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LANDSCAPE+URBANISM
SUND A Y, M A Y 23, 2010
L+ U
Explorations in landscape architecture and urbanism, with a focus on aligning theory with practice. Jason King is a landscape architect and Principal of TERRA.fluxus in Portland, Oregon, and currently is in the doctoral program at Portland State University in Urban Studies. contact: email twitter: @ja5onking delicious: bookmarks ads via Land8

Ecological Urbanism - Introduction Part 1

'Ecological Ur banism' (640 pages, Lar s Mller Publisher s; 1 edition (May 1, 2010) edited by Mohsen Mostafavi with Gar eth Doher ty) liter ally ar r ived with a thud last week, the 650 page br ick like tome touching down on the fr ont step of the house with much anticipation. Tempted as I was, a number of deadlines made me hold back a few days befor e cr acking it open.

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A bit of backgr ound... The pr evious 2009 confer ence at the GSD kicked off the over all dialogue in Apr il of last year - I was r eally bummed not to be able to attend, but happy that they have access to pr oceedings of which ar e captur ed her e in a number of infor mative podcasts a few months later which r eally captur ed the essence of the confer ence in the actual wor ds. The book was eager ly awaited, and r umor s of it's massive size and br eadth wer e floating ar ound pr ior to it's actual r elease. A pr eliminar y snapshot fr om the back cover :

"While climate change, sustainable architecture, and green technologies have become increasingly topics, issues surrounding the sustainability of the city are much less developed. The premise of this book is that an ecological approach is urgently needed as an imaginative and practical method for addressing existing as well as new cities. Ecological urbanism considers the city with multiple instruments and with a worldview that is fluid in scale and disciplinary focus. Design provides the synthetic key to connect ecology with an urbanism that is not in contradiction with its environment. ... with the goal of providing a multilayered, diverse, and nuanced understanding of ecological urbanism and what it might be in the future. The promise is nothing short of a new ethics and aesthetics of the urban."
While book jackets ar e supposed to str ive for hyper bole, 'a new ethics and aesthetics of the ur ban' is quite a goal, even for a book of this size. The book didn't however disappoint with a list of contr ibutor s too numer ous to list in total - but spanning a r ange of disciplines fr om landscape ar chitectur e, ar chitectur e, ur ban design, planning, engineer ing, ecology, science, economics and social science to name a few. The mar ked mix of academic and non-academic voices was also evident and welcome - as this wasn't just another heady tr eatise fr om the ivor y tower but a combination of application spanning theor y and pr actice. So in this intr oductor y post on the book I wanted to focus on the ear ly chapter by Mohsen Mostafavi to delve into the specifics that define Ecological Ur banism. I plan on tackling some of the other por tions of the book in subsequent posts, but wanted to use this as a gener al r eview of the content and intr oductor y mater ial. Look for war d to subsequent posts loosely based on the sections of the book: Anticipate, Collabor ate, Sense, Cur ate, Pr oduce, Inter act, Mobilize, Measur e, Adapt, and Incubate... stay tuned.

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Why Ecological Urbanism? Why Now?

Mohsen Mostafavi This intr oductor y chapter addr esses the question at hand that most people think of in r elation to this or any other method of ur banism. What is it, and why is it the answer . Mostafavi adds the ter m 'why now?' which maybe is an indication of the evolutionar y chain of the ur ban (picking up on thr eads of landscape ur banism and ecological design in a mor e meaningful and applied way per haps?) One aspect of the ar gument is the somewhat dubious claim that sustainable ar chitectur e lacks sophistication and r equir es a lifestyle change to accompany poor design. This may have been tr ue in the fledgling sustainability of the 1970s and 80s, but the last 15 year s, with apologies to Mr . Gehr y's latest r ant, has made significant contr ibution to better move design awar e fr om pur e ar t to a mor e balanced appr oach. That said, LEED and sustainability for all of it's good - has pr obably been detr imental to design as a pur e for m, but again - we'r e not cr eating disassociated wor ks of ar t, but places for people that must exist within our ecological r eality. The second point, and the mor e impor tant, is the question of scale. The scope of impacts of singular buildings limits the impact and a r ealization of ur banism and infr astr uctur e becomes mor e vital links to tr ue sustainability. As Mostafavi points out, "...there is a need to find alternative design approaches that will enable us to consider the large scale differently than we have done in the past." (p.13) Apar t fr om a building, ur banism r equir es wor k within differ ent and complex economic, political, social, and cultur al fr amewor ks. Additionally, tr ue integr ation of ecological systems r equir es a necessar y adjustment of scale (beyond the site) and str ategies (inter disciplinar y) to accommodate the lar ger contextual fr amewor k in which they oper ate.

