Undergraduate Thesis: Designing Access to Waterfront Public Spaces

D E S I G N I N G A C C E S S TO WAT E R F R O N T P U B L I C S PA C E S : GENERAL PRINCIPLES AND CASE STUDIES FROM VANCOUVER, B.C. ROY CLOUTIER H O N O R S U N D E R G R A D U AT E T H E S I S , 2 0 1 2

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University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Campus College of Design; School of Architecture

Advisors: Pat Nunnally (Chair) Katherine Solomonson, PhD Gregory Donofrio, PhD

May 2012

D E D I C AT I O N 3

Many thanks to professor s Pat Nunnally, Kate Solomonson, and Greg Donofr io. Your exper ience , advice , and encour agement was invaluable and indispensable to me throughout the process of wr iting this thesis. I dedicate it to you.

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TA B L E O F C O N T E N T S

TA B L E O F C O N T E N T S

TA B L E O F C O N T E N T S 5

P R E FAC E

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A C C E S S TO U R B A N WAT E R F R O N T S

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H I S TO R Y & B A C K G R O U N D

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B A R R I E R S TO A C C E S S O N U R B A N WAT E R F R O N T S

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C A S E S T U D I E S / D E S I G N S T R AT E G I E S : V A N C O U V E R

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A N A LY S I S

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CONCLUSIONS

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A R E A S O F F U R T H E R S T U DY

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WO R K S C I T E D

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W O R K S C O N S U LT E D

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PREFACE

PREFACE

PREFACE 7

H

ailed as a “worldwide urban success story,” the redevelopment of urban waterfronts around the globe has garnered significant praise and enthusiasm. Despite this acclaim, significant problems of access and equity still exist on waterfronts. Professional literature on waterfront planning and design has long observed a tension between private residential development on waterfronts and public access to waterfronts, in which nominally public waterfront spaces become cut off from the existing city, effectively privatized by the residential development around them. While planning documents and other professional literature have proposed some general design strategies to create access, they do not specifically address the

par ticular set of challenges created by private residential development.

My research provides a review of the unique physical and psychological barriers created by private residential developments on urban waterfronts.

Following this, I analyze a series of case studies from Vancouver, British Columbia, examining the evolution of the specific design strategies employed to create access while negotiating potential conflicts between public access and private development. Through historical analysis of this succession of development in Vancouver, my research extrapolates general principles, creating a “toolkit” for designers facing similar redevelopments.

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INTRODUCTION

A C C E S S TO U R B A N WAT E R F R O N T S

INTRODUCTION 9

O

ver the past sixty years, urban waterfronts around the world have undergone massive changes, passing from industrial use, to neglect and disuse, to revitalization and redevelopment.

This redevelopment has transformed areas that were often extremely polluted and underused into housing, parks, and other amenities, garnering untold amounts of enthusiasm and praise.

Hailed as ever ything from a “waterfront renaissance” to a “worldwide urban success stor y,” these effor ts have spurred great collective optimism (Breen and Rigby, 1996).

However, beneath the veneer of enthusiasm and praise there exists a more problematic side to waterfront redevelopment. Social scientists and others have noticed a number of negative trends made manifest in waterfront redevelopment, such as pronounced class and racial disparities, erasure of cer tain histories and cultural memories, and effective privatization of public space

(Marshall, 2001). One par ticular critique leveled at waterfront redevelopments is that, in many cases, waterfront redevelopment projects create “walls” of residential development, effectively cutting off the city from the water (Sairinen et al., 2005). Professional literature on planning and design of waterfronts has long recognized this tension between residential development and public access, in which nominally public waterfront spaces become cut off from the existing city, effectively privatized by the residential development around them (Breen and Rigby, 1996; Fisher et al., 2004; Sairinen et al., 2005).

Social science research takes an even more critical stance on this pattern, observing that these residential developments typically cater almost exclusively to the upper class (Sairinen et al., 2005; Bundesinstitut für Bai-, Stadt- und Raumforschung, 2011), and rarely follow through on creation of affordable housing and amenities (Wakefield, 2007;

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INTRODUCTION

Dyson et al, 2011). This homogeneous, high-income residential development combines with a lack of access from the existing city to create pronounced inequalities in terms of who has the oppor tunity to use these nominally public spaces, unequally distributing access to these amenities by social class (Wakefield, 2007; Dyson et al, 2011). This pattern is a perfect example of what sociologists have termed “environmental privilege,” the unequal distribution of environmental benefits (Pellow and Park, 2011; Bullard, 2005).

