Van Alen Institute 2007 Competition : Democracy of Disturbance uRban Detail w/ tadd heidgerken The re-envisioning of Gateway National Recreational Area as an urban public
Alternating tracts of appropriately programmed parkland are anchored to the
park is predicated on redefining the sites in terms of choices made by an
institutional nodes and assigned finite frequencies of time. A series of pathways
ever changing body politic, fully engaged in the democratic process. Included in this body are stewards of the biological
connect park program while cutting representational sections through the current body politic.
ecosystems, individual users as represented by publicly run constituent groups, and the park service responsible for land allocation. All groups evolve according to the
This project approaches the evolutionary nature of community
interests of the community and the needs of the affected ecosystems. The inevitable
through an understanding of the
conflicts that arise between disparate programmatic desires are both integral to
than a planned architectural outcome. The strategy thus involves crafting a dynamic
the model of
agonistic democracy, and analogous to the phenomenon of disturbance in nature, which inhibits diversity, adaptability and growth.
site that reacts to an educated and involved democratic body.
The multi-scalar design embraces this establishing an
politics of disturbance by open framework that modifies over time, anticipating a
disturbance in nature is to act as a catalyst, thereby preventing stagnation from predictable environmental trajectories. In addition, it promotes growth and adaptability of competing organisms. Disturbance
shifting definition of the public’s needs and desires. The framework is structured on
is a balancing agent that prevents any unhindered effects of hegemony between
long-term institutional nodes located according to inherent site logics which act as catalysts for related activities, and a cyclical concept of programmatic phasing.
adversarial species, thus resulting in a diverse ecological landscape
park as a public process,
rather
The role of
six initial disturbances or
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de t roit : u R b a n D e ta i l
over multiple spatial and temporal scales.