AN ADAPTIVE RESPONSE TO PERI-URBAN CHANGE

Typology: Masterplan

Location: Sekinchan, Selangor, Malaysia

Status: Proposal

Year: 2023

Peri-Urban Change

In a rapidly urbanizing climate of Malaysia, peri-urban areas are undergoing massive changes to their identity, roles and landscape as urban areas continually expand into the countryside, forming a new urban-rural interface. Sekinchan is a coastal peri-urban town located 50km away from Kuala Lumpur and is known as the village of fish and paddy for its main exports of rice, seafood and other cash crops. In recent years, local government policies and grassroots organizations have championed the way for the development of an emergent tourism industry which functions as an economic diversification strategy for locals during off seasons between harvests.

Masterplan Strategy

The project examines how the roles of peri-urban sites are adapting and diversifying. It aims to respond to the increasing tourist demands by providing public spaces and architecture that is adaptable to the varying needs of both locals and tourists. Additionally, the complex nature of tourism as a form of consumption is ever changing as tourist demands grow. By providing a tourist interpretive path from the paddy to ocean with nodes of adaptive spaces in between, the proposal aims to create a comprehensive strategy for the integration of local lifestyle and productive processes as a means of consumption for the cultural tourism industry. The use of “architecture acupuncture” can serve as a solution to stimulate economic development through minimal interventions at key pressure points. These pressure points are identified based on open space usage, proximity to production industries, correlation to festival routes and intersection between local and tourists.