In several cases, cities have successfully implemented policies to ensure a mix of income levels in residential developments to combat these inequalities (City of Vancouver, 2003; Por tland Development Commission, 1999).

However, while this addresses the economic injustice issues, it fails to address the barrier s to access posed by waterfront residential development. Even providing a good social

mix in these developments is not enough if the public space is effectively privatized; access is the only thing that opens the spaces so that anyone can use them, regardless of social class or residence in the neighboring housing developments. The spaces being socially equitably used is one thing, but they are fir st and foremost a public amenity, paid for by the public, which all member s of the public should have the right and ability to use, argue social scientists (Sairinen et. al., 2005; Gould and Lewis, 2009; 2011).

Even more disturbingly, they charge that in many cases, the government itself is complicit in the creation of these conditions. Geographers have tracked the rise of what they term “entrepreneurial governance,” characterized by increasing public/private collaboration (Har vey, 1989; Smith, 1996; Hackwor th and Smith, 2001). Why then, they ask, aren’t social concerns and the

I N T R O D U C T I O N 11

public good adequately addressed, if these collaborations presumably give governments more involvement with and leverage over developers?

For this disconnect, the researchers credit the conflicting interests of the par ties involved in the planning process, namely, how differences in relative influence between par ties leads to cer tain goals overshadowing other goals in the planning process (Bunce, 2009; Moore and Bunce, 2009). In many cases, they charge, the more powerful influence of profit-motive-driven par ties like developers leads to social goals (like ensuring public access) being overshadowed and ignored (Hagerman, 2008; Dooling, 2009).

When dealing with developers or other entities whose primar y motivation is profit, social goals are typically only included if they can be seen to increase profit, given token inclusion in a minimal way, or in many cases, merely ignored (Moore and Bunce, 2009).

However, in the case of access, assigning blame purely to the planning process is an oversimplification of reality. While in many cases they are correct, and access is impeded because it is not made a priority during the planning process, this is not true in all cases (Dyson et al., 2011). For example, many cities have instituted progressive planning doctrines in which public access is made a priority. However, even in these places, issues of access often till persist (Dyson et al., 2011). Clearly, there is more at play. From these cases, it becomes clear that this issue persists not purely because of a failure of planning doctrine to place emphasis on access, but also because of a lack of understanding of the role of design and design strategies for creating access in these circumstances, as well as because of additional barriers arising from the physical context of post-industrial waterfront redevelopment.

This thesis is an examination of these two issues, design and context, as an expansion of social science’s critique of waterfront development.

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INTRODUCTION LITERATURE REVIEW

W

ith these issues in mind, we turn now to a review of proposed solutions for creating access to waterfronts, examining how this problem has been addressed in three types of relevant literature. A review of social science literature, professional literature, and city-specific planning documents finds that, while public access is addressed, the specific barriers to access posed by residential development are infrequently mentioned, if at all. Even when they are mentioned, they lack specific design strategies proposed in response; there is a general hesitance to suggest or specify design solutions in the planning process. For tunately, however, designers have begun by necessity to address this issue in practice, and ultimately it is to these built projects that we must turn to begin to establish best practices and theor y.

While literature from the social science fields of sociology and geography has been instr umental in raising awareness of the social problems surrounding access to waterfront public space, it rarely leaves the realm of abstract ideas and governance methods to address the specific physical conditions that impede or permit access. In turn, its main contribution lies in the realm of governance solutions (diver sifying waterfront housing through subsidies and other policies, ensuring that social

goals like access are not over shadowed in the planning process), leaving aside the physical determinants of access. While the planningand governance-focused recommendations of social scientists is a cr ucial fir st step in creating access (governments must establish and enforce access as a priority), this does not determine something that is, ultimately, dependent on physical conditions and design. For this examination of physical conditions, we turn to professional literature in urban design, planning, and landscape architecture, as well as city-specific codes and documents providing guidelines for specific projects.