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:: Extreme Weather Even ts : Plaquemin es Paris h, Louis ian a, 2005 - image via The Canar y Pr oject

The integr ation of ecology r equir es one to define what they mean - in or der to under stand it's connection to the ur ban. Mostafavi points of the inher ent differ ence between city and ecology - but also misses a key element in moder n ecology by r efer r ing to as cor r ectly, "...an emphasis on the interrelationship of organisms and the environment..." but using an antiquated notion of the concept by mentioning that this includes, "... an emphasis that invariably excludes human intervention." (p.17) It is unlikely that any ecological science is still r ooted in the pur ely non-human, as ecology seems to have embr aced the need to look contextually at the impacts fr om humans as one of the or ganism within these complex r elationships. While we may isolate inter actions to mor e pur e for ms of biological focus, any applied ecology - in or der to be consider ed r elevant - has included humans as actor s in the study for many year s, such as called on by Paul Sear s - and not just those subsets such as Human Ecology but discipline-wide to study and pr ovide infor mation to deal with human impacts on the ecosystems. In this case, per haps ecology is even mor e of an appr opr iate vehicle, as it's changing ideology to include the human, and wor k within the envir onments humans occupy, make ecological ur banism much mor e viable of a str ategy.

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:: Alberta Oil San ds - image via Encyclopedia of Ear th

This distinction of what we mean by ecology is impor tant - par ticular ly when used as a the foundation for a concept. Like other 'ur banisms' that get appended with a modifier , the definition of the modifier in this context impor tant, as a wor d like ecology is fr aught with misconceptions that could minimize the impact (like sustainable ur banism, or landscape ur banism for instance). You either make the concept impossible to define, or able to define anything. The key to Mostafavi's definition is the idea of action and oppor tunity which I think is the r oot of the concept, as he mentions "...we need to view the fragility of the planet and its resources as an opportunity for speculative design innovations rather than a form of technical legitimation for promoting conventional solutions... Imagining an urbanism that is other than the status quo requires a new sensibility - one that has the capacity to incorporate and accommodate the inherent conflictual conditions between ecology and urbanism. This is the territory of ecological urbanism." (p.17)

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:: Wheatfield - A Con fron tation (Agn es Den es ) - image via gr eg.or g

Building on this idea of human ecology, the conver sation dr ifts to 'ecosophy' including envir onment, social r elations, and human subjectivity, with an "...emphasis on the role that humans play in relation to ecological practices." (p.22) No wher e is this mor e impor tant to r ealize than in the design pr ofessions, making human significance, both the individual and the collective, a necessar y component that should be at the hear t of all design. Mostafavi concludes: "Such a radical approach, if applied to the urban domain, w ould result in a form of ecological design practice that does not simply take

account of the fragility of the ecosystem and the limits on resources but considers such conditions the essential basis for a new form of creative imagining." (p.22,26) Rather than fr ame this concept as all new (thankfully) it does acknowledge a combination appr oach of old and new pr actices wor king in tandem, "...providing a set of sensibilities and practices that can enhance our approaches to urban development..." wor king towar ds "...a cross-disciplinary and collaborative approach toward urbanism developed through the lens of ecology." (p.26) This br ings to bear the idea of r etr ofitting, displayed by the Pr omenade Plantee in Par is, which was one of the major pr ecedents to the moder n incar nation of the High Line. Rather than demolish and r eplace, the r etention of this is both ecological and str ategic... "Given the undulating topogr aphy of the city, the pr omenade affor ds an ever -changing sectional r elationship to its sur r oundings. As a r esult, the par k pr oduces a differ ent exper iences of the city compar ed, for example, to that of a Par isian boulevar d." (p.26,28) As an adjunct, the High Line could be even mor e ecological, taking the same appr oach but adding dimensions of mor e appr opr iate, non-or namental vegetation that pulls fr om the oppor tunistic vegetation that colonized the der elict elevated line pr ior to r edevelopment.

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:: Promen ade Plan tee - image via Amer icinPar is

The wor k of r ehabilitation in sides can span fr om building scale (such as the Caixa For um Madr id seen below) to the mor e expansive post-industr ial development of sites such as the fabulous Duisbur g-Nor d Landscape Par k by Peter Latz. Mostafavi mentions "...the site acts as mnemonic device for the making of the new. The result is a type of relational approach between the terrain, the built, and the viewer's participatory experiences." (p. 28) Which sounds to me, a bit like an human ecological ur ban appr oach.

TH E P LU S ON ES
aesthetic grounds best green blogs brand avenue complex terrain laboratory coolboom critical terrain david barrie design observer designboom dezain dezeen im mocoloco radical cartography strange harvest strange maps the design blog the sesquipedalist treehugger volume waterblogged

:: Caixa Forum M adrid - image via David Gr ajal

The methods of taking on these sites dr aw fr om a number of examples with have been pr edominately featur ed in landscape ur banism liter atur e, such as competitions for Downsview Par k and the OMA submittal for the Par c de la V illette competition (won by Tshcumi) - both of which featur e the idea of 'pr ogr ammed sur faces' as opposed to deter ministic design. The Downsview submittals, along with the much mor e pr ominent Fr esh Kills Par k competition entr ies ventur e mor e towar ds the ecological, but the OMA submission for la V illette pr oposal was one of the best examples of inter disciplinar y alignment of ar chitectur e, landscape ar chitectur e and ur banism that led to a r e-emer gence of landscape and ecology in the conceptual fr amewor k of designer s.

