Embed Size (px)
DESCRIPTION
Space- Its still a Frontier
Citation preview
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 1 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Subscribe to Home Deliverycross3...
MyProfileMyAccountSavedItemsLogOut
Help
Home PageToday's PaperVideoMost PopularTimes Topics
Search All NYTimes.com
The Opinion PagesWorldU.S.N.Y. / RegionBusinessTechnologyScienceHealthSportsOpinionArtsStyleTravelJobsReal EstateAutos
EditorialsColumnistsContributorsLettersThe Public Editor
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 2 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Global Opinion
February 3, 2010, 6:45 pm 74 Comments
Space: It’s Still a FrontierBy ALLISON ARIEFF
Sterling Ridge I (c)2008 Christoph Gielen. Courtesy Daniel Cooney Fine Art, New York.Sterling Ridge I, Florida, 2009. Click to enlarge.
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 3 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Allison Arieff on design and architecture.
Tags:
economics, empty space, infrastructure, real estate, urban planning
“Our beds are empty two-thirds of the time.Our living rooms are empty seven-eighths of the time.Our office buildings are empty one-half of the time.It’s time we gave this some thought.”— R. Buckminster Fuller
That quote is 40 years old, but I continue to be amazed by the extent to which we haven’t begun to address theproblem Fuller highlighted. There’s a staggering glut of empty space around the country right now, unusedspace that’s not doing anyone much good. That in itself isn’t new; what is unprecedented is our ability tovisualize that data in an entirely new ways.
The ability to use G.I.S. (geographic information systems) to locate data spatially, for example, is one reasonBarack Obama is president today. His campaign turned a database of voters and volunteers into a map and wasable to strategize house by house about how to get those votes. More broadly, G.I.S. allows us to literally viewour place both globally and in a hyperlocal context.
That level of specificity, both at the micro and macro level, is helping revolutionize the way we think about,plan for and design the space we inhabit (or abandon). A visual map can show us patterns of overbuilding,abandonment, mis- (or lack of) use; it can teach us something about our current tendency to overbuild.
How can this now-instantaneous access to data add clarity to ingrained patterns, and perhaps allow us to changethose patterns according to evolving needs and requirements?
Nicholas de Monchaux, an assistant professor of architecture and urban design at the University of California,Berkeley, has been thinking about all this a lot. Last year, he and his students developed a project called LocalCode, which takes as its focus unused pavement space in major urban areas. Though most of us barely notice orgive any thought to this seemingly useless space, finding pragmatic ways to use it can have a beneficial impacton the social, economic and environmental health of a region.
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 4 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Courtesy Nicholas de MonchauxAn analysis by Local Code of vacant city-owned parcels in San Francisco, in which physical and ecologicalproblems (storm-water remediation, heat-island effects) and social and medical problems (risk for respiratoryailments, incidence of crime) are highlighted. The mapping helps to visualize these sites as a resource, andshows that they are located exactly where there is most need of help. Click to enlarge.
Local Code took much inspiration from the artistic interventions of Gordon Matta-Clark, whose (literally)ground-breaking project “Fake Estates: Reality Properties” (1971-1974) uncovered what he called “spacesbetween places” — alleys, gutters, weedy no-man’s-lands. Where it took Matta-Clark months of methodicalsifting through microfiche to locate the 15 “gutterspace” sites — demapped and operationally isolatedfragments of New York real estate — that form the work “Fake Estates: Reality Properties,” de Monchaux andhis students were able to map the more than 1,600 sites of Local Code in seconds.
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 5 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Courtesy Nicholas de Monchaux Abandonedby traditional development, under-utilized areas identified by Local Code are precisely those in need ofecological and social attention. As de Monchaux explains, “You couldn’t pick a better archipelago of sites ifyou wanted to help the city out.”
Local Code (video here) proposes a systemic re-greening of leftover pavement space on a large scale. Culledfrom a database maintained by the Department of Public Works, the many sites for Local Code have beendeemed “unaccepted streets,” that is, sites in the San Francisco grid that occupy the position of streets but arenot maintained by the municipality, or necessarily even passable to traffic. Seen separately and individually,these are litter-filled, residual spaces — and there are 1,625 of them, mostly around highways and industrialsites. But seen as a whole, they have a combined surface area of more than half of San Francisco’s Golden GatePark, for example.
