Umeå Wants More!

Conclusion.

COMMON GROUND Matthew Ashton

1.

Rem Koolhaas. The Generic City In S,M,L,XL, Rem Koolhaas and Bruce Mau. (New York: Monacelli Press, 1995) 2.

Umeå city Homepage Online at www.umea.se/mer/omvarumarketumea.4 .2d18108b11c658dd5468000645.html

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Umeå Wants More!

“Umeå wants more!” Screams the large crisp black letters as you exit the terminal at Umeå’s airport. The dark letters float before a large white billboard, briefly filling the sky as you are caught in the space lock between the balmy interior of the terminal and the subarctic winter that awaits just outside. The slick advertising campaign is certainly loud and eye-catching, not the run of the mill city slogan that usually greets visitors; welcome to so and so, the city of such and such. The billboard is “Fresh” in the same way as an advertisement for a new Volvo, or a new fragrance from DKNY; the use of Helvetica, the international font of good taste, further smooths the experience for the visitor. There are no images of famous landmarks or ties to the local culture or region. The slogan reveals absolutely nothing at all about the city, in fact it seems to go deliberately out of its way to repress any possible connotations with an actual physical place. Malmö wants more, Hannover wants more, San Diego want more; “Insert your city here” wants more. Is this the new slogan of Rem Koolhaas’ “generic city?”1 Why go to all the effort to create a city branding campaign that is so broad and placeless?

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Through its slick silence, this billboard does in fact reveal a great deal about the city of Umeå, even more than the previous billboard welcoming visitors to the “city of birches’. It divulges an anxious city; a city doubting its even existence. Is this slogan really intended to sell brand Umeå to the outside world, or is it needed to sell the city to itself; To reinforce that it is in fact a real city, and not just a small provincial town located on the periphery of Europe; an isolated colonised peculiarity briefly breaking the continuous forest of pine stretching from Uppsala to the Arctic Sea. Umeå just wants to join the team, to put itself firmly on the map as just another boring, modern european city, but a city nonetheless. The explanation on the city’s homepage further reinforces this;

“Today Umeå is competing against the world when it comes to attracting new residents, students and businesses and creating economic conditions for a good society. We Can’t just sit back. We must be on our toes all the time. Otherwise we will be overtaken. The competition is tough. The main message of our brand work is that it is our will that is Umeå’s great opportunity and the strongest attraction. We want to grow. We want to improve. We want more.”2

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Through my thesis project, I have attempted to explore and imagine how this “collective city” could grow and develop from the present situation of the city of Umeå. It is both a critical reflection and a hypothetical vision. My aim was never to produce an ideal plan or new model city

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How about more democracy, more civic involvement, more political engagement, more coexistence, more social interaction, more equality, more variety, more difference, more imagination? Is it possible for Umeå to resist the temptation and dazzle of late capitalist urbanism and “banal cosmopolitanism”4 and instead explore other ways of becoming a city? Henri Lefebvre explains in his article “The Right to The City” that a city should be understood as an Oeuvre - A collective work in which all its citizens can participate in the public sphere. The city is where difference lives and where the shape of the city, the terms of access to the public realm, and even rights of citizenship constantly have to be renegotiated.”5 Could Umeå use its current state of anxiety and uncertainty as a driving force to explore another kind of urbanism that embraces this idea? An urbanism which goes beyond the current culture of consensus, with its ability to neutralise and assimilate all forms of conflict and difference and repackage them into safe, clean, static, inoffensive arrangements towards an urbanism of dissensus, where conflict and contradictions could be used and manipulated as a instrument to produce new and unexpected forms and constellations which engage the public rather than simply pacifying it.

5.

Henri Lefebvre. Writings on cities, translated from french [le droit a la ville, 1968] (Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 1996)

Matthew Ashton

Umeå wants more! more people; more growth; more business, more investment, more landmarks by starchitects, more international festivals, more hotels, more shopping centres, more motorways, more designer living in exclusive waterfront developments, more international flight connections, more everything! Must the city follow this well worn neoliberal path of mediocrity in order to “become” a city, or is there another path to follow?

4.

Ulrich Beck. Cosmopolitan Vision (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2006),10

COMMON GROUND

It seems like Umeå is in a mad rush to catch up to its neoliberal cousins in the south. The city has become a brand and its citizens have been transformed into customers. Umeå must now compete with other “brands” in order to maintain and increase it’s customer base; of course some customers are preferred over others, those with deeper pockets, large companies, multinationals, developers, investors and certainly those who hail from the so called “creative class.”3

3.

Richard Florida. The Rise Of The Creative Class (New York: Basic books, 2002)

6.

Roemer Van Toorn. Aesthetics as a form of politics In Hunch volume 11, (Rotterdam: Nai publishers / Berlage Institute, 2007),6 Available Online at www.roemervantoorn.nl/aestheticsasafor.html 7.

Ibid p.3

COMMON GROUND

which solves all of the city’s problems in one sweep. Neither was it to explore ways of engaging citizens in a participatory design process, in which residents are encouraged to participate in the development of their neighbourhood; I believe that there is merit in this process and that it has the potential to be successful for certain projects, but it can also be easily abused and hijacked; becoming a kind of “feel good urbanism”, where public engagement is bureaucratised and reduced to coffee, cake and colourful post-it notes. Public participation cannot be reduced to a weekend workshop, but must be a constant and ongoing process which must be nurtured and cultivated. Cities are in a constant state of movement, nothing is ever really static. People, goods, capital, technology, laws, places of employment, places of leisure, infrastructure, buildings, nations, even the natural elements such as rivers and mountains change over time. Architects must constantly negotiate this space between the permanent and the temporary, between the possible, impossible and that which cannot yet even be imagined.

