Module 6 -- Moving Forward

Module 6 – Moving Forward

As we become increasingly closer to living in a world that mostly inhabits cities, rather than the rural countryside, the practice of urban design will continue to provide metropolis’ with a structure of organization for co-existence. This migration to urban areas across the planet demands of us designers the consideration of those people who rely on civic amenities for many of their daily activity. The growing trend of Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) has begun to redefine the way that planners and designers think about high density development as it pertains to urban growth. By working towards a better functioning transit system, urban design can help ever expanding cities to provide incoming residents with the necessary amenities for a positive urban existence. An urban existence that allows new residents access to the places they live and the places they work, to their nearest grocery story or the closest medical facility.

In an effort to provide the masses of people moving to cities with a universal understanding of their new surroundings the language of wayfinding, especially signage pointing towards environmentally responsible public amenities such as public transportation, parks, etcetera, has become increasingly important. Technology has expanded beyond imagination over the most recent decades, making it imperative that signage guide those new to cities, or those unfamiliar with civic technological advancements to their intended destinations.  Updated signage work in collaboration with Transit-Oriented Development by drawing people’s attention to their alternative transportation options. This widened exposure to transportation options can have a direct influence on awareness and ridership.

 

Not only do Transit-Oriented Development and updated urban wayfinding help to solve existing urban challenges, but they can also be instrumental in the smart and sustainable growth of municipalities. As the world moves more towards urban centers and away from rural life it will be increasingly essential for urban designers to sculpt a new international city that provides it’s new and old residents with facility for success and prosperity.   

Module 5 – Urban Design & Urban Development

Arch 504 – Module 5 – Urban Design & Urban Development

   From the readings assigned for this, our fifth module of the semester, it occurs to me that building and zoning codes maintain a great deal of control regarding the shape that a city takes, and how that shape continues to evolve as that city grows older and older. To me, the success of any enforced design code can be reduced down to whether or not that code intends to be inclusive at its core, or intends to be exclusive. I believe codes that strive for the inclusion of all people have society’s best interests in mind, and codes that seek to exclude users are poisonous to our natural appetite for individuality.

   By this, I mean that Building and zoning codes can have the strength to drastically effect people’s lives, both directly, and indirectly. Take for example the form-based building codes enforced in the new urbanism project in Seaside, Florida. While this development has succeeded in many ways, its form based codes have rendered the community seemingly one dimensional. The homes all look the same, they cost about the same amount and the result is a community that from a glance appears to be all of a similar cast. Some may argue that these social similarities create a safer environment, but in my opinion it creates a dangerously uninteresting neighborhood that is the consequence of zoning and buildings codes. Such codes seek to exclude those who see the physical appearance of their home as an expression of who they are.

   Yet another significant influence that city officials have is the power to regulate through planning and building commissions the physical health and safety of their city’s residents. It is well documented that the health and fitness of all urbanites is directly influenced by their physical activity, an activity that is controlled in majority by a city’s walkability. A city’s walkability, in turn, has everything to do with how that urban area has been planned and coded. Portland, Oregon, for example, scores very high in both walkability and bike-ability according to walkability.com because of the way in which the city streets have been planned and designed. By mandating smaller block sizes and prioritizing alternative methods of transportation Portland has become one of the healthiest and most active cities in America, as stated in author Jeff Speck’s book “Walkable City”. The graphic below illustrates the comparative “size” of a city and its population. From this graphic we can quite accurately assume a city’s general well-being and fitness due to its activity. How bound to their vehicle are residents of Houston, Texas compared to those living in Amsterdam or Vancouver?

   While I do believe that building and zoning codes have every intent to provide for a safe and friendly public environment, I think it is also healthy to question such codes for the purpose of maintaining equality and character. Imagine a world where every city had block sizes like those in Irvine, California, made larger for vehicular efficiency and big box stores and neglecting to engage with or acknowledge the pedestrian experience.

Module 4 - Representation of Space, Information, and Design Interventions

    Of the many examples from this module’s lecture regarding “representations of space”, perhaps the most compelling to me are the many methods with which a designer can implore communication and storytelling. Specifically, comparing existing urban design conditions with new ideas, or redesigns of urban space that are intended to improve those spaces performance. A designer can effectively show how their ideas for the reconsideration of urban space can drastically improve urban life for that city’s inhabitants by utilizing before and after photographs and renderings. Such renderings allow potential viewers the opportunity to imagine experiencing such spaces themselves. This visual communication technique is especially helpful for those who are less familiar with experiential design.

    Since primitive peoples have been adorning cave walls with stories of hunting or battle human beings have been communicating visually as a method of recording and preserving their past, or looking forward to their futures. Today, we utilize visual storytelling in urban design and architecture as a compelling and informative tool for the public to more clearly understand our thoughts on how our creations can improve their lives. To me, visual communication and storytelling are the intellectual and psychological connection linking art and design, life and human sustainability. 