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 6 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Courtesy Nicholasde MonchauxLocal Code takes G.I.S. data on buildings, sewer location, topography, etc. and then recommends an optimumdesign for each site (instead of a general design strategy). Click to enlarge.
“When we examined all the leftover spaces in San Francisco, New York, New Orleans, Minneapolis — wefound the same thing to be true in every city,” de Monchaux says. “You had a whole archipelago of city-ownedlots lying fallow. In New York they add up to the size of Central Park and Prospect Park together. It’s a massiveuntapped resource that’s impossible to visualize without these contemporary tools.”
Neglected at the local level because they neither provide nor generate revenue, these sites are markers of largerpatterns of neglect (much as we’re seeing with homes abandoned to foreclosure). In San Francisco, they oftenoutline the shape of entire, mostly lower income neighborhoods like Hunter’s Point, Bayview and the OuterMission. Abandoned by traditional development, such areas are precisely those in need of ecological and socialattention.
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 7 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Courtesy Nicholas de MonchauxVisualization of Step 1 of the Local Code process: A case study for a site in San Francisco, its specific needsindicated by, for example, pink arrows for energy and thermodynamic inputs/outputs like carbon; blue arrowsfor storm water, rainwater; and green arrows for a transportation network. Image has been cropped. Click toenlarge.
Courtesy Nicholasde Monchaux
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 8 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Visualization of Step 2 shows a Web interface that could be used to transform the site(s) identified by LocalCode. Designers, community member and other users would be able to select from a palette of options (frombenches, say, to plants). The online/social media component moves toward building digital democracy incommunity design and activism. Click to enlarge.
Local Code isn’t about making pleasant parks. “It’s the difference between Newtonian physics and quantumphysics,” de Monchaux enthuses. “You can’t do something the same way once you discover the new wayexists!” Using G.I.S. in conjunction with parametric design tools, Local Code suggests a set of individuallandscapes for each site with the goal of mitigating larger urban performance variables like storm-waterretention and heat-island effects — referring to the 1.8 to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit temperature increase thatoccurs within densely built environments. (De Monchaux suggests that his intervention would most likelyrender redundant San Francisco’s current multi-billion dollar effort at increasing sewer storm-water capacity).Together, the aggregated sites project an alternative green infrastructure with potentially measurable benefits tosafety and public health as well.
Looking through this lens also enables us to think about infrastructure in a new way. The era of massive,expensive, centralized projects like the Big Dig in Boston has passed. “Now, with the ability to model dynamicsystems, we can show a much more decentralized collection of resources could provide greater benefit,” deMonchaux says. “If, in the 19th century, it was a biological metaphor that fueled the creation of Central andGolden Gate parks, the idea that a city needs hearts and lungs to grow, there’s now a networked metaphor. Thecity is a dense network of relationships. The best way to provide infrastructure is to not go in with a meat ax butto practice urban acupuncture, finding thousands of different spots to go into.”
Much as Google Maps has given us all a staggering new perception of the world we inhabit, this methodologycan provide an avenue to a wider understanding of data-driven design, which can most certainly be applied toany number of spatial dilemmas. Other projects in the same vein as Local Code are proliferating: The LongIsland Index, for one, uses interactive mapping to highlight opportunities for downtown redevelopment,aggregating a different class of sites than Local Code but following the same path of inquiry.
Consider the case of Silicon Valley, where, as of the third quarter of 2009, 43 million square feet of commercialspace stood vacant. Four million of that was added in just the past three years. There’s a certain irony to the factthat the center of innovation is ill-equipped to accommodate the cyclical nature of business.
Then there are shopping centers, which are modeled more on the monolithic Mall of America rather thancentralized, walkable European-style high streets. Mega-malls have proliferated so that a Web site exists solelyto document their demise. (That site, by the way, has just celebrated its 10th anniversary, its founders moreaware back then of the coming demise than the retail industry ever was.)
Changing space requirements plague our nation’s schools as enrollments ebb and flow. I spoke with a parentrecently whose fifth-grade son had spent his entire school career in trailer classrooms: his school district, inanticipation of projected declining enrollment — a decade out — was forced to continually re-address theproblem of operating within the confines of a school not appropriately designed for its population.
And in boomtowns like Phoenix and Tampa, developers with an eye more to profit than market realities farsurpassed any realistic demand for housing. The result? Rampant foreclosures, thousands of abandoned homesand even streets, and acres of excavated land awaiting stalled-out projects that won’t get built.
