Activating the Public Realm: Provisional Urbanism for a Permanent Future
M.Arch. Independent Capstone Project 2021 Arizona State University SHRISTI OJHA Advisor PHILIP HORTON Clinical Assc Prof of Architecture | Sr Sustainability Scientist The Design School, Arizona State University
Committee of Chairs
ELIZABETH McLEAN, AIA Faculty Associate Arizona State University
HEATHER PERSONNE Evolve Ventures
ADRIAN YAT WAI LO, PhD University of Auckland
Abstract A city is defined by people and their various activities. There is a lack of human interaction in road centric development and often results in dull urban commons and public spaces. This makes the city less attractive to its own citizens and results in prompting them to live elsewhere usually in the suburban areas and thus completing the cycle of car-centric planning. This loss of activity contributes in decrease in profits for commercial business owners and prompt them to move their business elsewhere causing further loss of activity in the city, which is commonly referred to as ‘Urban Decay’. Phoenix, the fifth largest city of United states is an example of a car centric development. The city of Phoenix struggles in achieving lively and vibrant urban commons and has nominal movement and activity even in the dense downtown. It struggles to sustain retail activities in street level which has enormous direct impact to the economy and community and indirect impact to the environment. This research will focus on downtown Phoenix and study how the urban commons can be reactivated while prompting movement and activity to revitalize retail businesses in urban spaces.
Contents 1. Introduction 1.1. The problem with Car-centric development 1.2. The decline of small retail businesses 1.3. UN habitat’s value of Sustainable Urbanization 1.4. Reactivating Urban Commons with movement and activity 1.5. The Project scope and significance 2. Shopping as an Urban Experience 2.1. Agora 2.2. Arcade or Gallery 2.3. Department stores 2.4. Shopping Mall 2.5. Big box stores 2.6. E-commerce 2.7. Market typologies in different parts of the world 2.8. Placelessness vs Placefulness 3. Movement in Urban Spaces 3.1 Walkability 3.2 Access Hierarchy 4. Precedent Studies 4.1. Street Retail- Mongkok Street, Hong Kong 4.2. Temporary Urbanism - Tamaudi Square, Kathmandu 4.3. Walkability in car-centric development - Barcelona 5. Downtown Phoenix 4.1. The City of Phoenix 4.2 Downtown Phoenix
Introduction The problem with car-centric development
The design and planning of car centric development often results in monotonous cityscape and affects our sense of happiness and wellbeing. It is proven to generate stress, impulsivity and low positive effect. People’s dependence on car for movement is leading to an acceleration in climate change. The consequences of car-centric planning are clearly seen in various aspects. Cars contribute to more than 70% of CO2 emissions in the transportation sector, reducing air quality. Cars are also responsible for increasing obesity and chronic illness and killing more than 1.25 million people in the world. Furthermore, it prompts people to live in the periphery resulting in an urban sprawl which is another leading cause of climate change and change in social behaviors. Jane Jacobs, in her book, ‘Life and death of American cities’ highly criticizes the design of American cities. She writes in her book that middle income housing projects are ‘marvels of dullness’, Civic centers are avoided by every one, commercial centers as lackluster imitations of standardized suburban chain store shopping, expressways that eviscerate great cities and she refers to the modern urban development as ‘Sacking of cities’.
The decline of small retail businesses Vibrant urban spaces and retail stores are closely related to one another since public activities and commercial activities are required to support one another. People, movement, walkability are key aspects of urban public space while retail stores are significant part that generates these aspects. Retail Businesses can be categorized into two types based on their nature - Small local businesses and Big supply chain stores. In the United states 44% of economy’s share is small local businesses. They are an important part of the economy since they are the driver of creating jobs and innovations. However, the share of these small retail businesses has been declining the past two decades. 1962 the first Walmart, Target and Kmart stores opened. Since then these stores have had massive prosperity in the five decades. The focus of these stores was on deep discounts and suburban locations. According to a 2014 research in Social Science Quarterly: On average, within 15 months of a new Walmart store’s opening, as many as 14 existing retail establishments close. The supply chain management and the deep discounts that comes with it, has created a challenging time for small retail businesses. In this scenario where big chain suppliers are rapidly growing and small retail businesses are constantly struggling, what is the future for small retail businesses?