Two very different versions of Visual Communication and Storytelling can be seen below: 

First,an image from the Lascaux caves in France and Marcel Duchamp's "Nude Descending Staircase 2".

   

   These images are obviously made with very different mediums and seek to express very different stories, but are both examples of ways in which we as designers and artists can communicate intricate and important history through the visual representation of time and space. In urban design we see this same type of representation in many forms, whether it is in signage and way-finding devices, two and three dimensional public artworks, or building and spatial form, and so on... These visual materials tell us as spatial travelers where we are, where we are going, and perhaps most importantly when we are in time. Our collective history is characterized by the built and visual environment that surrounds us. This can be represented in many different ways, be it through district specific signage showing you are within the boundaries of a historic district such as Hyde Park in the northwest corner of Boise, Idaho. Hyde Park is a neighborhood that has, and continues to go through many changes as the city around it grows. The historic Hyde Park district reaches essentially the entire length of one residential street and spans out two or three block perpendicular in each direction. The area of town is marked visually by signage, but even more visibly by its historic shops and homes, and the old growth deciduous trees that line its sidewalks.

    Yet another urban space that is visually represented well is Friendship Square, here in Moscow, Idaho. Friendship Square is a modest public space complete with street furniture, a seasonal water feature, and playground equipment suitable for most ages. What appears to me as particularly memorable about Friendship Square is how the city of Moscow has placed it at what had previously been an intersection of a road crossing its Main Street. While it may be considered bold to essentially block a vehicular passage way it resonates as a shift in priority away from the automobile to many thankful Moscow pedestrians. While I am unsure of the square's age or history, I can tell that it will exist as a place for rest and celebration for many years.

The last urban space that I have examined for this module is Pioneer Square at the southern end of downtown Seattle. Over the last two decades this area of Seattle has transitioned from being a part of town most avoided because of perceived crime and danger to an active and vibrant sector of a seemingly ever-expanding city. Today, this neighborhood is home to a new multipurpose stadium, many new are galleries and restaurants, as well as updated public transit lines that have improved the areas image and activity. While pioneer square remains home to a significant transient population, improvements to the district have slowly led to a more desirable area for tourists and residents alike.

Module 3 - "Influential Urban Thinkers"

William H. Whyte: Prolifically Sitable

William H. Whyte was an author and urbanist whose career began in 1946 following his graduation from Princeton University and military service in the United States Marine Corps. His most notable was produced during the sixteen year period he spent as an assistant and advisor to the New York City Planning Commission. Whyte worked also as a prolific writer whose penmanship crossed many subjects and produced several novels throughout his career. He is perhaps most well-known for authoring The Social Life of Public spaces, a documentary piece that focuses on the success, vitality, and healthy of many noteworthy public spaces in the United States.

In addition to the fame Whyte garnered from The Social Life of Public Spaces, the many books he has written, and a career with the New York Planning Commission, he also worked extensively as a mentor to The Project for Public Spaces, “a nonprofit planning, design and educational organization dedicated to helping people create and sustain public spaces that build stronger communities”. (pps.org) Of his many contributions to the architectural union, perhaps his most meaningful has been The Social Life of Public Spaces. The hour long documentary, which is charming for its vintage, provides for those interested, and otherwise a glimpse in to the mind of a person carefully considering human pattern and tendency. The result of this groundbreaking work is nothing short of an insurmountable contribution to the field of urban design. Whyte’s seminal work continues to provide planners and designers with a framework for creating successful public spaces.

As it may be, I am left wondering whether or not the most impactful segments of The Social Life of Public Spaces are not the many interesting proven truths that are the result of this work, but the moments where Whyte himself acknowledges that some of the greatest achievements in urban design exist in spaces where people are given the flexibility and freedom to exercise their own inventiveness and ingenuity. By this, I mean spaces where space is universal, public furniture can be moved, or places that leave open their definition to be determined by its guests. This notion of self-guidance reminds me a good deal of what Whyte’s fellow urbanist, Allan Jacobs, would refer to simply as “the magic”.  A sort of organic dance that happens when humans are given the right kind of climate for finding their own comfortable spaces. This concept of greater public involvement in design suggests that maybe some of the healthiest and most active public centers are those that relinquish some control to the users themselves. Spaces that are created with less ego and more responsibility. 

Module 2 - "Contemporary Urban Design Theories"

Module 2 – “Contemporary Urban Design Theories”

Much of what I have gleaned from the reading required for the second module of this course’s workload carefully confronts the challenge of essentially defining the otherwise undefinable. By applying theories and intellectual consideration to aspects of human existence the authors we have read for this exercise attempt to quantify concepts that are difficult in nature to describe.  Despite the many ideologies regarding a city’s sense of place, it seems to me that it remains an almost impossible feat to put in to words how the physical world that surrounds you influences your interest and emotion.