Professional literature in design fields has also long recognized access in general as a problem on waterfronts. Numerous books, journal articles, and repor ts on waterfront design have chronicled the unique physical and psychological barrier s to access posed by post-industrial waterfront sites. However, their responses are often limited to vague blanket statements or general goals like “[a]ssure physical and visual access to and from the waterfront for the public� (University of Maine Sea Grant Program, 2007). In addition, while the literature addresses access as a problem in general, it largely fails to address the specific barrier s to access posed by new residential development. This specific issue is given brief mention in Breen and Rigby’s The New Waterfront:

I N T R O D U C T I O N 13 flict. These city-based waterfront plans almost always place access in general among their priorities, though it is often included vaguely, briefly, or without any specific design strategies implied. Nonetheless, these plans are much more prescriptive than the general literature, and as such begin to give more direct, design-based suggestions of how to create access.

PHYSICAL

P R O F E S S I O N A L D E S I G N L I T E R AT U R E

C I T Y- S P E C I F I C P L A N N I N G L I T E R AT U R E

POLICY FOCUS

ABSTRACT

DESIGN FOCUS

O V E R V I E W O F L I T E R AT U R E

S O C I A L S C I E N C E L I T E R AT U R E

MORE

LESS S P E C I F I C I T Y O F R E C O M M E N D AT I O N S

A Wor ldwide Urban Success Stor y (1996), as well as Fisher and Benson’s Remaking the Urban Waterfront (2004). However, these sources again stop shor t of specifying par ticular strategies, instead broadly stating that effor ts should be made to overcome the physical and psychological barriers posed by new residential development, while simultaneously not detailing what physical form these effor ts might take, or what exactly these barrier s are.

City-specific planning documents offer much more specificity in terms of design solutions, but also stop shor t of directly addressing the public waterfront access/private housing con-

For example, plans for specific cities name preser ving water views and view corridor s (City of Vancouver, 2003; Saint Paul on the Mississippi Design Center, 2007), creating a continuous waterfront path (City of Vancouver, 2003; City of Por tland, 2006; Hargreaves Associates, 2004), connecting specific nodes within the city (St. Paul), and creating greenway streets to the waterfront (City of Vancouver, 2003; City of Por tland, 2006; Hargreaves Associates, 2004; Philadelphia City Planning Commission, 2006) as key design strategies for creating waterfront access in general. These are often coupled with more general directives such as “[c]reate a larger urban-scale network” or “[e] nsure that all groups have access to the river’s amenities through maintained open space, access, over looks and view points” (Minnesota Planning, 2002). However, these plans are still not specific to the public access/private housing conflict; few if any actually mention it, let alone directly address it.

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INTRODUCTION

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ence, in order to learn more about the specific design strategies used, we must look to specific built examples where designers have addressed the conflicts between residential development and public access to the waterfront. In particular, it is helpful to examine how designers have taken the overall access-creating strategies described in the planning literature (waterfront paths, green streets, etc.), and applied them to the context of these residential developments. As well, examining these strategies through the lens of the evolution of the design approach of a par ticular city, Vancouver, allows the subtleties of shifts in approach to be drawn out, so that other cities may learn from the trial and error already conducted in Vancouver.

In this paper, I begin by laying out a brief history of waterfront redevelopment and a review of the various physical and psychological barriers that consistently appear on waterfronts; this is followed by an examination of the specific barriers posed by new-build residential development, to better provide context for the case studies that follow.

I then provide analysis of a series of case studies from Vancouver, British Columbia, to examine the evolution of design strategies for resolving the conflict between public access and private residential development. I then conclude with a series of recommendations for creating access and minimizing the barriers caused by private residential development on waterfronts.

I N T R O D U C T I O N 15

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HISTORY + BACKGROUND

HISTORY + BACKGROUND

H I S T O R Y + B A C K G R O U N D 17

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n order to understand the challenges facing designers of waterfront redevelopments, it is useful to delve into the histor y of these spaces and how they came to be as they currently are. For much of the time between Western settlement and the early 1900s, waterfronts were the economic centers of many major cities in Nor th America (Marshall, 2001). Due to the relative ease and efficiency of water-borne transpor tation, many goods were shipped via water.

In response, urban waterfronts became home to a succession of a wide variety of industrial uses, from logging and mining to food and grain processing, to heavy industr y and manufacturing, and so on. This period of prosperity and industrial use lasted over a centur y in many cases, from the mid-1800s until the mid-1900s.