Live, Work and Play
In urban spaces, our lives are lived in one of three spaces. First is the home where we live, Second is our work places and the third place is any social space outside of those two. Today, the third place is commonly known as the place of ‘Play’. The car centric developments often lack a quality ‘Play’ space. The decline of shopping mall is contributing in demise of our play activities. The ‘Play’ spaces have a great role in creating helathy urban envronmnets and social well-being of people. There are six qualities that makes a great ‘Play’ place. 1. Neutral Grounds that provide equitable environment to all 2. Accessibility and walkability 3. Conversations 4. Inspiring Playful Mood 5. Home away from Home 6. Opportunities to foster communities
UN habitats value of sustainable urbanization
Below are listed some of the key selected findings and messages of the world cities report: UN habitat’s value of sustainable urbanization, that comes in alignment with the project:- Cities are consuming land faster than - Some green actions and sustainability they grow and well planned cities and policies in urban areas are having unintended urban extension can curb excessive land impacts to marginalized communities.. consumption..
- The Covid Pandemic does not signify the end of cities. Despite early fears that Urban density co-relates to the spread of the disease, epidemiologists have now come to a consensus that overcrowding, not density is the chief culprit. Covid-19 shutdown has had economic impacts that are far beyond their boundaries, however in the long run this does not signify any big change towards how cities are designed.
- Cities can respond to the enduring threat - Cities can build economics around culture and creative industries. of climate change with local actions..
- Urbanization cab be a pathway to - Smart cities rhetoric does not always match eradicating poverty. Urban areas offer reality - true smart cities are people oriented. significant opportunities to generate prosperity which in turn can and should be leveraged to eradicate poverty. If adequate policies are implemented, cities can be real poverty fighters. - The informal economy has become the life blood of many cities in the developing countries. - The informal micro and small enterprise constitute 82% of enterprises world wide and 44% in the united states..
- Prioritizing the needs of most disadvantaged people means to create opportunities within local planning processes as well as giving a chance to represent their views.
Temporary Urbanism and Tactical Urbanism Temporary urbanism covers any initiative on unoccupied land or buildings that aim to revitalize local life before development occurs. The opening up of possibilities on such sites generates innovation, creativity and often mixed-uses. Tactical urbanism includes low-cost, temporary changes to the built environment, usually in cities, intended to improve local neighborhoods and city gathering places.
Shopping as an Urban Experience
Throughout History public plazas and town squares has provided the public realm for people to meet socialize and interact. They were formed by a combination of political, social and economic functions. However today the privatization of public space has resulted in the demise of these traditional exterior public domain.
Traditional shopping allowed people to access goods and services of multiple vendors while comparing goods based on quality, quantity and cost in a convenient way. It initiated competition for customers which the foundation for modern retailing.
“In the past retail was seen as a public space but now we see publicness in retail spaces”
Agora
Around 8th century BC public places appeared in various towns of Greece, where meetings were organized, theatre pieces were enacted, festivals and elections were held. This was called the Agora.
The Agora was the first formally structured market that also offered civic and commercial functions and created a meeting point for strangers, encouraging interaction
Arcade or Gallery
In 15th Century, in the Renaissance period, Italian cities introduced a new retail typology known as ‘Arcade’ or ‘Gallery’. The arcade is a pedestrian shopping environment of a long gallery, sometimes taking the form of an internal street. The arcade slowly transformed the retail trade from medieval market stall and open fronted shops into a more sophisticated surrounding.
Though arcades reduced access points compared to traditional public spaces, it provided the perfect route for leisure promenade continued from public streets with long gallery accommodating shops to satisfy the whims of the passer-by while also protecting them from nosier and more polluted streets and the vagaries of the weather. The Arcades were generally four story high which met in a central point, housed elegant shops, restaurants and leisure area like bars which consequently became the social center of the town in 19th century.
Department Stores
Then came the development of department stores which initiated privatization of retail space and retail spaces start to lose public amenity. Department stores developed in Great Britain, France and America during the 19th century.
These stores developed the first step of control as it featured a realm of open grid planning. The fixed grid planning of the shop arrangement was the outcome of studying efficiency of consumers movement patterns.
