Essay in 'Atlantis' Magazine

I am happy to report that a recent essay was published in 'Atlantis' Magazine, which is published by Polis and collects writings that make "...the link between students, academics and professionals besides the Polis activities. This magazine is our medium to keep you as member up to date about everything going on in the urbanism & landscape architecture world.  The issue 22.4 discusses concepts around the 'Urban Landscape' and features contributions from a wide range of authors.

The essay "Land- 'scape' / Land- 'space':  Pedantic, Semantic or just Anagrammatic" is a tongue-in-cheek play on words that carries with it a more serious message.  The dialogue around landscape urbanism has been called pedantic, and the splitting of hairs could be dismissed, particularly by those uninformed and who disagree with the concepts, as mere semantics.  The anagrammatic is purely a place on words.  The content, revolving around an exploration of the terms 'landscape' and 'urbanism', and more specifically the parallels of the anagrammatic terms 'space' and 'scape' begin the discussion. 

 

Using definitions from JB Jackson's essay 'The Word Itself', the parallels between space and scape are delineated, as Jackson's cultural reading of landscape as "...a composition of man-made or man-modified spaces to serve as infrastructure or background for our collective existence.” (Jackson, Discovering the Vernacular Landscape, 1984)  This expands our idea of landscape beyond scenery and greenery to encompass a more broad understanding of 'context'. 

Urbanism is also investigated, starting with Wirth's 1938 essay 'Urbanism as a Way of Life' and tracing the divergence of urbanism as 'study' to that of action.  I claim we need to differentiate between the study of urban areas and the design and planning activities. This will allow us to operate in a shared space for dialogue:

"Thus study equates to urbanism (of which there can be many types of study), and practice equates to disciplinary modes and interdisciplinary contexts, such as urban design, architecture, landscape architecture and planning (of which there can be many types of solution). The distinction allows us to avoid binary argument because there are infinite types of study and methods of solving problems – each driven by the unique context. Dialogue and critique can still operate – but there will more transparency and it won’t be summed in an either/or proposition. The complexity of urban areas in our contemporary world is too immense for only one of two solutions"

The end along with a call for more clarity in writing about these terms, specifically the need for clear definitions when discussing terms.  We are too loose with terminology today, and the overall impact and reach of our discussion suffers from this. Whichever way you choose to interpret and intervene the urban conditions, there needs to be shared understanding of fundamental issues, because, as I mention: "In the end, no discussion or argument (binary or otherwise) is worth much if it happening around vague language..."

Comments and discussion, with clear definitions, always welcome.

Check out the entire magazine online here, or click to download a PDF of the article here.

Kerb 20 Seeking Submissions

Kerb is one of best journals out there for landscape architecture - and you can be part of their next issue around the topic 'speculative narrative'.  Here's the call for submissions:

KERB 20 IS SEEKING SUBMISSIONS OF ESSAYS/PROJECTS/ 
ARTWORKS/ STORIES ETC

Speculative narrative and the potential of imagination are important factors in creative production. It is considered that a multitude of small stories are the “quintessential form of imaginative invention” (source). 

Speculation through narrative offers an apparatus through which we may investigate the concept of ‘reality’. Immersed within our current understandings, speculation is influenced by our contemporary condition. In these fictional dispositions, the variables and constraints of ‘reality’ can be controlled, omitted completely or utilized as key motives for the foundations of new territories.

Speculative Narrative can be an exploration of idealistic scenarios, the fossilization of information, or the creation of fantastical realms.

This allows the model of design to move beyond problem solving, crisis management and project liberation from the constraints of our existence. The augmentation through speculative narrative, enables the reshaping of current processes, understandings and disciplines.

Speculative Narrative makes it possible to redefine ‘present’ and ‘future’. Kerb is an annual cross-disciplinary design publication produced by the RMIT University School of Architecture and Design in Melbourne, Australia.

Kerb is a progressive design journal focused on contemporary landscape architecture issues from an international and national perspective. Submit to:  kerb@ems.rmit.edu.auby 4 May, 2012 and for more information regarding submission requirements please visit our website at www.kerbjournal.com or our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/kerbjournal

Waterscape Urbanism

I was struck by a recent mis-use of the term landscape urbanism in this article from the Atlanta Journal Constitution on the need for climate change inspired floating homes.  Quoting  Thai landscape architect Danai Thaitakoo on the need for dealing with innundation.

"Climate change will require a radical shift within design practice from the solid-state view of landscape urbanism to the more dynamic, liquid-state view of waterscape urbanism," says Danai, who is involved in several projects based on this principle. "Instead of embodying permanence, solidity and longevity, liquid perception will emphasize change, adaptation."

While amphibious architecture is nothing new, and i agree that it will become more common in the future there are two points.  The first is minor - that of the mis-characterization of landscape urbanism as 'solid-state' and 'embodying permanence, solidity and longevity'.  If there's any flavor of urbanism that emphasizes change and adaptation, it's landscape urbanism - so i think there's a disconnect in that above paragraph.  Just saying.

Second, and more troubling, is the idea that we must react to climate change by building floating structures - rather than address the topic at hand.  It's similar in nature to dealing with semi-urban forest fires by designating fire-safety clearing zones of tinder and brush around houses, rather than looking at not building homes in these areas - or heaven forbid - letting them burn.  Or coming up with vertical farms due to our misguided agricultural subsidies and policies that make it impossible to grow a variety of food on terra firm.   

Its cause.  Not effect.  We spend way too much time on solutions to problems and calling it need-inspired innovation - rather than getting to the real root of the problems themselves.  May not be as press-worthy of sexy, but at least its real.

To New Horizons

Oh the sick and twisted future... a film from General Motors in 1940 entitled 'To New Horizons' talking about the world twenty years later.  Yes indeed, "Man continually strives to replace the old, with the new!" 

Spotted on one of my favorite new sites - Copenhagenize.  Check it out.

Siftings: 01.11.12

"“All great art is born of the metropolis.” - Ezra Pound

 :: image via NY Times


A great little snapshot on urban serendipity from the NY Times that looks at the accidental 'curation' of spaces that the urban environment yields, such as the framed view from the subway to the Brooklyn Bridge.  Perhaps the uniformity of the grid is part of the magic, as the NYT also talks about the 200th Anniversary of the Manhattan Grid, along with the exhibition at the Museum of the City.  And speaking of paving here in Portland, local group Depave got some nice coverage on OPB for their continued work on rolling back pavement in the city.  As for making money on the urban agriculture and gardens - a study in Vancouver, BC finds that it is still a challenge to make a living wage farming, even in the city.  Perhaps we can lobby for urban farm subsidies?

:: image via Museum of the City

Nate Berg at the Atlantic Cities sums up Los Angeles Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne's year-long project to explore his city through its literature, and some of his conclusions on where we stand.  As quoted in the Atlantic article:

"“What the books have suggested to me,” Hawthorne argues, “is that we really don’t have – and need – a new framework for understanding the city at this moment in its history as it undergoes this transition.”

A review of his most recent reading of 'Los Angeles Plaza: Sacred and Contested Space' can be found here - which is an interested exploration of the role of space, and the role of social status, on the way we interpret urban histories.  Related, and probably not big news, but people are less enamored with the suburbs, and are re-urbanizing, in this case, Philadelphia along with living in more dense types of housing. 

:: image via Philly.com

More on Occupy, with the recent flurry of Global and US occupations bringing into question the 'limits' of how public spaces are.  As mentioned in the story:

"The Occupy Wall Street movement showed there are often limits to how long one can stay in the town square of a “free” state to express one’s opinion. Various kinds of force were used to get people out of New York’s Zuccotti Park."