Roemer Van Toorn states that:

Matthew Ashton UMA 2012

“Architecture cannot, of course, conduct parliamentary politics. Spatial constellations can deliver no advice on how to vote or convey messages about social and political problems. Architecture is political precisely because of the distance it takes from these functions. Architecture can also be political in the way in which, as a space-time sensorium, it organises being together or apart, and the way it defines outside or inside. Architecture is political in the manner in which it makes reality visible by means of its own aesthetic syntax, and gives it a direction.

Architecture influences the sensorium of being, feeling, hearing and speaking that determines the atmosphere and experience of a spatial constellation.”6

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Architects don’t hold the power, which is probably a good thing, but they are certainly not powerless. It is time for architects to wake up from their post-whatever snooze and re-engage with society. It is not enough anymore to simply stand on the sidelines and blame everyone else for the current state of things; developers, politics, planing laws, the market, dead architects, etc. It’s time for architects to get their hands dirty again; to work from within the system; to find and exploit its loopholes and weak points; to have, what Roemer Van Toorn calls “a passion for the real”. According to Van Toorn, “The question is not: Is populism bad or good (it’s in all of us) but what kind of political logic of the public do we construct in our projects?”7 Through extensive research, investigation and observation I have endeavoured to map the real in Umeå; or at least parts of the real which I found relevant, useful and possible during the time constraints given for this project. The real is of course inexhaustible, which is part of its beauty, and I acknowledge that there are many aspects which I have overlooked which would have also given different, valuable insights for my project work.

I will continue this essay by reflecting upon the results of my research, which could be divided into three different parts, corresponding with the city slogan “Umeå wants more.” Firstly I will look at “Umeå”. What kind of city is it and what does it already have? This exploration will then lead to an investigation of the “Wants”. Where are the opportunities and potentials for the city? And finally I will provide a proposal which will address the “More”. What can this “more” entail and what kind of city can Umeå become?

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The strange thing with Umeå is that it is at once completely familiar, but at the same time totally alien. It seems as if someone has tried purposely to reconstruct a generic European city; all the ingredients are there, but they seem strangely out of place and scale, and everything is separated by tidy patches of grass or perhaps a domesticated pine forest. It has the standard commercialised pedestrian core; a couple of dominating towers, one a modernist office building, another being a post-modern hotel; several suburban business parks and retail centres; a series of ring roads, bypasses, over-dimensioned bridges and tunnels (with another bypass under construction); a modernist suburban university campus and hospital; and dozens of segregated residential enclaves, some consisting of detached villas, others of multi-story modernist blocks, scattered throughout the landscape. There is no Distinction between city and nature, or city and suburb. Everything is safe, controlled and comfortable. Umeå is the city for “the good urban life” minus the possibility (or threat?) of a genuine urban experience. Roemer Van Toorn describes this condition as the “suburbanisation of imagination. The experiential landscape we live in has become synthetic, fabricated nature. Actually, for us, the synthetic approximates the natural.”10

10.

Roemer Van Toorn. Rethinking city Spectacle, Linz Cultural Capital 2009 In Linz / Texas, A City Relates, Editors Angelika Fitz, Martin Heller (Vienna: Springer, 2009),2 Available Online at www.roemervantoorn.nl/linzrethinkingci.html

Matthew Ashton

Asking the question, “What kind of city is Umeå?”, it is impossible to avoid the inevitable follow up question “but is Umeå even a city?”. There are of course multiple technical definitions of what a city is and these vary dramatically between different regions and cultures; In Scandinavia for example, a city must have over 200 residents, whereas in other countries city status may only be granted by a monarchy.9 In any case, Umeå has a population of around 80 000 residents, a municipal government, an airport, university, hospital, poorly performing hockey team and a city branding campaign, so obviously it fulfils at least the minimal requirements to be considered a city, but it certainly doesn’t conform to the traditional image of the city, at least not in the european sense. But this shouldn’t come as a surprise though, considering Umeå’s location in the far North of Europe. With its extreme climate and isolation one would expect a special type of city, right?

9.

See Theo Deutinger. You Shall be Urban Online at www.td-architects.eu/?id=39

COMMON GROUND

“The scale of the city is an extremely interesting space. It is a collective product, the city as a mess, as an incomplete formation. In that incompleteness lies the possibility of making.”

- Saskia Sassen8

8.

Saskia Sassen. The Urbanising of Global Challenges - Can Cities Re Invent their Civic Capacities Available Online at www.wn.com/ The_Urbanizing_of_Global_Challenges_Can_Cities_Re-invent_their_Civic_Capacities

11.

Dietmar Leyk. Embracing Difference: from Urban Scenarios to Critical Brief In Hunch 13 (Rotterdam: Nai publishers / Berlage Institute, 2009),111

COMMON GROUND

I think “landscape” is a more accurate term to describe a place like Umeå rather than “city”, as it is able to encompass both the natural and artificial elements of our urban environments, especially considering that almost everything we consider as “nature” today is also a result of human manipulation or fabrication. A Landscape, as opposed to a city has no centre or periphery, it is often fluid and irregular. This doesn’t mean that it lacks hierarchies, but rather that the relationship between its elements are fundamentally different and inherently more flexible; In a landscape it is the relationships and connections between elements that becomes important, not so much their position within the system. Or as Dietmar Leyk states, “Clear differences between private and public, global and local are not distinguishable anymore. Definitions blur. Different genres, categories, and typologies melt together. We can observe an evolution of organisational principles, which creates a challenge of non-definition.”11