How do we design and build to accommodate changing economics, family sizes, and employee and studentpopulations? How can we merge online technologies with physical architecture to more directly serve our real-
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 9 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
time needs? Data-visualization capabilities can’t solve all the problems, but it’s hard to overestimate the extentto which this information can help us to think about larger systems and their interrelationships, so that we see abuilding as not just a building but an ecological infrastructure.
These challenges are massive; the attitudes responsible for them, deep-seated. Inquiries like de Monchaux’sillustrate that there is intelligent inquiry and actionable theorizing happening about how patterns might bebroken, planning might be more flexible and dynamic, and our visions of space and its functions could expand— and, perhaps, contract.
Editors’ note: G.I.S. stands for geographic — not graphic — information systems, as we had it in an earlierversion of this post.
FacebookTwitterGoogle+E-mailSharePrint
economics, empty space, infrastructure, real estate, urban planning
Previous Post How Safe Is Safe Enough? By DAVID BROOKS AND GAIL COLLINS
Related Posts from Opinionator
Sleight of the ‘Invisible Hand’
California Dreams, Iranian Décor
Green Roofs in Big Cities Bring Relief From Above
Leasing Los Angeles
Occupy Wall Street’s ‘Political Disobedience’
Next Post Grifters’ Tale By TIMOTHY EGAN
74 Comments
Share your thoughts.
AllReader Picks
Newest
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 10 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Write a Comment
Search This Blog
Search
Previous Post How Safe Is Safe Enough? By DAVID BROOKS AND GAIL COLLINSNext Post Grifters’ Tale By TIMOTHY EGAN
Follow This Blog
TwitterRSS
Allison Arieff is editor and content strategist for the urban planning and policy think tank SPUR. She writesabout architecture, design and sustainability for Wired Design and The Atlantic Cites. The former editor inchief of Dwell magazine, she is co-author of the books “Prefab” and “Trailer Travel: A Visual History ofMobile America.”
Inside Opinionator
Fixes
Disunion
The Stone
Anxiety
DraftMore Contributors
Linda Greenhouse
Mark Bittman
Schooling
Stanley Fish
The Conversation
The Score
Things I Saw
Timothy Egan
TowniesAll Contributors and Series »
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 11 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
December 5, 2012
Putting Charities to the Test
There are now more ways than ever to help us calculate where our charitable dollars will do the most good.
November 28, 2012
The Power of Failure
Taking a cue from Silicon Valley, nonprofits are learning to use their failures as an integral part of the processof innovation and, ultimately, progress.
More From Fixes »
December 4, 2012
Lincoln, Colonization and the Sound of Silence
Contrary to common belief, the president never really let go of plans for African-American emigration.
November 30, 2012
‘Last Best Hope’
As a speech, Lincoln’s second Annual Message to Congress contained glimpses of what was to come atGettysburg.
More From Disunion »
December 2, 2012
Philosophy and the Poetic Imagination
Poetry can help awaken us to the richness of the language that surrounds us, even in the seeming cacophony ofthe digital age.
November 29, 2012
Learning History at the Movies
Films like “Lincoln” can contribute to our understanding of past events, but on their own, they are no substitutefor the work of historians.
More From The Stone »
December 2, 2012
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 12 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
When the World Ends
The sun will get too hot and oceans will rise. The earth will go away and everything we built will go away, too.
November 24, 2012
The Snake in the Garden
I found myself in a sort of Paradise. But I was quickly exiled by my own mind.
More From Anxiety »
December 1, 2012
The Art of Being Still
I transform the mundane task of grocery shopping into a writing exercise, and I become my character.
November 24, 2012
The Dual Lives of the Biographer
In one realm you’re moving forward in ignorance. In the other you’re moving backward with somethingresembling omniscience.
More From Draft »
November 29, 2012
A Liberal Moment
What we’re seeing is the advance of progressive political ideas by a majority that spurns an obvious label.
November 22, 2012
Give Pot a Chance
Forget all the lame jokes about Cheech and Chong: social revolutions in a democracy should not be lightlydismissed.
More From Timothy Egan »
November 29, 2012
A Messy Relationship
My parents are housekeepers. I never expected to date the son of one of their clients.
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 13 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
November 21, 2012
My Celebrity Love Triangle
Pretending to worship Farrah Fawcett-Majors while secretly adoring her husband.
