SURFACEGEOMETRYORIENTATIONCONSTRUCTIONAESTHETICS

NUMBERPROGRAMMEAGENDABUDGETNETWORK

SURFACEGEOMETRYORIENTATIONCONSTRUCTIONAESTHETICS

NUMBERPROGRAMMEAGENDABUDGETNETWORK

POSITION

§2.2 URBAN INERTIA

There are many texts about the end of the city, old ones and new ones, but

the fact is, cities are still there, like old pubs. The city exists, it’s changing

and growing gradually; a metamorphosis is taking place. The use of the urban

space is changing faster than urban space itself. It’s a question of scale and

inertia. Like a giant petrol tanker can’t change course in a matter of minutes,

the urban body has a certain resistance against big and sudden changes. To

harmonize the discrepancy between the relatively static city and it’s dynamic

users, a new layer of intervention must be conceived. Architecture can play

a harmonizing role. Not only by filling the envelops that were developed

in urbanist terms, not only by aesthetic facades, but by taking a responsible

position in the development of urban fabric. Aesthetics are an important aspect

of this harmonizing, as it has enormous influence on how we appreciate urban

space subjectively. But more important, the functional aspects of small scale

urban interventions and their ripple-effects, can influence the urban growth-

pattern.

The consequences of urban inertia are very apparent in the development of

urban amenities. Urban (re)development needs amenities, but specifying what

kind has its complications. If we suppose that the term for urban planning

includes at least ten years, we know that it is difficult to know ten years ahead

what specific amenities a certain area will need. We have a general indication,

but can we specify between a grocery store and a supermarket, between library

and a gym? Urbanists play it safe and call the amenity ‘multi-functional’

or ‘hybrid’, and leave specification for a later instance. This is where the

task is handed over to architecture. A building can be conceived with the

responsability to render a public quality. The volume and the place have to be

specified, but not the activity. This is a symptom of urban inertia, an open end.

This is where architecture comes in. Components like acces-, traffic-, main

and secondary spaces, and performances like ‘openness’, privacy, distribution,

(re)presentation and flexibility, have to be considered carefully so as to

activate the site as required. These subjects can be suggested in urbanism, but

have to be determined in architecture. Whether it concerns new developments

or redevelopments, buildings have the capacity to induce urbanism by their

functional scheme, and this capacity must be applied to improve the city.

If we can describe urban inertia, we can write an agenda for inductive

urban enhancement. If we can find out where urbanism fails, we can see

if architecture can help out. Architecture must therefore develop an urban

ambition. The long term goals of urbanism, that are generally managed top-

down, can be made attainable by strategic architecture, bottom-up.

§2.1 URBAN DYNAMICS - ARCHITECTURAL STRATEGIES

(For this chapter The Netherlands were taken as example since it is the writers native country.

However the situation could be symptomatic for other countries.)

With the population growing and society changing at the speed they do, it is

becoming increasingly difficult to manage all aspects of society in one model.

Repetitive changes in education, research and health care management create

enormous bureaucratic papermills and leaves no time for optimisation. Post-

colonial demography introduces questions of multi-cultural co-habitation.

Relationships and family structures change. Technology changes the

geographical pattern of our professional and private life. Can we still respond

to all these challenges with a management tool of lasting value, in an intergral

approach? Meanwhile the scale of management is increasing parallel to the

development of global economics and politics. More participants, more issues,

more changes, more specifications.

The Netherlands have a long history of collective managment structures. For

a relatively small country there are an incredible amount of political, technical

and social instruments, all concerned with the optimal and equal welbeing of

its inhabitants. But despite the effort of course some things tend to slip through

our hands. The models of management are reaching their limits.

The same situation can be questioned for urbanism: until what scale can

urbanism still aspire to regulate co-habitation within a single integrated urban

model? Spatial needs change at such speed that we can ask ourselves if the

spatial provisions can follow. Big scale urban coordination gets bigger, and

slowly it becomes inevitable to leave some responsabilities for the quality of

urban space to smaller scales like architecture. Architecture should be aware of

this responsibility as a particle of urbanism and develop an agenda for better

co-performance with urbanism.