This period of industrial use drew to a close soon after World War II, as industrial uses began to leave urban waterfronts for areas out-

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HISTORY + BACKGROUND

HEIGHT OF THE INDUSTRIAL ERA: LOGGING, MILLING, SHIPPING

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side of cities or in developing countries. This seismic shift in urban land use was brought on by a number of factors, including the globalization of manufacturing, containerization of shipping, shifting technological trends, and many more (Norcliffe et al., 1996). Urban waterfronts, centers of industr y for over a centur y, lay largely blighted, unused, or disused.

These areas then underwent a period where they lay vir tually ignored, polluted with toxic chemicals that were remnants of their industrial pasts, and cut off from the existing city by the transpor tation infrastructure they previously depended on (Mar shall, 2001). In many cases, these challenges per sist today.

1900

However, beginning in force in the late 1970s and early 1980s, cities began to recognize that these waterfront brownfield sites held the potential to become tremendous civic assets (Norcliffe et al., 1996). Since the cities had initially grown around industrial uses on these waterfront sites, the sites are typically located in the economic and political hear ts of cities. The fact that these sites were located in close proximity to the downtown core made them extremely attractive investments for redevelopment. As well, at that time, cities were still reeling from the challenges of the first wave of urban renewal and its resultant social problems. Hence, the idea of redeveloping a relatively “blank-slate� site where

H I S T O R Y + B A C K G R O U N D 19

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displacement of neighborhoods was not an issue was extremely appealing, and perceived as less politically risky or socially unjust (Norcliffe et al., 1996).

Simultaneously, the rise of the modern environmental movement brought with it a sweeping public interest in nature in general and bodies of water in par ticular. A surge in public interest in cleaning up polluted waterways, culminated by the backlash after the burning of the Cuyahoga River, led to the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972 (Adler, 1993). Across the countr y, and increasingly around the globe, people had begun to see the waterfront as a place that, given the

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proper ecological restoration, could become a tremendous environmental asset, right in the hear t of the city (Norcliffe et al., 1996). Hence, remediation of the pollution on these sites and the creation of parks began to be discussed in earnest.

In tandem with the calls for remediation of these sites, the potential of urban waterfronts for recreational use began to draw interest in cities, with public desire for waterfront parks, trails, and marinas steadily increasing (Norcliffe et al., 1996). Cities heard these calls and, realizing the amenity that they had on their hands, began to see waterfront redevelopment as a

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HISTORY + BACKGROUND

way to combat the white flight, suburbanization, and disinvestment that plagued urban areas in the post-WWII time period (Marshall, 2001).

In turn, redevelopments were often built with the goal of drawing upper-middle class suburban residents back to the city, by harnessing the tremendous potential of riverfronts to become a social and ecological amenity (Marshall, 2001).

For these reasons and a host of others, cities began to turn their attention to the waterfront as they began a new wave of redevelopment.

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CONTEMPORARY CONDITIONS

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n many cities, the redevelopment phase of urban waterfronts has been characterized by extensive public-private collaboration, which can both open up possibilities and cause challenges for planners and designers (Marshall, 2001). Due to the sites’ contaminated nature and seclusion from the urban fabric, private-sector developers are often hesitant to take on redevelopment projects on these sites (Marshall, 2001). In response, public sector groups such as city and local governments or port authorities have played an increasingly significant role in removing barriers to redevelopment (Malone, 1996; Murphy, 2008; Brown, 2009). By remediating the pollution on these sites,

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1 9 7 8 : FA L S E C R E E K F R O M C A M B I E B R I D G E , VA N C O U V E R

2 0 0 3 : FA L S E C R E E K F R O M C A M B I E B R I D G E , VA N C O U V E R

commissioning comprehensive master plans to provide a framework for reincorporating these sites into the existing urban fabric, creating initial waterfront parks, and other reinvestment strategies, the public sector seeks to “prime the pump” for private development of these spaces, taking on more and more of the roles, expenses, and risks usually borne by the private sector along the way (Brown, 2009). This can be seen as part of a larger trend toward what has been termed “entrepreneurial governance” (Harvey, 1989), in which the government and the private sector become increasingly interdependent. This trend continues today, with public/private collaboration of various forms as the method of choice for many waterfront redevelopments.

While it not without its challenges, this direct collaboration between public-sector planners, private-sector developers, and designers also holds great potential for public influence and inclusion of social goals in the development process (Beasley, personal inter view; July 19, 2011).

