LANDSCAPE URBANISMBY CARLOS PEREZ-RAMIREZ

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CARLOS PEREZ-RAMIREZ

626.627.4556

cperezram0@gmail.com

This pamphlet will explain the principles of landscape urbanism and how it can help with the development of our cities and how we need to involve ecology into our designs in the development of urban communities.

Response to reading

Response to wandering

Response to Listening

REsponse to language

Landscape Urbanisim (sub) urbanism

The Highline

Central Park

Lehrer + cullityBob Perry

Lexicon

Urban connectors

Spontaneous Urban Vegetation: Ref lections of Change in a Globalized World

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“The populatiion of people in the United states is expected to hit the 60 million habitatants by the year 2025.”

Landscape Urbanisim(sub) urbanism

Richard weller

Los Angeles County 2013. 10 million people

01

Landscape (Sub) Urbanism by Richard Weller, describes the different principles of Landscape Urbanism and how they apply to the urban realm. It is insanely to think that by the year 2025 we will have “60 million people living in the United States and 12 million homes built by then.” Where are these people going to live? Suburban sprawl is the answer to most developers. Which is our number one problem, stated by Silliam S. Saunders, “Sprawl... presents itself as the single most significant and urgent issue in American land use” (2005,xvii)

Developers don’t see what is actually happening to the ecology, they only see the dollar signs. Developers do not see the long impact our ecologies will be receiving in the future. They see the impact it will have in their wallets. As we grow in population people tend to spread towards the suburbs or developers tend to build these enormous buildings to accommodate the population growth. This is a problem that people would need to face in the future. As suburbia begins its inclination, it begins to remove that habitats of native animals and plants. Giving a helping hand to global warming as we see climate, ecology and wildlife fuctuations.

Landscape

Landscape Urbanisms is the combination of design and planning to be able to engage a city with its landscape adding different layers of research that will in the end contribute to a “chaotic ecology” . It bridges buildings, infrastructure, ecology, and planning. The city has created patterns as to either open space, voids, parks, that need to be a centralized site for the devolopment of these ecologies who once thrive in its presence.

Where at a tipping point with the current climate changes that we’re seeing by our own sight, how the climate, vegetation, people, animals, ecosystems, are changing. They are changing due to our own need of housing. Where we once saw blue heroins nest and seek to see their infants grow, now we see a seven storie building that accomodates the demands and wallets of developers and growing population.

Landscape

urbanism+

Theory of Landscape Urbanism

- include withing the purview of design all that is in the landscape- insfrastructure and buildings, etc., and shuffle across scales so as to bridge the divides between landscape design, landscape ecology and landscape planning.

-bring greater creativity to planning operations and greater rationality to design operations.

- emphasize the creative and temporal agency of ecology in the formation of urban life as opposed to envisaging an ideal equilibrium between two entities formerly known as culture and nature.

Theory of Landscape Urbanism-conceptualize and then directly engage the city and its landscape as a hybridised, natural, chaotic ecology

-understand and manipulate the forces at work behind things and less with the resultant aesthetic qualities of things.

-interpret and then represent landscape systems so that these systems can in turn infinflinfuence urbanforms, processes, and patterns.

-prefer open- ended (indeterminate and catalytic) design strategies as opposed to formal compositions and master plans.

-Richard Weller- (256)

Urbanconnectors

David gouverneur andoscar grauer

02

Urban designingfies a city, town or developing city population, while connectors is exactly what the word says, a connector. Urban connectors are two cities or more that are being connected by means of transportation, parks, or infrastructural design. The words Urban Connectors is a more detailed description of an informal city or settlement and a formal city being connected for a safe and healthier environment. Informal settlements are also known as s larger society at risk of disease” (Gouverneur and Grauer). Many of the people that live in informal cities or settlements were low income people that did not have money to provide a more hygienic environment for their family. Urban connectors help informal settlements be integrated with more formal settlements by creating inexpensive homes, or shelters that low income people can reside in without having to move. lums, “a term coined during the Industrial Revolution. First in England and then in other parts of Europe, government efforts were made to integrate them into cities to improve their hygienic conditions, since people believed that they put the

Although Urban Connectors relates more closely to the people that live in those settlements; the informal and formal settlements also house other creatures that architects and urbanization leave out of their plans for expansion. Before infrastructure and cities started to develop for people to live in certain areas there were animals, and insects that were living there first“We believe that cross-sector interaction can be fostered through interventions in the urban fabric essentially by providing good public spaces within both formal and informal cities that will be used by residents of both” (Gouverneur and Grauer).