An interesting article from The Dirt on the $50 million!!!!! dollars of planning documents and designs for the Orange County Great Park, which has failed to yield much in terms of output.  It brings into question the time-scale on these massive endeavors, and how much needs to happen to create a 'park' in a traditional sense to satisfy some - while allowing space (and budgets) to evolve over decades.

:: image via The Dirt

Finally, a new competition from the Land Art Generator Initiative asks how renewable energy can be beautiful with a planned site at the Freshkills Park - which has a similar time-scale to the Great Park above.  And Freshkills may be an apt model for Mexico City, who is planning to close their massive landfill... And for the squeamish, a new report from the National Research Council changes the tune of reclaimed wastewater (aka toilet to tap) from a 'option of last resort' to a viable strategy that poses no more health risks than other sources.  Drink up!

Introducing THINK.urban

I am happy to announce the formation of a new organization, THINK.urban in Portland, Oregon.  Along with colleagues Katrina Johnston and Allison Duncan, our group plans to promote, as our tagline mentions: "Better Design Through Applied Research."   We bring a range of experience in urban design research, landscape architecture, urban ecology, public space, and social science, combining academic rigor with creative expression.

In short, we are a research based non-profit that connects academic research to urban design practice through a number of means, including expertise, scholarship, interventions, publications, and consultation with professionals.   We have current focus areas in public space, streets, and landscape - and cast a broad net across urbanism in general - with a goal to act as a bridge between theory and practice.  We are currently forming the 501(c)(3) organization and recruiting board members, so more is happening in 2012.

A snapshot of a couple of the projects that we are working on in tandem and as an extension of our studies at Portland State, include:

• Public Space + Protest:  OPDX  (Katrina Johnston)
• South Auditorium Study (Allison Duncan)
• Hidden Hydrology Project (Jason King)

Find out more about the activities of the non-profit on the website and ongoing blog, by following us on Twitter @think_urban or by checking our our new Facebook page.  

In the spirit of economy (and my own sanity), I will be cross posting periodically between these two sites - particularly posts that are relevant to both - but will still have original content on each as it makes sense.   Enjoy!

Unlocking LU 2: The Re-Representation of Urbanism

Continuing the thread of review for the new landscape urbanism website, I'm discussing 'The Re-Representation of Urbanism' by Gerdo Aquino, SWA Principal as well as educator and author of the book 'Landscape Infrastructure' (see L+U review here).  As a fundamental opening to his essay, Aquino mentions the major shift that has taken place towards urbanization and linking it to Odum's ecological idea of the 'carrying capacity' as these areas continually add more people.  It's interesting to think in these terms in numbers we can related to, so the example of the resource base for Los Angeles being about to support 1% of the current population is troubling - as it is a case in point (and a poignant example) of us living well above our means.

:: Los Angeles - image via City Photos

The other major theme mentioned is the use of adjectival modifiers of urbanism - ecological, new, everyday, combinatory, to name a few of the many.  The question isn't which of these is most appropriate, or 'right' but do they address the complexities of the city in meaningful ways and do they lead to appropriate actions.  In our search for solutions we tend to choose a dominant paradigm and stretch it to fit, rather than asking whether it is the right tool for a particular job.  As Aquino mentions:

"The study of cities needs to include many points of view in order to move beyond outmoded planning diagrams that no longer describe how to improve our cities. Despite so many variables, each of these terms argues for an ideas-rich platform for public debate, competition, and academic research in which the specificity of a particular factor can be magnified, examined, and explored in context."

Which is another way of saying a phrase I just heard again for the first time - "If you have a hammer, every thing looks like a nail".  So no self-respecting carpenter would carry one tool, but a box (or truck) full of potential solutions that work at varying scales.  Not to oversimplify cities - but you get the idea.  One of the most interesting ideas that landscape urbanism brings to the discussion, mentioned by Aquino in the article is that of a new relationship to graphic methods and imagery.  Many of the formative theories of LU look closely at mapping, representation, and as Aquino mentions:  "The collective visualization of our world..." which "...is even more important in influencing how we understand and think about urbanism and landscape."

The representation within disciplines is very important but sometimes missed as a key part of the discussion.  A softly rendered static watercolor perspective suffices for a view of a product, primarily because it is easier to convey than the complexity of urban systems and their dynamic properties.  The integration of science, particularly landscape ecology, chaos theory, and social dynamics, ramps up the number of urban variables to a degree where traditional representation crumbles.  Is the solution to retreat back to what is known and understandable (or more importantly, easy to convey as simplification to clients and others)?  Or do we take on the challenge of this, in Aquino's words - re-representation?

In this regard the essay references a 1997 article "Design by re-representation: a model of visual reasoning in design" by Rivka Oxman [link to PDF here] which Aquino summarizes below:

"...understanding design proposals requires both cognitive knowledge and visual literacy. Oxman’s research explores how emergence, or the way complex systems arise out of relatively simple connections, informs creativity and, particularly, the process of design. Design then can be understood as a culmination of thousands of decisions—and each representation offers a layer of meaning behind these complex ideas."

This is on the same theme as preliminary writings in 'Recovering Landscape' so again, this isn't really a new idea, but good to reinforce the concept of landscape architecture as a profession well suited for representational experimentation and the ability to capture fluidity and complexity, which is referenced in some of the major graphic convention evolutions during the first decade of this century.  Computers have became a significant tool not just in being able to automate techniques of collage, but also are beginning to aid in crunching significant quantities of data and more specifically, along with video and other media, represent motion and change over time, interrelationship of site actors, and to portray changes that occur on timelines too slow for our comprehension.

The second part of Aquino's essay focuses not on representation, but on actual places and the lack of a modern method of visual vocabulary for landscape architecture.  The profession is still mired in the pictorial scenery in the Olmstedian tradition (especially in North America) and architecture/urban design in the 'Main Street' utopia - so it becomes more difficult to give tangible examples of new ideas when the dominant visual and cultural paradigm is based on powerful, established imagery.  As Aquino mentions, "Landscape architecture... suffers from a poor collective visual vocabulary. The absence of prevalent and progressive design precedents hinders our ability to communicate our ideals for a better urbanism to a broader audience."

Part of the issue is in communication, the other part is more political - in actually convincing people that there is a better urbanism, and that the natural (or native) should not be the proper 'frame' for the ecological.  The debate of cultural frameworks and perceptions will continue to evolve as mentioned as we integrate more ecological thinking and systems into projects - but will they be required to fall into the fate of such techno-ecological marvels as Olmsted's Back Back Fens project - a landscape ecological urbanism in disguise as a natural wetland park?


Aquino then comes to the crux of the solution - and that is to build the work.  As he mentions:  "Educate through practice. Landscape architects, planners, and urbanists need built precedents to demonstrate that a more integrated approach to landscape and urbanism is possible. Policy and planning does not spark a collective re-imagination of our future in the way that tangible, built work does." 

This goes to the heart of the debate about landscape urbanism - and really becomes perhaps the wicked problem that we all face in trying to elaborate a new representational and methodological process.  At this point we have some of the fundamentals we want to achieve... flexibility, adaptability, indeterminacy and multiplicity... driven by ecological principles and woven into complex social and economic milieu - in response to cultural and market conditions.  This is the urbanism parts - the working aspects of cities and systems we want to address.


