EUROPAN WIEN KAGRAN

HOW TO GROW A CITY?

IF_THEN_

A complex task like growing a city demands a strategy.

It is not about aesthetics and appearance of things, but rather about sequential design of order in which they are appearing and relationships thus being created.

FIXED FRAME

Since the cities are developing in accelerating speed, and no one can predict uncertainties that we will have to face, the projects refers to the period between nowadays and 2030.

There are four stages of the development, starting from the rigid framework, but as far as the vision goes further to the future, forms and proposals are becoming more loose, suggesting rather than demanding. First and forth stages deal directly with physicality of space through building, while second and third are programme based, and therefore overlap.

INCREMENTAL DEVELOPMENT

EVENT SPACE

HOUSING

SPECULATION

The design approach is based on the Incremental planning model developed by Lindblom (1959) that incorporates risk management. “In this model, the development of an area proceeds step by step, adapting over the long term to changing factors and actors. New developments grow, as it were, out of existing uses, on the basis of place-specific characteristics.” Loosening the intention of Master plan this trial and error approach can play a role as a catalyst within the development process. Over recent decades we are witnessing failures of great urban expectations and promises; so far testing as a new paradigm is the only efficient tool in preventing this side effect of urban planning.

TESTING AS THE METHOD

Test offers space for bottom-up planning instrument as well as space for reflection and action. The most important: it introduces trial-and-error approach that presents the opportunity to learn from one’s preliminary steps (mistakes and successes) and adjusts one‘s plan if necessary. A test period can change previously made decisions; by simulating situations it can be proved that the anticipations are right and it should keep developing in that direction or that they are wrong and that something completely different is needed. A test is opening up a possibility for incremental development.

TIME LINE

2013 - 2015 FIXED FRAME – FIXED FRAME – The first stage implies building an infrastructural backbone of the site; providing plenty of parking space, it thus enables the ground of the site to become an open public space. At the same time, this spatial structure is built to open up a possibility for a program to take place. The grid is based on the spatial requirements of a parking, with the intention to create as much possible adaptable space above, that can easily be turned into flats, offices or to host some public program.

Cleaning of the oil polluted soil through the process of phytoremediation is starting on the contaminated Mobil Oil area.

2015- 2017 EVENT SPACE – the main purpose of this stage is to make the site public through series of events and programs with the different time span, from one day to few months. This time window is used as a display to exhibit the new vision for the area – as a result of the previous stage, what used to be parking areas accompanying shopping malls are now green public spaces. Together with the spatial structure the site is becoming a field of possibilities for events to occur.

2017 - 2025 HOUSING – HOUSING – after the mix of programs and services (as a base for housing) is developed through first two stages, new residents are attracted with favourable ownership, rental or construction conditions. At the beginning the target group are people in interim of their life: recently moved to Austria, students, people with newly started business, alternative theatre, bar, flea market… Here one can house his home, business, social life. Most of the housing is hosted in the longitudinal structure, the backbone, though there is a possibility that some development, in the sense of building could emerge as well.

2025-2030 SPECULATION – This is the stage of the rapid construction development. Urbanity is reaching the highest level, area is densely populated, program diversity is very high offering multiplicity of choices. Design of this stage observes the hole city of Vienna and development of the overlapping transport network: public transport, car roads and bicycle paths.

What is evaluated and fostered in the future are therefore connections with other strategic points on a larger urban scale.

TRAFFIC

The strategy is based on universal management process that consists of planning, organizing, motivating and controlling.

Planning - Setting the goals and deciding what is the most efficient way to achieve them.

Organizing - Determining the best way to group activities and resources.

Motivating - Motivating all the stakeholders to contribute to common interest.

Controlling - Monitoring and correcting on-going activities to facilitate goal attainment.

io at

iv

ot

m n

g

in nn

ZONE 3 The contamin ated area is cleaned through the process of phytoremediation - the use of plants that mitigate the environmental problem without the need to excavate the contaminant material and dispose of it elsewhere. The highest tolerance towards soil contamination by oil products has been demonstrated by three annual crops: maize, oat and lupine. These plants were tested for phytoremediation of polluted black soil from the area of oil refinery plant (Mazeikiai, Lithuania). The maize plants revealed the highest remediation ability: oil content in the soil decreased by ~ 1.5 times in one month plant vegetation. Using phytoremediation include cost effectiveness, aesthetic advantages, and long-term applicability.

