Social Interchange

SOCIAL INTERCHANGE Reclaiming Ownership of Urban Infrastructures

Melissa Peter

CONTENTS

MANIFESTO (AND OTHER ESSAYS) [01]

Social Interchange: Abstract

06

[02]

Communicative Outlets

09

[03]

Multitude in Common

13

[04]

Subverting Spectacle

17

[05]

Planning Unplanned

25

[06]

Networked Urbanity

29

DESIGN PROJECT

Published by Blurb Press Copyright 2013, Melissa Peter/ Cal Poly Architecture Department All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written consent of the copyright owners. At the time of publishing, all content created by the author is believed to be either public domain or used appropriately according to the standards of fair use and attribution. Inaccuracies may be directed to the attention of the author and will be corrected in subsequent editions.

First Edition, 2013.

Special thanks to: Jackson Studio 2013 and Thesis Advisor Doug Jackson

[07]

Site: Mapping The Network

[08]

Genetics 51

[09]

Mutations 67

39

PROBE [10]

Thesis Show

129

MANIFESTO (And other essays)

[01-06]

Cedric Delsaux, Stormtroopers under bridge, Paris, 2004 http://www.cedricdelsaux.com/en/photos/ dark-lens.html

4

5

ABSTRACT Physical manifestations of public space need to be redefined in order to embody cultural ideals of social connectivity. Mass media is a successful model of society’s communicative outlet in the virtual realm: in its ability to incite involvement and creativity. Architecture is also a communicator with the public. Architecture, as the physical communicator, is too often projecting a message driven by the mundane, top-down nature, conveying corporate or institutional messages of control, rather than those of a multitude of individuals.

“Multicultural” cities, like Los Angeles, exist more as a series of distinct microcosms, rather than a heterogeneous unit. The freeway system as it exists in Los Angeles and other urban cities, holds the most potential to operate as a networked set of public spaces, more akin to the communication we value culturally through the digital network. In its current state, however, the freeway is ambivalent in doing so. The freeway suggests that it breaks down divisions throughout the city in this way, but actually operates to create them.

While the spread of the system reaches a multitude, it does so hierarchically, lifted off the ground and away from the activity of the ground plane, rather than in a rhizomatous way. It creates boundary conditions unprecedented by way of its scale, shift of speed, and elevation. Experiences of its use are isolating and desolate in its current state. A series of mutations within the freeway system promote instead, a networked public space that invites bottom-up participation, genuine social exchange, and an objective public.

These mutations provide for an ad-hoc, spontaneous connectivity that fixed and discreet elements do not provide. The transformations promote a looser, less predefined use of the freeway in relation to its surroundings. The family of mutations, however, is inextricably linked by the nature of the connective freeway thread, and a set of material and operational techniques based on the freeway system itself. “The overpass”, for example, is a morphology of the minuscule pedestrian bridge versus freeway condition, affording opportunities instead for visual and physical inclusion by blurring these dualities.

A focus is placed on “the tower”, having the ability to generate power by way of the common, giving a frame of reference for which the multitude can relate. A continuously ramped tower creates slightly articulated ambiguous platforms for cars, pedestrians, and the in between. Continuously sculpted surfaces not only blur distinction between freeway and building, types of mobility and occupation, but also floor, wall, ceiling, and enveloping capabilities. Digital media pixels are embedded in these surfaces, allowing for the display of uploaded bottom-up information content to be broadcast at large. Opportunities for overlap, maximum chance interactions, and unplanned activities are promoted by a somewhat haphazard set of amalgamations within a set of formal principals. They serve to blur distinctions between freeway and city grid, and aim to dissolve physical compartmentalization in hopes of doing the same culturally.

6

[01]

SOCIAL INTERCHANGE A series of mutations within the freeway promote networked publics, otherwise frustrated by its existence. Slightly articulated, ambiguous surfaces are pleached from freeway into building, blurring boundaries between various types of mobility. Facadeembedded LED pixels allow for bottom-up content uploading and broadcasting, promoting ownership by the multitude over the institution.

7

[02]

COMMUNICATIVE OUTLETS

Physical Versus Digital

“

Dear Kazys, In his surreal and strangely plausible The Buick, French artist Cédric Delsaux draws from the abounding cultural archive as he conflates the fictional space and time of a galaxy far, far away with the real space and time of a vague and almost equally alien global city. In our increasingly connected and atemporal culture, one that routinely remixes, re-shuffles, and re-synchronizes, worlds are produced which, in their very untimeliness, manifest the curious historiographic sensibilities of our time. Under pressure from globalization and new technology, we are faced with a condition that you have called “the immediated real,” in which we inhabit a present that we configure within the networked media. How does this new network culture both define and react to architecture and popular culture today?

—Eds.1 1

Cornell Journal Of Architecture. 8:RE

” Cedric Delsaux, The Buick, Dubai, 2009 http://www.cedricdelsaux.com/en/photos/dark-lens.html

8

9

http://visualogs.com/images/2013/02/the-matrix-online-wallpaper-HD-.jpg

Physical manifestations of public space need to be redefined in order to embody cultural ideals of social connectivity. Productive space must be re-imagined for genuine

bottom-up exchange to reinstate an actively engaged public. “Publics can be reactors, (re)makers, (re)distributors, engaging in a shared culture and knowledge through discourse and social exchange as well as through acts of media reception.”1 Virtual means of communication have broadened the ways that people may socialize with one another, devaluing traditional models of physical space. Social exchange is now possible through means that are also: immaterial, transitive, and networked more rapidly across a larger distance, due to advances in information technology. With the ability to dissolve material limitations of the body and its physical relationship to surroundings in order to hyper-connect, what will become of our view of fixity in the material state? Mass media is a successful model of society’s communicative outlet in the virtual realm: in its ability to incite involvement, creativity, and an engaged public.

1

10

Ito. Networked Publics. Introduction

Architecture is also a communicator with the public, “an effective charge, which is so to speak deposited at a particular place and thereafter “represented” for the benefit of everyone else everywhere.” 2 Architecture, as the

physical communicator, is too often projecting a message driven by the mundane. Architecture of the top-down nature conveys corporate or institutional messages of control, rather than those of a multitude of individuals. “The gradual privatization of urban public space in western cities is having profound effects on contemporary architecture as a whole. It is a game whose end is easily predicted: architecture will end up as infrastructure built to maximize profits within the global economy”3 Architecturally defined public space is material, static, and disjointed. This has led to a decline in the use of traditionally defined and operated public space. Without an outlet to provide for genuine exchange, public opinion is dominated by economically driven voices at large. A non-critical public is doomed to further inequalities, poverty, and injustices. As the primary agent of spatial fixity and top down control, architecture holds the responsibility to intervene on this condition. Given its unparalleled expertise in producing critical, alternative space, it is uniquely suited to do so.