The problem with implementation - and with re-representation, is that we haven't actually figured out the representation part - so it is a giant leap to building.  While he offers examples - these are good works of urban planning and design, interdisciplinary landscape architecture, and innovative ecological solutions at work - but they aren't built works of landscape urbanism, and they aren't even really physical examples of the representational transformation of the disciplines... which haven't yet matured on the drawing boards, and definitely haven't been realized in the field.

I just don't see the connection between theory and practice being strong enough to justify a new label - and resistance within disciplines to new ideas notwithstanding, perhaps it will just become a natural maturation of all of the above disciplines with infusions of some aspects of new theory from all of the various 'urbanisms'.  It isn't really worthy of a label like 'landscape urbanism' or even 'landscape infrastructure' - although we do love new labels.  Is is okay to modify urbanism as 'study' and keep the disciplinary frameworks of applied methodology intact - so LU can influence and change and expand landscape architecture or architecture or planning without being considered a failed theoretical attempt?  I'd much rather see that than to try to formalize it into a method (ala New Urbanism) or to force projects into a new category of definition as Landscape Urbanism. 

Either way, I'm with Aquino partway, and agree that:  "Over the next decade, as the work communicated in words and pictures transforms into real places in the world, the public understanding of both urbanism and landscape architecture will expand, while new challenges and opportunities emerge for designers to tackle."

What we will call these works... these re-representations and re-implementations... that's the question?

Europe Journal: Diana Memorial Fountain

Located at one of the far ends of Hyde Park in London is the Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fountain, an elegantly curved ring of water opened in 2004 (design by Kathryn Gustafson  from her London office of Gustafson Porter).  Although somewhat controversial, I found the feature quite engaging, even experiencing it late in the day in somewhat rainy weather.  The flattened perspective gives subtle hints to the overall shape, but invites exploration.

Simple pathways were added after the fact due to some issues with sogginess, but are done pretty well.  You can never really see the entire feature in one view due to some subtle berming of the interior areas as well.

The movement and sound of water is subtle as well, with a variety of textures and smooth falls that glide along - not rushing rapids, but a trickling and bubbling that is peaceful.

Some details show the different water flow characteristics, and you see the construction technique of the individual computer-cut pieces of granite connected together at intervals - a sort of sculptural feat in it's own right.

 

The aerial shows the overall configuration of the oval, with some of the context of the adjacent Serpentine Lake.

Unfortunately, videos of the features didn't make it back from Europe with me - so there is the missing experiential aspects and the sound and movement of water - which is really part of the experience.  If you are in the area, definitely worth a side trip to check it out for yourself

Reading the Landscape: The Emergence of Landscape Urbanism

The next essay from the Landscape Urbanism Reader is by David Grahame Shane, entitled 'The Emergence of Landscape Urbanism'.  This essay builds on Waldheim's essay and further elaborates on the origins of the theory - with a broad take on the historical foundations and precedents around landscape urbanism as mentioned in the introductory text: “Shane surveys the growing body of literature attendant to landscape urbanism, while tracing the institutions and individuals implicated in the discourse, especially as they relate to the disciplinary formations and discourses of urban design.” (17)


As far as defining landscape urbanism, Shane mentions that the concept "has recently emerged as a rubric to describe the design strategies resulting in the wake of traditional urban forms.” (58) and echoes Waldheim in describing it as encompassing: "the practices of many designers for who landscape had replaced architectural form as the primary medium of citymaking.  This understanding of decentralized post-industrial urban form highlighted the leftover void spaces of the city as potential commons.” (57-58) Furthering this defintiion that provides a way out of the current methodologies of urban design practice.

“Landscape urbanists want to continue the search for a new basis of a performative urbanism that emerges from the bottom up, geared to the technological and ecological realities of the postindustrial world… implies an opportunity open urban design out beyond the current rigid and polarized situation to a world where the past building systems and landscape can be included as systems within urban design.” (65)

Shane mentions this in terms of creating new "recombinations and hybridizations, liberating the urban design discipline from the current, hopeless, binary opposition of past and present, town and country, in and out." (65)  but does mention that although filled with potential as noted above, "All of landscape urbanism’s triumphs so far have been in such marginal and ‘unbuilt’ locations.” (62)  This is another common refrain from critics of landscape urbanism, and it is worth noting that the ideas of contemporary urbanism and its potential solutions are very different in distant open spaces as opposed to dense urban fabric, which is valid, but also misses the point that the theory is attempting to address this situation, not, as many posit, blindly accepting sprawl as a given and deciding to operate within the residual post-industrial or generic Koolhaasian fields of landscape within the periphery.  Rather there is a residual fabric of corridors, edges, and other surfaces that can be re-engaged within this ideology.

:: Louisville Waterfront Park - image via LouisvilleKY.gov

The precise operational dynamic of works of landscape urbanism is one thing - but to move beyond this and think of ways in which the concepts that interweave into practice is a different approach altogether.  The landscape urbanist project, if you would call it such, is addressing all of this (hence the term distiguished from the suburban), and Shane does explain that “The recent discourse surrounding landscape urbanism does not yet begin to address the issue of urban morphologies or the emergence of settlement patterns over time. The problems of this approach is its amnesia and blindness to preexisting structures, urban ecologies, and morphological patterns.” and concludes that “Landscape urbanists are just beginning to battle with the thorny issue of how dense urban forms emerge from landscape and how urban ecologies support performance spaces.” (63)


This essay is way to dense to capture in any detail, but does offer some thought provoking historical origins of theory spanning the last century.   The change in urban form and dynamics through this time period are exp
ressed by 'decompression', evolving from the ideas of Post-Fordist modes of production, deindustrialization leading to shrinking cities, and the resultant postmodern organization that "became obvious in the 1990s with the proliferation of sprawling cities, gated enclaves, residential communities, megamalls, and theme parks.” (59)

This context of contemporary urbanism is best captured by the provocatively wonderful 'City as an Egg' diagram from Cedric Price, which contrast three city morphologies "traditional, dense, ‘hard-boiled egg’ city fixed in concentric rings of development… the ‘fried egg’ city, where railways stretched the city’s perimeter in accelerated linear space-time corridors out into the landscape, resulting in a star shape… and the postmodern ‘scrambled egg city,’ where everything is distributed evenly in small granules or pavilions across the landscape in a continuous network.” (64)

:: City as an Egg - image via Archiable

A wide array of projects are included as examples.  Some are more obvious or oft-mentioned, such as the Parc de la Villette, Downsview, and Freshkills competitions, and also the East River Competition conducted by the Van Alen Institute.  There are some new ones, includingWest Market Square by West 8 (1994) which is a space owned, maintained and programmed by the city, but " which is also free at times to be occupied by local people of all ages, under the surveillance of cameras and local police.” (60) marking a new example of heterotropic space.  The New Town Competition entry from Koolhaas/OMA from 1987 is another precedent where the residential form is shaped by, in the words of Corner, "linear voids of nondevelopment." (60) hinting at the concept of privileged site over architectural form.


Other examples include the unbuilt Greenport Harborfront project in Long Island (1997), which is an example of  “the concept of ‘performative’ urbanism based on preparing the setting for programmed and unprogrammed activities on common land.” (59) which is reflective of some of the later work from Field Operations as well.  A built example of the idea, in a more architectural and site scale context, is the sculptural Osaka Ocean Liner Terminal by FOA, where the architects "turn the concept of the green roof into a dynamic, flowing, baroque parkland setting… Pier and park, two previously separate urban morphologies, are hybridized so as to become inseparable.” (65)

:: Yokahama Terminal - FOA - image via Matt Kingstreet

Shane references an even more extensive list of references, which provide some great historical precedents.   Many of these cover basic historical urbanism, such as the work of Kostof (The City Shaped, The City Assembled), history of the Western/US landscape by Slater and Conzen, and early 20th century writings on garden cities from Howard and regionalism, specifically 'Cities in Evolution' by Patrick Geddes from 1915.  Other writings include later writings of Lynch, Rowe, as well as McHarg's 'Design with Nature' and shifts to more contemporary discussions from Harvey and Soja for exploration of postmodern urbanism, writings from Guy Debord 'The Society of the Spectacle' from 1995 and the explorations by Garreau of the edge-city phenomenon from 1991.

