Private Mobilities Influence on the Urban Landscape

TRACE THE INFLUENCE OF PRIVATE MOBILITY, IN CONTEXT TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CITY FABRIC AND OUT OF TOWN SHOPPING, TO CONSIDER THE LIKELY SHAPE OF THE URBAN (AND INCREASING RESIDUAL) LANDSCAPE. SPECULATE ON HOW THIS ENCOURAGES AUTONOMY WITHIN OURSELVES AND OUR COMMUNITY. CALLUM SOHAL BA (HONS) ARCHITECTURE YEAR 3

Callum Sohal

Cultural Context C6-1

Trace the influence of private mobility, in context to the development of the city fabric and out of town shopping, to consider the likely shape of the urban (and increasing residual) landscape. Speculate on how this encourages autonomy within ourselves and our community.

Callum Sohal I.D. S10503774 BA (Hons) Architecture Cultural Context ArC6-1 Year 3 Submission date: 20/12/12 This essay is presented to the Birmingham School of Architecture at Birmingham City University as part of the BA (Hons) Architecture course.

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Callum Sohal

Cultural Context C6-1

Table of Contents

Page 1 _Introduction _Retail throughout the late 19th – early 20 Century _The post-industrial city th

Page 2 _Inner city road networks & the introduction of shopping arcades _Inner city rail networks

Page 3 _Aviation’s role as an out-of-town retail district _The birth of shopping malls, the Gruen effect and individualisation

Page 4 _The birth of shopping malls, the Gruen effect & individualisation (continued)

Page 5 _The 2 modernity’s effect on the urban landscape & autonomy nd

Page 6 _Conclusions

Page 7 _Reference List _Forum contribution!

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Callum Sohal

Cultural Context C6-1

Trace the influence of private mobility, in context to the development of the city fabric and out of town shopping, to consider the likely shape of the urban (and increasing residual) landscape. Speculate on how this encourages autonomy within ourselves and our community.

age of industry the country would not of benefitted from investments into the infrastructure that supported the city for future generations. These investments paved the way for private mobility throughout the coming decades.

Introduction The built-up environment that surrounds us has undergone vast changes throughout the last century; private mobility in all of its forms has been a major driving force behind the development of many Western urban landscapes. Road, train, air and Internet infrastructures are constantly being adjusted to suit the ever-changing occupation of the city, creating essential links that interconnect the city to the world.

Focusing on retail as a running topic this essay seeks to identify how private mobility has influenced the urban landscape in both cities and outof-town shopping districts. In turn the findings will define the reasons why the urban retail landscape is becoming increasingly residual within its physical form and how autonomy has, and is being affected by shifts in city functions.

Retail throughout the late 19 - early 20 Century th

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To understand and allow a comparison I must first identify retail in a more basic form, at a time where private mobility was limited. This will be demonstrated through Bart Lootsma’s theory on the first modernity using examples during the late 19 century/early 20 century; a period where the consumerist led society was almost non-existent. Retail in this era was undergone as necessity rather than pleasure, shopping was restricted to geographical location as travelling long distances to shop was simply unheard of. Daily essentials were found within short walks to the towns/village shops i.e. grocer, butcher, post office or chemist. It was a time when industry occupied the city; smoke filled, polluted and filthy streets made for an unhealthy environment but economically proved very successful. It could be argued if Britain had not of prospered from this th

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FIG 1 - Family grocers in York, 1880

The post-industrial city

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As industry reached saturation point the industrial revolution came to an end, but what would replace the factories and workhouses that the city comprised of? In short, services and consumerism. The occupations moved in, and throughout the early to mid 20 century completely changed the cities functional fabric; it was now a public domain. Not only was retail expanding in physical form but it also began to appear in culture, affecting our very own day-to-day lives. No longer was the city a centre of manufacture but an environment specific to services, society th