After having read the material for this course module the contemporary urban design theories that resonate with me the most have been centered around the concept that to achieve a functional urban design the built environment that surrounds us must exist in conjunction with the open space that has been left behind both intentionally, as well as by accident after a project’s construction. In a sense, our community’s positive and negative spaces have to be in harmony in order to achieve the social balance of activity and calm we seek to achieve in urban design. Seamon and Sowers confront this notion in their critique of Edward Relph’s work Place and Placelessness by describing it as “the relationship of space to a more experientially-based understanding of place, space too must be explored in terms of how people experience it.” To me, this means that we as designers are only truly accomplishing our design intentions if we hold to the same consideration the informal and undefined spaces created by community design as we do those formal and more strictly planned places. The theory of urban phenomenology requests that we acknowledge equally the intangible as we do the intangible.

These sentiments are reiterated in The City as Text: Architecture and Urban Design, defined in the section of the reading Architecture and “Mere Building”. In this section the author outlines the difference in priority that separate building from architecture. Building, as I have interpreted in from this reading, considers primarily the economic function of a structure and its surroundings, whereas architecture must further recognize the social and psychological impacts that a building, and its adjacent landscape has on both its admirers, as well as its users.

While I feel as though many of the positions outlined in this module’s reading have been well thought out, and are applicable in certain urban design scenarios, I am left wondering if such design theories can be used as absolute when creating a new urban experience or if they are more valuable as case studies whose qualities can be drawn from piece by piece rather than as a whole. From the limited education I have in the field of urban design it strikes me that every project carries unique circumstances that should have some influence on the resulting design, and that in many cases those circumstances might require an individual approach appearing more like an amalgamation of contemporary theories instead of something more cut and dry like the theories presented in our readings. Maybe human society and urban life is less predictable than we have given it credit for?

Module 1 – “Background of the field”

Module 1 – “Background of the field”

It seems only logical that we begin the first module of this semester by forming what we as a cohort deem a suitable definition of Urban Design, and once that definition has been clearly represented we may work towards a more in depth discussion regarding the idiosyncrasies of planning. Although I had the pleasure of attending courses in both Urban Theory and Urban Design last semester with Professor Xiao Hu I absolutely consider myself a novice when it comes to the art and science of metropolitan procedure and arrangement. Thankfully I will be contributing to this seminar and taking another urban design studio simultaneously this semester in effort to further strengthen my personal understanding of urban design as a discipline.

From the studies I have completed to date in the field of urban design, including the lessons from Module 1 of this course, I have begun to understand that much of the results of new urban design projects stem from a wide reaching and comprehensive initial process of analyzing conditions of an urban situation. By that, I mean it is clear that any successful urban design project must start with an acute consideration of an urban area in order to truly accomplish a design that suits its users. This “Design as a Process of Actions” is outlined in the second lecture of module 1 (Exploring Urban Design), described as “problem finding, fact finding, idea finding, and an acceptable solution.” It seems to be that while a project must begin with such research, that study seem to never really end. That even in post design the strength of a design’s function is always in discussion.

From our module 1 readings we can determine that a successful urban design will have many critical pivot points that must remain nearly in balance in order for that design to sustain. These Pivot points may include, but not be limited to economic growth, residential density, diversity, and accessibility. Pre-design analysis of these qualities and many more must be completed in order to achieve a plan that leads towards a blooming future. By communicating such analysis visually we can more clearly characterize a city or neighborhood’s strengths and weaknesses. Below are examples of some analytical diagrams I created for an urban design studio project last semester. These graphics helped to better describe conditions in an urban context that worked, and those that required rethinking.   

 

 

              

This brand of research and analysis helps us as designers to understand not only the contemporary character of urban places, but also to better recognize the moments in that place’s history that have led up to its current circumstance. With knowledge of a city’s ethno demographics and industry we can anticipate how a city has shaped its own identity and sense of place, for example. By understanding the endeavor and vision of design predecessors we can further support future design aspirations. In order to glean this kind of obscure knowledge urbanist Kevin Lynch has outline five elements of a city whose interpretation by which we may better perceive the less tangible aspects of a city’s personality. Lynch’s five elements, in no particular order, are paths, edges, districts, nodes, and landmarks. By examining a city’s elements we can examine its past, its present, and its future, as well as its spatial priorities.

I look forward to applying the concepts and theories that we have learned from this first module and the remaining modules throughout the duration of this term to current, as well as future urban design projects. I believe a deeper investigation of such urban ideologies will help to strengthen my knowledge of urban practice and vocabulary.

Eamonn Parke

About Me

I am a fourth year architecture student pursuing a second bachelors degree at the University of Idaho. I was raised in Boise, Idaho, but have also lived in Bellingham and Seattle, Washington where I previously attended college. A few of my interests include, but are not limited to art, music, sports, and the outdoors. 

I am greatly looking forward to this course as I have developed a growing interest in urban architecture, planning, and neighborhood design during my time as an undergraduate in Moscow. A goal of mine for this semester is to acquire a deeper knowledge and more meaningful understanding of the functions and purposes of urban design, as well as a clearer perspective of the role of the designer working with complex urban challenges.