::  Tyson's Corner Edge City

A fundamental aspect discussed by Shane is the connection to landscape ecology, specifically the work of Forman (Landscape Mosaics) and Forman & Godron (Landscape Ecology) and mentioning that its strength "is the consideration of the geographical landscape and the ecological cause-effect network in the landscape.”(61)  The connections of landscape ecology and its roots in Europe are important due to the differing relations between nature and culture (rather than just dealing with landscape sans humans).  As Shane elaborates:

"European land management principles merged with post-Darwinian research on island biogeography and diversity to create a systematic methodology for studying ecological flows, local biospheres, and plant and species migrations conditioned by shifting climatic and environmental factors (including human settlements.” (61)

Finally, the essays captures some of the more recent writings tied closely to LU theory, mentioning 'Stalking Detroit' (2001), 'Mississippi Floods' by Mathur & da Cunha (2000), 'Reclaiming the American West' by Berger (2002), 'Sub-urbanism and the Art of Memory' by Marot (2003), and 'Recovering Landscape' edited by Corner and published in 1999 - which i would consider a close precedent to the currrent discussion.  Stalking Detroit is also an important contribution, offering essays by Waldheim and Corner and provides context, within the prominent shrinking city model of Detroit for a changing city typology.  "After Ford' by Schumacher and Rogner, “provides a most convincing explanation for the relation between modern urbanism and Fordist economic imperatives, as well as the surreal spectacle of decay and abandonment found today in many North American industrial cities.” (57)

:: Shrinking Detroit - image via VIA Architecture

The work in Stalking Detroit, although unbuilt, provides some examples of potential operational methods of landscape urbanism.  One project discussed was Waldheim's 'Decamping Detroit', which illustrates a four stage process for recolonization of space in the shrinking city, including "Dislocation (disconnection of services); erasure (demolition and jumpstarting the native landscape ecology by dropping appropriate seeds from the air ); absorption (ecological reconstitution of part of the Zone with woods, marshes, and streams); and infiltration (the recolonization of the landscape with heteropic, villagelike enclaves.” (59)

 :: Decamping Detroit (Waldheim) - image via detroit disurbanism project

This context of deindustrialization and surburban sprawl is a consistent theme, moving away by necessity from the modernist planning ideology and including a different reading of the city, focus on urban morphology, activated with new strains of thinking from landscape ecology with a goal, as explained by Shane:  “A determination not to accept the readymade formulas of urban design, whether ‘New Urbanist’ or ‘generic’ urbanist megaforms a la Koolhaas.” (64)  The key this is a reversal of normal processes, which "opens the way for a new hybrid urbanism, with dense clusters of activity and the reconstitution of the natural ecology, starting a more ecologically balanced, inner-city urban form in the void.”(59)

Check out as well a longer version of this article from the Harvard Design Magazine (pdf) and I would highly recommend 'Recombinant Urbanism' from 2005 for an exhaustive study of urban modelling processes.

Reading the Landscape: Landscape as Urbanism

The next essay in the Landscape Urbanism Reader, following 'Terra Fluxus' and the initial 'Reference Manifesto' is a longer essay by Waldheim exploring the idea that landscape is most suited to the modern metropolis, being "uniquely capable of responding to temporal change, transformation, adaptation, and succession... a medium uniquely suited to the open-endedness, indeterminacy, and change demanded by contemporary urban conditions." (39)  This idea could be considered one of the formative structures on which landscape urbanism is built, explained by many writers as a response the failings of architecture and urban design to cope with the complexity of the urban situation, leading to Waldheim's apt, but somewhat hyperbolic statement that "the discourse surrounding landscape urbanism can be read as a disciplinary realignment in which landscape supplants architecture's historical role as the basic building block of urban design." (37)

:: Lower Dons -  River + City + Life by Stoss LU

Ironically, this essay explains clearly that landscape urbanism theory has its origins in the same rejection of modernist architecture and planning, and the retreat to "policy, procedure, and public therapy." (39)  This is a common refrain from contemporary planners as a way to distance themselves from top-down, totalitarian schemes of the mid-twentieth century, which has led to a renaissance of engagement in both community and context that makes all urban design and planning better but also a tendency to favor specific strategies.  Corner is quoted as well, mentioning that "only through a synthetic and imaginative reordering of categories in the built environment might we escape our present predicament in the cul-de-sac of post-industrial modernity, and 'the bureaucratic and uninspired failings,' of the planning profession." (38)

I think at heart it means there is room for both a rejection of modernist planning, along with a rejection of some contemporary approaches as well which may be suited for some situations but not appropriate for all.  As an alternative path to new urbanism, rational planning and similar strategies, the fixed nature of deterministic planning must be questioned - thus forming the heart of this debate, Waldheim mentions:  

"the very indeterminacy and flux of the contemporary city, the bane of traditional European city-making, are precisely those qualities explored in emergent works of landscape urbanism." (39)

The context here is important, as many critics of landscape urbanism point out some form of 'anti-urban, pro-sprawl, pro-car' agenda within the writings, whereas proponents of LU might be summarized as arguing that the current forms of urban planning and design are alternatively 'anti-reality,' as they don't acknowledge the messy reality of shrinking, decentralized, globalizing, capitalist, sprawling, market-driven, polluted, socially diverse and complicated nature of the modern city.  Thus beyond a palliative that uses greenery to mitigate urban ills, the definition includes a more expansive field of view, including infrastructure systems (water, waste, transportation), post-industrial sites, waterfronts, linear systems, public open space, as well as more traditional urban-scaled landscape projects.

 :: The Contemporary Context - image from Drosscape - Alan Berger (link)

The context of environmental movements is important as well, as this drives the landscape architecture to a new relevance in sustainability (yet a marginalization in such contemporary processes such as LEED).  Invoking ecology as a "model for process" (39) where projects "appropriate the terms, conceptual categories, and operating methodologies of field ecology: that is, the study of species as they related to their natural environments." (43)  Corner warns of the ecological being solely about advocacy that leads us into the distance of humans from the natural environment, summing current environmentalism as "nothing more than a rear-guard defense of a supposedly autonomous 'nature' conceived to exist 'a priori' outside of human agency or cultural construction." (38)  Applied in a holistic manner to a range of systems and project types listed above, this fundamental advantage of landscape urbanism and its ecological viewpoint allows for "the conflation, integration, and fluid exchange between (natural) environmental and (engineered) infrastructural systems." (43)

These fundamentals of cultural ecology draw on historical precedents like Olmsted's Emerald Necklace, urban development in Barcelona in the 1980s and 90s, and the human-shaped landscape of the Netherlands, which is often used as a model for a non-pastoral idea of shaped (i.e. cultural) landscape that differs from the American frontier model of verdant wilderness).  More specifically, Waldheim mentions some of the other formative competitions, including the less ecological Parc de la Villette (1982) as well as more recent examples of Downsview Park Toronto and Fresh Kills Landfill which strongly incorporate the ideas of ecology.