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If we look again at Umeå in the context of a landscape, rather than a city, it liberates us from any classical notions of what a city is or should be; Debates about centre vs. periphery become irrelevant, and instead we are able to accept the discontinuous nature of the city; even embrace it, and begin to imagine how we as architects are able to manipulate this new landscape of opportunity. By mapping several different variables, including population density, employment opportunities, student population etc we are able to locate places of intensity, density and activity within the city. It becomes apparent that the city centre is just one of many nodes within a network, each with varying degrees of co-dependance and independence. The centre is still an important node, being the site for local government and its administration, as well as a popular retail and leisure precinct, however it is no longer indispensable to the functioning of the rest of the city. The University and Hospital form another strong node which operates more or less independently of the city centre, with its own associated political and administrative apparatus, and its own transport links, including a newly built train station and bus interchange linking it directly with regional centres as well as distant cities. This precinct is not only the largest place of employment in the city, but is also surrounded by some of the most densely populated residential areas, with a very high proportion of students, academics and immigrants. Other intensities of employment, retail, industry, transport and habitation orbit around these two central nodes.

It could be argued that Umeå is comprised of two cities; one local, centred around the historic city, and the other global, centred around the University. These two different cities co-exist and occupy the same physical space, but they have limited interaction with each other. The local city remains very much occupied by parochial issues, with deep ties to the immediate region; It sees itself as the “real city”,comprised of real “umebo”; residents who were born in the city, or at least in the north and have no intention of leaving it. The “other city” on the other hand is less rooted in the immediate region, but very connected globally. It is made up of students, teachers, professors, academics and immigrants;

people who happen to find themselves in Umeå for some reason or another, but have stronger connections to somewhere else, be it within Sweden, or abroad. The questionable allegiance of these citizens creates a certain friction with the real city, which views the other city as a kind of transient community; an academic circus setting up tent for a while, only to later move on again. This may very well be the case, but with a student population alone of almost 40 000, it is a community which cannot be excluded.

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Sociologists often use the term “glocal” to demonstrate that the global cannot exist without the local, and vice versa. There will always be a certain degree of mutation and adaption as global ideas and products are incorporated into a local context. In most cases these adaptions will happen naturally and unexpectedly, but many glocal adaptions are purposely manipulated by corporations to maximise uptake of a product or idea in a certain locale; McDonalds is a prime example, adapting their menu to cater to local preferences and tastes.14 In today’s world it is becom-

13.

Arjun Appadurai. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization ( Minneapolis, Univ Of Minnesota Press, 1996),30

COMMON GROUND

The uneasy antagonisms between the local and global produce many schizophrenic situations throughout the urban landscape. Historic timber buildings in the city centre are still being razed to the ground in the name of progress; to be replaced by something with a bit more global contemporary flare; a new hotel designed by a starchitect, or perhaps a new shopping mall, or office tower, anything that can distance Umeå from its humble provincial beginnings. The city centre is a disorientating mix of seemingly out of place global mutations; have a beer at an authentic english pub (at last count there were 5), or watch the super bowl on one of the big screens at an american sports bar, if you get hungry you can always grab some sushi, a taco, or why not try a famous kebab pizza from the main square. The city has become a cosmopolitan theme park with selected elements of global culture( those elements which have been successful in other places) copy-pasted directly onto the existing form, rather than exploring a true cosmopolitanism which engages those international influences that are already present in the city. Simultaneously, romantic new urbanist developments are sprouting up in the landscape like mushrooms, creating what Frederic Jameson calls ‘a nostalgia for the present’.12 These tidy urban neighbourhoods idealise a world that has never existed, and seem especially foreign in a place like Umeå. As Arjun Appadurai puts it, “The past is now not a land to return to in a simple politics of memory. It has become a synchronic warehouse of cultural scenarios, a kind of temporal central casting, to which recourse can be taken as appropriate, depending on the movie to be made, the scene to be enacted, the hostages to be rescued.”13 This certainly seems the case in Umeå, where the city’s simple past is being erased from the centre to make way for neo liberal progress, while a more idealised, romanticised past is being re-constructed in the suburbs. I believe Umeå has the potential and the capacity to take another path; to instead explore and develop a new idea of cosmopolitanism, where the existing local and the global elements of the city are able fuse together, producing new forms which open up the possibility for social interaction and co-existence.

12.

Fredric Jameson. Postmodernism: Or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (London:Verso Books, 1990)

14.

See Theo Deutingar. Mc World Online at www.st-ar.nl/mc-world/ 15.

Roemer Van Toorn. Against the Hijacking of the Multitude In Transurbanism, V2, (Rotterdam: Nai Publishers, 2002),2 Available Online at www.roemervantoorn.nl/againstthehijack.html

COMMON GROUND

16.

Roemer Van Toorn. Fresh Conservatism In Quaderns 215 (Barcelona: Actar, 1998),4 Available Online at www.roemervantoorn.nl/freshconservatis.html 17. Rem Koolhaas and Bruce Mau. S,M,L,XL (New York: Monacelli Press, 1995),974

ing increasingly difficult, if not impossible to separate the global from the authentic; people, capital, ideas news and culture are transported around the world at incredible volumes and speeds. Globalisation is not something which can, (or should) be fought against, and attempting to seek out the “authentic” is a futile, regressive, even dangerous pursuit. This doesn’t mean that we have to embrace the universalism of neoliberalism, but we should, as RVT argues, “produce another kind of public and private sphere, where the potentials of the multitude are no longer hijacked by the ideology of Americanization.”15 Umeå, as a city (like most other cities) has never really had a period of “Authentic” existence, and has always found itself situated in-between different cultures and spheres of influence, be they Swedish, Saami, Finnish, Russian or American. Its location on the periphery of Europe (and the world) has given it a certain freedom, but also necessity to have a more global outlook, and to be more embracing of other cultures and ideas; both in the past as a frontier trading village and more recently, as an international centre for higher education. The big question is, how can Umeå utilise the potential of the multitude and what kind of idea of the public could this produce?