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Cultural Context C6-1

Inner city road networks and the introduction of shopping arcades

and consumerism. Shop fronts emerged into inner city streets creating high streets. Hospitals, airports and shopping centers were the modern day equivalent to cathedrals in both scale and function. Described in Supermodernism as ‘their (global companies) buildings standing as beacons in a sea of uniformity’ with author Hans Ibelings conveying his frustration with how the cities landscape was transforming into a dull and homogenous setting. Linking these buildings at street level were pedestrian pavements, introduced to create highly regulated domains where individuals felt safe to follow, physically separating them from the ever-increasingly dominant automotive traffic. The pavements created slower, more civilised routes for pedestrians to walk, subconsciously ‘window-shopping’ through shop displays prompting the first major environment for retail marketing. As mobility was a way of interconnecting the functions mentioned, new, quite bizarre ideas were put forward to increase pedestrian flow and speed, exhibits at the 1900 Paris World Exposition show moving platforms creating an infrastructure that carries its passengers along a conveyor belt, almost resembling the process of a factory line, collecting people and discarding them at retail stores along the high street. Although the inventions were not implemented into the city fabric they highlighted issues with outdated city planning; as pedestrian congestion and confusion appeared to be a problem at the time due to the city not being designed to cope with this great influx of pedestrianised city goers.

Car mobility was becoming an ever more popular mode of transport into and around the city, although still in it’s early phases, city road networks struggled to keep up with the rise in traffic density calling for an adjustment in how the cities automobile infrastructure was managed.

Many city road networks were being dramatically expanded through the mid 20 century in an effort to counteract the high traffic numbers and to connect cities with its surroundings; almost like arteries connecting organs. Metaphorically speaking, the world was beginning to become a much smaller place. M roads connected A roads which connected B roads. This complex infrastructure made way for a new car orientated culture that continues to support the cities automotive infrastructure today. The first shopping arcades were built in response to this, very popular with middle-class western societies as users were no longer shopping at specific stores but for specific items. The arcades offered a car-free haven for its users, described by Marc Augé as non-places where only function is in mind , they changed shopping culture forever as consumerism was now at its highest peak in history. Contact and interaction between small-scale shops and shoppers was no longer a priority as these ‘non-places’ can be seen as the first physical form created by the age of globalisation.

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Inner-city railway networks Not only was the automobiles environment changing but mobility in general was under influence of the post-industrial city. Already in place rail networks were updated to cope with the influx of commuting service workers and shoppers with stations like London Waterloo being expanded through the early 20 century, nearly doubling in size. This expansion is summarised by Sze Tsung Leong as ‘a landmark from the age of rail is updated for the age of retail’ . Not only were the capacity of the train stations increased but an extensive slum clearance throughout London th

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FIG 2 – Moving platforms at the Paris World Exposition, 1900

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IBELINGS, Supermodernism, 2003, p. 69

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IBELINGS, Supermodernism, 2003, p. 65 Leong, A Guide to Shopping, 2002

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and many British industrial cities, cleansing the urban landscape of its poverty and decay. Train stations were seen as blank canvases, with the opportunity for architects to design in a way that gave the city a new identity as a libertarian and programmed domain. Large stained glass windows not only flooded light into the interiors providing spacial climaxes for passengers to feel comfortable in, but allowed opportunities for railway companies to advertise upon, L&SWR’s (London & South Western railway) company crest was depicted through the glass windows of London Waterloo providing advertising space for global conglomerates to utilise. The new stations were in huge contrast to the previous ramshackled, confusing stations of the previous century, suggesting that the city fabric was becoming a more user-friendly environment.

hotels, banks and shops that they begin to compete with the very city it was intended to serve. An appropriate example can be seen at O’Hare airport, Chicago, one of the world’s busiest airports and typical to how passengers are increasingly resilient to enter the city as all facilities are present on site, especially when business is sole reason to travel. This creates a ‘new type of edge city’, towns on the edge of a town, linking the example back to how the cities fabric is being influenced by out of town shopping.