:: Downsview proposal by Corner/Allen - image via ecosistema urbano

La Villette, on the other hand, focuses on ecologically inspired idea of indeterminacy in spatial arrangement and programming, with both Tschumi's winning entry and the OMA/Koolhaas plans providing "a nascent form of landscape urbanism, constructing a horizontal field of infrastructure that might accommodate all sorts of urban activities, planned and unplanned, imagined and unimagined, over time." (41)  Thus the fluidity of the plan is the generation of adaptable, not fixed, form - able to react and change, quoting  Koolhaas from 'Congestion without Matter':

"the program will undergo constant change and adjustment... the underlying principle of programmatic indeterminacy as a basis of the formal concept allows any shift, modification, replacement, or substitutions to occur without damaging the initial hypothesis." (41)

Other current practice that fits into landscape urbanism derive from global context, such as the work of West 8 in the Netherlands, which allows for a wider latitude in cultural conceptions of open space that have been implemented including the Shell Project (Eastern Scheldt Storm Surge Barrier), Schipol Amsterdam Airport, and Borneo & Sporenburg, the last referenced as "an enormous landscape urbanism project... suggests the potential diversity of landscape urbanist strategies through the insertion of numerous small landscaped courts and yard, and the commissioning of numerous designers for individual housing units." (46) 

:: Eastern Scheldt Storm Surge Barrier - West 8

In addition to the work of West 8, inventive work in the post-industrial realm is evoked, including historical precedent like Seattle's Gas Works Park by Richard Haag, and the more expansive contemporary Duisburg Nord Steelworks Park by Latz & Partners - the model for reclaiming post-industrial landscapes as a cultural landscape.


The list of references is long, with some of the formative writings that have been incorporated in the structure of landscape urbanism, including ecological regional perspectives of Geddes, Mumford, McHarg (Design with Nature), the urban city-theory of Lynch (Image of the City; A Theory of Good City Form), and more recently the expanded realm of the polycentric city with Rowe (Making a Middle Landscape), Lerup (Stim and Dross) and Koolhaas (Delirious New York; S,M,L,XL).  Koolhaas marks the shift in thinking towards landscape using Atlanta as a prototype, stating that "Architecture is no longer the primary element of urban order, increasingly urban order is given by a thin horizontal vegetal plane, increasingly landscape is the primary element of urban order." (42)

:: 2008 Aerial View of Atlanta - image via Ace Aerial Photography

An important contribution to this is an 1995 essay by  Kenneth Frampton entitled 'Toward an Urban Landscape' in which he expands on the early essays on critical regionalism with a focus on the "need to conceive of a remedial landscape that is capable of playing a critical and compensatory role in relation to the ongoing, destructive commodification of the man-made world." (42)  He continues with two main points privileging landscape: "First, that priority should now be according to landscape, rather than to freestanding built form and second, that there is a pressing need to transform certain megalopolitan types such as shopping malls, parking lots, and office parks into landscaped built forms." (43)

 The second source worth exploring in more detail is the essay 'Mat Urbanism - the Thick 2-D' by Stan Allen (2001) - which expands the flat horizontality of the field with imbuing these suficial space as a process landscape.  "Increasingly, landscape is emerging as a model for urbanism. Landscape has traditionally been defined as the art of organizing horizontal surfaces… By paying close attention to these surface conditions – not only configuration, but also materiality and performance – designers can activate space and produce urban effects without the weighty apparatus of traditional space making.” (37)


This essay is another building block in the tradition of urbanism as exploration and study, not yielding specific answers to these questions but looking at the history of critical thought and linking to some of the formative analyses done, as well as some of the preliminary precedents that have emerged in the past century.  Critics have claimed as well that many of the concepts of landscape urbanism theory is not necessarily new - which is true, but is also a claim which sort of misses the point.  We should always look back to sources to inform our current thinking as there is much to be learned from both successes as well as failures - and by looking at new ways to apply these lessons to our current context (which I would posit is unique to cities throughout history).

Thus, Waldheim encapsulates the context of landscape urbanism within this historical framework, where:  "…the ability to produce urban effects traditionally acheieved through the construction of buildings simply through the organization of horizontal surfaces – recommends the landscape medium for use in contemporary urban conditions increasingly characterized by horizontal sprawl and rapid change.” (37)

Reading the Landscape: LU Reader broken down

Our previous excursion into online readings was sort of disjointed, sparsely commented, and for the most part not terribly fruitful.   There was some good discussion, but I think a combination of format, content, and time constraints added to the difficulty in exploring the Landscape Urbanism Reader to the degree I would have liked to see.  Also, the planned weekly updates on chapters never materialized - beyond the first introductory missive on Waldheim's 'A Reference Manifesto'.  Nonetheless, we may retool the concept for another book in the future - but in the meantime, I wanted to explore the content, as I took a somewhat more methodical approach to the essays - breaking it down to tease out some key points... including:

• Definitions of Landscape Urbanism
• Urban Context - what conditions are LU responding to?
• Key Urban Concepts that shaped LU?
• Representative Projects/Precedents
• Key References

Sso in the next couple of weeks I'll post on these chapters, starting with Corner's 'Terra Fluxus', and would love for some comment and discussion to ensue, as these formative essays are some of the most powerful (and misunderstood) in the landscape urbanism discourse.  In addition to the essay-by-essay exploration, there seems the need for some more cross-concept analysis (i.e. a focus on precedents, various definitions, etc.) that could be analyzed and displayed in some infographic analyses...

Will probably do a similar thing for some of the other key texts, such as Kerb 15, Topos 71, Center 14: Landscape Urbanism, Large Parks, A Manual for the Machinic Landscape, Stalking Detroit, Recovering Landscape, The Mesh Book, and selected essays from other key texts and sources... (along with continuation of the 'Red Brick Chronicles') - so lots of good stuff that would be great to construct the foundations.

Kunstler on Landscape Urbanism

James Howard Kunstler joins the LU/NU 'debate' with a completely Kunstlerian commentary with some rhertorical tidbids like LU displaying "a complete lack of interest in the basic components of urban design"... "incorporates lots of high tech 'magic' infrastructure for directing water flows and requires massive, costly, complex site interventions" and is "...against density and vehemently pro-automobile'" and much much more.  This is going toward the realm of satire in it's silliness... enjoy!  (via CNU - quoting Orion Magazine, date unknown)

"The mandarin headquarters of Modernist ideology, Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, having gone to war with the New Urbanist movement, is now pushing a dubious new practice they call “Landscape Urbanism.” Don’t be fooled again. Under the fashionable “green” rubric, it’s another version of “nature” as the default remedy for cities, a rejection of genuine urban form. Landscape Urbanism affects to be concerned with site planning, but it displays a complete lack of interest in the basic components of urban design: street and block systems.  Instead, it incorporates lots of high tech “magic” infrastructure for directing water flows and requires massive, costly, complex site interventions that amount to little more than art stunts. Landscape Urbanism is explicitly against density and vehemently pro-automobile. In effect, it’s just super high-tech suburbia. It’s designed mainly to generate big fees for site-planning firms while it does nothing to prepare this society for a post-oil economy. Naturally, it comes with heaps of opaque theory, designed to mystify and impress the non-elect.

Harvard has been battling the New Urbanists for two decades on the grounds that traditional urban design is insufficiently avant-garde, intellectually unadventurous, backward-looking, lacking in sex appeal, un-ironic, square. But the USA doesn’t need more architectural fashion statements or art stunts. It needs places to live that are worth caring about and compatible with the capital and material resources that we can expect to retain going forward, which are liable to fewer and scarcer than what we’ve gotten used to. The USA doesn’t need any more mendacious ideologies meant to confound the public about the operation of cities and the things in them so that star-architects can appear to be wizards.