Matthew Ashton

“Life is no longer thought of as a linear process, but as a complex totality that is full of contradictions. We are all guilty of - and we all profit from - the boons of schizophrenia and media addiction, the ecstasy of self-destruction and the seemingly total lack of borders. The important thing now is not the identity of architecture and art but what they can do - always depending on a specific territory and cultural program.”

- Roemer Van Toorn16

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Before I respond to the “how” I will first locate the “where”, as this is after all an architectural project and is concerned with actual spatial situations located in the real world, as well as their construction and manipulation. I have decided to concentrate my project in the neighbourhood of Ålidhem and its surrounds, located 4 kilometres the south east of the city centre. I have chosen to work with Ålidhem for several reasons, including; 1. its location, 2. its demographics 3. its physical composition and 4. its history and politics

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1. Location: Between the global and local.

The location of Ålidhem in relation to the city of Umeå places it in a very interesting position, situated just to the south of the city’s major institutions; the university and the hospital; the city’s largest employers and major international players, engaging over 36 000 students and 11 000 staff, many of whom have international backgrounds, including exchange students, guest professors and immigrant workers. The neighbourhood is separated from these institutions by a chaotic jumble of roads, bicycle paths, apartment blocks, offices, car parks and plenty of greenery. In fact, the neighbourhood is separated from the rest of the city on all sides by a large swath of asphalt and greenery; to the south

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2. Demographics: Discovering the multitude. Ålidhem is often called colloquially the “student ghetto”, referencing the neighbourhoods large student population housed in barrack like conditions. Although the term may provide quite an accurate illustration of the area and its population it is hardly flattering, and certainly doesn’t conjure up the same charm and allure of other student areas, such as Paris’ “Latin Quarter”; it implies more that it is an area that should be avoided unless absolutely necessary. In many other cities, such a neighbourhood consisting of so many students would probably be one of the hippest places in town, bustling with cafes, bars, bookshops, cheap restaurants and nightlife. I find it strange and intriguing that this isn’t the case in Umeå; that a city made up of almost 50% students can be so lacking in student culture and presence. Is this place really a ghetto? A place where students can be quarantined during the period of their studies so that they cause minimal inconvenience and interference to the regular population? Of course the neighbourhood doesn’t only consist of students, although they do account for approximately 60% of the population, that still leaves a large group of “non students”, which is made up of a wide mix of people, including high numbers of immigrants and children. Ålidhem is both the densest neighbourhood in Umeå as well as the poorest; due in part to the large amount of students, which tend to live compactly and thriftily, but even the non student population of the neighbourhood generally have a lower than average income. It is interesting that despite the stigma associated with the student ghetto, some of the most affluent and sought after residential areas in the city lie just next door. These green low density suburbs, consisting largely of single detached villas on large plots generally have the opposite demographics of Ålidhem, with a very homogenous population and very few students.

Matthew Ashton

It is this paradoxical nature of Ålidhem that I found immensely interesting, being at once extremely segregated from the city and it’s surroundings but simultaneously finding itself located at the confluence of many major institutions and infrastructures. This location gives Ålidhem a great deal of potential to interact and merge with its surroundings and to develop into another type of city; an open, globally connected city, as opposed to the passive segregated enclave it is today.

COMMON GROUND

and west is a major arterial road, which is currently being converted into part of Umeå’s ring road system, which when complete will place the neighbourhood alongside Sweden’s major North-South connection, and at the entry point to the University/Hospital area. To the North is a secondary though road connecting several outer suburbs with the centre, while to the west is a minor road servicing local traffic. Beyond these traffic wastelands to the east and west are several wealthy suburban enclaves consisting mostly of detached villas, while to the south is a mixture of both detached villas and modernist housing blocks. The neighbourhood is also located conveniently close to other major transport infrastructure, including the airport (3 km) and the regional train station (1.5km).

COMMON GROUND

I believe that a sustainable city must also be a socially integrated city, and this necessitates social interaction between all groups in society. It is naive to think that this contact can or will take place in a segregated suburban setting. The nature of suburbia separates people into different income brackets, which dictates what social makeup they acquire; often producing certain areas of social advantage and others of social disadvantage. It is a difficult challenge to address, but one which architects and urban planers must begin to confront. Readjusting the social imbalances that are so inherently built into suburbia, especially within the swedish context, is an onerous task. It is in the public sphere of the city, rather then the private safety of suburbia where this meeting with the “other” can take place, so we need to explore new ways urbanising our suburban landscape of motorways, office parks, shopping malls and segregated communities. We must explore new ways of creating common spaces within this forbidding environment.

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3. Physical Composition: Urban Mid-life Crisis. Ålidhem is a relic from Sweden’s large scale social housing project (miljonprogrammet) carried out between 1965 and 1974, during which time over one million dwellings were constructed throughout the country. The feat was made possible by heavy government subsidies and the rationalisation of the construction industry, and although majority of the dwellings built during this period were single detached or semi detached houses, the program is most famous/infamous for the large scale modernist housing estates that it also produced, such as Ålidhem. These neighbourhoods were meticulously planned, combining all the latest research, knowledge and statistics with the most efficient construction techniques, providing high quality housing, with good access to natural light and open space. Engineers and planers were also able to solve the conflict between high speed motor traffic and pedestrians, by creating a complex system of separated roads, paths, bridges and tunnels, so that motor vehicles could travel safely at high speeds without the need to stop or meet pedestrians; a system which remains unchanged today.