In many cases, rezoning packages are negotiated between the city government and developers, in which the city secures a commitment to public amenities from the developer, in exchange for rezoning the land from industrial use to residential or commercial development (City of Vancouver, 2003). As well, deals are often made where public amenities are created or preser ved in exchange for floor area ratio (FAR) bonuses or

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HISTORY + BACKGROUND other concessions to developers that help them increase the profitability of their developments (Beasley, personal inter view; July 19, 2011).

Through these processes, parks and other public spaces are often created along the water’s edge to supplement the existing public parks typically created through the initial public investment as par t of the “pump-priming” process (Beasley, personal inter view; July 19, 2011). Public access to these spaces is typically included as a precondition for these developments, negotiated as par t of these packages and made a priority in the planning phase. However, in cities with a weaker planning process, the developers’ priorities tend to overshadow public priorities, eclipsing social goals like public access to amenities (Moore and Bunce, 2009). Hence, if these goals are not included in the planning process, creating public connections is under-emphasized in the design process, often leading to inadequate access to waterfront parks and public spaces, and the “wall of housing” effect described earlier.

THE “ACCESS TRIO:” CONTEXT, PLANNING, DESIGN

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owever, lack of emphasis on access in the planning process is not the only reason that spaces become cut off from the city and public access is impeded; as previously mentioned,

design and physical context also play key roles.

Some cities with stronger planning processes and more progressive planning models have largely overcome the problem of lack of emphasis on access in the planning process. Even in these cities, and even when access is made a priority in the planning process, access is still often impaired (Marshall, 2001; Beasley, personal inter view; July 19, 2011). Clearly, something more must be at play than just a lack of emphasis.

Rather, a lack of understanding of design strategies also plays a major role in determining access, with designers unclear on which methods of negotiating the conflicts between public access and private housing are the most effective (with few objective methods for analyzing specific design moves). As well, the physical context of the sites plays a large role in either complicating or simplifying the task of creating access; the number, type, and intensity of barriers varies widely from one site to another. These three factors—planning, design, and context—combine to determine the quality of public access.

Hence, before we may directly address the issue of design, we must first turn to a review of the barriers to access inherent in the context of post-industrial waterfront sites.

H I S T O R Y + B A C K G R O U N D 23

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BARRIERS TO ACCESS

BARRIERS TO ACCESS O N U R B A N WAT E R F R O N T S

B A R R I E R S T O A C C E S S 25

T

here are many barrier s endemic to urban waterfronts that stand in the way of access to waterfront public spaces. These barrier s fall into two major categories: barriers existing prior to redevelopment (stemming from the context of the sites), and barriers created in the redevelopment phase (stemming from the quality of the design strategies employed).

Within these categories, physical and psychological barriers form sub-categories.

Barriers existing prior to redevelopment include many of the previously discussed historical issues emerging from the industrial-to-residential transition. Infrastructural barriers are the main physical barriers that are present on these sites.

For example, in many cases, obsolete railroad tracks that were previously used to transpor t goods from por ts to inland markets now ser ve as a barrier to movement between the city and the water’s edge. A similar infrastructural bar-

rier is formed by waterfront freeways, which were often built through former ly-industrial waterfront areas because of the inexpensive land, lack of local resistance, and a similar linearity and physical form between waterfronts and freeways that eased route design and construction (Marshall, 2001). These freeways severely impede access to the waterfront, limiting passage to pedestrian bridges and street crossings at best, and forming an impassible wall of concrete and traffic at wor st.

PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIERS More pernicious still are the psychological barriers that impair access to these spaces. Psychological research on the way people perceive the urban environment has identified cer tain archetypal conditions that people use to filter their understanding of the urban environment;

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BARRIERS TO ACCESS

INFRASTRUC TURAL BARRIER: I-5; PORTLAND, OR

B A R R I E R S T O A C C E S S 27

PAT H

EDGE

DISTRICT

NODE

LANDMARK D I A G R A M : LY N C H ’ S F I V E A R C H E T Y PA L C O N D I T I O N S ( R E D R A W N F R O M LY N C H , 1 9 6 1 )

these conditions are par ticularly useful in analyzing barriers to access. In his book The Image of the City (1961), Kevin Lynch proposes five different archetypal urban conditions: edge, district, path, node, and landmark. These archetypal conditions construct how we mentally filter and understand the elements of cities and begin to structure our perception of and relation to our urban environments. Of par ticular relevance on post-industrial waterfronts are the notions of edges and districts. In Lynch’s terminology, a district is an identifiable area in a city that is unified by some set of perceptual characteristics and has some degree of internal homogeneity.