2 3

Lefebvre. The Production of Space. 143 Wolf Prix- b5 2 c6: public space. 18

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[03]

MULTITUDE IN COMMON http://pausemag.sjmc.umn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/occupy-banner.jpg

Allowing differentiation within a reference “The power of the grass roots media is that it diversifies; the power of broadcast media is that it amplifies. That’s why we should be concerned with the flow between the two; expanding the potentials for participation represents the greatest opportunity for cultural diversity.”1 An increasing value has been given to the individual as a culture. The advent of open content framework provides ways to cultivate an identity for public display, while digital networks provide paths in which the individual may cater the information they glean according to their own interests. This localization, and dispersion is important for creating distinct differences amongst us. “Internet is a good initial image or model for the multitude because, first, the various nodes remain different but are all connected in the web, and second, the external boundaries of the network are open such that new nodes and new relationships can always be added”2 While individualization and differentiation are especially important to the promotion of diversity, the common is also important for providing a platform with which we may understand and communicate with one another. “We have seen that the flesh of the multitude produces in common in a way that is monstrous and always exceeds the measure of any traditional social bodies.”3

http://www.timessquarenyc.org/image.aspx?id=1543&width=1370&height=847

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1 2 3

Jenkins. Convergence Culture Hardt Negri. Multitude. xv Hardt Negri. Multitude. 196

13

Reversing the Panopticon is a diatribe by Deborah Natsios http://reedperry.com/2011/02/01/reversing-the-panopticon-and-julian-assange-on-conspiracies/

“

The panopticon must not be understood as a dream building: it is the diagram of a mechanism of power reduced to its ideal form.

-Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish, 1977

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The digital network does not operate to produce the common in the way that architecture may. A certain type of exchange is promoted through blog, websites, etc. through the “anonymous” post, and the ability of anything to “make it” Online. The illusion is given that within the multitude each element holds similar value, degrading the value of any one element in the absence of the common frame of reference by which to judge associations. The virtual persona is so far removed from the physical one, that virtual exchange becomes unthoughtful, unintelligent, and indicative of a culture lost of coherent conversational and topical values in the rise of highly individualized, and superficial ones. Physical space allows for a visualization of the framework within which the multitude operates, a system of “checks and balances”, Per Se, that gauge a broader spectrum than the micro-climate of a specified group of “followers” via the Internet. Without the common, our direct exposure to discourse is limited to the telescope of our own lives, rather than these set amidst a global perspective that may change the way we relate to one another outside of this sphere. Architecture holds the potential to break down compartmentalized and stereotyped groups by providing space that is shared, through common needs, goals, and interests, that the digital realm does not.

What will replace the monument, a platform for the visible and physical representation of the common in a highly differentiated world?

The traditional monument’s purpose to sediment blanketed ideas of a society’s power figures throughout time in a fixed location no longer resonates with a culture embracing of temporality, and bottom-up progress through individual contributions. “Monuments are invisible now. They are disproportionate- so large(at the scale of the world) that they can not be seen. Or so small (at the scale of computer chips) that they can not be seen either”1 Monuments, or anti-monuments perhaps should more fittingly be called, are important in that they project the commonalities of the multitude. The shared projection as provided through the medium of architecture is crucial as a platform to grow ideas through the overlapping and juxtaposition of differences amongst commonalities.

” 1

Tschumi de dis ex 216

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[04]

SUBVERTING SPECTACLE Towards participatory consumption

U.S. Situationist graphic, circa 1960’s -Anonymous.

The boundary between spectator, participator, and producer is dissolved in the digital realm. The attempt of architectural intervention in public space should aim to do the same.

“

The question we face at the dawn of network culture is whether we, the inhabitants of our networked publics, can reach across our micro clustered worlds to coalesce into a force capable of understanding the condition we are in and produce positive change …1

”

The city is increasingly sprawled, becoming indefinite and undefined, and even more susceptible to informational subjectivity and isolation.

The suburban life, so far physically removed from globally relevant social activity, is reduced to spectator sport. News, information, and “communication” is pre-ordained and imposed with views of some pseudo- majority. “The question we face at the dawn of network culture is whether we, the inhabitants of our networked publics, can reach across our micro clustered worlds to coalesce into a force capable of understanding the condition we are in and produce positive change …”1 The threshold between social classes is now a cultural matter, rather than simply a physical one. “Have electronics and, more generally, technology replaced the boundaries, the guarded borders of the past?”2 While it has created a hyper-connectivity in a visual sense, technology has become a tool to help isolate class levels physically. .

1 2

16

Varnelis. The Meaning of Networked Culture. Conclusion tschumi 216, de-dis-ex

17

A gate in the traditional sense, did not allow one to see the activities of the other side without entering into it. It operated both to keep out, and to also demand entry for participation in some way. With technological gates we can see the contents without having to participate. Digital envelopes have become the new gates of “super-modernity” in architecture, creating nothing more than the illusion of digital permeability. This usage of the spectacle places the person in a subjective position rather than one that is objective towards it, or towards one another through it. “Modernity expressly reduces so called ‘iconological’

forms of expression (signs and symbols) to surface effects.”1

Attempts to create new technological facades that may communicate to the public, or even better, of the public and by the public, has been a bit like the criticisms of the Internet. “It has come to represent phenomena that might appear anywhere and everywhere. The origins of these phenomena may not only be obscure but also irrelevant.”2 “The new envelope analogously weakens disciplinary autonomy, de-differentiates procedures of design and dissemination, and attempts to dissolve the very distinction between the architectural representation and the larger world of image-spectacles”3 Similar to the process of digitization, new media facades have a way of dissolving their physical context to reach a wider audience. The material nature of the architecture itself is dissolved by further curated and choreographed impenetrable screens.

“Marks are supposed to signify, to be part of a system, and to be susceptible of coding and decoding. Space may be marked physically, as with animal’s use of smells or human group’s use of visual or auditory indicators; alternatively, it may be marked abstractly, by means of discourse, by means of signs.” 4 Markings in our current society are controlled by the one

percent. They are imposed upon us and hence we can only expect to think of the world, the symbolisms we make of these spaces, based upon the ideas of a consumer-driven economic interest in place. Without an inherent disposition to challenge the status quo, we lose interest in creating, as it is already there for us without it. It is in our nature to mark our territory. A number of movements have taken shape by those with the disposition to challenge the norm, including that of parcours, graffiti, and street performance to name a few.

http://modernalice.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/dsc_0288.jpg

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1 Lefebvre. Right to the city. 146 2 88 Terence Riley the global and the local on globalism 3 Michael Hays- the envelope as mediator 4 Lefebvre. The Production of Space. 141

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Architecture needs to promote the involvement of the public in helping to create their environment, and their experiences of it. Symbolism is impractical for new architecture. Symbolism can only be created by that of tradition and is therefore based upon an individuals life experiences, and history. Nostalgia for a past architecture that is symbolic simply for its historical context is not reason enough to recreate buildings for a time that no longer exists, an existing culture that is more ephemeral and fleeting. How do we create permanence, or material realities that allow for variation and temporality of our time? “If and to the extent that production occurs, it will be restricted for a long time to marks, signs and symbols, and these will not affect the material reality upon which they are imprinted.”1 The digital media facade places us, again, as consumers subjected to the curation of the spectacle. What is our purpose here? This existential question becomes very apparent when flooded with digital-visual cues on the daily that we are one of very many.