With the development of economy and increasing standard of living, people desired for a higher quality of social retail space that was not dirty and dangerous. Today’s commercially driven environment is a result of people’s desire for higher quality shopping experience, “an act of leisure”
Shopping malls
Shopping mall is typically an enclosed, climate controlled spatial environment with store fronts and entrances on one or both sides. On site parking is usually provided around the perimeter of the Centre or situated underground in the basements. The protected realm of malls eases the difficulties or tension of public spaces. It attracts with weatherless atmosphere and constitute a safe world without crime or cars.
The mall is recognized as a clean and controlled space that has the layout of an anchor, where shops are placed with a goal of maximizing profits. The large ‘Anchor’ stores at either end is joined by an arcade (the ‘handle’) lined with a string of smaller shops. The essential innovation is the syntax not the plan. The principal is that anchors act as magmets to draw customers past the smaller shops, increasing the density of pedestrian traffic and ensuring that there is no economic dead ends.
The handbook for shopping centre developments, Urban Land Institute has explained six configuration that are commonly used in mall design which are : - The strip - A line of stores tied together by a canopy over the sidewalk, which runs along the fronts of the stores. - The L - a strip, but with one end tuned, is good for corner location - The U - a strip with both ends turned in the same direction. - The Cross - two strips crossing over on the centre point - The Mall - a pedestrian way between two facing strips. The mall may also take other shapes, an L for example - The Cluster - A group of retail buildings separated by small pedestrian malls or courts.
Big Box Stores A big-box store is a physically large retail establishment, usually part of a chain of stores. Located in large-scale buildings of more than 50,000 square feet, the store is usually plainly designed and often resembles a large box. Walmart, Home Depot, and Ikea are examples of big-box retailers. Big-box retailers are meant to be a one-stop shop for customers. In a Walmart, a customer can find every consumer good from groceries to clothing to technology.
In 1962 the first Walmart, Target and Kmart stores opened. Since then these stores have had massive prosperity in the five decades. The focus of these stores was on deep discounts and suburban locations. Shoppers would arrive by car, not foot, so what mattered was highway access, acres of parking and massive scale.
One of the Walmart managers said - “There’s a common misconception that we are in the retail business, where actually we’re in the supply business”
Walmart alone employs 1% of US population. They took the unorthodox approach of establishing retails in suburban and rural areas and instead of turning a profit with high mark ups, it reduced its margin to the minimum and focused on high sales volume. Also, Instead of relying on third parties for storing shipping and replenishing requirements, walmart does almost everything by itself.
Walmart’s architecture (shopping center and distribution center) are a hybrid of architecture and infrastructure. They dont just build venues for shoping but also bring acres of parking lots, traffic access, drainage and sewer system etc. The locations are determined by corporate growth strategies like optimization of flow of goods. The architecture is highly provisional and temporal and the big box stores including walmart never had any effort to relate its corporate image to its architecture.
E-Commerce
E-commerce, is the activity of electronically buying or selling of products on online services or over the Internet. E-commerce has grown significantly in the past few years. The online market grew by 56% between 2015 to 2020. In 2017, retail e-commerce sales worldwide amounted to 2.3 trillion US dollars and e-retail revenues are projected to grow to 4.88 trillion US dollars in 2021. Traditional markets are only expected 2% growth during the same time. Brick and mortar retailers are struggling because of online retailer’s ability to offer lower prices and higher efficiency. Many larger retailers are able to maintain a presence off line and online by linking physical and online offerings (wikipedia)
Despite pf proving lower price rate, great product selection and high efficiency rate some customers still prefer the traditional physical retail stores. Online retailer cannot offer the physical experience that traditional retailers can. Another issue about the online market is the concern regarding the security of Online transaction.
Throughout time, the sales environment shifted from interaction and utility based to leisure based setting. Consumption or shopping became leisure activity which was not simply an issue of need but more a matter of desire. With the e-commerce, markets are shifting back to utility based. Not having to spend for a physical store and advanced set of logistics in the supply chain has marked a new era of shopping. In this case, what is the future for physical retail stores?
