virtual community. This is the high level of mobility of the contemporary population. The vehicular merging of the urban landscape allows geographically distant events to be brought into our everyday life, and the result is “time-space compression as this collage of disconnected stories intrude and shape everyday life” (14). Both these factors, the development of a media visual culture and high mobility, lead to the de-spatialization of communities. The consequence is that there is not enough activity to fulfil purpose of the local public spaces in neighbourhoods. This leads to degradation of the urban environment. I think this is why recent urban developments in Holland have failed. The residential developments (called the Vinnex settlements) such as Ypinburg and Almere, included public spaces but they are almost completely unused, because the lifestyle of the social groups that inhabit the settlements is not able to activate those spaces . Increasing Social segregation of communities in the city. There is a trend of polarisation of social life and growing distance between public domain and intensifying private sphere. (15) The process of the privatization of the public environment, which is going on in the US cities and which has started to develop in Europe leads to the lack of sensitivity towards the city as a social environment. Lack of social diversity in the contemporary city districts and clustering of mono-social districts, as well case the loss of urban plurality which support the crisis of disappearing of public.
Loss of Self-identification of the community. A very important factor in the formation of a local community is the self-identification of the citizens with the place where they live. In this context the promotion by property developers of a spectacular “dreamscape of visual consumption” (16) and similar market-successful environments, multiplied on a global scale, cause significant problems for people identifying with their local areas. All these three features of contemporary urban society play a negative role in the achievement of a sustainable urban form, which has to reply to those social and psychological aspirations of “satisfaction, territorial definition, personalisation, privacy and social interaction”. (17) 4. Scale. When describing an open eco-system, John T. Lyle in his article says, “no ecosystem stands alone” because all ecosystems are connected by “flows of energy and materials” (18) Every ecosystem is a part or subsystem of a larger system and that it in turn includes a number of yet smaller subsystems (19). The definition of the right size of the ecosystem is important because “each system draws in energy and materials from the system around it and in turn exports to them. In drawing the boundaries of an eco-system, therefore, we need to consider the flows that link it with its neighbors.” (20) The question of the scale of a self-sufficient urban system is also very important. One of the factors leading to the stability of a village and social cohesion within its community is that it is the right size. This is because to form a healthy public environment all the public facilities must be based on pedestrian accessibility (approximately 10-5 minutes walk accessibility). But when the settlement size grows and number of communities increase its structure become progressively more complex. As they grow, they are transformed from general structures to specialized structures. In the city sociologists extract several scales of communities, sub-communities, formed, for instance, around the urban block, communities – larger scale of neighborhoods, minority group – town or urban district scale of community and so on. At this moment different scales of communities have to form more complex interrelationships in order to be sustainable. Communities hierarchy and “Sustainable urban Matrix” model. The study of scales of different levels of communities and transformation of this knowledge to the design instrument to achieve an interdependent social structure in the city, has been developed with a very interesting model of “Sustainable Urban Matrix”. Planners tried to develop a social and spatial unit which is “not so large that it cannot develop and sustain personal contact, nor so small that it suppresses difference and variation.” (21) The primary unit according to this model constitutes an apartment block 4 stories high, inhabited by approximately 64 people. This type of unit can be multiplied by four, creating a group (sub-community) with a maximum of 256 inhabitants. Anthropological evidence and recent studies indicate that the optimal population for a neighborhood is between 500 and 1500 inhabitants. So the next unit of scale, called a Close Neighborhood group, contains 1000 inhabitants (or 16 primary units) and this corresponds to the size of a traditional European village. Beyond this, a Close Neighborhood group multiplied by four is able to create an urban village or a small town, with approximately 4000 inhabitants., This could represent a sustainable community, a place with major public and civic activity and a transport nodal point and it also matches the criteria of a quarter of a mile walking distance
from the edge to the centre (a walk of about 10-15 minutes). (22)
The Sustainable Urban Matrix, Source Hasic 1997 As shown on the diagram this spatial organization allows a hierarchy of interior and exterior socializing spaces of different scales of communities, open neighborly contacts and also other activities and semiprivate spaces for the residents themselves. This model allows one to see the axial relationships between social structures and public, semipublic, semiprivate and private spaces. However, in the contemporary city when public facilities get separated from open public spaces and transposed to the interior spaces of shopping malls or entertainment complexes, it gets harder and harder to achieve the spatial connections between the different scales of communities. Example of Lafayette Park, Detroit The Lafayette Park project is a good example of a unit which works as a component in the interdependent social structure of the city. Lafayette Park, planned by M ies van der Rohe , Ludwig Hilberseimer and Alfred Caldwell is an example of the transmission of the suburbia (suburban?) model of living to the city environment. It was built on the site of the former Black Bottom community (a “degraded region of Detroit, known as a slum area with substandard housing and countless “social patalogies” )(23) Charles Waldheim, Hilberseimer / van der Rohe. Lafayette Park Detroit is an effort to counter the migration of middle and upper-income families to the suburbs. “Live in a city in the suburbs… live in the suburbs in the city”. The project includes a landscaped, 19-acre park with no through traffic, in which high and low-rise apartment buildings are sited. These residences form a mixed-income and mixed-race development, so the community was intended to attract residents of diverse backgrounds.(24) The landscape of the Park continues to form the primary framework for the spatial organisation of the site, with larger communal landscapes giving way to shared yards and private courts. In these days Lafayette Park maintains relatively high market value and
greater racial, ethnic, and class diversity than both the city and the suburbs that surround it. (25) The development of Lafayette Park has to play a double role, first as a good example of a self-sufficient community with social diversity, and secondly as a public centre for the neighborhoods and so it is plays the role of being a component of the larger system.