While we specialize in our minds, our studies, our interests, space does not follow suit. Space does not specialize for our presence, it does not acknowledge our existence. “The ‘reading’ of space is thus merely a secondary and practically irrelevant upshot, a rather superfluous reward to the individual for blind, spontaneous and lived obedience.”2

We may usurp disillusionment by the allure of the intangible visualization of pseudo-connectivity by both producing its creation, and consuming its effect. “The spectacle is not a

collection of images; rather, it is a social relationship between people that is mediated by images”3 Reducing people’s interactions with each other to those with an anonymous voice on a screen has bred a dominance of non-critical, purely consumerist behavior. “Some amount of dramatic spectacle is empirically necessary for reaching and persuading audiences in politics, and what we need is dramatically educated audiences not some grand censor or master of revels approving every political script before it can be performed”4 While the spectacle has its value in projecting cultural ideals through iconography, its consumption must be paired with its inception, and its critique. An open dialogue between the two will provide a system of analysis: that the projected is in fact representational of the beneficial. Fed with pop-ups and special effects, We must make a spectacle out of our criticisms of such. An external projection of an attitude, created by public experiences contained within a new architectural paradigm, will promote an interested public. “The key issue is the role of the engaged spectator or the user. The question is whether activities or actions of that user in fact constitute the artwork.

Let’s say that without the participation of the user there is nothing.”5

Yet Another Introduction to the Situationist International issue #27, 1997

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1 Lefebvre. The Production of Space. 143 2 ibid.

3 Debord. Society of the spectacle.

4 Parkinson. Democracy and Public Space: The Physical Sites of Public Performance. 48 5 Eliasson

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CONTROLLED

SUPERFICIAL

Photography c. Paul Raftery/Artur http://archrecord.construction.com/projects/bts/archives/museums/0401_kunsthaus/photos.asp

http://www.moscone.com/community/benefit/publicart_scofidio.html

DIFFERENTIATION

Cook and Fournier’s Kunsthaus Graz

BIX Media Facade

A regulatory database can be tapped into by discretely located individuals, and then broadcast for the public. Similar to the way Colin Fournier speaks of his and Peter Cook’s inspiration in that “The process of globalization, understood as the ability for cultural seeds to travel far afield and land in odd and unsuspecting places, may be found to have an acceptable face and has always had an important role as a welcome and essential catalyst of urban mutation.”1 The “acceptable face” in this case is the media facade, devoid of making a statement in itself, but rather in the differentiation of its use. While the involvement provokes distinctly different individual inputs, their manifestation is nothing more than a meticulously curated art piece. The problem with homogeneity in material form is that when the content being interpreted and uploaded is also homogeneous in nature, the differentiation required to tag the effect to a source is missing. The relationship of the digital media with the space and experience of the architecture itself does not reflect the character of a multitude of inputs either. The experience is reduced to slight visual fluctuations in a blanket effect. The idea does not ingrain in ones physical being, and does not resonate for that fact.

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1

84 Colin Fournier - “a friendly alien: the Graz Kunsthaus”

FACADE

Diller Scofidio and Renfro’s Facsimile

Traversing video screens create an interest dynamic between the virtual and the real, but still only manages to do so with 2d means. The project plays with the element of time, delaying the gap between live action and recording. This progresses the interaction from simple projection, to an image that provokes a certain inquiry and mental involvement by the spectator. While Diller Scofidio’s facsimile alludes to a spatial change vis a vis a digital one, it still does not in fact change physical space, however.

The architecture does not come into play. While the gap is created by the architect and filled by the user, it is done so in their mind rather than in their involvement with the provocateur physically. Digital means are perhaps the most feasible way to create a dynamic facade, constantly in flux and embedded with information that is both individualized and collective. For digital media facades to resonate within the field of architecture, however, they need to have a relationship with the spatial configurations of the building and its surroundings, and impose a certain forwardness in their ability to pervade not only the mind, but also the body. Digital facades need to be made in order to subvert the spectacle, promoting interaction with it, but also with one another through it.

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[05]

PLANNING UNPLANNED Allowing differentiation within a reference Designing a framework for the allowance of unexpected results is mandatory in evoking a vested public interest in architecture and collectively used spaces. The prominent existence of the expected has made

society go numb to its surroundings. Point A to point B is no longer memorable as a collection of events, but a melted blur of non-happen-stance. While specifically programmed spaces may at times be mandatory, the habitants should form this activity by way of transforming the architecture of the space by its use at that time, while experiencing alternative spatial experiences and qualities upon its happening. The framework should be open enough to allow for a certain amount of unintended use. On the contrary, creativity will not appear without suggestion. It must be paired with designed framework that catalyzes input.

First Fridays at Abbot Kinney, Venice Beach, LA, CA http://www.thecorsaironline.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/3826268984.jpg

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AD HOC

PREEMPTIVE

http://www.rudi.net/pages/16989

http://cdn.theatlanticcities.com/img/upload/2012/02/21/paris.jpg

URBAN FABRIC

Mayor Edi Rama’s Painting Initiative: Tirana

Post-communist Albania‘s architecture continued to hold traces of the iron curtain nature, up until Mayor Rama led the Tirana painting initiative in 2000. The permanence of architecture in its material legacy is often slow to accommodate cultural progression. In an attempt to reinvigorate the city from its drab state, government buildings and street-scape alike were brightly painted. While it may have sparked temporary discussion in the community, in its breadth and scope, the conversation was fleeting, and its effects, superficial. In 2003 the Tirana Biennale furthered the initiative, turning the city into a collaborative art project. While the contemporary nature of these art works alludes to an alternative image, expressive and unique rather than controlled and secured, the effects are not dissimilar. The monotony of the new makes the city read as undifferentiated as before. The problem is that the city does simply “read” rather than create an experience. Facades are turned to canvases, and although involving of the community in their inception, become mere spectacle in their duration.

Tirana: Greening and painting, Re-inventing the Wheel: when colours become politics, written by Edi Rama

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URBAN PLANNING

Haussmann’s Plan for Paris

With the rise of industrialism, population, and urbanization in light of capitalist structure in mid-nineteenth century Paris, a widespread attempt to design a new modernist capital was made not simply to “tinker with the problems of a medieval urban infrastructure” but “[bludgeon] the city into modernity.”1 Haussmann’s design scope included that of streets, roadways, housing blocks, public squares, sewage and water, and parks and squares. Haussmann created a network of monuments, carving widened streets through city blocks, demolishing housing in its wake, for new highly controlled housing blocks. This method of absolute control in urban planning led to forced perspectives to imposed imperialism, rather than an organic flow of a city dedicated to its people. What may appear as a network, only acts to partition the city into the network of economy, and that of the outskirts. Housing becomes further disconnected from the city life, and monotony rules the city’s experience. The network for the bourgeois further distanced classes throughout Paris. Absolute Planning of the city in this case further emphasizes the fault of urban infrastructures to control, to prevent uprising, and to impose regulations on a city disconnected from its inception.

1

Harvey, David. Paris, Capital of Modernity. New York: Routledge, 2003.

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[06]

NETWORKED URBANITY Mutations of a linked Infrastructure As a contributor to its state, architectural intervention has the obligation to deal with growing inequality. Current urban strategies have been targeted

towards densifying outdated models of the city center. Despite this, the edge or boundary condition continues to expand, blurring typical district, or zoning procedures. The historical “core” vs. outrigger typology only further isolates the consumers of suburbia from locations of production that saturate the city center. Heterogenous cities are the prime location to facilitate the cross mixing of these two disparate elements of the city.

A “multicultural” city, due to a cultural tendency toward the comfort of the known, is more like a series of distinct cultural bubbles existing in parallel to one another. Public space as it is exists acts to further isolate exposure to opinions of those inside of a physically limited social network. Public space must be relocated to facilitate the crossing of these boundaries.