The USA does need a body of principle and skill that will allow us to assemble places with a future, and the New Urbanists have retrieved this information from the dumpster of history – where it was carelessly tossed by two generations in thrall to the phantom of limitless expansion. They recognize the resource limits we are now up against and the threats posed by climate change. They’re keenly aware of the need to re-integrate local food production into the landscape in an appropriate relationship with the places where people live. They’re the only group of design professionals on the scene right now who are capable of delivering a vision of the future that is consistent with the reality of the future."

Reading the Landscape: A Reference Manifesto

As mentioned previously we are fully engaged in a group reading of the Landscape Urbanism Reader, edited by Charles Waldheim, and as promised, are providing some brief synopses of what transpired in the previous weeks dialogue are regular intervals.  Our first week was a soft launch, allowing folks to introduce themselves to the group, and then to comment on the Introduction by Waldheim, "A Reference Manifesto".

BACKGROUND: THE GROUP
For starters, I wanted to give a brief overview of our group members - so you have a feel for the who and what of this diverse array of contributors.  It's exciting to see the diversity (geographical, disciplinary, age, background, gender, and more) of the group as well as to have folks relatively new to LU theory and those with some experience.  A rough breakdown of two key metrics gives a snapshot of the group dynamics and global community made possible through our digital opportunities:

Disciplines:
Landscape Architecture/Design, Architecture, Real Estate Development, Planning, Civil Engineering, Graphic Design, Marketing, Sustainability Consulting, History and includes focus from Academia (both students and professors) and from a range of firms, universities, and experiences.

Locations:  
Shanghai, China; Portland, Oregon; Memphis, Tennessee; Seattle, Washington; Washington, D.C.; Nashville, Tennessee; Boston, Massachusetts;  Guelph, Ontario, Canada; Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Seoul, Korea; Charlottesville, Virginia; Austin, Texas; Somerville, Massachusetts; Los Angeles, California; Salida, California; London, UK; Manchester, UK; Rougemont, Switzerland;

WEEK ONE:  A REFERENCE MANIFESTO (Waldheim)
This is sort of a preliminary overview and snapshot of what's in the book - so it typically left the group with more questions than answers.  There was some good dialogue that referenced the distinction between those new to Landscape Urbanism and those with some background - as well as a few surprises from people that had initially read the book but were now revisiting it after some time.  The frontispiece included an image from Andrea Branzi - particularly his

The intro also includes the controversial and provocative excerpt from the text - outlining the 'discinplinary realignment' that places landscape in a more prominent position in terms of conceptualizing and production of urban space.

As a relatively open-ended intro, there were many perspectives - including some of those mentioned within the text such as global capital, de-industrialization and changes in the modes of economic production, increased importance of public infrastructure, decreased density & decentralization (surburbanization), cities as themed environments for tourism, commodification and homogeneity of form, waste & toxic landscapes, social pathologies, and prevalence of the automobile/paved surfaces, and the integration of ecological processes.

While Waldheim specifically frames these issues within the predominant themes of North American cities, many question the overall potential scope of LU - particularly in being able to address rapidly growing cities, density, and whether it is specifically oriented towards looking at suburbs instead of the city per se.  It echoes trends from a number of critics that the theory ignores specific existing conditions of growing cities and the rapidly changing nature of cities - folding into that concept the distinction of what is considered 'urban' today as densities, edge cities, and other non-central city agglomerations change our perceptions of the city.  There was also thinking about the different nature of deindustrialization between the ideas of Rust-Belt shrinking cities versus changes in the nature of production (a shift to the service economy) in cities that are still growing but changing in less physical and more social/economic ways.

Others mentioned questions related to the ideas of horizontality, the role of the car within, how is landscape defined within this context, the role of ecology, positions on capitalism, origins in postmodernism, and the role of nature (and our historical/cultural perspectives of it)...bringing in ideas from Leo Marx to William Cronon - as well as the role of Olmstedian designed pastoral scenery from the 19th Century.   Marx was brought up in terms of the concept of the triad of primitive, progressive, and pastoral views - specifically relating to the American viewpoint of its relationship with land derived from the frontier ethic and movement westward - which is a truly American phenomenon that has taken root in other locales that didn't experience the same relationship. This was mentioned as a source for some of the confusion related to LU theory - as it does focus on the progressive in that it acknowledges the technological and economic reality that influences our modern world (infrastructure, cars, decentralization).  The resulting view then is that by default, acknowledgment is akin to support.

Much attention was given to the concept of the 'horizontal field' as merely a "uni-directional urbanism" or in a broader viewpoint of a "multi-directional" schema capturing fluctuations of people, capital, communication.  Others   One reference connected this to Peter Walker's minimalist themes of flatness, seriality, and gesture - which provides a connection to postmodernism at least from the design perspectives of the 1980s. Even taking in the context of a field of operations, the horizontal field seems to be ambiguous, leading to questions of scale, how does agriculture fit in, is it relevant to the city or just the suburb, and ambivalence towards sprawl.  Others took a different reading of horizontality, seeing the references as "not to me so much a call to build cities this way but rather, an acknowledgment that they exist in this form." or that the views of horizontality are not limited to terrestrial or territorial expansion, but encompasses the surfaces at a variety of scales of rooftops and other urban spaces.  It is also important to mention that many point to the fact that Waldheim, although the originator of the term, does not speak for the movement as a whole - and others may have a more expansive viewpoint.

The idea of a new prominence for landscape architecture, a theme admired by many of the LAs in the group was also mentioned - whether as a "shot across the bow of the other design professions" or a true path to interdisciplinary methods with landscape architects as the synthesizing leaders of these teams.  Building on this idea is a broader viewpoint of landscape as a more holistic conceptual framework (not specifically applying to a discipline) that including the broad range of landscape elements, as well as the urban landscape that includes people and buildings as parts.  This distinction beyond 'greenery' to a broader view of landscape is vital - as there is a good amount of ambiguity in the word landscape that seems to stir up the already muddied theoretical waters - which definitely need to be addressed in LU as well as ecological urbanism and environmentalism in general.

Many offered ideas for ways of placing LU within larger theoretical frameworks such as New Urbanism, the work of Kevin Lynch (Image of the City), Aldo Leopold (A Sand County Almanac), Ian McHarg (Design with Nature), to a sprawling commentary (which I cannot begin to paraphrase in a meaningful way) covering foundations in philosophy from Aristotle & Plato, Copernicus & Aquinas, and Wittgenstein & Merleau-Ponty - attempting to place the concept and utility of themes in search of a Good Maxim in which to direct us. 

Many were and are intrigued by concepts within LU that attract many to the dialogue, such as process & systems thinking, catalyzation and staging, ecological thinking, focus on infrastructure, as well as interdisciplinary synthesis.  An overall theme however, which is the point of the reading and will provide some clarification, is that there are still a lot of questions and frustration about specifically what LU is proposing.  People mentioned: "...beyond simply describing urban processes as one-dimensional fields, LU theory would be better served by formulating a working framework for also analyzing the character of those phenomena." or "ways that these concepts can be applied for more useful ends that promote urban density and vibrancy rather than fetishizing their demise" or simply a desire to find "the positive side" of LU.

There was a strong desire for specific viewpoints on things like specific urban issues, a search perhaps for a working methodology of landscape urbanism. While some of these answers may be found in the text - there will also, like this chapter, result in more questions than answers... but then again, isn't that the point of urbanism?