Bringing together informal and formal settlements is just as important as bringing together human settlements with animal settlements. Animals or insects had like homes many of the land we constructed buildings, houses, roads, bridges upon. The land sheltering the animals was changed completely that these animals and insects had to move land in order to survive. Urban connectors want to merge together informal and formal settlements, not have the people in the informal settlements leave to another informal settlement, which is why it is as important to merge together human settlements and infrastructure with the animals that are already living in that land.

There are many methods in which the animals and insects that are inhabitants of the land can stay and live alongside the human settlements. Depending on the type of animal that lives in the land, parks can be designed by landscape architects to fit the needs of the animals or insects while humans are also able to roam and take use of the parks. For example, in the city of San Gabriel California, coyotes were part of the ecosystem and land. As the city started to get more industrialized and more infrastructure built, the coyotes were fleeing to other lands in which they could live in. Recently, there have been reports of coyotes roaming the streets and taking shelter in nearby parks or dams. Giving homes to humans should be as important as helping the animals stay in their land, “Fostering a Non-Hierarchical Integration of Formal and…” (Gouverneur and Grauer) animal settlements.

Spontaneous Urban Vegetation: Ref lections

of Change in a Globalized World

Elizabeth massop

03

What is beautiful? Many people have different perspectives of the definition of the word beautiful. Beautiful can be a dress, shoes, a human, a baby; practically anything that a person finds something peculiar in it can be considered beautiful. But do we ever call a root, or a weed beautiful? What we do call beautiful are roses, gardenias, or just flowers in general that are usually grown and taken care of by people. But what truly is beautiful deep down is what flourishes without the help of a person watering it or caring for it, something that is born and rises by itself. It is amazing how many plants, weeds or shrubs grow in areas where there are no people living in and taking care of the infrastructure. Where these beautiful plants grow is called ruderal landscape. Ruderal landscapes “…consists of marginal or degraded urban land that receives little or no maintenance and is dominated by spontaneous vegetation- a cosmopolitan mix of species that grows and reproduces without human care or intent” (Tredeci).

Many people pay large amounts of money to have gardens designed for their home or cities build parks with unique plants that if they are not taken care of will die. Ruderal landscapes have natural growing plants that are native to the land and that grow with the little water or sun they receive. How beautiful and less expensive would it be if humans would stop interfering with the process of nature and allow Mother Nature to give us what the land can do all by itself? People would have minimal water payments, and the plants grown would be native to each land or city. “Certainly people can plant native species in the city, but few of them will thrive unless they are provided with the appropriate soil and are maintained at the same level as other intentionally cultivated plants” (Tredeci). Not only would people benefit from spontaneous urban vegetation, but also the ecosystem such as animals. When an infrastructure is built, many of the plants native to the land are removed in order to plant trees, flowers or shrubs that would make the city more “beautiful”, but when the ruderal landscape is transformed, many of the animals that live in those areas are also pushed away to other lands. Keeping ruderal areas and working with them what they have created would create a bond between humans, ruderal plants, and animals.

Because of the infrastructure being built, many bees have been declining in numbers. Bees are part of an ecosystem that is not seen as much but that contributes to the pollination and growth of other plants. Not only are bees important to the growth of plants but also they provide humans with honey. Honey is a substance created by bees that is very nutritional and useful for human consumption. If ruderal areas are destroyed and replaced by infrastructure, many animals and insects like the bees will be destroyed. The connection of helping native plants and animals keep living alongside humans is very crucial to the ecosystem we live in. We all depend on one another for survival but have yet to realize it.

The Highline, chelseanew york

James corner

The Highline, chelseanew york

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The High Line has been a hidden jewel for the city of New York. During our field trip week I got to experience this jewel. Our professor decided to takes us on a field trip to Philadelphia and New York which helped us see many landscapes and beautiful sights we had never seen before. The High Line was one of the sites that we were going to visit, designed by James Corner Field Operations a firm who leads the landscape urbanism realm. James Corner Field Operations rescued this high rise subway and created this catalyst for people to pull people away from the street and provide them with safer route.