Much like the micro sectors in a digital network under the umbrella of the collective and democratic internet, fragmented architectural public spaces must be decentralized, but linked.

“Due to the concentration of economic power in such urban centers, any actions, whether planned spontaneous, would immediately take on unexpected dimensions”1 Edward Burtynsky. Highway #1 Los Angeles, California, USA, 2003

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1

The environmental trigger -Tschumi. 6

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The ability of a location to broadcast debate is important. With landscape urbanism at its close, and an increasingly vertical model for cities on the up, public space must become visible amongst cluttered skylines and monotonous suburban plains. Traditionally, the ground is associated with public activity in its accessibility. As population increases in the city center, any available ground space is taken up by parking and additional building in fill. Notions of accessibility to public space must be moved to high ground, and made with increasing transparency to the public eye, to promote its use. In this way, it can truly become a voice for the city at large in its physical interactivity with the public.

The city is typically stratified in its organization, in order to segregate by wealth and status.

“Along with the still uneven urbanization of suburbia and the growing mismatches in the distribution of jobs, housing, and public transit, the new urbanization processes have been generating almost everywhere increasing problems of social and economic polarization.”1 In its inception, the freeway provided a route for the wealthy to live away from the muck of the city center and be able to float above it while transporting to and from it. Due to the proliferation of the freeway, there are no longer walk-able public spheres within each 20 minute district.

With the loss of this, the majority of public space has been restricted to those experienced in isolation, that of the freeway and the automobile.

The freeway in its current state acts to create visual, physical, and acoustical boundaries in the city from a human perspective. The freeway system prevents efficient use of land due to its geometrical constraints. Life on the streets has become disconnected from life in the tower because of the nature of hermetically sealed transportation: car, elevator car, etc. Public space needs to cut through the layers of social strata that the freeway and car culture has underlined.

We transcend time and space differently today in the physical sense. Mobility has given us a sense of geographic independence.

“Speed annihilates space and compresses time.2” Fixed space loses significance with our ability to transcend it. The architecture of mobility, that of roadside appearance has changed because of this. The car can be equated to another facilitator of the spectacle. Like a film

1 Soja- designing the post metropolis //urban design- Kreiger and Saunders editors 267 2 Fahren, Fahren, Fahren Virilio

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A woman poses in front of the uncompleted Hollywood Freeway, 1952. Courtesy of the Automobile Club of Southern California Collection.

“

It is an acknowledgment that the freeway system in its totality is now a single comprehensible place, a coherent state of mind, a complete way of life, the fourth ecology of the Angeleno.

-Reyner Banham

”

projector, the windshield frames a world physically separated from you. The context of place, now lost by speed, is replaced by building types of drive-ins, parking garages, and gas stations, all focused on gaining visual response for consumerist goals rather than physical relationships for social goals.

Through technology, people find time to socialize by multitasking, rather than setting aside specific times and locations to do so. By implanting public space into mixed-use areas of multiple demographics, usage is enhanced. An overhaul of existing “democratic” infrastructures of the city will interrupt unsubstantial journeys that occupy a substantial amount of time. One of the most widely utilized public spaces is the freeway. “It is an acknowledgment that the freeway system in its totality is now a single comprehensible place, a coherent state of mind, a complete way of life, the fourth ecology of the Angeleno.”1 While public, the experience of it is quite the opposite. The hermetically sealed world of the car is on the one hand encouraging towards individualized attitudes and displays of creativity. The problem with this model as a space for exchange is that on the other hand, there isn’t any. Car culture is here to stay. Cars will become increasingly people friendly and recyclable, while future technologies suggest lowered emissions and noise disruption. If public space is to be relocated to the most accessible domain, as it exists with maximum density at the mercy of the freeway system, then transportation will be mandatory to its enjoyment. Creating yet another formal icon in the city center is not sufficient “The less critical the media is, the more global its reach and the greater its influence.” 2 It might also be argued that criticality can only operate on a localized, if not local, basis. It seems that it is only in these situations that the critical dialogue between artist and audience can develop and cohere.” Spectacles along this journey should be made instead as public think tanks, nodal spaces specific to a multitude of community identities. Display of individual opinions will promote involvement as rooted in our competitive nature. Architecture built off of existing demotivating trajectories can begin to motivate an engaged public.

The freeway system as it exists in Los Angeles and other urban cities, holds the most potential to operate as a networked set of public spaces, more akin to the communication we value culturally through the digital network. In its current state, however, the freeway is ambivalent in doing so. The “velocity they promote, their mono-functional legacy, their ability to stimulate paroxysmal development, and their strong physical and psychological impact have together generated a new 1 Banham “the architecture of four ecologies” 195 2 Terence Riley the global and the local on globalism 88

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urban element characterized by a set of problematic that lacks familiar references and normative solutions.” The freeway alludes to a network typology, connecting a broader set of physical spaces through compressed time and medium of translation. The freeway suggests that it breaks down divisions throughout the city in this way, but actually operates to create them. While the spread of the system reaches a multitude, it does so hierarchically, lifted off the ground and away from the activity of the ground plane, rather than in a rhizomatous way. It segregates type of occupation in a scalar and speed shift inconceivable, and undesirable to any other type of transportation that the motor vehicle. It creates a wall between residential and civic sectors, defining falsified boundary conditions between cultural groups, frustrating other types of connectivity that a digital network does not. Amidst the ad hoc, agglomerated, and sprawled nature of Los Angeles, the freeway is, however, the one recognizable, monumental, and cohesive thread tying it all together. It links together physical space in a way that no other element does in the city, and is the most widely used “public space”, reaching the widest demographic of users through the widest stretch of time.

A series of interventions throughout the freeway system promote instead, a networked public space that invites bottom-up participation, genuine social exchange, and an objective public. These mutations provide for an ad-hoc, spontaneous connectivity that fixed and discreet elements do not provide. The transformations promote a looser, less predefined use of the freeway in relation to its surroundings.

A multitude of individualized experiments along the freeway system, localized in their behavior and inception, give rise to community identity and pride in use. The family of mutations, however, are inextricably linked by the nature of the connective freeway thread, and a set of material and operational techniques based on the freeway system itself.

Rather than introduce a new typology, as imposed and ordained onto a resistant system, the project is a transformation of the freeway material itself. Typological freeway intersection geometries are used as a foundation for developing new intersections from freeway into building, and the in between. Grafted onto, and pleached into occupiable space out of the freeway, concrete slabs peel, branch, and grow into volumetric building form. An unravelled foundation sprawls as it is pulled out of existing ground level operations, and finds its way into a cohesive building form slowly as it loops and coils back together. Limbs drop down to the street level, pick up at the freeway level, and rise to the skyline in order to cut through the social strata associated with height in the city. A continuously ramped tower creates slightly articulated ambiguous platforms for cars, pedestrians, and the in between.

Continuously sculpted surfaces not only blur distinction between types of mobility and occupation, but also floor, wall, ceiling, and enveloping

34

http://nostradome.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/pleaching-complex.jpg

capabilities. A mixing chamber is created for the juxtaposition of things we know and identify with culturally, and those that subvert these. Questionable mutations of what we “know” through identifiable markers, such as road striping beginning to peel with a ground surface across to the facade, cause spectators to pay attention in a critical fashion, where previously blind. Digital media pixels for the display of gathered information are sprinkled across surfaces in a less expected or coherent manner. These pixels peel from the exterior to the interior of the building, inviting a continued participation and physical movement of the body devoid in a typical billboard realization. Opportunities for overlap, maximum chance interactions, and unplanned activities are promoted by a somewhat haphazard set of amalgamations within a set of formal principals. Variety is produced by fluctuations in relationship to site specific conditions, and localized try-outs. As a family of mutations within the genetic material of the freeway system, the results within the city are unpredictable and emergent. They serve to blur distinctions between freeway and city grid, and aim to dissolve physical compartmentalization in hopes of doing the same culturally.