Edges can be defined as a seam or dividing line

between two differing conditions, often the dividing line between two districts. Edges can be physical, mental, or most commonly both; they can be formed by anything from a change in land use to a change in building typology, to a change in street orientation, to more intense physical barriers such as the aforementioned infrastructural barrier s. In the case of post-industrial waterfronts, edges are often par ticularly apparent; the psychological edge between former ly industrial areas and another adjacent distinct district only ser ves to heighten the physical and infrastructural barrier s left behind by the sites’ industrial pasts.

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BARRIERS TO ACCESS This perception of difference is one of the main barriers to access on post-industrial waterfronts, and is key to understanding the multifaceted challenges that designers face in creating access to these areas from the existing city.

When people perceive an area as “over there” and not par t of their district or their domain, they are much less likely to cross over to it even if there is a way to cross the edge and a reason to cross the edge (Lynch, 1961). This psychological barrier effect is compounded by the notions of toxicity, danger, and lack of public use associated with formerly-industrial waterfronts.

These two layers of psychological barrier add to the already pronounced physical barrier that is often present in these spaces, creating a difficult challenge for designers to overcome.

These psychological barriers often persist after redevelopment, due to differences and discontinuities in the urban fabric between old and new areas that create a perception of an “edge” separating two distinct districts. In many cases, the condition that is created is one district with a large amount of housing that was all built approximately at the same time, immediately next to another existing district with a wide range of ages of housing, some old, some new. In this regard, the fact that the new developments are typically completed in a shor t time frame actually works against integration with the rest of the city; due to their homogeneity and newness,

these developments are perceived as a distinct district rather than as par t of the existing urban fabric. In addition to the age of the housing stock, slight differences in building typology between old and new areas also reinforce this perceived edge. The physical forms and sizes of the buildings in waterfront developments are often different than those of the surrounding city. As well, the redeveloped areas are typically homogeneous and made up of ver y similar buildings, while the existing city is heterogeneous, comprised of a varied and diverse array of types and architectural styles of buildings and built using a wide variety of materials. As with building age, the relative homogeneity of the building aesthetics contributes to the perception of the waterfront redevelopments as a different district. These factors—age of the housing stock, differences in building typology and size, and differences in architectural style and material— combine to reinforce the perception of an edge between new and old areas, which in turn forms a psychological barrier to access.

PUBLIC/PRIVATE GRADIENT & CLARITY One of the most persistent and problematic psychological barriers to access in these redeveloped areas is caused by a lack of clarity between public and private space (Sylvia, 2011).

Exterior space is “claimed” by the buildings in

B A R R I E R S T O A C C E S S 29

A R C H I T E C T U R A L F O R M A N D U R B A N D I S T R I C T S : H E T E R O G E N E O U S B U I L D I N G S T O C K , G R A N V I L L E S T R E E T, V A N C O U V E R

A R C H I T E C T U R A L F O R M A N D U R BA N D I ST R I C T S : H O M O G E N E O U S B U I L D I N G STO C K , C OA L H A R B O U R , VA N C O U V E R

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G E O R G E W A I N B O R N PA R K , V A N C O U V E R

P U B L I C V S . S E M I - P U B L I C V S . P R I V AT E S PA C E

a spectrum of different degrees from public to private. The most private shared exterior spaces (legally and perceptually) are the cour tyards on the top or interior of housing blocks, clearly for residents’ use only. Slightly more public are the small front yards for street-level townhomes and similar spaces; these are often fenced off but visible from the sidewalk. More public and in the extremely ambiguous realm between public and private are privately-owned public spaces (POPS), which often take the form of nonfenced exterior space that is clearly not in the fully public realm of the street and is “claimed” by the buildings around it, but is also clearly for some degree of public use. Within this categor y, the perceived publicness varies widely, depending on the specific physical conditions and how much it is “claimed” by the surrounding private spaces (Sylvia, 2011). Even fur ther on the public spectrum are public parks, which are typically fairly clearly delineated from private develop-

ment, although they can be made to feel par t of the development as well in some ways. At the most public end of the spectrum are streets and sidewalks that, save for café seating and arcades, are considered entirely public spaces.