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The birth of shopping Malls, the Gruen effect & individualisation One of the architectural proposals that combined shopping arcades and the high streets pathways was the large-scale shopping mall; a controlled environment built up from a complex of shops and interconnecting pathways often multi-storied and indoor. Influential to these centers of commercial purpose through the 20 century was Victor Gruen, an Austrian born architect who immigrated to New York to escape Nazi occupied Vienna in 1938. The term ‘The Gruen Effect’ derives from his desire to integrate shopping into everyday life, today this has become an integral part of western culture with an image from American artist, Barbara Kruger stating ‘I shop, therefore I am’ , in essence the image questions consumerism as a lifestyle choice, highlighting shoppers addictive tendency to compulsively buy thus giving them false meaning to their lives through material possessions. th

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FIG 3 - L&SWR inscribed into stained glass and London’s Waterloo Train Station

Aviation’s role as an out-of-town retail district Aviation throughout the mid 20 century encapsulates the essence of this changing relationship between mobility and retail. Once serving the city as gateways for people to enter and exit as the wish whether it is for business or pleasure. They have developed into something so economically significant throughout recent times with the introduction of endless facilities such as conference centers, casinos, restaurants, th

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FIG 4 – Kruger ‘I shop therefore I am’

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IBELINGS, Supermodernism, 2003, p. 80 BALDAUF + WEINGARTNER, The Gruen Effect, 2009, 2.51mins

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The urban landscape was redefined after the construction of shopping malls, Gruen recognised the city as a space to captivate peoples imaginations as they shopped in what can be described as a performance venues. Users were encouraged to restrict their views to ground level as functional spaces were designed with featureless ceilings, exposed pipes and large clear glass walls, not only creating an environment for marketing to be fully exploited but also to provide visual interaction between product and user, strengthening the human desire to see and want. It’s important to recognise the impact that World War Two was having on society during the time this change was under development, many western post-war societies evolved around consumerism, especially in middleclass American homes, an example of this culture can be seen through the tendency’s of the mid 20 century housewife, very trend conscious and keen to remain up-to date with the many technological advancements taking place at the time, such as household utilities like washing machines, hoovers and cooking equipment. This new attitude to Western society can be summarised as Individualisation, described by Ulrich Beck as “first the disembedding and second, the re-embedding of industrial society’s ways of life by new ones, in which the individuals must produce, stage and cobble together their biographies themselves.”

People began to distinguish themselves as unique, depending on their income and geographical location. Rotterdam can be seen as a European representation of a typical Americanised city during the mid-20 century.

City inhabitants would express their individualisation through the interior of the homogenous apartment blocks in which they lived. Decorating them with coloured fabrics not only representing themselves as individual but celebrating the cultures which defined them. The city was no longer synonymous with one specific community but a mixture of inhabitants from numerous backgrounds and cultures. th

FIG 5 - Victor Gruen (right) explaining shopping mall design

sculptures and fashion shows were just some of the experiences that would entice shoppers in and ultimately keep them entertained.

Throughout the mid 20 century shopping malls spread through the United States and Europe, Gruen himself described them as ‘spreading like a disease.’ They degraded the cities high streets as they became ‘empty shells,’ neglected landscapes that were now being occupied by minorities and discriminated societies, downtowns were returning to their previous slum-like state as poverty spread through the unused areas of the landscape. Gruen described as the father of the shopping mall abandoned his baby, how could the wealthy be lured back into the city?

