ELaperal


 * Responses to Readings

Thesis Booklet**

MIDTERM















PRELIMINARY RESEARCH:

Project: Frederick Law Olmstead (1822 – 1903) and Calvert Bowyer Vaux’s (1824 – 95) Central Park
 * 1850s**

Central Park emerged out of the necessity for an open space of garden and landscape in New York City. According to Olmstead, a park must work as a refuge for its city inhabitants regardless of their social standing. A park must be a neutral place where both the rich and the poor can come together in one setting and enjoy nature in its rurality. Pedestrian, equestrian and carriage traffic are separated by bridges and tunnels. The Park promotes its visitors solace. Entirely artificial, the Park imitates states of nature, claiming its therapeutic benefits for the residents and visitors of Manhattan Island.

Project: Robert Moses’ Brooklyn-Queens Expressway
 * 1939**

The BQE (10.4 miles) begins in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, through Red Hook and ends in Woodside, Queens. Moses’ plans proposed that the BQE would bull-doze through the posh neighbourhood of Brooklyn Heights, demolishing many historical buildings and sites. However, because Brooklyn Heights was an area whose residents had a steady flow of high income over the years, the BQE through Brooklyn Heights was detoured and placed on the waterfront. The BQE is now covered by the Brooklyn Heights Promenade.

Project: Robert Moses’ (1888 – 1981) Brooklyn Heights Promenade
 * 1950s**

The Brooklyn Heights Promenade is a hierarchical solution to the proposed passing-through of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway through the neighbourhood of Brooklyn Heights. The Promenade is the highest strata situated above the BQE North and South, and below that, Furman Street and the Brooklyn Piers. It serves as a “public back yard” to residential establishments on Columbia Heights, Pierrepont Street and Montague Terrace. It is simply a view point and its backdrop is Manhattan Island.

Project: Roberto Burle Marx’s (1909 – 1994) Rio de Janeiro Coastline
 * 1960s and 70s**

The Rio de Janeiro Coastline is another juxtaposition of how nature and the man-made can exist in harmony. It is a sectional layering scheme of beach, beach promenade, sidewalk, highway, parking and buildings. The park and greenery are not enjoyed by visitors as a means of self-removal from the city but a distinguishing factor of the Coastline. Pedestrian and motor vehicles are separated by two-dimensional lines or curbs on the street. Crossings on these designated layers are segregated. Highway traffic is closed off on Sundays.

Project: Bernard Tschumi’s Parc de la Villette
 * 1970s**

The Parc de la Villette is the plan-like layering of rigid grid points (folies), lines (pedestrian walkways), and organic curvatures (

Project: OMA’s Proposal for the Town of Melun-Senárt
 * 1980s**

The plan of OMA’s Melun-Senárt is series of programmatically-assigned bands and their residual spaces. These bands intersect with each other, thus creating an interstitial space where programs overlap and intersect, creating an entirely new experience. Residual spaces serve as open programmes, capable of being transformed without affecting the programmes of the bands.

Project: Field Operation’s Fresh Kills
 * 2000s**

Fresh Kills Landfill in Staten Island is a project that anticipates the changes and adjustments made by nature and man throughout time. The landfill supports long-term plant life and natural processes. By transforming New York City’s biggest garbage dump into a park, Fresh Kills will turn around to become the biggest wildlife preserver, cultural and social centre, and leisure, entertainment and recreational centre.

THESIS STATEMENT:

It is common misperception that the rural and the urban cannot co-exist in the same site or local setting. People go to a city to experience a city’s busy and hectic ambience. People drive to the countryside to experience a more relaxed ambience. Ambience, in this case, is the combination of common elements that influence a setting or site to create or influence an environment pleasurable for its visitors or inhabitants. In cases where there is this immediate opposition of rural and urban occurs, it seems impossible to harmonize these two. However, in cases like Central Park, the Brooklyn Heights Promenade, the Town of Melun-Senárt, the Rio de Janeiro Coastline, etc., it is clear that the combination of rural and urban elements can be an equation to a successful ambience that imposes the same feelings of relaxation and enjoyment as a single ambience type. What is common to the research sites is that they all have some element (or are completely) of a park. Should a park be a place of solace or social interaction? Should it combine different types of traffic e. g. pedestrian, cyclist, motor vehicles? What social class should it aim for as its market? It is private or public?
 * What is at stake in your project?**

The typology of a park has been constantly changing with the times on its use, design and programme. I plan to challenge this notion by adjusting elements of the park, and thus increasing its applicable enjoyment value and
 * What are you trying to do/influence/address?**

With today’s new discoveries in science (nanotechnology, genomics, universal theory), adjustments need to be made to improve and to make more applicable. In society today, people are given a freedom of choice which should be reflected in aspects of architecture and its inhabitants.
 * Why does it matter?**

Previous research has been done of the influence of architecture on the behaviour of human beings when exposed to a physical structure or obstacle. Should the person turn right or left? Should he walk down the hall to see what’s on the other side? Should he be bound by a wall or a curb or simply a line of limit?
 * How does it relate to the research you’ve done thus far this year?**