Lafayette Park, Detroit 5. Three modes of order which compose an interdependent urban system. The ecological design method, which I described above, involves the aspect of order with its three modes of 1) structure, 2) function and 3), location . These can translate into the design of an urban environment where they could be considered as: 1) spatial structure of urban pattern and modes of assemblage of the different components into an interdependent urban system; 2) the composition of interdependent interests and capacities of components in this system, the so-called “principle of the shared energy”; and 3) the structure of the interrelations of the system within its context. I will now look at each of these in turn taking into account the role of the social factor in establishing sustainable development. 5.1 Role of the spatial pattern and assemblage principles. Social scientists argue that rational spatial organization of the communities with lower level of activities and critical mass could cause their self - development to the next higher level of activities, and further constitute a complex hierarchy of communities. For example, adopting an radial road pattern and spatial organization of farms (each a lower level of activity), could produce a higher level of activity by enabling farms to join together to mill and store their grain (26) . I will now examine several models of organization of sustainable urban structures, which take social factors into account and which give advantages to city communities. The decentralized urban model. The “Sustainable Urban Matrix” introduced the “decentralized city” model, where lots of
local centers organize a hierarchy of communities around themselves. This model was found to be very successful in other aspects as well. In 1980 the process of the decentralization of the Greater Copenhagen area reduced car traffic; the development of secondary centers was successful giving the population in the suburbs better access to jobs and services; and finally this model allowed traffic and car pollution to be controlled in the Copenhagen city centre.(27) The compact city urban model. The compact city urban model is another model which offers a socially sustainable organization. This is the model which has been offered in response to the low-density urban sprawl of the contemporary cities. A compact city has to have a form and scale appropriate for walking and cycling, efficient public transport and a “compactness that encourages social interaction”. It had to have appropriate quite high density levels to allow the creation of places that are “busy, convenient, attractive, energy efficient and supportive of public transport”.(28) The method of the intensification of the urban environment. Urban intensification is commonly understood as a process whereby new buildings in cities are built at higher densities, vacant land in urban areas is developed, and highdensity redevelopment takes place. Urban intensification is also associated with increases in the amount of activity that takes place within cities – both increases in the population density, and the extent of economic and social activity. (29) In other words this is a transition of the compact city model to the existing urban environment. This method of the improvement of towns and cities, fosters civic pride, local identity and community. This concentration on accessibility of services and facilities aims to make essential amenities accessible to all urban residents, regardless of their income, age or gender. The reasoning is that high population densities reach the thresholds which enable a mix of uses in the city to be supported locally. Therefore local services and facilities can be maintained within a short distance of residential areas. From the practical implementation of this model we could see that the town centres where retail and employment activity had been concentrated, offered more cultural and entertainment facilities; and were used more intensively during the daytime and in the evenings, partly due to intensification policies, but also because of changes such as alterations in social behaviour and increasing affluence.(30) In practice this method of intensification is being applied in Bijlmermeer, the degraded district of Amsterdam inhabited by very poor immigrants. This district has been intensified by a new development, which attracted another more wealthy social group. Part of the programme involves the building of new facilities which all the district inhabitants are going to share. Thus the more wealthy residents of the district do not live in the district but move just into the new development, which allows more diversity of social groups in area and avoids the gettoification of the district.