I find to believe that many people find the High Line being 1.45 miles long stretch of metal as a catalyst for people which connects them without having to stop at every traffic light. Walking through an access point at 17th street in Chelsea District. I find myself walking up a stairway like if it was a portal into another world. As I emerge at the top of the Highline I see these green, yellow and red vegetation that block my view from seeing what is up in front. Like if James Corner did that on purpose. As I look to my left I’m able to see the Hudson River which you are not able to see from the street. Once you are up on the High Line you forget that you are in the city, no more cars, no more traffic. Seeing this High Line countless times in the magazines and school lectures I’ve seeing this landscape.

Central parknew york

Fredrick law olmsted

05Central park

new york

Central Park the lungs of New York City. If there was no Central Park, New York would not of have been the same. Walking through Central Park was a surreal experience. Once we saw this green wall on the corner of 5th Ave. and central Park it looked like something magical and mysterious. This green wall made me wonder what was going to be behind it. I wanted to go and explore every corner of the park. The minute you walk through central park you do not hear the cars anymore. It’s like you have been teleported into this jungle that sits in the middle of a city. While walking through central park it felt like every 20-30ft you got a framed view, you got to see something else of the park. It felt like Fredrick Law Olmsted made it intentional for people to see these frame views, just like James Corner did with the High Line. It’s the back yard of these new Yorkers were people come to isolate themselves from everything. People used every bit of this park. People would walk, run, and bring their dogs. It was great to not see the urban concrete jungle. Central Park is an essential part of the city design. I don’t think New Yorkers would be able to live without Central Park. People are too busy in what is going on with their lives. Central park acted as a relief from all the chaos people are going through every work day.

lecture 1

lecture 1

lehrer + Cullity

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Kate Cullity, from T.C.L, a firm in Australia was one of the two speakers of the lecture who came to talk about the design in Melbourne, Australia. Australia has an arid climate, somewhat close of what the summers in Southern California are beginning to look like. However, they have that arid climate year round plus they have not seen any rain in the past 10 years. Kate Cullity compared how Southern California is beginning to look a lot alike Australia and how it is not necessarily a bad thing. As she said, “People need to be able to accommodate to the changes”. Something Australia is doing is adapting to the climate changes and drought. benefit in this drought California is experiencing.

One of the ways they are adapting to the ecology that surrounds their cities in Australia is one that is rarely used. The majority of the plants that are in the serve part of the Australian ecology are fire-stick farming, which people use to burn vegetation to be able to control it and change the composition of the animals and plants that are in the area. Mia Lehrer from Mia Lehrer + Associates, from our very own back yard decided to speak about the Los Angeles River and how climate and water drought has impacted her designs. She talked about how we need to reclaim the ecology that once was near the river and how it can help with the development of the Los Angeles River project. There are many plants that still grow without the need of using so much water, which is a

lecture 2

lecture 2

07Bob perry

This second lecture took place at our very own Cal Poly Pomona campus where, Bob Perry came to talk a little about how ecology is such an important part of a landscape and how it effects our design. Sometimes we need to look at our past to makes connections into the future and how designs are going to make influential experiences for people, animals, or plants. What Bob Perry talking about, is that design is not only about the shapes and forms, but the vegetation in which makes the design come alive. By looking at past vegetation of a site and implanting them in their corresponded location it will be able to reconnect with its history.

Making animals of this region migrate through the site should be an important aspect of design. By developing this ecology in a site you are able to connect people back to nature. It is important for people to have a connection with nature because children are relying more on technology to develop their senses that they are forgetting about nature. Not only is it good for people’s senses but for the environment. Currently California is going through a drought, scientists have come to conclusion that it is due to the removing of ecology systems. For example, it is like removing a chromosome from a DNA strand which would make it incomplete and it wouldn’t be able to function properly.

lexicon

lexicon

readings

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landscape urbanism

compresses the polarisation between design and planning in an effort to combine the strengths of each. It shifts the landscape architectural project from an art (or craft) of making beautiful landscapes to one of interdisciplinary negotiation and the seeding of strategic, development processes.

-Richard Weller -

When designing a city, park, building or anything that may conflict with nature; landscape urbanism should be the process used because it will work with the already there landscape. Landscape urbanism helps the designers to work together with the architectural buildings and the homes of the many animals, and insects that contribute to our ecosystem.