The reverse of so called ‘white flight’ was now his goal, attempts to design shopping malls that would work in harmony with the deteriorating city was priority; this is where mobility played a significant role. One decisive factor which contributed to the success of the out-of-town malls was its travel convenience, regular public transport would ferry shoppers from nearby suburbs as well as plentiful car parking all conveniently sitting besides the clean glazed exteriors of the vast shopping mall, interconnecting the malls were multi-lane highways that ran right through the shopping districts th

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Gruen designed shopping malls to disorientate shoppers; to manipulate them into purchasing themselves out of the store, it was a way of creating an event out of a previously mundane activity, social spaces were merged with retail, creating ‘shopping towns’, places suburban families could visit and enjoy. The malls were abundant in theatrical performance, fountains,

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LOOTSMA, Architecture in the 2 Modernity, 2011, 6:20mins nd

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BALDAUF + WEINGARTNER, The Gruen Effect, 2009, 31:45mins BALDAUF + WEINGARTNER, The Gruen Effect, 2009, 35.53mins

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making visiting an effortless experience for shoppers, far easier than making the transition through public mobility into the city. Gruen proposed a scheme that would replicate this but in an inner-city setting. The problem of the deteriorating cities was responded to with newly constructed inner city shopping malls. As space was limited, structures began to grow vertically instead of horizontally. The first multi-story shopping developments such as the Midtown Plaza in New York set precedents for modern day city occupation, they encouraging people to occupy the city once again, as retail merged with services and office space, again the driving theme behind Gruens proposal was linking convenience and experience, car parking was integrated into the shopping mall design through hidden underground car parking allowing access for private mobility. Through the 50s, 60,s and 70’s Gruen Associates replicated Midtown Plaza across the world working on over fifty similar projects. Today its possible to apply the Gruen effect to not only the commercial environment but to urban life in general as consumption has became the master principle of city planning.

Western families to acquire their own automobile as a means to enhance their lives through freedom of travel. The automobile has been at the route of city planning through the 20 century and its no wonder why.

Jonathon Bell is correct in saying ‘roads constitute a significant proportion of the built environment’ , although during recent times private mobility in automobile form has been at an all time low as a means of transit to the city with public mobility becoming an ever increasingly promoted and encouraged method by Governments and city planners.

Even with taking this into account the need to physically travel into the city is becoming less and less essential, as the internet becomes an ever increasingly prominent tool for communication and commerce, is there any need to make this physical transition anymore? It’s clear that roads have changed the cultural basis of society, and in doing so they pave the way for a deepening sense of capitalist economic relations . th

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Image of Westway carriageway, London; an elevated multi-lane highway that cuts through inner city housing developments. A hierarchy is created, mobility is the dominating factor of city planning as it disregards residential areas through physical barriers, in-turn dividing communities and reducing socialism.

The 2 modernity’s effect on the urban landscape & autonomy nd

The second modernity within the city landscape can be summarised through technological advancements, machinery began replacing human labor and private mobility began to increase, ‘almost everyone is connected to everyone.’ As mobility varies in direct proportion of income, the characteristics of private and public mobility differ significantly; both are subject to their own constraints and limitations as well as benefits.

Private mobility is often the preferred method of transit as users aren’t restricted to location due to the advantage of freedom to travel where and when desired. Public mobility is far a more controlled method of transit, often specific to urban locations where demand is at its peak as well as currently being economically and environmentally more viable.

Originally cities were designed to work alongside public mobility with train stations being the main gateways in and out of the city, post-war society saw the popularisation of private mobility through increased desires for 9

FIG 6 – Westway carriageway, London

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LOOTSMA, Architecture in the 2 Modernity, 2011, 23:35mins nd

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BELL, Carchitecture, 2001, p.69 BELL, Carchitecture, 2001, p. 69

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Conclusions Autonomy has developed in direct response to the social change of the urban landscape. Today, autonomy can be summarised as something of a residual experience as it was once, during the mid 19 century a deciding factor to why people would make the transition into the city; ‘much of the excitement and much of the threat, of the city came from the possibility of autonomous, sexually charged, social encounters. The urban landscape has lost its emotional attachment to the user, no longer a personal environment for interaction and socialism but a functional place, mundane and all too very similar to its equivalents around the world. From personal experience, this can be seen through many European cities, I feel they’re far too often built from the same stores, the same architecture and used for the same function. It is only in the cities historic past that defines it from another, its cultural identity in which it was built upon. Something that may attract tourists initially, but may then soon find themselves in the same retail districts they could of found closer to home.