Market typologies in different parts of the world Floating Market, Bangkok
Located 90 km south-west of Bangkok city, It’s an authentic expression of food, culture and retails of Thailand. In Thailand, floating markets also known as water markets are well supported locally and mainly serve as tourist attractions. One of their purposes is to allow domestic visitors and international tourists to be able to experience the culture of riverside shopping. Most communities in Thailand were built at the sides of rivers. The waterways served as means of transportation and the center of economic activity, as well. Boats were mainly used for local and regional trade, bringing goods from those that produced to those that could barter and trade. Such ways of life of the riverside communities and initiated floating markets.
Thailand Railway Market The market located at Mae Klong in Thailand has a working railway line running straight through the market. Seven days a week, four to eight times a day when they hear a warning belle the traders calmly pack up their stalls and let the train pass through before getting back on with the business. The market and railway line have co-existed for over a 100 year. This one of the most unusual market around the world is famous for its fresh fish.
Lal Darwaza, Ahmadabad, India Lal Darwaza Market, located at Ahmadabad India is one of the most crowded markets in India. The market is know for Jewelery. The gated market has hundreds of shops that extend to the street during operation time. After the operation time at night, the shops pack up and store the merchandise before getting back to business next day.
Placelessness vs Placefulness In this chapter we examined various kinds of shopping experience in Urban space. The historical shopping spaces allowed people to interact and communicate and had it’s own character. As the shopping spaces started transitioning from open fronted shops to sophisticated temperature controlled environments, we noticed a lack placefulness in the modern shopping experience. While most parts of the world adapted the shopping mall and department store typology, we also went through some examples of markets that never lost it’s authenticity and is still able to exhibit it’s character with placefulness.
Movement in Urban Spaces Walkability Walkability is a measure of how friendly an area is to walking. The extent to which the built environment is friendly to the presence of people living, shopping, visiting, enjoying or spending time in an area is defined as Walakbility. Walkability has health, environment and economic benefits. Factors that influence walkability are quality of footpaths, pedestrian right of way, traffic and road condition, land use pattern, building accessibility and safety. Making cities walkable is one of the major solutions for adapting cities to climate change as it reduces carbon emission and improves quality of life (Drawdown: Project Downtown, 2017)
Many Cities around the world is embracing pedestrian mobility as an alternative to older building practices that favor automobile. Dependency in automobile is ecologically unsustainable and automobile oriented environments lack aesthetics.
Walkscore, a walkabilty research by real estate professionals define factors affecting walkabilty as the following: 1. A center: Walkable neighborhoods have a center, whether it’s a main street or a public space 2. People: Enough people for businesses to flourish and for public transit to run frequently. 3. Mixed income, mixed use: Affordable housing located near businesses. 4. Parks and public space: Plenty of public places to gather and play. 5. Pedestrian design: Buildings are close to the street, parking lots are relegated to the back. 6. Schools and workplaces: Close enough that most residents can walk from their homes. 7. Complete streets: Streets designed for bicyclists, pedestrians, and transit.
Access Hierarchy In any transit oriented development, the highest priority of access is given to the Pedestrian and Bicyclist, the second priority is given to the people who use the public transportation modes, the third priority is given to drop offs whereas the least priority is given to the people who arrive by cars.
Precedent Studies Moving back to walkable streets Barcelona Super blocks The superblock concept has been proposed to be used in Eixample district of Barcelona. This part of the city was designed in 1859 in repetitive grid structure The conept is take 9 blocks of the grid and close off the inside to heavy vehicular traffic. Buses or trucks that are trying to drive from one place to another has to drive outside in outline of superblock. Inside the superblock the speed of vehicles is kept to 6 miles per hour. The curbside parking is replaced by underground parking which allows more space in the streets for markets, outdoor games and activities. Within the nine block parameter would be a pleasant walkable environment where pedestrians are prioritized. This kind of space allows commercial activities to increase.
Street Market - Mongkok Street, Hong Kong
Mongkok is the most crowded and intense neighborhood of an incredibly crowded and intense city. It has everything good and bad about Hong Kong: markets, specialized markets, malls, giant monster malls, street life, street life including protests, mysterious private clubs, and great food. One of the most remarkable things about Hong Kong is how much stuff is tucked away into the giant buildings. Here, a monster mall could be hidden inside a building, or a major market crammed inside one building corner. For Hong Kong, there’s no telling where a market begins and ends.