STRATEGY

a pl

NOISE

Anticipating, on one hand that this way of trading will become out-dated compared to online shopping, or on the other that the new facilities might have a direct impact on growth of the businesses, the project focuses on the theme of retrofitting existing shopping area. Adoption of the new spatial regulations regarding parking areas should secure new public spaces. The regulations are coming into force in 2014 with the implementation plan by 2015.

l

ZONE 2

nt ro

The city provides the main spatial infrastructure in order to foster future development. The first activity on the site is connected to the process of phytoremediation taken over the contaminated zone. The main intention in early phase is to bring knowledge and sustainable know-how as the way to promote and advocate contemporary ways of living.

co

ZONE 1

NOISE MANAGEMENT: The project develops a particular position regarding the housing agenda for the site. Having in mind the temporal logic of the housing for people in interim, and the intended social and spatial development of the site, the noise produced by two mayor traffic corridors is not considered to be a critical issue. Nevertheless, since the site is considered as an urban island of intense activity, the whole area is walled with up to the height of 8 meters above the level of traffic; structures are built on the perimeter of the location, opening the space for the urban activities to bloom.

Activities, that in some cases would imply noise as well.

n

ZONING

The potential of a place to develop urban qualities is directly governed by the level of the intervention and the diapason of possibilities that such a place provides. Therefore there is no distinguishing between parts; the intention is to think about the project as a whole. The only differentiation is time based, meaning that the project site is the first one in a series to be constructed. The city should provide the main infrastructure in order to encourage the mixture of publicly and privately funded developments through both: optimized/partial financial support and new spatial policies; with the main goal that in the forthcoming period the study site reaches its full economic independency.

INFRASTRUCTURAL BACKBONE Common for these three zones is infrastructural backbone.

The backbone is the first structure emerging on the site., providing the whole area with parking spaces and rentable units, spaces that can host housing, services and events.

During the second and the third phase the backbone capacity is used to the full capacity, and the forth phase can begin. If the first phase is focused on basic infrastructural facilitating, second and third, are more program oriented, the fourth phase is the one when architecture and urbanity enter on real scale. In that moment the backbone that was engine of growth is becoming to dematerialise.

isa tio

ZONE 1

AREAS OF INTEREST

ga n

ZONE 2

STRATEGY

or

ZONE 3

PHASE 1: up to 2015

INTENTION: Facilitating TOOL: Spatial structure GOAL: Opening up a spatial possibility for an event to happen.

STRUCTURE

FIXED FRAME

In order for the testing site to grow and develop in natural and generic manner, the site itself needs to be habitable. The proposed infrastructural backbone of the site is conceived as a structure for a variety of programs interconnected to the program of living.

URBAN OPEN SPACE POLICY

The city of Vienna introduces a new spatial policy for the business that operate in this area. During the one-year period each business is required to release the existing parking lot and transform it into a green public space.

Envisioned parking space should be located in the newly formed central axis that runs through the middle of the area, above the existing street. The regulations on new spatial regulations are coming into force in 2014 with the implementation plan by 2015. Each business individually must independently fund the prescribed changes. In the case of non-compliance with the new spatial regulations, businesses will have to pay a fine. The income raised through fines is used to build new garages and arrange green public space.

PHASE 2: up to 2017

INTENTION: Making the site public, visible and appealing TOOL: Promotion through events

GOAL: Raising interest, attracting future users/ residents

PLACE

EVENT SPACE

To promote the site as an emerging urban quarter one needs to bring the audience. The goal is to generate a heterogeneous mass, creating a calendar of events that will bring diverse groups of people during various events, to activate the site during the seasons, at different times of day, different days in week, few weeks, same Sunday every month, few months...

PHASE 3: up to 2020

INTENTION: Fostering dynamic category of urban development TOOL: Favourable ownership, rental or construction conditions

GOAL: creating a hybrid compound of urban qualities

HOUSING

PEOPLE Users are people in interim. In order to sustain the mixture of programs, project proposes a model of temporal housing that would attract citizens of all incomes and variety of social backgrounds, but with one particular common preference- need of temporal housing solution. Initial design is based on an ambivalent unit that would be able to host different programs and activities attached to basic dwellingconcept of living and working - home office, workshops, shops, recreational activities, activities linked to the concept of neighbourhood everyday life‌ In this faze, the backbone reaches its full capacity in the sense of both program and space. It gains stability as an urban space, the whole site becomes a place in the city.

PRICE : AFFORDABLE During the two years period until the infrastructure is not totally developed, low cost and favourable conditions, temporality above all, are what can attract users.

PHASE 4: up to 2025

INTENTION: Steering TOOL: Evaluation, Suggestion, Recommendation GOAL: Cultivating and improving attained

SPECULATION

RAPID CONSTRUCTION DEVELOPMENT

This is the stage of the rapid construction development.

Urbanity is reaching the highest level, area is densely populated, program diversity is offering wide multiplicity of choices. Design of this stage observes the whole city of Vienna and development of the overlapping transport network: public transport, car roads and bicycle paths.

What is evaluated and fostered in the future are therefore connections with other strategic points on a larger urban scale.