This leads me to question if the city is a necessary commodity in the modern world. Even today, we are still progressing through this change, retail has reached it’s saturation point in physical form due to a combination of poor financial management and weakened footfall has led to once major retailers closing, i.e. Woolworths as ‘M’ commerce is now prevailing, with shoppers using Internet compatible devices to buy from reducing the need to make the physical transition into the city.

Undoubtedly a pattern is emerging, first industry fading, now retail, it leads to an uncertain future, what will occupy the city next?

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Images below show two shopping malls, although in different countries it’s difficult to differentiate, example of globalisation through the Gruen effect

FIG 7 - Barcelona Shopping Mall

FIG 8 - Westfield Shopping Mall, UK

FIG 9 – Idea of the city becoming energy farms, just one of many possible future city occupations

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BELL, Carchitecture, 2001, p. 70

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Reference List Text Sources

Figure 3 – ‘London & South Western Railway logo inscribed at London’s Waterloo Train station, 1900’s’ s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/01/91/42/1914251_f85d5ca3.jpg

BELL, Jonathon, (2001) Carchitecture, Switzerland, August/ Birkhäuser IBELINGS, Hans, (2003) Supermodernism, Netherlands, NAi Publishers

Figure 4 – “I shop therefore I am”, Barbara Kruger, 1987’ p3.storage.canalblog.com/32/97/901321/68488623.gif

LEONG, Sze. T, (2002) A Guide to Shopping, UK, Taschen MEURS, Paul + VERHEIJEN, Marc, (2003) In Transit, Netherlands, NAi Publishers

Figure 5 – ‘Victor Gruen (right) explaining shopping mall design’ thefoxisblack.com/blogimages//victor-gruen.jpg

THACKARA, John, (1994) Lost In Space: A Traveler’s Tale, Netherlands, De Grafishe Haarlem

Figure 6 – ‘Westway highway, London’ BELL, Jonathon, (2001) Carchitecture, Switzerland, August/ Birkhäuser, p74

Lectures COLUMBANO, Alessandro, (2012) High Street and consumer culture, Birmingham School of Architecture

Figure 7 – ‘Barcelona Mont Juic shopping centre’ blogspot.com/-WGZlFZmKZu0/Tcl4CBIj6fI/AAAAAAAAIno/uoaTFwUUZM/s1600/BARCELONA_MONTJUIC_SHOPPING_LAS_ARENAS_15.jpg

Videos LOOTSMA, Bart, (2011) Architecture in the 2 Modernity, ArchitecturalTheory.eu nd

Figure 8 – ‘Wesfield shopping centre, UK’ http://www.viewpictures.co.uk/ImageThumbs/JNEW-023-0003/3/JNEW0230003_Westfield_Shopping_Centre_Stratford_Westfield_Group_2011_Interior_ Mall.jpg

BALDAUF, Annete + WEINGARTNER, Katherina (2009) The Gruen Effect: Victor Gruen and the Shopping Mall, vimeo.com/44030235

Websites cities-for-mobility.net, date accessed: 15.12.12

Figure 9 – ‘Tom Hanks’ city revolt, renewable energy; gadgetcafe.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Electric-City-the-Revolt.jpg

Illustrations Title page image – ‘New York city reflection’ (Edited) pbase.com/pnd1/image/65089816/original

Forum Contribution

Figure 1 – ‘Family Grocers in York, 1880’s’ yorkstories.co.uk/news_and_views/fp-content/images/25-bootham-1880s960.jpg Figure 2 – ‘Moving platform at the Paris Exposition, 1900’ weltausstellungen.net/uploads/tx_templavoila/1900_pk_rollsteig_01.jpg

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