This gradient of public/private relations, when not extremely clearly delineated, often leads to a disconnect between the actual publicness of a space and the perceived publicness of a space (Sylvia, 2011). In turn, people tend to perceive spaces as more private than they are, causing people to become hesitant to use the spaces and forming a barrier to access (Sylvia, 2011).

This is where the gap between the designers’ intentions of how a space should be used and the reality of how the spaces actually are used becomes par ticularly apparent; if designers do not fully understand the elements that trigger different perceptions of privateness, it becomes extremely hard to create public access.

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D I S C O N T I N U O U S ST R E E T G R I D : S O U T H FA L S E C R E E K , VA N C O U V E R

V I E W C O R R I D O R S T O W AT E R : G R A N V I L L E S L O P E S , V A N C O U V E R

ROLE OF THE STREET GRID

LACK OF VISUAL ACCESS

As well, discontinuities in the street grid form a dual physical and psychological barrier to access in redevelopments. Often, a major road of some sor t forms an edge condition separating the waterfront redevelopment from the city.

These major roads tend to cause problematic conditions in which existing streets cannot be continued into the new development, causing a physical disconnect while simultaneously emphasizing the disconnect between the two districts and heightening the perception of an edge. As well, the new development sometimes chooses not to extend the existing street pattern as is, instead imposing some other sor t of geometric layout on it. This difference also heightens the perception of an edge, creating a fur ther psychological barrier to access.

Lastly, development has also been known to block visual access to the water. This visual access is a key par t of an effective strategy for moving people to the water’s edge; being able to see the water makes people more aware of the water, and more likely to seek out routes to it (Wrenn, 1983). Impeding visual access breaks this link, reducing or eliminating what can be an extremely powerful draw.

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B A R R I E R S T O A C C E S S 33

T

his array of barriers, both pre-existing and post-development, both physical and psychological, coalesces to form an extremely difficult challenge for even the best planners and designers to overcome.

In this regard, no project is entirely successful or entirely unsuccessful; rather, projects have widely varying degrees of success and different areas in which each project succeeds or fails. As well, physical contexts vary greatly; some areas will have drastically more barriers and others will have relatively few. Hence, generalizing best practices becomes extremely difficult, with the variation in context either liberating or drastically curtailing the designer’s efforts. In this regard, to better understand the strategies that designers use to overcome these barriers to waterfront access, analysis of specific case studies is particularly useful. For this, we turn to the example of Vancouver.

34

CASE STUDIES

CASE STUDIES / D E S I G N ST R AT E G I E S : VA N C O U V E R

C A S E S T U D I E S 35

V

ancouver is an ideal urban laborator y for waterfront redevelopment. Its physical context, as a peninsula surrounded on three sides by water, creates over 15 miles of urban coastline around the downtown core itself. As a major por t city on the Pacific Rim, the city has been a longtime center of industr y, much of which was based on the waterfront (Marshall, 2001). As the city has redeveloped after the depar ture of much of its industr y, it has made residential development in downtown a major priority; the city’s “Living First” strategy makes the creation of urban alternatives to suburbia a major civic priority (Beasley, 2000).

As well, the city’s development has been guided by fairly progressive policies focused on redevelopment of former ly industrial sites, restoration of polluted areas, and inclusion of social goals in this planning process. This redevelopment has been buoyed by a massive influx of capital, largely from Asian markets,

that has driven development since the early 1980s (Punter, 2003). All of these factors coalesce to create the perfect conditions for the type of waterfront development described in the previous sections.

Interest in public access to the waterfront in Vancouver star ted ver y early in the city’s histor y. Beginning in 1918, Vancouver implemented policies mandating public purchase of the waterfront around the downtown core for the construction of a seawall to prevent erosion (Punter, 2003). As the city grew and planning priorities evolved, the seawall design began to incorporate a public path, and grew to extend along the entirety of the shoreline of the Vancouver peninsula, totaling almost 14 miles of unbroken public trail (City of Vancouver, 2003). The seawall was not completed in one fell swoop; rather, as industries and other uses moved elsewhere, the City bought up their land and conver ted

36

CASE STUDIES

A E R I A L V I E W: D OW N TOW N VA N C O U V E R P E N I N S U L A , FA L S E C R E E K I N T H E F O R E G R O U N D

the seawall por tion into a public path. Under Vancouver planning code, the water’s edge must be dedicated to the public at the time of zoning approval, and must be fully developed for recreational use (City of Vancouver, 2003). The seawall is Vancouver’s single most popular civic initiative, used year-round by millions of people; the presence of the seawall path can be credited for much of the popular interest in public access to the waterfront (City of Vancouver, 2003).