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building green (seattle djc) dialogue* (portland djc) front porch pnw regional architecture portland architecture portland spaces seattle great city initiative seattlescape

:: OM A - Parc de la Villette - image via a spatial chor eogr aphy of motion

The blur r ing of inter discplinar y lines, at least for some of us in landscape ar chitectur e & ur banism is long-over due, and I don't think it will mean the br eakdown of discipline-specific knowledge, but r ather a better outcome for these pr ojects. Mostafavi mentions this, but concludes the necessity ver sus wor king in isolation: "While a collaborative mode of working among various areas of design expertise is mandatory in thinking about the contemporary and future city, the transdisciplinary approach of ecological urbanism gives designers a potentially more fertile means of addressing the challenges facing the urban environment." (p. 29) I'd take this a step fur ther to include a much br oader inter disciplinar y gr ouping that includes not just tr aditional design and planning pr ofessionals, but r epr esentatives fr om ecological, cultur al, and social sciences as cor e member s of any team. Shifting to scale, the idea of ecology, much like what has been posited in landscape ur banism, is that it is a much mor e appr opr iate mode of inquir y to multiscalar investigations as opposed to singular building ar chitectur e. Ur banism in it many for ms seems to embr ace this, and ecology, along with a r ange of humancenter ed studies, gives us the ability to under stand and "...ultimately provide the most synthetic and valuable material for alternative multi-scalar design strategies." (p.30) Mostafavi mentions the wor k of Andr ea Br anzi (Ar chizoom) and differ ent modes of looking at ur banism, par ticular ly one that is less based on planning deter minism but on "...the fluidity of the city, its capacity to be diffuse and enzymatic in character." (p.30) This symbiotic ur banism looks at ar t, agr icultur e, and networ k cultur e, with a focus on "...its capacity to be reversible, evolving, and provisory." (p.30) which feeds into the idea of ecological indeter minacy in many concr ete ways.

:: No Stop City (Archizoom) - image via Design Histor y Lab

The str ategic implementation of ecological ur banism is the action-or iented mode of pr actice - r efer enced in the text similar ly to ur ban acupunctur e, wher e: "...the interventions in and transformations of an area often have a significant impact beyond the percieved physical limits." While ecology is one fr ame wor k, ther e ar e myr iad cultur al and political systems that must be incor por ated - and if not pur ely ecological in natur e - can be or ganized and communicated in design thr ough the use of ecological methods. "One of the major challenges of ecological urbanism is therefore to define the conditions of governance under which it could operate that would result in a more cohesive regional planning model." (p.30) By taking on the specifics of ur banism (r eal, ugly, dir ty ur banism) - r equir es a differ ent idea of design. Affor dable housing, use of vacant lots, code-r ewr iting, tr affic, tr ash, obesity, funding, and all other issues that tend to be dismissed in Utopian ideals (or even our moder n city planning pr oposals). We give this to municipal maintenance and oper ations to be dealt with, r ather than thinking of these flows as systems to be accommodated dur ing design and planning. Ecological ur banism ensur es that the flows in and out of mater ials ar e addr essed - and planned for in meaningful ways, building on the somewhat shallow sustainability policies that have emer ged in many cities wor ldwide.

:: Naples Garbage Strike - image via Fir e Ear th

It is vital that we have examples of this wor king, such as those discussed in Banham's Los Angeles: The Ar chitectur e of Four Ecologies, which takes on the city not in r elation to what we should cr eate, but r ather celebr ates the oppor tunistic methods (good and bad) that led to the cr eation of the metr opolis. This includes under standing and expr essing the flows in our cities as oppor tunities for cultur al expr ession. As Mostafavi mentions the ideas of water featur es histor ic r ole in connecting city to water , but "... on the whole we underutilize the unexpected opportunities afforded by ecological practice as well as the location." (p.36) I'd posit that a var iety of ecological designer s have been doing just this for year s, but as singular sites or installations, and r ar ely as lar ge scale public wor ks (although Dr eiseitl, Wenk, and other s may be pr ecedents we can explor e).

:: Growing Vine Street (Buster Simpson) - image via Happy Hotelier

This introductory review is continued in Part 2.

POSTED BY JASON KING AT 10:48 AM LABELS: BOOKS, CONFERENCES, ECOLOGY, INFRASTRUCTURE, LANDSCAPE URBANISM, RESOURCES, URBANISM

3 COM M E NTS: F9 said... I have been to the Caixa Forum in M adrid...it's amazing... M AY 23, 2010 AT 8:18 P M Anonymous said... Just a small point, but M ostafavi's first name is M ohsen, not M oshen. M AY 29, 2010 AT 3:13 P M Jason King said... M y bad... apologies to M r. M ostafavi. M AY 29, 2010 AT 3:17 P M Post a Comment L INKS TO THIS POST Create a Link Newer Post Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom) Home Older Post

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