Obviously this is a vast paraphrased oversimplification of many of the multivalent discussions at play  (even for a chapter so utterly lacking in real content) - so apologies for misrepresenting or missing any key points - so participants feel free to shoot an email or comment to clarify or expand on any of these points.

Next Steps...
We're currently wrapping up week 2, where we discussed Terra Fluxus (Corner) and Landscape as Urbanism (Waldheim) - so an update on both of these will be coming soon by members of the group.  Stay tuned for more.

Brief Thoughts on Binary Thinking

The on-going debate on LU/NU is interesting less for any content (of which there has been little beyond posturing and uninformed rhetoric), and more than its continuation of a history of binary discussions between oppositional actors that has occurred in many arenas, including a long history within urbanism and design.  Lest we think there is something special about this particular debate, it's important to remember some of those 'debates' (such as the visible rift between Mumford & Jacobs to name one of many - which is a fascinating dialogue worth some future exploration) have existed in the past.  These, instead of merely creating factions of us v. them, expand our understanding and discussions of larger, complex, urban issues.  A few thoughts on binary distinctions in general, therefore, is worthy of further exploration.

I always turn back to Elizabeth Meyer's essay in Ecological Design and Planning (Thompson & Steiner, 1997) where she elaborates on 'The Expanded Field of Landscape Architecture' and the tendency to provide 'binary sets' within discussions, such as architecture/landscape, culture/nature, and art/ecology.  The dualism in these positions are too distinct and limits potentials, positing that: “The scholar can develop theories for site description and interpretation that occupy the space between nature and culture, landscape and architecture, man-made and natural, and that are along the spatial continuum that unites, not the solid line that divides, concepts into binary opposites.” (p.74)  Instead, in the terms of landscape architecture, this requires "The rediscovery of the space between the boundaries – the space of hybrids, relationships, and tensions – allows us to see the received histories of the modern landscape as the ideologically motivated social constructs that they are… the gap between man and nature will be replaced with the continuum of human nature and nonhuman nature.” (p.51)

Having always been fascinated by the nature/culture debate, another resource worth mentioning is Placing Nature: Culture & Landscape Ecology (Nassauer, ed. 1997), which offers a range of essays in this realm, specifically focusing on blurring disciplinary and theoretical silos.  As Nassauer mentions in her concluding remarks: "Landscape ecology insistently confronts us with the complexities of connection. Rather than establishing boundaries to separate ecosystems or disciplines, it repeatedly points out their connectedness... [it] suggests that we should go beyond the boundaries precisely because sufficient answers are unlikely to lie solely within them. Respect for the complexity of the ecological relationships must balance out human propensity for know the world by simplifying it.” (p.165)

How we do that matters, but ecology offers some interesting parallels in thinking of urban systems, as both can no longer be perceived as closed, static, homogeneous collections, but rather are constantly evolving due to disequilibria, instability, disturbance, and flux based on a similar interactivity through reciprocal relationships between organisms and their environments.  This point is made thoroughly in Human Ecology (Steiner, 2002), who melds ecological thinking into our social construct at scales ranging from habitat to globe - describing an extension of the shift from deterministic ecological thinking towards a new ecology where humans are vital participants in the process.  In explaining this 'Subversive Subject', Steiner makes a case for ecological thinking as a new method for framing discussions, stating that "...human ecology emphasized complexity over reductionism, focuses on change over stable states, and expands ecological concepts beyond the study of plants and animals to include people.  This view differs from the environmental determinism of the early twentieth century."  (p.3)

I would make the case that this is the main thrust of landscape urbanist theory (i.e. it's not about landscape in a physical sense) in exploring a similar distaste with the concept of environmental determinism and looking to evolve this into more ecological thinking is mirrored in our changing from totalitarian urbanist schemes and deterministic urban strategies (closed systems) to methods that allow for temporality, market forces, chaos that fit within the complex mosaic that represent the modern metropolis.  These open systems, as mentioned by Steiner as possessing "...fluid, overlapping boundaries across several spatial scales from the local to the global," (p.4) and subsequently changes our approach to design and planning, where "...individual designed objects, be they buildings or gardens, are not viewed independently, but rather as parts of dynamic landscape systems." (p.10)  

This sort of thinking is missing from any single scheme of urbanism that claims to have 'the answer' to all of our problems.  Perhaps this is the inherent polarity in the distinction between NU (i.e. we have the answers) and LU (i.e. we have more questions) which leads to disagreement.  This is also represented in modern green building systems like LEED which are building-specific, because they can only exert influence over one distinct level of a complex, nested hierarchy of the entirety of  the urban realm.  A series of one-off, ultra-green buildings or dense, walkable communities are beneficial within a certain scale for sure.  The real question is to what extent to they solve larger problems of sustainability and issues of urbanism beyond their selected boundaries?  The either-or dialectic is not the issue but rather how we connect interventions within their larger (and smaller) contextual hierarchies, and how we general multiple solutions to deal with the complexities we face in addressing modern cities.  LU theory, for all its inability to articulate projects and its acknowledgment (not acceptance) of current urban issues (i.e. autos, suburbia) in my thinking isn't trying to occupy a binary opposite to NU (sorry Waldheim) but rather to offer a counterpoint to a larger urban methodology that is focused on product instead of process.

In this context, and shifting gears back to conflict for a second, I was struck by the parallels when delving into the great collection of essays 'Uncommon Ground' (1996), edited by one of my favorite writers, William Cronon, offers a wide discussion on the idea of nature in our modern thinking.  More exploration of that soon, but for now let's focus on the similarities inherent in debates on urbanism, in relation to binary thoughts related to 'environmentalism' and 'nature'  Cronon mentions, "...once we recognize that not all human groups and cultures view nature in the same way, it becomes at least more complicated to assert that one group's ideas of nature should take precedence over another's.  At a minimum, we need to enter into a dialogue with other people about why they think as they do... [and] we should be willing to question some of our own moral certainty in an effort to understand why we ourselves think of nature as we do, and why others do not always agree with us." (p.21)

By making a leap that substitution of the word 'urbanism' the same framework could inform our thinking in similar terms.  In conclusion, a wonderful quote can illuminate the recent LU/NU debate, particularly in relation to binary modes of thinking and the type of rhetoric that it has spawned due mostly to the previously mentioned, and much misguided feeling of moral certainty in one's particular viewpoint: 

"We live in a time when political discussion favors extreme positions and sound bites.  In the struggle to attract attention and support for one's own views, the temptation if very great to caricature those of one's adversaries.  The result it a rhetorical landscape of polarities, in which start oppositions arise and cartoons become our most common way of conducting what passes for reasoned debate.  In such a world, your either for the environment or against it, and any inquiry that points towards more challenging ways of framing the discussion can seem threatening.  The crucial task of self-criticism is all to easily avoided because it can seem to lend aid and comfort to the enemy." (p.22)

The Urbanism Wars: AD v. CW

Turns out you have to read and write a bit in doctoral studies - which sometimes cuts down on the time for blogging... who knew?  But glean and collect I still do, and lots of good reading since the last dispatch on the ongoing dispute/feud/discussion/turf-war on who controls urbanism - aka the LU/NU debates (which should actually be the AD/CW debates for Mr. Duany and Mr. Waldheim). 

My google alert for landscape urbanism has literally blown up in the last couple of weeks - mostly due to the debate emerging from some more mainstream media - which is an interesting twist... bringing a smallish academic squabble out into the open.