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Contemporary architects and planners often mock these projects, and attempt to distance themselves from the ideas and theories which brought about their materialisation. They are often criticised as failures, leading to social problems, isolation, criminality and segregation; they are portrayed as scary places, dangerous places, places that should be avoided, places where people don’t want to live, and those who live there are all trying to get out. This is of course not true, and these neighbourhoods are are no more dangerous than any other typology, but I find it fascinating that they are considered failures, when in fact they should be complemented for their success. These housing projects function in the exact way they were intended and designed to perform; They succeed in providing high quality housing, with good access to natural light and open space; they provide a safe internal pedestrian environment as well as high speed separated roads for efficient traffic flow; all essential

services are located within walking distance, including kindergartens, schools and shops. These urban projects succeed marvellously in providing a safe, green, orderly, predictable urban environment, without the risk of the unexpected, or unintended, which is exactly what they were planed to do and what most suburban residential neighbourhoods built since have also aimed to achieve.

COMMON GROUND Matthew Ashton

Recently there has been a great deal of debate about the future of these housing estates as they have begun to reach their fiftieth birthdays, and are starting to show signs of their age. Many argue that they should be demolished, (which is currently happening in several places around Sweden) while others would rather see a total renovation, which would increase their attractiveness (and rental income). I believe that there is no one size fits all solution to these housing projects, even though they may share floor plans, they all have a unique local context which affects their future potential. These buildings were built to last over 100 years, so it seems unnecessary and wasteful to demolish them, and a costly renovation which dramatically raises rents would force many tenants out of their homes. In working with Ålidhem, I took the position not to demolish any residential buildings, nor propose any extensive renovations. Instead I have focused primarily on exploring possibilities and potentials within the existing structure that could open up the neighbourhood to the surprise of the unexpected and unintended.

17.

Rem Koolhaas and Bruce Mau. S,M,L,XL (New York: Monacelli Press, 1995),974

“ Today, consensus builds around avoidance; our most profound adhesion to the non-event.”

- Rem Koolhaas17 UMA 2012 125

4. History &Politics: The Curse of Consensus. Ålidhem has a history of finding itself at the centre of political protest and dissent, and has been the staging ground for some of the city’s largest political rallies. These include a student occupation in 1972 against a proposed rent increase and a large protest against the demolition of a forest in 1977, which was started by a group of school children. Both these protests involved the majority support of the local community but both ended unsuccessfully; the rents were raised and the forest was cut down. These events highlight the peculiar relationship between the community of Ålidhem and local powers. Since the neighbourhood consists primarily of rental apartments owned by the municipal housing company or buildings and land owned directly by municipality, the local government is able to run and control the whole area as its own personal estate. This concentration of power creates a dangerous culture of consensus, where all important decisions affecting the neighbourhood are made centrally by politicians, experts and bureaucrats for the supposed benefit of local residents, but often lacking their engagement and input. This arrangement was established by a social democratic government as a way of providing cheap housing and protecting tenants from greedy and exploitative private landlords, but it fails miserably at protecting them from greedy and exploitative municipal governments.

18.

Alejandro Zaera Polo. The Politics of the Envelope: A Political Critique of Materialism In Volume 17, (Amsterdam: Archis, 2008) 76 - 105; Available Online at www.c-lab.columbia.edu p.28

COMMON GROUND

What is needed is a move away from this culture of consensus, where all forms of conflict and disagreement are dissolved prior to any debate, towards a culture of dissensus, where conflict and disagreement can be used as a tool to built upon, and produce new collective arrangements.

Rather than planing the future development of Ålidhem from the offices of city hall, it should be allowed to grow and be negotiated from real situations and needs of the neighbourhood itself. I am not suggesting an anarchistic approach with no controls, but more precisely the creation of a flexible plan, which opens possibilities and potentials, rather than stifling them, and provides plenty of scope for local actors to participate in the making of the city.

“There are two basic forms of political structures that have historically organised exchange and flow of resources, skills and command structures in time and space: markets and bureaucracies. They are the two domains where architects may try to construct their agency.”

- Alejandro Zaera Polo18

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If Architects wish to engage with the real world, then encounter with both bureaucracies and markets are unavoidable, and the current blurred relationship between the two creates a challenging situation, but may also present opportunities. Umeå, like most other cities has wilfully embraced a form of neo liberal capitalism, where municipal services and responsibilities are constantly being handed over to the private hands of the market; Libraries, Museums and University buildings are now owned by private companies, the historical town hall has been transformed into a night club and the elegant old school building is in the process of being converted into a luxury hotel. Meanwhile Government owned and run organisations are encouraged to adapt more market orientated practices, prioritising profits, marketing and cash flow over service delivery and civic responsibility; “maximum return on investment” has become their new mantra. Everyone is now a customer and everything has a price. There is no chance of a return to a state- driven ideologically-enlightened society, and places like Ålidhem should serve as a reminder to the limitations of bureaucracies. It is in this brave new world, where the distinction between public and private has become vague, that architects must operate, and strive toward opening up new spaces; common spaces, spaces which are able navigate the tangled web of public and private interests and reignite the idea of the public.

Though my thesis work I have attempted to find these “common spaces” in and around Ålidhem, and explore how their articulation could be realised; spatially, economically and socially. Rather than focus my efforts on a single architectural project which incorporates all these ideas, I decided instead to investigate a wide range of possible interventions and strategies, which vary dramatically in scale and time-frame, from the reuse of a bicycle shed to the realignment of roads and the development of new urban grid structures. Some interventions are capable of being implemented directly and independently whilst others are dependant on

each other, and larger changes to the urban environment over a period of time. All strategies aim to open up potential within the urban environment and create spaces which encourage social interaction and civic participation; spaces existing somewhere between the hierarchical control of bureaucracies and the cut-throat nature of the market. My main strategies could be summarised under the concepts of 1. Congestion, 2.