Bijlmermeer, Holland 5.2 Principle of Shared energy. The principle of the “shared energy” is based on a combination of the capacities of each component of the system, in order to reach the sustainability of the structure they organise. Each element of a design is has to be carefully analyzed in terms of its needs, outputs, and properties. Design elements then have to be assembled in relation to one another so that the products of one element feed the needs of adjacent elements. On these principles are built the self-sufficient environmental-friendly infrastructures such as a combinations of water treatment system, recycling, waste or water management. Introduction of those systems to the urban community frequently meets a lot of difficulties in term of restriction and change of the lifestyle of the users and therefore for components of this system. In a further example the precise analysis of the natural processes in the social realm in Indonesia allowed the development of an alternative to the conventional large-scale waste management and on the basis of the waste management programme to build a social sustainable urban structure. It was a three-year pilot project introduced in Bandung, the second largest city of Indonesia. The project was based on the research of 2 waste management systems which were typical in a developing country. The first was a “formal “ system of transport which collected and then dumped the waste. The second was an “informal” system based on the scavengers who collected materials with a resale value and then sold it to industries. By means of the project they established a centre for organising action in common, so
scavengers who had been trying to survive individually, transformed themselves into a dynamic and creative community. The community were sorting and recycling recovered paper, glass and metal, composting organic wastes for sale. In addition that community developed urban farming, raising rabbits, and improvements to their housing. This project became the basis for developing an Integrated Recovery module as the building block of a dispersed system of waste processing. This simple schema achieved a number of objectives: reduced volumes to be dumped; it reduced the need for financing and subsidizing waste management; it created jobs and income opportunities; it created social and community cohesion; the organised community became able to provide itself with better housing.(31) Public spaces, as I described them earlier, are the main component of a socially sustainable urban structure. But in the urban environment they could have more capacity; they could be more than just community gathering spaces. In the late 70-s there started up an alternative type of urban park - the city farm, which often included farm animals as a central part and also crafts, theatre, workshops and other activities. This concept provides a basis for community revival in depressed urban areas and an educational link with rural occupations by establishing an alternative framework for urban public spaces. The involvement of the local community also reduces the incidence of vandalism. For many people urban farming could become the alternative way of leisure, for others a way of obtaining the food at a reasonable cost.(32) So this vision of public space could not only maintain the diversity of the natural and cultural environment, but also economically support the local community. 5.3 Location, working within the context and new design Methods. The third mode of order is the location pattern. It includes the precise analysis of the larger scale system and where the smaller ones have to fit into it. According to Kevin Lynch “The city is the product of many builders who are constantly modifying the structure for reasons of their own‌only partial control can be exercised over its growth and form. There is no final result, only a continuous succession of phases.â€?(33) The main difficulties with building into the city environment interdependent structures which include the social component is that the context, ie the city, is constantly changing. The vision of the city as a process, is developing today with the dynamic approach to city planning and design. The Geographic Information System (GIS), whereby information is place based, and emerging Planning and Design Decision Software (PDDS), both provide tools that enable planners and architects to be responsive to changing conditions and demands on how urban space is to be used and configured (34). In my opinion the successful implementation of those tools in the planning process require a new spatial city model, which will allows flexible changes or adjustments according to the dynamic design process. 6. Conclusion In my opinion in order to provide sustainability to the new urban environment, it is very important to pay more attention to social and cultural issues. During my research I found that the building of a healthy community is not just a question of the right policy. Sociologists argue that environmental features, urban pattern and spatial structure of urban programmes really affect the community organisation.
Architects and planners in many “eco-city” projects, which they claim are sustainable urban structures, focus on environmentally stable infrastructures. But they do not respond to or deal with the social difficulties of contemporary society. They assume that the good quality of environment will produce a “healthy community”. But, to take one instance, they do not take account of the fact that most of these “eco-cities” are built for one social group, and so their cities will fail because social diversity is the main instrument of the vitality of the urban environment. The complexity and interdisciplinary issues of social factors are the reasons that architects try to avoid dealing with social factors in designing urban areas and cities. They leave those questions to the to municipality and local government. The only time architects will deal with social factors is when it has already produced an environmental problem. The new dynamic design methods, which are available now, would allow architects to manage those social difficulties, such as de-spatialisation of communities in the city or clusterisation of mono-social groups in the city, at the early stages. They could then avoid the bigger problems which would otherwise lead to the later degradation of the urban environment. In my current design project I deal with the process urbanisation of the villages in Pearl River Delta. This process is destroying the interdependent system of the village and rural land. This research helped me to understand the method of design of interdependent systems, and to study the urban models which respond to the social issues of the urban environment. So in my project I will try to offer the new structure of the interdependent system of villages in order to have sustainability in the new context - city context.
