Designed by Buro AD and SPECTACLE for this year’s CityVision Competition, their Rio de Inverso proposal critically addresses the historically cyclical attempts by urban planners to impose order post ex-facto on Rio de Janeiro's informally created, complex and spatially rich urban fabric. With the theme of the competition ‘sick and wonder (wonder and disgust),’ the architects demonstrate how the city was the arena for a continuous struggle. More images and architects’ description after the break.
Located in the intersection of the pedestrian axis of Festival Street within the heart of Magok city in Seoul, the competition winning proposal by Wooridongin Architects for the Magok Central Plaza weaves itself into the surrounding city. The plaza is a great traffic node since it is where the subway lines 5, 9 and Incheon Airport train cross. Its close location to Han River greenery and ecosystem aligning with the River, Jungang Park and Green Area Connectors makes it to be part of a continuous open space system. More images and architects’ description after the break.
In this article in the Wall Street Journal, a number of key players discuss the ongoing work to transform "the most elegant urban boulevard in the US", Philadelphia's Benjamin Franklin Parkway. The parkway has been on a long journey from boulevard to highway, and thanks to a new plan entitled "More Park, Less Way", it could be on its way back, with a variety of plans to change the Parkway into a vibrant, more densely populated series of spaces with more amenities for local residents. You can read the full article here.
A conceptual framework for the development of the city of Medellin, the Urban Current[s] competition proposal by L+CC (Land+Civilization Compositions), Taller 301, andopenfabric considers it important to think of the river territory beyond a simple design of public space. Instead, this is seen as the opportunity to re-structure and establish a framework for the future development of Medellín. Their approach creates new principles for the development of the city by using all available resources (natural, social, economic, political, and cultural) to link the city with its history, its ecology, and the movement of people in the territory. More images and architects' description after the break.
Since Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann began his comprehensive redesign of central Paris in the mid-nineteenth century, the Hausmann Plan has been a topic of discussion for architects, planners and social theorists. The network of wide, open boulevards lined by regular (and regulated) neoclassical buildings has come in and out of favor over the years, and now is one of the key factors in the city's popular reputation as a beautiful city.
Now though, a different set of academics have entered the conversation to offer a new way of looking at the Haussmann Plan: a group of mathematical physicists from the CEA Institute of Theoretical Physics in Gif-sur-Yvette have collaborated with a group of social scientists to analyze the changes of the Haussmann Plan using sophisticated network theory, as reported by BBC Worldwide.
Find out about their study's findings after the break
Rome’s new mayor, Ignazio Marino, is leading a crusade for walkability by eliminating noisy, out-of-control traffic surrounding the ancient monuments. Starting with the Via dei Fori Imperiali - a major avenue connecting the Piazza Venezia to the Colosseum - Marino plans to ban private traffic so pedestrians will have a place to “bike, walk, enjoy this incredible archaeological site.” More on the story at NPR.
Railroad Track in Detroit. Image Courtesy of Shutterstock.com
There is an intimate connection between people, power, poverty and place and there is no better city in the world to see this than Detroit. With the impending bankruptcy we cannot lose sight of the human issues that face our city.
For decades money and power have moved away from Detroit’s center. The complex reasons for this are well known so there is no need to rehash them here. Even in the face of city government’s failure to manage its assets properly, this is changing. There is slow and halting movement back to the center.The movement back to the center is a good thing for many reasons. It will help bolster the tax base and that is the basic financial problem the city faces. But more importantly it will create a stronger spatial connection between power and poverty that we haven’t had in this region for a century.
Power will see poverty and poverty power. They will feel each other’s existence. They will see the humanity of each side and be nudged to recognize the shared responsibility caring for this shared place. This is how successful vital, dense urban cities operate. There is an acceptance of diversity on all levels. Barriers are reduced and human interaction encouraged. This is how creativity is bred. Exposure to diverse people, places and ideas excite and promote the imagination and a sense of the common good that includes everyone.
Ville Radieuse (The Radiant City) is an unrealized urban masterplan by Le Corbusier, first presented in 1924 and published in a book of the same name in 1933. Designed to contain effective means of transportation, as well as an abundance of green space and sunlight, Le Corbusier’s city of the future would not only provide residents with a better lifestyle, but would contribute to creating a better society. Though radical, strict and nearly totalitarian in its order, symmetry and standardization, Le Corbusier’s proposed principles had an extensive influence on modern urban planning and led to the development of new high-density housing typologies.