35

DESIGN PROJECT [07-10]

36

37

[07]

SITE: MAPPING THE NETWORK (...And the lack thereof) Images, as seen to the left, of the effects of the freeway on the urban condition, reveal its wrath. While beautiful in form and engineering, the freeway creates distinctive divides in the urban landscape.

Relationships created by its existence almost always act to separate cultures, building types, and scales. What becomes of these adjacencies, then, are big box stores, shopping malls, and consumerist advertisements, targeted at a drive-by audience, rather than a living participant. Residential neighborhoods lining the freeways become crime ridden no-man’s-lands. The vehicular experience of the freeway is also nondescript and purely visual, rather than experiential or engaging.

Expansive spaces are reserved for tactical geometries to control speeds onto and off of the freeway, separating programs by lengths far removed by neighboring residents.

38

39

The Los Angeles Freeway

Community Borders

There 527 Miles Thereof527 Freeway Miles stretched of Freewayacross stretched LA. across LA. While UrbanWhile Parkland Urban access Parkland is limited access toisless limited thanto 1/4 less than 1/4 the nationalthe average, national only average, 8% of workers only 8%don’t of workers have don’t have access to a access vehicle.to (2005 a vehicle.

U.S. Census) (2005 U.S. 70% Census) of workers 70% of workers commute tocommute work via car, to work truck, viaorcar, van. truck, or van.

The freeway,The however freeway, isolating, however is isolating, a democratic is a democratic monument stretching monumentacross stretching cultural across boundaries. cultural boundaries.

Immigrant population Immigrant makes population the culture makes of theLos culture of Los Angeles oneAngeles of the most one of diverse the most in the diverse nation. in the nation.

Directed linguistics Directedof linguistics LA as a “multicultural of LA as a “multicultural city” city” ignore the boundaries ignore the boundaries created between created cultural between cultural groups living groups in parallel. living Distinct in parallel. micro-communities Distinct micro-communities have created have subjective createdviews subjective of selfviews and “other”, of self and “other”, limiting the limiting way in which the way wein socialize. which we socialize.

LA City

02

02

02

There are 527 miles of freeway stretched across Los Angeles. While urban parkland access is limited to less than 1/4 the national average, only eight percent of workers don’t have access to a vehicle. (2005 U.S. Census) 70% of workers commute to work via car, truck, or van. The freeway, however isolating, is a democratic monument stretching across cultural boundaries.

40

02

LA City

LA CountyLA County

01

01

Immigrant population makes the culture of Los Angeles one of the most diverse in the nation. Directed linguistics of Los Angeles as a “multicultural city” ignore the boundaries created between cultural groups living in parallel. Distinct microcommunities have created subjective views of self and “other”, limiting the way in which we socialize.

41

Suburban Sprawl

Open-Content Networking

LA has the 16th largest economy in the world, and considered among states, it is the 5th most populous in the nation. With urban sprawl, densities and poverty build up toward the city center. This centralized model isolates the outlier from places for creative exchange, while leaving the citycenter with little space to do so.

ate ual reates ively with a

A new model is derived from a reclamation of top-down driven infrastructures in order to create open content space for dialog between individual community outliers and a collective hub. This creates resources for communities to formulate a creatively engaged identity locally, while also identifying with a more global scope.

HUB 001: Downtown LA

People/ sq. mi: 4,770 (57,400 day flux) Avg. Household Income: $ 15,003

NODE 001: Compton 03

7

03

Los Angeles has the 16th largest economy in the world, If considered among states, the city of LA alone is the fifth most populous in the nation. With urban sprawl, densities and poverty build up toward the city center. This centralized model isolates the outlier from places for creative exchange, while leaving the city center with little space to do so.

42

04

People/ sq. mi: 9200 Avg. Household Income: $ 43,157

A new model is derived from a reclamation of top-down controlled infrastructures in order to create open content space for dialog between individual community outliers and a collective hub. This creates resources for communities to formulate a creatively engaged identity locally, while also identifying with a more global scope.

43

44

45

LOS ANGELES REGIONS

LOS ANGELES REGIONS

Los Angeles Districts

As compared by ethnicity, income, and population density.

South LA

South LA

Central LA

West LA

Central LA

03

West LA

03 03 02 01

01

110 Freeway

110 Freeway

01

Downtown Los Angeles

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

03 02 01

02

Watts

10 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 5

As bordered by the 405 and the 110

Crenshaw and Jefferson

02 02

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 105 Site Analysis Diagram highlighting the disconnect between micro communities as bounded by freeway zoning within Los Angeles, reinforced by their distinct population, income, and ethnicity statistics.

Watts

03 10 Freeway

110 Freeway 01

105 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 5

Downtown Los Angeles 110 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

At 8th Street and Francisco

As bordered by the 405 a

Crenshaw and J

10 Freeway

At Jefferson Blvd. and Crenshaw Blvd.

Income $25,161/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

$15,003/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

02

$38,209/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

Population 17,346 people/sq. mi.

Among the highest for LA

4,770 people/sq. mi.

Among the Lowest for LA

14,686 people/sq. mi.

Among the Highest for LA

01

Ethnicity

105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

110 Freeway

At 8th Street and Francisco

10 Freeway

At Jefferson Blvd. and C

Income 46

$25,161/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

$15,003/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

$38,209 47

Among the low

Regional Disparities

Between density and income

Population density as it concentrates towards the Downtown region of Los Angeles.

48

Distribution of wealth as it concentrates towards the outskirts, in the suburbs of LA County.

49

VARIABLE RESPONSE

as based on speed and traffic reports

[08] COLOR Minimal Distractions Autopilot

GENETICS

IMAGE

As defined by Evolutionary Characteristics

Maximum Visual Interest Limited public Participation

TEXT Maximum public Participation

@#%*!

Minimal building control

“YOUR� AD HERE

50

Mutations of the existing freeway condition are defined by a set of genetics, promoting an integrative whole, rather than the current binary. The consumerist advertisement is subverted by use of an open content billboard, facilitating interaction between people through the architecture. Embedded LED pixels , as well as a set of formal characteristics that help define the system show up in various shapes and sizes within each mutation. This genetic makeup creates a set of family traits that unites and links each individual mutation within an overall network, while allowing enough differentiation for each to adapt to its surroundings and create individualized circumstances for each site.