Footnotes: 22. Ed. Katie Williams, Elizabeth Burton and Mike Jenks, “Achievening Sustainable Urban Form” (London and New York, 2000) p.333 23. Charles Wanldeheim “Hilberseimer/ Mies Van Der Rohe. Lafayette Perk Detroit” (Harvard design school 2004) p.21 24. http://www.ci.detroit.mi.us/historic/districts/lafayette_park.pdf 25. Charles Wanldeheim “Hilberseimer/ Mies Van Der Rohe. Lafayette Perk Detroit” (Harvard design school 2004) p.21 26. (Ed: Frank Schweitzer, “Self-Organization of complex structures: from Individual to Collective Dynamics” (CRC Press 1997 ) p.548
27 Michael Hough, “Cities and Natural Process” (Routledge 1995) p.24 28. Ed. Katie Williams, Elizabeth Burton and Mike Jenks, “Achievening Sustainable Urban Form” (London and New York, 2000) p.65 29. Katie Williams “Can Urban Intensification Contribute to Sustainable Cities? An International Perspective” (Oxford Centre for Sustainable Development Oxford Brookes University) p.2 30. Ed. Katie Williams, Elizabeth Burton and Mike Jenks, “Achievening Sustainable Urban Form” (London and New York, 2000) pp.64-66 31. Michael Hough, “Cities and Natural Process” (Routledge 1995) p.216 1. Ed: Simon Swaffield, “Theory in Landscape Architecture” (University of Pennsylvania Press 2002) p.180 2. Freeman Dyson, Our Biotech Future, (The New York Review, 2007) pp. 4-8 3. http://www.foshan.gov.cn/english/shundes_ecological_paradise.html 4. Ed: Simon Swaffield, “Theory in Landscape Architecture” (University of Pennsylvania Press 2002) p.180 5. ibid. p.182 6. ibid. p.183 7. ibid. p.183 8. Michael Hough, “Cities and Natural Process” (Routledge 1995) p.10 9. Ed: Frank Schweitzer, “Self-Organization of complex structures: from Individual to Collective Dynamics” (CRC Press 1997 ) p.537 10. ibid. p.537 11. Alan S. Berger, ”The City: Urban Communities and Their Problems” p.132 12. Jon Urry “Consuming places” (London and New York. 1995) pp.18-30 13. Kenny Cupers, Marcus Miessen ”Spaces of uncertainty ” (Verlag Muller+Busmann 2002) p.19 14. Jon Urry “Consuming places” (London and New York. 1995) pp.18-30 15. Kenny Cupers, Marcus Miessen ”Spaces of uncertainty ” (Verlag Muller+Busmann 2002) p.24 16. Jon Urry “Consuming places” (London and New York. 1995) pp.18-30 17. (Anderson 1982)
Ed. Katie Williams, Elizabeth Burton and Mike Jenks “Achievening Sustainable Urban Form” (London and New York, 2000) 18. Ed: Simon Swaffield, “Theory in Landscape Architecture” (University of Pennsylvania Press 2002) p.180 19. Ed: Simon Swaffield, “Theory in Landscape Architecture” (University of Pennsylvania Press 2002) p.181 20. Ed: Simon Swaffield, “Theory in Landscape Architecture” (University of Pennsylvania Press 2002) p.180 21. Ed. Katie Williams, Elizabeth Burton and Mike Jenks, “Achievening Sustainable Urban Form” (London and New York, 2000) p.332 32 . ibid. pp.238-240 33. Kevin Lynch "Image of the city” (mit press1960) p.2 34 . Architectural design VOL 75 N 6 Nov/Dec 2005. “Just–in-time planning: New York + Huston” p.90 Bibliography: Books: 1. Ed: Simon Swaffield, “Theory in Landscape Architecture” (University of Pennsylvania Press 2002) 2. Michael Hough, “Cities and Natural Process” (Routledge 1995) 3. Ed: Frank Schweitzer, “Self-Organization of complex structures: from Individual to Collective Dynamics” (CRC Press 1997 ) 4. Alan S. Berger, ”The City: Urban Communities and Their Problems” 5. Jon Urry “Consuming places” (London and New York. 1995) 6. Kenny Cupers, Marcus Miessen ”Spaces of uncertainty ” (Verlag Muller+Busmann 2002) 7. Ed. Katie Williams, Elizabeth Burton and Mike Jenks “Achievening Sustainable Urban Form” (London and New York, 2000) 8. Charles Wanldeheim “Hilberseimer/ Mies Van Der Rohe. Lafayette Perk Detroit” (Harvard design school 2004) 9. Kevin Lynch "Image of the city” (mit press1960)
10. Ed. Peter Hall “ Urban Future 21” (Federal Ministry Transport building and housing 2000) 11. Juval Portugali “SelfOrganization and the City” ( Springer 2000) Jornals, articles : 1. Architectural design VOL 75 N 6 Nov/Dec 2005. “Just–in-time planning: New York + Huston” 2. Katie Williams “Can Urban Intensification Contribute to Sustainable Cities? An International Perspective” (Oxford Centre for Sustainable Development Oxford Brookes University) Websites: 1. http://www.foshan.gov.cn/english/shundes_ecological_paradise.html 2. http://www.ci.detroit.mi.us/historic/districts/lafayette_park.pdf