Urban Hyperobjects
Interplanetary Urbanization The evolution of urbanization and humans is pushing the boundaries of life being sheltered only on Earth, and the shift towards life on Mars is essential to be researched and considered. As architecture in space enters a new era, there has been a fundamental shift in the space industry from short term explorations onto long-term colonization, and new ventures such as space tourism. Present day architects need to learn how to develop multiple specie supporting design concepts for space exploration, as well as the need to employ an architectural intelligence and experimentation that can result in an operational architecture capable of inserting itself on space. The future urban realities require imaginative and resourceful approaches, in which architecture redefines the history of human conditions, a search in which urban active forms can enable urban shifts and transformations. When we talk about interplanetary colonization, we need to shift out of the traditional boundaries of design and construction since this is a challenging, multi-disciplinary problem that requires expertise from a wide variety of fields: aerospace engineering, environmental engineering, social science, urban planning, design, architecture, and structural engineering. Unlike structural engineering for the built environment on Earth, there are virtually zero rules of thumb or design precedents to draw on for construction on Mars or the Moon. There is exciting potential to shape this discussion with fundamental structural engineering principles and forward-looking material and fabrication strategies. The opportunity is lying in front of us, the challenge is to learn how to open a multidisciplinary collaboration that has success as the main interest. “Mars is the most habitable planet in our Solar System besides Earth,” said Laura Kerber, Research Scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “But it remains a hostile world for many kinds of life. A system for creating small islands of habitability would allow us to transform Mars in a controlled and scalable way.” (Nature Astronomy volume 3, pages898–903(2019). This statement leads us to begin thinking and planning how the urbanization should be thought beforehand as a controlled and scalable object.
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