51

Turning Radii Relationship

A

A

Speed as a function of Radius

Genetics defining curvature at various points along a path

B

470'-0"

Turning Radii Relationship 65-45 MPH

A

A

CIRCULATION DESIGN

65-45 MPH

As a factor of speed

A

N

C

A

D

45-25 MPH

45-25 MPH

B R230’

B

B

470'-0"

45-25 MPH

R230' 25-15

R150'-0" Vehicular to Pedestrian Relationship

R230' C

6' PED 6' BIKE 24' V

MPH

0-15 MPH

D

R50'-0

R25

25-15 MPH

C

Vehicular to Pedestrian Relationship

D

R50'-0"

R50'-0" separation/ stratification

Speeds in which Safety is of most importance

Vehicular to Pedestrian 01 Relationship

R150'-0"

6' PED 6' BIKE 24' VEHICULAR

D

0-15 MPH

Vehicular to Pedestrian Relationship

0

C

R230’ Diagram explaining speed as a R230' function of radius, as referenced by the California Highway Design manual. Larger radii allow for a transition zone for initially dangerous speeds, to tighter radii which encourage control and awareness while intermingling with pedestrians at similar speeds.

25-15 MPH

C

R150'-0"

C

C

52

B R230’

470'-0"

B

Turning Radii Relationship

B

R230'

Turning Radii Relationship

A

D

B

D

65-45 MPH

A

B2

R230’ 470'-0" 45-25 MPH

R50'-0"

6' PED 6' BIKE 24' VEHICULAR

R50'-0"

R25'-0"

R25'-0"

6' PED 6' BIKE 24' VEH 53

A

R150'-0" Vehicular to Pedestrian Relationship

01

Surface Manipulations

R230’ Genetics defining surface at various speeds and elevations 5 MPH 45-25 MPH

25-1565-45 MPH MPH

0-15 MPH

6' PED 6' BIKE 24' VEHICULAR

B

R50'-0"

R230'

D ionship

ace Manipulation

C

s to blur470'-0" lines between Pedestrian ehicular Traffic as speeds decrease

B 03

C

Surface Ambiguity

D

Decision making and awareness is returned to the driver, enforcing engagement and participation

Separation/ Stratification separation/ stratification

R150'-0"

Vehicular [FWY] Approach

Vehicular to Pedestrian Relationship 03

01

Speeds Speeds in which Safety is of mostat which safety is of importance R25'-0" utmostR25'-0" importance

6' PED 6' BIKE 24' VEHICULAR 01

R50'-0"

02

02

R50'-0"

45-25 MPH

03 02

trian Relationship

separation/ stratification

Pedestrain [STreet] Approach

6' PED 6' BIKE 24' VEHICULAR

01

Diagram explaining how surface manipulations are used to progress from complete pedestrian and vehicle isolation to a more cohesive and ambiguous whole, as used in the project to encourage interaction within an otherwise hermetically sealed and unsubstantial journey.

54

eet Interchanges

Street Interchanges

As Referenced for FWY to BLDG Transitions [CHP Highway Design Manual]

03

Begins to blur lines between Begins to blur linespedestrian betweenand Pedestrian vehicular traffic

02

and Vehicular Traffic as speeds decrease

25-15 MPH

03

Vehicular [FWY] Approach

Surface Ambiguity

tion/ stratification

n which Safety is of most ce

Speeds in which Safety is of most importance

Surface Manipulation Surface Manipulation

Decision making awareness is returned to the driver enforcing engagement and participation over the typical auto-pilot system

Surface Manipulation

02

Begins to blur lines between Pedestrian and Vehicular Traffic as speeds decrease

Surface Ambiguity

03

Decision making and awareness is returned to the driver, enforcing engagement and participation 03

55

S

D d

56

57

ramping

Ramping Strategies

Interweaving Programmable and Circulatory Space

58

01

Loop Interchange

02

Double DIamond Interchange

03

Clover Interchange

04

Loop Interchange

05

Loop Interchange

Compact Floors extend Vertically

Linked/Related programmable space

Multiple perspectives Woven vehicular/pedestrian relationships

Exterior Pedestrian Circulation+Perspective Interior Vehicular Circulation+Perspective

Interior Pedestrian Circulation+Perspective Exterior Vehicular Circulation+Perspective

59

tail Embedded Open-Content Pixels

190’

Genetics defining facade imaging at the pixel level

Tubular Cavities are randomly arranged as 4 sizes for variety of texture and visual interest 16”, 12”, 8”, 4”

Iconography/History 60

16” LED

Pixels become wider spaced and dissipate as opposed to a hard line for improved architectural integration

Call and Response

Bottom-Up Art

1.5’ concrete

random gatherings of pixels add texture without clarity

Current Events 61

TRAFFIC RESPONSIVE SMART FACADE TRAFFIC RESPONSIVE SMART FACADE TRAFFIC RESPONSIVE SMART FACADE Traffic Responsive TRAFFIC RESPONSIVE SMARTSMART FACADE TRAFFIC RESPONSIVE FACADE Genetics defining Different modes of operation for the LED Facade as it responds to local traffic conditions TRAFFIC RESPONSIVE SMART FACADE

AVG SPEED AVG SPEED Frequent updates streamed from Traffic.com FrequentAVG updates streamed from Traffic.com SPEED AVG SPEED Frequent updates streamed from Traffic.com AVG SPEED Frequent updates streamed from Traffic.com Frequent updates streamed from Traffic.com 45-75 MPH AVG SPEED 45-75 MPH Frequent updates streamed from Traffic.com Jam Factor: 45-75 MPH 45-75 MPH Jam Factor: 7 45-75 MPH7 Jam Factor:

7 7

Jam Factor: 45-75 MPH Jam Factor: 7 Jam Factor:

7

VARIABLE RESPONSE VARIABLEasRESPONSE based on speed and traffic reports as based onVARIABLE speed and traffic reports RESPONSE VARIABLEas RESPONSE based on speed and traffic reports VARIABLE RESPONSE as based on speed and traffic reports as based on speed and traffic reports

VARIABLE RESPONSE

as based on speed and traffic reports

COLOR COLOR

COLOR COLOR Minimal COLOR

Minimal DistractionsDistractions COLOR Minimal Minimal Autopilot Distractions Distractions Autopilot Minimal Minimal Distractions Autopilot DistractionsAutopilot Autopilot Autopilot

25-45 MPH 25-45 MPH 25-45 MPH 25-45 MPH Jam Factor: 5 Jam Factor: 25-45 MPH Jam Factor: 5 25-45 MPH Jam Factor:

5 5 5

Jam Factor: Jam Factor: 5

0-25 MPH 0-25 MPH 0-25 MPH Jam Factor: 2 0-25Factor: MPH Jam 0-25 MPH Jam 0-25Factor: MPH 2 Jam Factor: Jam Factor: Jam Factor: 2

Diagram of the media facade as a traffic responsive system, by allowing for engagement and participation when otherwise trapped in eternal rush hour.

62

IMAGE

IMAGE

IMAGE

IMAGE

Maximum Visual Maximum IMAGE Visual Interest IMAGE Interest Maximum Visual Maximum Visual Interest Limited public Limited public Interest Maximum Visual Participation Maximum Visual Participation Interest Limited public Interest Limited public Participation Participation Limited public Limited public Participation Participation

2 2 2

TEXT

TEXT TEXT Maximum public Maximum public@#%*!

TEXT Participation Maximum public Participation TEXT TEXT Participation Maximum public@#%*!

Minimal building Minimal building Participation control Maximum public Maximum public Minimal building control Participation @#%*!

Participation control Minimal building control building Minimal Minimal building control control

@#%*! @#%*! @#%*!