Density, 3. Difference and 4. Temporality

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I believe congestion should be viewed as a positive attribute and be encouraged as a method to bring people together and stimulate interaction. It is an important strategy to create friction between different flows of people, so that a certain level of negotiation is required in daily life, and this can in turn produce certain points of intensity and activity, where many things become possible. Through a series of proposals and scenarios, based on an understanding of the current flows of movement around Ålidhem, I have strived to introduce this element of congestion into the city. The current system of traffic separation should be dramatically altered so that different modes of transport (pedestrians, cyclists, cars and buses, and eventually trams) can share the same space, and benefit from being together. All crossings should occur on the same level,

Matthew Ashton

1. Congestion The word Congestion, in its etymological essence simply means, to bring together. It is a shame that this word has gained such negative connotations in modern times, when its basic meaning is so beautiful.

Today congestion is always seen as a problem, something that should be eliminated, most often through technical or engineering solutions. People and traffic should flow freely and unhindered, ideally without the chance that they should ever encounter each other, forgetting that it is this very “chance of encounter” which underpins the urban experience. Ålidhem is itself a perfect example of a successfully engineered congestion-free city, where all different modes of movement have been provided with their own spaces; pedestrians and cyclists are rigidly separated from car traffic which is then further separated from buses. This arrangement consumes large areas of space, both for the paved surface, as well as the zone of separation, and requires a complicated system of rules and signage which must be followed and enforced. It is claimed that this system of separation enhances traffic flow and improves safety, but for who? Not for cyclists and pedestrians who are forced onto long winding detours, and dark concrete underpasses just to avoid a the chance that they will encounter a car.

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“The street is a space where new forms of the social and the political can be made, rather than a space for enacting ritualised routines. With some conceptual stretching, we might say that politically “street and square” are marked differently from “boulevard and piazza”: the first signals action, and the second ritual.”

-Saskia Sassen19

19.

Saskia Sassen. Global Street Comes to Wall Street In Possible Futures (12/27/11)

20.

Hannah Arendt. The Human Condition (Chicago: University of Chigago, 1958),100.

21.

Jane Jacobs. The Death and Life of Great American Cities (New York: Random House, 1961),349

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between all forms of traffic, so that neither car nor bike is prioritised, but both are forced to wait together; the interesting thing with cars, and buses is that once they are at rest, or traveling at slow speeds they are no longer seen simply as machines, but as capsules of people.

It is usually at these crossings, places of people at movement and at rest, that the greatest potential for social interaction and economic opportunity occurs, and the more people that pass by, the greater the potential.

Congestion can also be used to create active links between places of interest, livening up otherwise dull areas, such as between Ålidhem and the University, and the concentration of spaces of movement also frees up a great deal of land, as other roads and paths become redundant; land which can be used for more productive, or valuable purposes.

Matthew Ashton

“The revelatory quality of speech and action comes to the fore where people are with others and neither for nor against them - that is, in sheer human togetherness. Because of its inherent tendency to disclose the agent together with the act, action needs for its full appearance the shining brightness we once called glory, which is possible only in the public realm.”

-Hannah Arendt20

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2. Density If congestion can be described as being together in motion then density could be used to describe being together at rest. It is a term which is typically used in urban planing solely as a tool of measurement, used to quantify people or objects in a given area of space. I believe that architects should begin to broaden their interpretation of this term, and apply it to factors that aren’t so easily quantifiable. How about measuring density of social interaction, urban activity or street life? A high population density does not necessarily translate into a high density of social interaction, if the spatial circumstances impede it. This is the case in Ålidhem, which has the highest population density per hectare in Umeå, but very low levels of social interaction, despite the large number of students. People generally do not just meet in a void, but tend to gather around certain places of interest and intensity; as Jane Jacobs famously said, “life attracts life”.21

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In combination with striving to increase congestion in Ålidhem, I have also tried to increase densities, not only the number of inhabitants, but more specifically the places of interest and intensity. The existing high densities and the demographics of the area give it a solid foundation, but what is needed is to create opportunities for people to meet in the public realm. One tactic I have explored is opening up more spaces for economic activity within the neighbourhood, which could be used for small kiosks, cafes, bars, restaurants and shops. Currently, the shopping centre has a monopoly on all economic activity in the area, centralising all shops to one location; with very little variety and a depressing setting, it doesn’t encourage people to linger. A more open approach could lead to the establishment of small nodes of activity within the neighbourhood,

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I have explored several strategies which attempt to deal with this challenge, several working within the current political circumstances of Ålidhem, as well as others which create a new space, free, or at least partially free from the current tangle of bureaucracy. I believe the creation of places of density and congestion, as examined earlier would also aid in the production of places of difference, but recognise that a more supportive approach would probably also be needed. One idea that I exam-

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3. Difference The city is a wonderful, messy place, and part of its strength and attraction is that it is able to accommodate and cultivate difference. A city is able to offer both protection and opportunity for difference; It is able to provide an environment for co-existence and debate where conflicts can be solved, or at least mediated, without the need for consensus. Unfortunately Ålidhem is currently not such a place. Under the surface is a city of otherness, but this is not represented in the official idealised image of the city. The concentration of power and ownership in Ålidhem presents a challenge to the production and maintenance of difference, where ideas and actions must first be filtered through a thick bureaucracy, with its risk adverse nature, striving to maintain the status quo.