The street market divides the street into three linear sections in which th central section allows people to walk whereas the two sections (indicated in yellow in the diagram) on the edges allows for pop up retails that run 18 hours a day. The yellow part also allows narrow ally ways in certain interval to allow people to walk into the other retail spaces that lies in the facade of the building.
Temporary Urbanism - Tamaudi Square, Kathmandu Tamaudi Square lies in the UNESCO world heritage site of Bhaktapur district in Kathmandu valley. It is one of oldest town squares in the valley that is known for exhibiting its authentic and unique culture. Below are some images of Tamaudi square during a regular day - various times of the day and during an event.
The series of images shows the effect of temporary urbanism and how it can transform the space during different times of the day. A cultural ritual of visiting temples is priorotized morning where as in the daytime there isnt much activity happening. The evening time allows for markets to sell their products and residents to walk arround. During the time of an event such as a Jatra, exhibition or music concert, the space transforms into a platform that accommodates and entertains thousands of people.
Phoenix Phoenix is the capitol of south western U.S. State of Arizona. The city lies in the Sonoran desert and has a hot desert climate and is home to 1.6 million residents. It is the fifth largest city in United states by population. The population of Phoenix exploded after world-war two. A town with 65,000 residents in 1940 turned into America’s 6th largest city by 2010 with a population of nearly 1.5 million.
With the first survey of the new town, streets were laid out in a grid, with Washington Street as the main east–west thoroughfare. The north–south streets originally bore Native American tribal names, but were changed to more easily remembered numbers, with everything east of Center Street (later Central Avenue) named as streets and everything west as avenues. The town continued to grow, and was eventually incorporated as a city on February 28, 1881, centered around downtown (Wikipedia) The history of formation of the Phoenix city dates back to 1870. 320 acres of land was purchased to form this new city. The whole town of Phoenix at that time was the what the core downtown Phoenix is today. It was bordered by Van Buren street in the north and Jackson street on the south, with seventh street and seventh ave in east and west..
Urban Sprawl The growth of Phoenix started mounting in 1912 when Arizona achieved statehood. Phoenix quickly exploded from a small town to a modern skyline composed of various commercial buildings. Downtown was dense, compact and pedestrian friendly. After the world war-2, with the rise of automobile and evaporative cooling, there were large amount of relocation of population outside downtown that resulted into a sprawled suburban. Today the city of Phoenix is spread into the land area equal to the combined land area of three big cities - Tokyo, San Fransisco and Seattle.
Economy With a boom in population, Phoenix started transforming its economy that was primarily agricultural and natural resources based, to industrial manufacturing and mass production. Phoenix’s early economy focused the “5Cs” of copper, cattle, climate, cotton, and citrus. With the establishment of the Southern Pacific rail line in 1926, the opening of the Union Station in 1923, and the creation of Sky Harbor airport by the end of the decade, the city became more easily accessible The construction industry spurred by the city’s growth. As of 217 the top five industries are Real estate, Finance and insurance, manufacturing, retail trade, and health care. The per capita income of Phoenix is near $58,000 where as the poverty rate is 15.6% which is 48.5% greater than national average and 13.5% higher than the state average.
Climate The city of Phoenix experiences a hot desert climate, with low annual rain fall and low relative humidity. The low humidity in Phoenix means there are fewer clouds in the air to shield the land and absorb the heat, and the rocky terrain radiates the heat from the ground. To put it simply, the heat comes at us from all angles The hottest month is July with an average temperature of 103 F. The coldest month is December with an average temperature of 63 F.
Energy Consumption and Carbon Emission Phoenix, one of the hottest cities in the world is also one of the most energy consuming cities in the world. Phoenix is the second highest energy consuming city in the United States. Around 45% percent of energy is consumed in cooling. The state is Arizona is at high risk of being uninhabitable in th near future due to global warming. Phoenix also has one of the largest carbon footprint in the world. The carbon footprint of Phoenix is 4 times the global average.