:: image via Boston Globe

I make my bias clear as a landscape architect, I find much of LU compelling in both the potential to expand the practice of landscape architecture (process over product) and in larger ideas of dealing with modern cities (flexibility in responding to rapid change).  I like the concept of NU, but also take issue with some tenets (level of control for instance, determinism, generic transects, equity issues) feeling it's a great formula for a certain problem type that will continue to be relevant, but in it's present form is ill-equipped to handle many urban issues that need to be addressed.  Both will evolve through discussion, not through 'swallowing up' or destroying the other.  Others think differently - and dialogue is the generator of new ideas and solutions.  Unfortunately, we are not witnessing or participating in a dialogue, and  neither Waldheim or Duany is the prophet to lead us out of this. 

LU comes from an academic base, and is attempting to refine the inherent conversation (or add to it) by recognizing the need to acknowledge (i.e. accept, not promote) that cities are different, people are different, there is sprawl, there are lots of roads and cars, some people don't like density, the line between 'city' and suburb is not longer clear, etc.  Right now it is theory and discovery (i call that urbanism in the true defintion which should come from academia) that is trying to expand a conversation.  Thus there is not charter, and there are no rules or regulations in which to critique at this point, and there are few built works to evaluate as well.  This may come, or more likely it will assimilate into professional practice in a number of disciplines - not emerge as either a professional position (i.e. I am a landscape urbanist) or become codified into a system (such as NU).

NU comes from an established professional base that has a body of work and a well-tended methodology that produces good results for walkable, mixed use, community plans.  The successes and limitations are well documented, and the proponents have much sway of many types of developments (and many vocal adherents).  So, the questions are:   Does it have a wider relevance in cities, retrofitting suburbs, attacking rapidly expanding global mega-cities?  Can it apply to a wider demographic?  Can it adapt a transect model based on a monocentric model to the reality of messy, polycentric cities?   What it is is method and application (i call that planning, urban design, architecture) resulting in work but in need of new, wider discussion about how to deal with our changing cities and spaces.  How does this discussion take place if the response to any new idea is to hunker down and fight.

That said, neither is a panacea, and believe there is much to be found in a dialogue.  The conversation and media has been mostly to misrepresent the LU agenda (i'm sorry but that's what it is, plain and simple - hint - despite Waldheim's claims, there isn't an agenda).  Thus the reaction is not to reality and disagreement with a position, but knee-jerk, uninformed reactions to a constructed version by people feeling threatened by a different (note I didn't say opposing) viewpoint and wanting to tear it down.  The similar practice is done and has been for a while by those in opposition to NU (i am as guilty as anyone else of this) - oversimplification of complex issues.  This need to stop on both sides.  Criticism is one thing.  Uninformed criticism is useless, or worse, moves the discussion backward instead of forwards.  

Sidebar:  Can any other LU proponent beyond Waldheim out there (i know you are there, now hiding behind 'ecological urbanism') step up to this conversation, or are ya'll all too busy now getting high profile commissions?   Conversely, can we get some response from the West Coast school of NU, particularly from Calthorpe et. al?

 I blame the word 'landscape' which is just too loaded with preconceptions for people to get over the fact that we're not talking about sprawling density with green spaces and parsley in the urban sphere (just look at the image from the Boston Globe article - buildings and cars draped in greenery.  People think of landscape as landscaping, not the opposite of building.  Thus in looking at a fundamentally different way of approaching cities in an 'un-architectural' manner the word landscape detracts from what is fundamental (an un-architecturally driven urbanism).  This doesn't preclude buildings and density, and sidewalks and people - but rather isn't driven by building and then filling in the spaces in between.  Ecological urbanism, I daresay, is an even worse title.  Then again, the oxymoronic use of 'new' in New Urbanism has shown much success by focusing on the exact opposite of their name... so maybe there's hope. 

Or wait.  Better yet, let's all take a time out for a sec. 

Let's sit down and read each other's stuff rather than making stuff up. 

Or, rather than perpetuate this dueling - perhaps we can look at the larger issues of urbanism that could draw from many urbanisms, rather than the drama of a cat fight. 

Then again, our culture of reality TV and polarizing politics seems to appreciate a cat fight and drama over an informed conversation... on that note...  or your reading pleasure:

Recent Dialogue

Green Building by Leon Neyfakh (Boston Globe) with the sidebar Where its Happening
(yields another class Duany quote... that really gets to the heart of the debate)...

"“What you’re seeing is the New Urbanism about to swallow the landscape urbanists,” Duany said. His plan now, he said, is to systematically “assimilate” the language and strategies that have made his opponents such a white-hot brand. “We’re trying to upgrade ourselves. I’m not gonna say, ‘We’re gonna flick ’em off the table because they’re a bunch of lawn apologists.’ I’m gonna say, ‘For God’s sake, these guys took over Harvard!’ ”

A actually had a really great email exchange with Mr. Neyfakh prior to and after publication about some aspects of landscape urbanism, which is echoed in a follow-up piece discussing the historical development of the Back Bay Fens by Olmsted as a prototype for modern LU:  'Boston's long history with landscape urbanism'


A Tire in the Park  by Emily Talen (The New Urban Network)



Landscape Urbanism: sometimes an enemy is good to have by David Sucher (City Comforts)


James Howard Kunstler on Landscape Urbanism by Sam Newberg (CNU)
I can't find the actual article on Orion so if anyone has a link... anyway per this quote he's just parroting what others are saying in his 'clusterfuck' lens... for what it's worth.


The War Over 'Landscape Urbanism'   by Tim Halbur (Planetizen)

New Urbanism, Landscape Urbanism and the Future of Settlements by Christopher Ryan (Post Carbon Institute)

Landscape Urbanism vs. The New Urbanists (Brookline Perspective)

Discussion on Cyburbia from the Boston Globe Article

Isms, Ideology, & Landscape: Boston Globe Edition (Eric Papetti)
(a landscape architect's perspective)

Landscape Urbanism, New Urbanism, and the Future of Cities (Alex Steffen)

As you see, these aren't all anti- or pro- positions - but are reacting more to the war than the point of the war... which I think will happen with time.  Next year's CNU conference may be the biggest ever due to Waldheim & Duany there together.  Good for ratings.


Post-script:
Along a similar timeline, the Minneapolis Riverfront competition is definitely infused with a landscape urbanist perspective with teams from Ken Smith Workshop, Stoss Landscape Urbanism, Tom Leader Studio and Turenscape as mentioned by Archinect - 3-1/2 of the proposals hint at landscape urbanism. 

Another article from the WSJ talks with Adriaan Geuze of West8, making ample references to LU...


There's also some great dialogue about the concept of urbanism and the role of urban design in the book 'Urban Design' by Krieger and Saunders - a look back at the origins and development of modern urban design since 1956, and well worth exploring (stay tuned for a book review here) and giving some perspective on our constant ability to disagree, which will continue well past this debate and others... 

A related but not specific to LU story on Slate by Witold Rybczynski entitled: "A Discourse on Emerging Tectonic Visualization and the Effects of Materiality on Praxis: Or an essay on the ridiculous way architects talk"  revisits the tired metaphor of professional language to exclude, given the fact that most of this language emerges (yes i said it) from academic discourse (said that too) and not from praxis (again, guilty!).   Any journalism that uses Ted Mosby as an architectural model is suspect.

Upcoming:

Also we kick off Reading the Landscape with timely discussions of 'The Landscape Urbanism Reader' later in February, which is sure to yield some great discussion from a diverse group of folks from all backgrounds, regions, and discplines... entry for the group is closed, but there will be dispatches at points to capture the conversation... stay tuned.