Some idea’s might pass through in a sanitised form, but most will get stuck somewhere between the department of health & safety and the legal department.

Matthew Ashton

‘”Difference’ today seems to be about identity - we think of race, gender or class. Aristotle meant something more by difference; he included also the experience of doing different things; of acting in divergent ways which do not neatly fit together. The mixture in a city of action as well as identity is the foundation of its distinctive politics. Aristotle’s hope was that when a person becomes accustomed to a diverse, complex milieu, he or she will cease reacting violently when challenged by something strange or contrary. Instead, this environment should create an outlook favourable to discussion of differing views or conflicting interests.”

-Richard Sennett22

22.

Richard Sennett. The Space of Democracy: Raoul Wallenberg Lecture (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1998), 19

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creating local hotspots, as well as the establishment of areas of larger intensities in places of congestion and intersection, such as around public transport hubs. I have also explored how parkland and open space could be used to produce other densities and concentrations of people and activity. There is currently no park in Ålidhem, instead every block has a large green courtyard consisting of a few trees, a playground and a bbq area. Although these courtyards are appreciated, with over forty of them they have a very dissipating effect. I have proposed the creation of a large park along the edge of Ålidhem and the adjoining suburb, replacing a road barrier that exists there today. This park would complement the green courtyards, providing a social green area which acts not only as a meeting place for residents of Ålidhem, but also for residents of nearby suburbs.

23.

Dietmar Leyk. Embracing Difference: from Urban Scenarios to Critical Brief In Hunch 13 (Rotterdam: Nai publishers / Berlage Institute, 2009),113 24.

Zones Urbaines Sensibles. Schieblock: Making the Temporary City In Hunch 14 (Rotterdam: Nai publishers / Berlage Institute, 2010),69

COMMON GROUND Matthew Ashton

ined was to open up spaces in an old abandoned school building located in the centre of the neighbourhood. This building has remained largely unused since the school relocated to a new building in 2012, and its future is still uncertain, with suggestions it will either be demolished, or converted into a nursing home. If the municipality were to subsidise heating and electricity costs, the spaces could be made available to a wide range of uses and activities, both commercial and non commercial, creating a vibrant hub of activity at the centre of the neighbourhood. There is a risk however that the municipality would favour certain activities over others, turning it into a kind of entrepreneurial incubator, or simply sell the land, or building later on, forcing tenants to either move or face steep rent increases. I believe it would be a good start, but it should also be complemented with a continual long term diversification of the neighbourhood and its surroundings. New blocks could be created on currently unused land in Ålidhem, as well as in the area between it and the University, bringing new stakeholders into the game. Some blocks could be sold privately, others could be leased or given to certain organisations, such as student groups, religious groups, etc, creating a diverse mix of uses and interests, free from the direct influence of the municipality.

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“Temporality, concerning activities and space, continuously challenges consensus in city making. The relation between urban activity and urban space is never permanent. Activity patterns, including density or tenacity, change over time in relation to urban space. This can happen suddenly or progressively over the day, week, or year. There is a direct connection between behaviour patterns and spatial qualities.”

-Dietmar Leyk23

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4. Temporality Time is an important aspect that is often overlooked or unappreciated by architects and urban planers. Cities are not static objects, and consist of more than bricks and mortar, and although buildings generally stand for a long time, their uses and activities are constantly changing. Swedish urban planing has only really changed cosmetically since the time Ålidhem was built in the 1960’s, and is still based on a method of “instant Urbanism”24; a site is decided, a detailed plan is produced (a process that can take over twenty years), existing structures are demolished, a new urban form is built, and finally life is added. Once construction is complete, the builders move on to the next site and the neighbourhood will remain largely unchanged for the next fifty years until it is in need of renovation. This process produces very dull, static urban neighbourhoods, that usually lack all but the most basic level of service and activity; possibly a supermarket or a sushi bar. It is time we challenge this current process of city making and develop new methods which acknowledge existing social, cultural and economic structures and are able to produce more dynamic and adaptive urban environments which do not become sclerotic.

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Conclusion.

For me this thesis project has been an adventure into the unknown, uncertain and unmapped. It has been an urban exploration of a peripheral place in a peripheral city; a city where I have lived for the last two years, but still find perplexing and difficult to understand. Beginning this journey I made an effort to put my prejudices on hold, and approach the project with a naive optimism, which was a difficult undertaking in Umeå during the long dark winter. As I began to map the city, and dig deeper into many different layers, I became much more interested in uncovering the right questions, than producing a definitive architectural solution on a specific site. The result is a very broad analysis which explores a wide variety of problems and opportunities and provides a range of possibilities and scenarios, always focusing on what architecture can do to produce a new idea of the public. I made en effort to base my architectural proposals and strategies on discoveries from my mapping exercises, and tried to merge my ambitions with the existing reality of the place rather than impose my personal utopian dreams; providing the framework for a more democratic city to evolve, but leaving its final form open and incomplete.

Matthew Ashton

“The city at its best is our collective making. It is our inheritance and what we make collectively has a power. The city cannot destroy power but it can contest power” Saskia Sassen25

25.