The current conversation about redesigning cities usually focuses on Boomers or Milllennials, two extremes of the age spectrum. The largest percent of people are between 30-64 years old and everyone will eventually be elderly--a reality no one can escape.
We are a global society, more savvy, fashionable and in-the-know than ever before, and most of us want an urbanized lifestyle, meaning a blend of great food and conversation, tech modernization, access to healthy and alternative life choices, and being at the center of the action.
The best cities in the world like New York, Berlin, and Tokyo market themselves as meccas for young, energetic people that promise diversity and innovation. This generates a lack of ideal architecture for people over the age of 65 and shuts the door on them. Thus we lose the knowledge, stability, and experience they provide to civilization.
The 2010 launch of the “Boris Bike” - London’s cycle hire scheme, named after mayor Boris Johnson – was the clearest indication to date that cycling was no longer just for a minority of fanatics but a healthy, efficient and sustainable mode of transport that city planners wanted in their armoury. There are now more than 8,000 Boris Bikes and 550+ docking stations in Central London. And the trend’s not anomalous to London: Wikipedia reports that there are 535 cycle-share schemes in 49 countries, employing more than half a million bikes worldwide.
However, the real question is: will cycling actually change the city? Will it result in new urban forms or, as the title of Australian academic Dr Steven Fleming’s new book predicts, a “Cycle Space”? Like Fleming, I believe so. I believe that cycling might just be the catalyst for a 21st Century urban renaissance.
A recent profile in Architectural Record highlights the career of Peter Wynne Rees, the chief planner of the City of London: the famous 'square mile' which contains the major financial district of Greater London, as well as some of its great tourist attractions, such as St Paul's Cathedral.
The profile focuses on the new crop of skyscrapers which Rees has ushered in in his 27 years as chief planner, something which has been contentious for preservationists. When he came to the job in 1985, the City of London had just one skyscraper: Tower 42, built in 1980. With the success of the Gherkin in the early 2000s, the surrounding area has seen many more high profile skyscrapers, such as the Heron Tower, 122 Leadenhall Street (The Cheesegrater) and 20 Fenchurch Street (The Walkie-Talkie).
Freecell Architecture's proposal for the PXSTL Competition was recently announced one of the three finalists by the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts and the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University. Participants were asked to reimagine a vacant lot in St. Louis’ Grand Center cultural district while exploring the critical role arts and culture play in creating vibrant, growing communities. The competition aims to demonstrate how small-scale interventions can spur large-scale urban transformation, and Freecell's proposal was selected for their ability to visualize Grand Center’s long-term vitality, emphasizing community engagement, interactive elements, and cross-disciplinary collaboration among St. Louis’ many cultural organizations. More images and information after the break.
“Increasingly we experience cities mediated by digital technology — whether that's via smartphone maps, digital transit signage, or texting a friend that you've arrived at a destination. How our city is built to support residents, businesses, and visitors [...] is now part physical and part digital.”
John Tolva, the Chief Technology Officer for the City of Chicago, is on a mission: a mission to bring the physical and digital worlds into conversation.
To embed more and more digital information into the physical world, a growing number of digital specialists are beginning to embrace the worlds of architects, planners and urbanists. But, so far, it has not been a two way street to make the digital leap.
Find out why architects should be at the forefront of the digital/spatial overlap, after the break...
Dharavi - Asia’s largest slum of one million with an average density of 18,000 residents per acre - is amidst a heated debate between its people, the government and private investors as it sits on some of India’s hottest real estate in Mumbai. While the government is grappling for solutions on how to successfully dismantle the low-rise slum and relocate its residents to a high-rise podium style typology, the investor’s profit-driven approach has placed residents on the defense, “rendering Dharavi a perfect storm of contested urbanism," as architect, urban designer and author William Hunter describes.
Freedom Tower; Courtesy of Flickr User Arturo Yee; Licensed via Creative Commons
NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg's twelve years in office will leave an undeniable impression on the physical landscape of the city for future generations. The new and revised policies of this administration have encouraged unprecedented growth of New York City and its outer boroughs in the years following 9/11. According to a new series called The Bloomberg Years by WNYC and this article by Matthew Schuerman, Bloomberg's three consecutive terms have made New York City's skyline taller, have made the city more attractive and in turn, more expensive.
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