The Highline - New YOrk

Green urbanisim

https://sapiens.revues.org/1057

As the industrial revolution started evolving in America it brought about many ideas and new technological machinery from Great Britain. Without thinking of the consequences this rapid evolution would bring to our homes, nature, and food we welcomed it and started building our homes, cities, and structures. Now, in this era, we have experienced the consequences and should adopt green urbanism as the method to reduce waste and emission.

Has been defined as the practice of creating communities beneficial to human and the environment. According to Beatley, It is an attempt to shape more sustainable places, communities and lifestyles, and consume less of the world’s resources.

carlos Perez-Ramirez

new urbanismViews disinvestment in central cities, the spread of place sprawl, increasing separation by race and income, envronmental deterioration, loss of agricultural lands , wilderness and erosion of society’s built heritage as one of interrelated community -building challenge.

-Richard Weller-

As one may walk down the street of our house, neighborhood, or shopping center, one may see that there are many places or things that need to be updated. New urbanism would help solve this problem by bettering the sidewalks, our homes and even the parks around the neighborhood by re-designing and implementing safer environments.

Ground zero- new york

suburban sprawlThe unplanned, uncontrolled spreading of urban development into areas adjoining the edge of a city, such as the expansion of humans/ people to mono-functional and more than likely car dependent communities that rest away from the central urban areas that most people live in.

thefreedictionary.com/suburban+sprawl

The car emissions and other factors that contribute to the pollution of the city such as factories, chemicals, and many more have caused suburban sprawl. Humans are migrat-ing to the outside parts of the city for a cleaner neighborhood, but they have increased the use of cars since they live far from stores.

Suburbs-philadelphia

nostalgia

a wistful or excessively sentimental yearning for return to of a certain place, thing or person; or of some past period of irrecoverable condition.

Merriam-Webster

In times of holidays such as thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s, there is an outbreak of nostalgia across the whole nation. People all around tend to grieve and long for a specific time in their lifetime in which the holiday celebrated was of great happiness and enjoyment to them. Whether they are nostalgic because they miss their hometown or a person that was there during that holiday but has somehow gone away, such as passing.

Central park - New York

urbanizationIs the process where an increasing percentage of a population lives in cities and suburbs. This process is often linked to industrialization and modernization, as large numbers of people leave farms to work and live in cities.

www.chegg.com/homework-help/definitions/urbanization-47

Many years ago most of the people would have their own garden or farm available to grow their own food. Other people that lived in the more industrialized part of the city would go down to the farms and buy vegetables or dairy products from the farmers, but as the industrial revolution began, urbanization also evolved and people started leaving their farms for more high paying jobs.

The high line - james corner

infrastructure

The physical and organizational structures and facilities such as roads, bridges and more that are needed for the operation of society or enterprise.

Merriam-Webster

The traveling from one point to another is made a lot easier with the use of infrastruc-ture. Trains or buses help people that do not have vehicles get around, while the roads and freeways are the most important part of daily transportation for people. In many cities, there are bridges that help put a road such as a freeway at a high point that will not interfere with residential areas.

flying bird -calatrava

fractalEndlessly repeating patterns which are self-similar across scales; or a geometrical or physical structure having an irregular or fragmented shape at all scales of measurement between a greatest and smallest scale such that certain mathematical or physical properties of the structure, as the perimeter of a curve or the flow rate in a porous medium, behave as if the dimensions of the structure (fractal dimensions) are greater than the spatial dimensions.

Dictionary.reference.com

A kaleidoscope can be a reference or assimilated with fractals because when one looks through the cylinder, one can see many geometrical patterns that change as it moves.

Central park - new york

posit

Merriam-Webster

to suggest something, such as an idea or theory especially in order to start a discussion; To put forth an idea or position.

It is very common that when people get in an argument they always posit their idea of what they think happened and why they are correct. While the other person may think the posit is wrong, they can argue against it and bring forth their own posit on the argument.

Helms design center- Culver city

identity

Merriam-Webster

The qualities, beliefs, etc., that make a particular person or group different from others; the fact of being who or what a person or thing is.

There is a large amount of humans that live in this planet earth and many of us look alike or have the same names. The only thing that distinguish us from one another is our identity. People may look alike physically but their qualities, behavior or beliefs are very different. Another characteristic that is part of every person’s identity is their fingerprints. There is no two humans that have the same fingerprints, so when one applies for a job or a passport our fingerprints have to be asked for in order to check our background.

Navy yards - James corner

Carlos Perez-Ramirezcperezram0@gmail.com