Saskia Sassen. The Urbanising of Global Challenges - Can Cities Re Invent their Civic Capacities Available Online at www.wn.com/ The_Urbanizing_of_Global_Challenges_Can_Cities_Re-invent_their_Civic_Capacities

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Through my thesis work I have explored how a more dynamic method of planing could be implemented and how temporality could be used as a tool to activate and enliven both existing and future urban environments. Ålidhem is a very static neighbourhood and apart from a few minor additions and extensions, has remained largely unchanged since it was built in the 1960s. The problem with Ålidhem is that it is not only rigid in a physical sense, but also very much so in a legal /bureaucratic sense, and this is a major hinder to the fast establishment of new urban ideas and activities. Temporary and flexible structures and projects should be encouraged as a way of experimenting with urban environment, and unlocking potential; successes can then be given a more lasting form, while failures can be easily deconstructed. The advantage of these type of interventions is that they are quick, easy and cheap as well as generating instant feedback from the public, bypassing the now cumbersome, ineffective process of public consultation and creating new ways of urban participation and dialogue. I have also investigated how a new urban area could take form between Ålidhem and the University, which has a very flexible plan, existing of basic infrastructure, streets, services, etc that would be able to grow and adjust over time, adapting its pace, density and composition depending on prevailing circumstances.

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Matthew Ashton

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References.

COMMON GROUND Matthew Ashton

Andersson, Eva. Ålidhem och Tomtebo, Planering, Arkitektur och Bostadspolitik i Två Bostadsområde i Umeå (Umeå: Umeå University, 2006)

Rosin, Björn Erik. Hyresstrejken i Umeå Västerbotten 1.10, Det röda Umeå (Lund: Västerbottens museum ,2010)

Appadurai, Arjun. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization (Minneapolis, Univ Of Minnesota Press, 1996)

Sassen, Saskia. The urbanising of global challenges - can cities re invent their civic capacities http://wn.com/The_Urbanizing_of_Global_Challenges_Can_Cities_Reinvent_their_Civic_Capacities

Arendt, Hannah. The human condition (Chicago: University of Chigago, 1958) Arvidsson, Aron. Boendesegregation i Umeå, En Tillämpning av Rumslig Regression (Umeå: Umeå University, 2006) Beck, Ulrich. Cosmopolitan Vision (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2006)

Sassen, Saskia. Global street comes to wall street, possible futures.

12/27/11 Sennett, Richard. The Space of Democracy: Raoul Wallenberg Lecture (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1998)

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Florida, Richard. The Rise Of The Creative Class (New York: Basic books, 2002)

Statistiska Centralbyrån: Befolknings- och inkomststatistik för Ålidhem och Tomtebo. http://www.scb.se

Hagson, Anders. Stads och Trafikplaneringens Paradign, En Studie av SCAFT, Dess Förebilder och Efterföljare (Gothenburg: Chalmers Tekniska Högskolan, 2004)

Umeå Kommun Samhällsbyggnadskontoret. Byggnadsordning för Sofiehem och Ålidhem - Ett Förhållningssätt till Stadsdelarnas Karaktärsdrag, (Umeå: Umeå Kommun, 2006)

Hugoson, Rolf. Umeå Björkarnas Stad, Från Stadsbrand till City Brand (Umeå: Umeå University, 2009)

Umeå Kommun. Umeå Index 2009 (Umeå: Umeå Kommun, 2009)

Jacobs, Jane. The Death and Life of Great American Cities (New York: Random House, 1961)

Umeå Kommun. Korta Fakta om Umeå Kommun 2008 (Umeå: Umeå Kommun, 2008)

Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism: Or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (London:Verso Books, 1990)

Umeå Kommun. Kommun Fakta 2011 (Umeå: Umeå Kommun, 2011)

Koolhaas, Rem and Mau, Bruce. S,M,L,XL (New York: Monacelli Press, 1995)

Umeå Kommun. Vad Tycker Studenterna? Webbaserad Enkätundersökning för att Identifiera Mål för Studentkommunsamarbetet (Umeå: Umeå Kommun, 2007)

Lefebvre, Henri. Writings on cities, translated from french [le droit a la ville, 1968] (Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 1996) Leyk, Dietmar. Embracing Difference: from Urban Scenarios to Critical Brief in Hunch 13 (Rotterdam: Nai publishers / Berlage Institute, 2009) Lindqvist, Eric , För Egen Maskin, Tillgänglighet till Service som Cyklist eller Fotgängare i en Medelstor Svensk Stad (Umeå: Umeå University, 2010) Pillay, Johan and Kushch, Paul. Vad Anser Studenter Vara en Attraktiv Stad? (Umeå: Umeå University, 2009)

Umeå City Homepage http://www.umea.se Van Toorn, Roemer. Rethinking city Spectacle, Linz Cultural Capital 2009 in Linz / Texas, A City Relates, Editors Angelika Fitz, Martin Heller (Vienna: Springer, 2009) http://www.roemervantoorn.nl/linzrethinkingci.html Van Toorn, Roemer. Aesthetics as a form of politics in Hunch volume 11, (Rotterdam: Nai publishers / Berlage Institute, 2007) http://www.roemervantoorn.nl/aestheticsasafor.html

Westin, Sara. ¨…Men Vart Ska Ni Då Ta Vägen?¨ Ombyggnation Ur Hyresgästernas Perspektiv, Institute for Housing and Urban Research (Uppsala: Uppsala University, 2011) Zaera Polo, Alejandro. The politics of the envelope: A political critique of materialism in volume 17, (Amsterdam: Archis, 2008)pp 76 - 105; available online at http://c-lab.columbia.edu

Matthew Ashton

Van Toorn, Roemer. Fresh Conservatism in Quaderns 215 (Barcelona: Actar, 1998) http://www.roemervantoorn.nl/freshconservatis.html

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Van Toorn, Roemer. Against the Hijacking of the Multitude in Transurbanism, V2, (Rotterdam: Nai Publishers, 2002) http://www.roemervantoorn.nl/againstthehijack.html

Zones Urbaines Sensibles Schieblock: Making the Temporary City in Hunch 14 (Rotterdam: Nai publishers / Berlage Institute, 2010)

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