63

ECT PIXELS

ping Strategies LED Striping

3 rows of 4” Pixels Median Striping ~(16”) 4 rows of 4” Pixels

Genetics defining the extent of the LED system Planar Pixel Planar PixelStriping Striping Provides guidelines when circulation focused

Provides guidelines when circulation traffic lanes are necessary. focused traffic lanes are necessary Lane Division Striping ~(1’) 3 rows of 4” Pixels Lane Division Striping ~(1’) 3 rows of 4” Pixels Median Striping ~(16”) 4 rows of 4” Pixels

Elevational Pixel Striping Elevational Pixel Striping

Emphasizes unpredictability

Emphasizes unpredictability and redirects Redirects decision making to the person decision making to the person while deDe-emphasizes systematic emphasizing a systematic a approach, which auto-pilot approach causes driversdrivers to pay more to merging Causes toattention pay more attention to merging pedestrian paths and other types of circulation.

pedestrian paths and other types of circulation

Elevational Pixel Striping Emphasizes unpredictability Redirects decision making to the person De-emphasizes a systematic auto-pilot approach Causes drivers to pay more attention to merging pedestrian paths and other types of circulation

Drawing of the LED Pixel system as it extends to way finding and road striping as an integrated building system component.

64

65

The Overpass

[09]

MUTATIONS The Billboard

The Tower

66

Nodal Occurrences defined by their genetics A series of mutations throughout the freeway promote a networked public space that invites bottom-up participation, genuine social exchange, and an objective public. The transformations promote a cohabitation of multiple types of mobility, dissolving existing dualities between vehicle and pedestrian, city ground and elevated highway. Each node takes its formal state from a relation between the cohesive set of genetics, and its surrounding context.

67

South LA

Central LA

West LA

03

THE OVERPASS :

03 02 01

The overpass mutates and extrapolates on the existing condition seen throughout suburban Los Angeles: where a miniscule pedestrian bridge connects two disparate zones 02 of housing as divided by the colossal freeway. The mutation, instead, provides for interactions between pedestrian, car, and 110 Freeway 10 Freeway the in between as facilitated by the slightly articulated, and As bordered by the 10 and As Central bordered by LA the 405 and the 110 South LAthe 5 simultaneously ambiguous sculpted surfaces.West LA

01 LOS ANGELES REGIONS 110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

Downtown Los 03 Angeles

Watts

Crenshaw and Jefferson

LOS ANGELES REGIONS 03 02 01

02South LA

01

Central LA

03

03

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

01

LOS ANGELES REGIONS South LA

105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

10 Freeway

At 8th Street and Francisco

Watts

03 02 01

Population

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

Among the lowest for LA

02 Income

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 5

17,346 people/sq. mi.

Among theDowntown highest forLos LA Angeles

Watts

Population

Ethnicity

68

105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

02

110 Freeway

10 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 5

Downtown Los Angeles

As bordered by the 405 and the 110

03

Crenshaw and Jefferson

$38,209/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

110 Freeway

At 8th Street and Francisco

02

10 FreewayADAMS, LOS ANGELES, CA WEST As bordered by the 405 and the 110

01 4,770 people/sq. mi.Avg. $25,161/yr.

Among the lowest for LA Among the Lowest for LA Crenshaw and Jefferson 105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

17,346 people/sq. mi.

02

01

01

$15,003/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA 01

Crenshaw and Jefferson

02

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

$25,161/yr. Avg.

As bordered by the 405 and the 110

At Jefferson Blvd. and Crenshaw Blvd.

110 Freeway

Income

10 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 5

01

West LA 110 Freeway

03

110 Freeway

Downtown Los Angeles

Watts

03 02 01 Central LA

West LA

02

Income

Among the highest for LA

Ethnicity

Among the lowest for LA

$25,161/yr. 03 Avg.

14,686$15,003/yr. people/sq.

Avg.mi.

Among theHighest lowest for for LA LA Among the

110 Freeway

At 8th Street and Francisco

4,770 people/sq. mi.

Among the Lowest for LA

$15,003/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

10 Freeway

At Jefferson Blvd. and Crenshaw Blvd.

03 $38,209/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA 10 Freeway

At Jefferson Blvd. and Crenshaw Blvd.

14,686 people/sq. mi.

Among the Highest for LA

$38,209/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

Population 110 Freeway

At 8th Street and Francisco

17,346 people/sq. mi.

10 Freeway

Among the Crenshaw highest for LA At Jefferson Blvd. and Blvd.

4,770 people/sq. mi.

Among the Lowest for LA

14,686 people/sq. mi.

Among the Highest for LA69

70

71

72

73

03

03 02 01

THE BILLBOARD:

01relationships The Billboard mutates the existing disparate of freeway, top-down advertisement billboard, and irrelevant adjacencies, by twisting itself to accommodate all three.

Sculpted surfaces allow for multiple mobilities: encouraging LOS ANGELES REGIONS 110 Freeway 110 Freeway exploration, play, and cohabitation by neighboring residential and As bordered by the 10 and the 105 As bordered by the 10 and th high-speed highway-goers alike. At once separated South LAin elevation, Ce LOS ANGELES REGIONS the circulatory paths coil to meet, slowing vehicular traffic in the Los A Downtown Watts process and creating a living street at their confluence.

03 LA South Ce 03

02

03 02 01 02 03

01

01

01

LOS ANGELES REGIONS

01 110 Freeway

110

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

South LA

105Central FreewayLA

110 Freeway Watts LA As bordered West by the 10 and the 105 110 Freeway

110 Dow

Watts

Dow

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

03

As bo

As bo

At 8th Street and Francisco

Income $25,161/yr. Avg.

03 02 01

01

Population

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

$15,003/

Among the lowest for LA 02

01

Among the lowe

01

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 5

105 Freeway As bordered by10 Alameda and S. Central Freeway

110

At 8t

As bordered by the 405 and the 110

17,346 people/sq.

105mi.

Freeway

4,770 people 110

Among the for LA Crenshaw and Among the Low Downtown Loshighest Angeles Watts Jefferson WATTS, LOS ANGELES, CA Income As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

At 8t

$25,161/yr. Avg.

Ethnicity

01

Income

Among the lowest for LA

02 Population

Among the lowest for LA

Population

$25,161/yr. Avg.

17,346 people/sq. mi.

03

Among the highest for LA

17,346 people/sq. mi.

74

105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

Ethnicity

110 Freeway

At 8th Street and Francisco

Among the highest for LA 75 10 Freeway

At Jefferson Blvd. and Crenshaw Blvd.

76

77

78

79

03 02 01

01

02

THE TOWER:

The urban tower has the to produce “the common”, 110 Freeway 110ability Freeway 10 Freeway

As borderedREGIONS byathe 10 and the 105for which the As bordered by the 10 may and theoperate 5 As bordered by the 405 and th LOS ANGELES reference multitude within.

Unprecedented results arise from its bridging between a South LAdowntown LA Wes Downtown Los Angeles Watts currently office dominated regionCentral east ofCrenshaw the 110 and Jeffe LOS ANGELES REGIONS freeway, and a residential region south west of the freeway. The 03 bottom-up open content on unexpected Southmedia LA facade takesCentral LA We proportions in this downtown node, absorbing and projecting content at both a local and 03 global scale .

02

03 02 01

01

03 02 01

01

01

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

LOS ANGELES REGIONS South LA

Watts 110 Freeway 110 Freeway

At 8th Street and As bordered by the 10 andFrancisco the 105

110 Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 5

As bord

Crens 10 F

At10 Jefferson As bordered by the and the 5 Blvd. and Crensha As bo

Cren

02

03

$25,161/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA 01

Population

02

$15,003/yr. Avg.