Downtown Phoenix Downtown Phoenix Arizona, is the central business district of the city of Phoenix, Arizona. It is located in the heart of the Phoenix metropolitan area. The area is the major center of employment for the region with financial, legal, and other national and international corporations housed in a variety of skyscrapers. Major arts and cultural institutions also call the area home. Downtown Phoenix is a center of major league sports activities, live concert events, and is an equally prominent center of banking and finance in Arizona. Downtown Phoenix has gone through major changes in the past two decades. From 2005 to present, more than $6.5 billion in private and public capital has been invested in the 1.7-square-mile downtown (City of Phoenix). However the city core still struggles to sustain retail activities.
History of Retail in Downtown Phoenix Twenty years in the past, Downtown Phoenix was struggling to attract residents, since there were no grocery stores or other retail stores near by. Every time there were initiatives for retail stores, they would quickly die because there were not enough residents to support them. This cycle continued until ASU downtown Campus was build. Only after ASU committed to developing and building the Downtown Campus did the ‘life’ of Downtown really begin to grow..
After thirty years, Downtown Phoenix finally has a full sized grocery store. However, after decades of struggle in attracting residents, downtown Phoenix is finally booming. The 1.7 sq mile downtown has 77,000 apartment units existing and 34,000 additional units are currently under construction. Along with existing commercial buildings, downtown has emerging high-rise apartments.
Context Analysis
Urban Context
Land Use Zoning
Light Rail and Walkable Distance The diagram shows light rail stations and walkable distance from light rail. The inner white circles are the spaces with in 1/4 mile radius and the larger circles are 1/2 mile radius distance from light rail stops.
Shopping Retail
Food and Drink Retail
Arts and Culture
Parking Structures
Footfall The diagram shows the streets that have the most pedestrian flow.
Relationship between Footfall and Retail
Parking structures and Light rail
Major Downtown attraction as ‘Anchors’
Eliminating streets with Traffic flow
Comparison: Linear Corridor and Loop Corridor The linear corridor provides opportunities to centralize the crows but would create a difficult vehicular movement pattern compared to the loop.
The loop corridor distributes the crowd instead of centralizing but it does create a fluid vehicular movement.
The Corridor and Loop After analyzing and comparing the linear corridor and loop corridor, a synthesis of both is proposed in Downtown phoenix. The loop would prioritize the vehicular movement and the internal corridor would prioritize the pedestrian flow. The streets that are connecting the loop to the corridor would be prioritizing drop-offs.
Street Division
Present Context
The Vision of Activating the first Street at Filmore Junction
Organizing events 8-10 times a year including different activities such as music, food and art festivals.
At the end of five year, 1st street is expected to be activated as a public realm. Allowing different scale of retail businesses operating in the street. The activities and pedestrian movement is expected to minimize vehicular flow, limiting its speed to 7 Mph.
Types of Retail to be accommodated
Nano Retail on Side-walks
Micro Retail on Curbside Parking
Mini Retail stores on vacant lands
Adaptable Bridge Retail
Bibilography Official Website: City of Phoenix - https://dtphx.org/about/ Thesis: Retail Typology as a Public Realm - Jessica Lim M.Arch 2016, University of Auckland Journal: A world of Flop houses - Walk in Mongkok, May 2017 http://www.aworldofflophouses.com/project/walk-in-mongkok/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix,_Arizona#/media/File:Poverty_in_Maricopa_ County.png Article title Small Businesses Generate 44 Percent of U.S. Economic Activity URL https://advocacy.sba.gov/2019/01/30/small-businesses-generate-44-percent-of-u-s-economic-activity/ Website title SBA’s Office of Advocacy Article title The impact of big-box retailers on communities, jobs, crime, wages and more: Research roundup URL https://journalistsresource.org/studies/government/municipal/impact-big-box-retailers-employment-wages-crime-health/ Website title Journalist’s Resource Date published March 08, 2017 Article title Pros of big box stores outweigh cons: economics professor URL https://toronto.citynews.ca/2017/10/26/pros-of-big-box-stores-outweigh-conseconomics-professor/ Website title CityNews Toronto Date published October 26, 2017 https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/29663388/Forsyth_walkablity_082415_final.pdf http://www.city-data.com/us-cities/The-West/Phoenix-Economy.html https://www.dw.com/en/top-10-cities-with-the-largest-carbon-footprint/g-44177013 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/phoenixcityarizona/PST040219 https://www.geotab.com/heat-in-the-city/#Phoenix