To write this agenda we must find out how architecture can complement to

the goals of urbanism (and society) and pick up the pieces that urbanism can’t

take care of. There are symptoms in today’s urban development that require

analysis. Acting in accordance with the results of those analysis, and doing

so on an architectural scale, is introduced as ‘Inductive Urban Enhancement’.

This strategy approaches urban problems with architectural tools. While

urbanism is dealing with the long term development of an area ‘top down’,

architecture can act immediately and activate a site with the intended urban

direction ‘bottom up’. Ideally the two interventions will meet halfway and

share the succes. Architecture can be the flexible tool that bridges the gap

between planning and growth. To fullfill that role it needs a corresponding

political status.

PHASE 1

PHASE 2

PHASE 3

FLEXIBILITY

The present-day condition of the western city demands a more flexible tool

of management, since its population, use and technology change ever more

rapidly. The modern city is the result of an attempt for controlled modification

and growth, but things are getting out of control. Too many intentions of

different periods are superimposed which blurs our comprehension. The city

has taken control of itself as points out Koolhaas when he mentions urbanism

despite planning [*04/S,M,L,XL].

The city has taken on a proper life almost like a natural phenomenon. We look

in awe at its technological and cultural manifestations but we can no longer

understand or control it. An exemplary case was explained by D.C. Dennett:

“If British Telecom sponsors a conference on robotics, it’s because they have

an interest in developping a tool that could control their network that oneone

can grasp anymore. This shows the uncomfortable position of a company

that no longer controls their own invention.” [*04/D.C. Dennett] The city has

become a second nature. The original biotope has become a techotope, i.e.

our daily living environment - and so, as Darwin established, survival is for

the fittest, meaning the most adapted. Buildings have to adapt to a changing

context, in other words to be flexible, to survive.

Paradoxically, recapitulating the paragraphs, a. acquiring identity requires

time and sustainability, b. sustainability requires flexibility towards changing

conditions, so c. identity requires flexibility. This situation calls for ‘hybrid

identities’, multi-functional objects with a multiplex profile and the capacity to

adapt.

Hybridity in architecture means the end of programmatic typology (the ‘form-

follows-function’ kind), and if nothing else replaces that, it will introduce the

architectural degeneration as was announced : “all buildings are hotels..” [*06/

S,M,L,XL].

Instead of fleeing forwards towards a ‘generic city’, design approaches can

be developped that intend the construction of ‘speciville’. In this ‘city’ each

occasion for specificity in architectural design is seized in order to maintain

and increase the profile of a specific public landscape, even during dramatic

changes. The extreme complexity of this mission, to embrace the need for

hybrid architecture and acknowledge the value of architectural diversity,

requires taking some distance and re-evaluating certain matters.

SCULPTUUR De specifieke sculpturale vorm van de stedenbouwkundige volumes zijn een garantie voor een locatiespecifiek stedenlijk weefsel - een plek identiteit - houvast voor de verdere ontwikkelingen.

STRUCTUUR De open structuur van de gebouwen refereert naar prototypische pre-fab haven architectuur, en biedt de mogelijkheid van een exploitatie-afhankelijke invulling terwijl de sculpturaliteit herkenbaar blijft.

HOUT Houten pallets zijn typisch elemnten uit een haveninrichting. In het nieuwe ontwerp komt het hout in verschillende fases terug in eenvoudige basis en een luxe en gerafineerde uitvoering.

STUC De zakelijk ogende pleisterlaag van een aantal bestaande gebouwen is goed toepasbaar. Het maakt een stapsgewijze upgrade van kaal casco naar chique volume mogelijk.

METAAL De sierlijk glans en curven van de scheepsschroeven, en de daaraan verwante materialen, vult de geometrische architectuur aan met feestelijke elementen. De totale compositie is daarmee compleet.

B

C1

C2

D

E