More From Townies »
November 28, 2012
Things I Saw — No. 45
The artist draws things he saw in New York.
November 24, 2012
Things I Saw — No. 44
The artist draws things he saw in Michigan and New York.
More From Things I Saw »
November 28, 2012
Press Clips
What is “the press” today? It is a question without a simple answer, either in today’s rapidly changing medialandscape or in Supreme Court doctrine.
November 14, 2012
Changing Times
Two recent election-related developments are directly relevant to cases on the Supreme Court’s docket andcould influence the outcomes.
More From Linda Greenhouse »
November 28, 2012
Fiscal Ecstasy
Brooks and Collins make budget deliberations interesting.
November 14, 2012
War and Peeps
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 14 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Brooks and Collins on General Petraeus and Paula Broadwell, the private lives of public figures and the newsnooping.
More From The Conversation »
November 27, 2012
The Reconstruction of Rome
As a young man in Rome, I fought the 1970s orthodoxies to find my voice as a composer. Today, music istransformed. But our new toys need to be used wisely.
October 18, 2011
Prophecy of Machines
Technology has surpassed art, not only in its power to influence public imagination, but also in prophetic vision.
More From The Score »
November 27, 2012
Hunger in Plain Sight
One in eight Americans get government assistance to buy food, yet many more are eligible.
November 20, 2012
All Hail the Sweet Potato
If you didn’t take the sweet potato for granted, you’d be giving thanks for it.
More From Mark Bittman »
November 26, 2012
Damned if He Does: The Susan Rice Dilemma
On the secretary of state issue, the president is boxed in, though a Clinton could point the way out.
November 12, 2012
Going in Circles With Hate Speech
As a new collection of essays on hate speech makes clear, there is no completely satisfying way to deal with thetopic.
More From Stanley Fish »
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 15 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
November 22, 2012
What Should Children Read?
Shakespeare vs. menus: The battle over public school reading lists.
October 27, 2012
Teaching Lessons
When faithfully implemented, the Responsive Classroom approach correlates with an almost 20-point gain onstate standardized test scores in reading and math.
More From Schooling »
November 22, 2012
What Should Children Read?
Shakespeare vs. menus: The battle over public school reading lists.
October 27, 2012
Teaching Lessons
When faithfully implemented, the Responsive Classroom approach correlates with an almost 20-point gain onstate standardized test scores in reading and math.
More From Schooling »
Opinionator Highlights
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 16 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Putting Charities to the Test
By TINA ROSENBERG
There are now more ways than ever to help us calculate where our charitable dollars will do the most good.
Philosophy and the Poetic Imagination
By ERNIE LEPORE and MATTHEW STONE
Poetry can help awaken us to the richness of the language that surrounds us, even in the seeming cacophony ofthe digital age.
When the World Ends
By ELYSE PITOCK
The sun will get too hot and oceans will rise. The earth will go away and everything we built will go away, too.
Learning History at the Movies
By GARY GUTTING
Films like “Lincoln” can contribute to our understanding of past events, but on their own, they are no substitutefor the work of historians.
The Power of Failure
By SARIKA BANSAL
Taking a cue from Silicon Valley, nonprofits are learning to use their failures as an integral part of the processof innovation and, ultimately, progress.
Previous Series
Line by Line
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 17 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
A series on the basics of drawing, presented by the artist and author James McMullan, beginning with line,perspective, proportion and structure.
The Elements of Math
A series on math, from the basic to the baffling, by Steven Strogatz. Beginning with why numbers are helpfuland finishing with the mysteries of infinity.
Living Rooms
The past, present and future of domestic life, with contributions from artists, journalists, design experts andhistorians.
Specimens
This series by Richard Conniff looks at how species discovery has transformed our lives.
Subscribe
Opinionator RSS
Allison Arieff RSS
12/5/12 10:55 AMSpace: It's Still a Frontier - NYTimes.com
Page 18 of 18http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/space-its-still-a-frontier/
Big boys lay out their OscarbaitALSO IN MOVIES »
Amanda Seyfried and the Hathaway extractionA.O. Scott and the many meanings of "Lincoln"
© 2012 The New York Times CompanySite MapPrivacyYour Ad ChoicesAdvertiseTerms of SaleTerms of ServiceWork With UsRSSHelpContact UsSite Feedback