17,346110 people/sq. mi.

Freeway

As bordered by the 10 and the 105

01

105 Freeway

$38,209/yr.

Among the lowest

110 Freeway

10 Fre

At 8th Street and Francisco

4,770 people/sq. mi.

At Jeffe

14,686 people/sq

As bordered by the 10 and the 5 bordered by the 405 and the 110 CA 105AsFreeway 10 F DOWNTOWN, ANGELES, Among the highest for LA LOS Among the Lowest for110 LAFreeway Among the Highest As bordered by Alameda and S. Central At 8th Street and Francisco At Je Income

Downtown Los Angeles

Watts

02

Among the lowest for LA 01

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

110 Freeway

Income

Ethnicity

02 Population

10 Freeway

Crenshaw and Jefferson

$25,161/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

$25,161/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

17,346 people/sq.03 mi.

01 105 Freeway

As bordered by Alameda and S. Central

80

10 Fre

Downtown Los Angeles 110 Freeway10 Freeway

Income

03 02 01

02

Downtown Los Angeles

Watts West LA

Central LA

02

Population Ethnicity 110 Freeway At 8th Street and Francisco

Among the highest for LA

17,346 people/sq. mi.

Among the highest for LA 10 Freeway

$25,161/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

$15,003/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

A

$15,003/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

4,770 people/sq. mi.

Among the Lowest for LA

4,770 people/sq. mi.

Among the Lowest for LA

At Jefferson Blvd. and Crenshaw Blvd.

Ethnicity

Income

$15,003/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

$38,209/yr. Avg.

Among the lowest for LA

81

14,

Am

14

A

82

83

park Picnic Drive

bike

bike

Drive park

park food trucks

shop Drive Picnic

Beach Car wash

bike

Pedestrian Access from Francisco St.

Vehicular Access from 110 Freeway

84

85

+100’

86

+200’

87

+400’

88

+700’

89

“Due to the concentration of economic power in such urban centers, any actions, whether planned spontaneous, would immediately take on unexpected dimensions�1

90

1 -Bernard Tschumi Architecture and Disjunction (6)

91

At +100’ a more pavilion like base unfolds to scoop up traffic of all types. An ejection of geometry sprawls over the freeway to create a billboard for localized passersby on the 110 freeway. Programs are loosely defined in this zone by the sloping and separating of ramps for cars and pedestrians. In-between surfaces are covered with various textures for a varied experience, including sand for beach-volleyball and the like, grass for picnicking or relaxing, and pavers for traversing or patio seating. Car related programs extend out to the arms closest to the freeway, including an indoor/outdoor car wash, and a pedestrian bridge peels out across the 110 to attract Los Angeles city residents into the mix.

92

93

At +200’ exists the splitting point for vehicular occupants and all other types of mobility. A large platform for circulating, turning, and parking accommodates various functions as imagined or formed by its users. Food truck gatherings allow for outdoor picnicking, etc. while the more fixed In-n-Out suggests that drive-through cars become part of the social experience.

Juxtapositions like these are designed in hopes of encouraging those who would typically isolate themselves in their vehicle .

94

95

+400’ high into the tower, it begins to wrap itself into a cohesive building form, emulating the surrounding context. Leasable space places unsuspecting users at the mercy of media facades responsive to a larger demographic. Interesting relationships arise between office, retail, etc. owners representing the 1%, and their ability to view media as uploaded by the commuters and other local uploaders representing the 99%. Ramping surfaces continue for pedestrians and cyclists using the adjacent programs. The tower still accommodates new interactions between multiple mobilities by way of its visible half level platforms and interstitial spaces.

96

97

A culmination of program exists at +700’ high, as the tower loops to create a final billboard, now reaching multiple regional communities in its visibility and communicative effects. An outdoor viewing deck caps the tower, as it exists within the skyline of Los Angeles. This space relates to the enclosed bar just below. Users of this space look out to other rooftop decks of downtown, and are viewed reciprocally by office-goers and downtown deck-partyers alike. Unique to the open-content tower in regards to other corporate roof decks is its interest group of users. In its flexibility, and loosely defined function and participatory capabilities, it reaches a wider demographic of users than the typical post 9-5 white collar work party.

98

99

The tower aims to operate at multiple speeds, encouraging different levels of interaction associated with each. As a passerby on the highway 110, commuters are provided with a new and exciting visual engagement with the architecture. Images are being rear projected from the LED pixel embedded surfaces that individuals have uploaded their thoughts, images, jokes, etc. to. The building at this scale of engagement becomes an interactive billboard, unique and highly differentiated in its content, which is also made integral to the form of the building.

100

101

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The tower purposefully unravels at its base, taking longer to develop into more typical building form as it negotiates and compromises with the forces of the freeway and the surrounding city context. It merges freeway and building, swooping with wider radii at the base, and extending arms with which to pick up pedestrians and other types of mobility.

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Adjacent to the freeway, as the building peels away from purely circulatory traffic, it stretches its platforms for enhanced and varied types of mobility. These areas encourage such events as farmers markets: inviting food trucks, vendors, bikes, and pedestrians alike to both circulate and stay. Folding surfaces create sitting areas while flattened portions encourage circulation within an otherwise ambiguous differentiation. The unraveling of geometry just above the typical billboard height reaches over the freeway, projecting creativity and ideas of the people to passersby.

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The conclusion of the tower is a final projected surface, a billboard that reaches audiences by viewability on a more regional scale due to its height and positioning amongst the skyline. Capable of housing events of many kinds, the sky lobby just below spills outside, where inhabitants can upload content directly into this and other surfaces of the tower. Related or unrelated themes create interesting relationships between the event and the information projected from the tower by the people.

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[10] Designed so as to showcase Doug Jackson’s thesis student’s work in cooperation with themes of their intent, the final show, entitled “Probe”, enhanced viewer interaction with the work by providing tools with which to augment and reveal additional content.

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1 Plywood projection display panel 2 Panel spacer 3 Panel hanging structure 4 connecting lateral beam 5 Beam hanger to chamfered concrete building structure 6 Profile trigger key 7 Model base 8 Projector hanger box 9 Gooseneck augmentation connection

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Left: Component detail of projector hanger box Above: Component detail of gooseneck connectors to

augmentation devices including a light, a decoder pad holster and case, and a magnifying lens.

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Through the use of Ubi software, and a strategically placed Kinect within the projector boxes hanging in front of the projection display panels, the presentations were made as interactive flash documents, allowing for the use of multi-touch features and direct navigation by touch with the images by use of buttons and other individualized wayfinding devices. Through an additional partnering software group, Aurasma, slides were made to reveal additional content, or “overlays”, when the correct “trigger” image was scanned with the decoding tablet provided, which was tuned into a specific channel for each individual project. Overlays included such content so as to augment and provide additional information when PROBED by the viewer, in charge of their own experience of the work, and encouraged to engage and interact with the work by doing so.

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A field condition was created for the gallery, enhancing the feel of selfnavigation and exploration with the work. Each station was provided also with an individual’s “Probe” Profile trigger, which when scanned with the decoding device, would reveal the student’s profile video and introductory page within the frame to the left of the content projection. Model bases were also strategically placed within reach of the decoding tablets, which through Aurasma, also served as triggers for additional content overlays.

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