It is upon this base of public suppor t and desire for waterfront recreation that the city began its redevelopment process. This process began in the early 1970s with the redevelopment of South False Creek, before proceeding to Granville Slopes, Nor th False Creek (the Concord Pacific Lands), and Southeast False Creek over the next for ty years. Through analysis of these case studies, this chapter will detail the lessons Vancouver learned throughout this process.

C A S E S T U D I E S 37

WHEELED TRAFFIC

SEAWALL MAP

F O OT T R A F F I C

S E C T I O N : S E AWA L L , W E ST E N D, VA N C O U V E R

S E AWA L L , C OA L H A R B O U R , VA N C O U V E R

38

CASE STUDIES SOUTH FALSE CREEK Redevelopment of the vast post-industrial waterfront lands in Vancouver began in earnest in the early 1970s.The south shore of False Creek, a lake-sized inlet of water on the south side of the downtown peninsula, was selected as the first site to be redeveloped from industrial use to residential use.

SOUTH FALSE CREEK: VIEW FROM BURRARD BRIDGE

SOUTH FALSE CREEK: REDEVELOPMENT AREA AND CONTEXT

Begun in 1973, the South False Creek developments focused on creating medium-density (high-density for that time), inwardly focused communities, each based around small, shared park spaces. (City of Vancouver, 1974; City of Vancouver, 2003) While the project was a success at attracting a wide variety of people to live there and sold out almost immediately, concerns were raised about the fact that it was too insular and unintegrated with the surrounding city (City of Vancouver, 2003). Its curving streets, lack of direct waterfront connections from the rest of the city, and lack of public-oriented uses (such as shops, parks, and walkways) separated it from the rest of the city, creating a pronounced barrier between the established neighborhoods on the hills above it and the newly-built public seawall path.

Despite these flaws, its model of high-density urban housing proved to extremely popular, and succeeded at catalyzing what would become Vancouver’s “Living First” housing strategy, by demonstrating the viability of dense urban living (Beasley, 2000; City of Vancouver, 2003).

Through the South False Creek project, the vision of a dense urban community made livable by waterfront parks was first brought forward.This vision would soon come to dominate Vancouver’s urban development.

C A S E S T U D I E S 39

S O U T H F A L S E C R E E K : S E A W A L L P AT H

SOUTH FALSE CREEK: DISCONNECTED FROM THE EXISTING CITY

40

CASE STUDIES THE “LAGOONS” PLAN AND PUBLIC INVOLVEMENT Public involvement has also been a strong par t of Vancouver’s planning process since the early 1980s. This public interest in planning, and this planning interest in involving the public largely stems from one incident in par ticular. Soon after the relative success of South False Creek, the city was presented with a truly unique oppor tunity, as Vancouver was selected to be the host for the Expo ‘86 World’s Fair (City of Vancouver, 2003).

The formerly industrial waterfronts surrounding the northern and eastern edges of False Creek were chosen as the site for the grounds for the

ORIGINAL “LAGOONS” PLAN

World’s Fair itself. After the Fair closed, the lands were sold to private developers and rezoned; redevelopment has been proceeding ever since.

The first proposal for the Expo lands helped firmly entrench public waterfront access as a key priority in Vancouver planning doctrine, mostly due to its shock value. The developer proposed what has come to be known as the “Lagoons” Plan, after the small lagoons of water separating extremely dense islands of private development from the main city (City of Vancouver, 2003).

Fresh off frustration with the lack of public waterfront access in South False Creek, and excited by the opportunities offered in English Bay and along the seawall where direct water access was long a part of the public

APPROVED CONCORD URBAN DESIGN CONCEPT

C A S E S T U D I E S 41 program, the residents of Vancouver were outraged at the Lagoons Plan’s privatization of the waterfront and complete disregard of public access. After a concerted campaign of letters to the editor and comment during public meetings, the significant public outcry caused the Vancouver planning department to soundly reject the plan, forcing the developer to completely reorient its approach to the design (City of Vancouver, 2003; Punter, 2003). Acknowledging the public concerns, the developer’s designers agreed to

work directly with city planning staff and incorporate public participation into their design process, leading to a design scheme that reduced the sense of privatization, re-integrated the waterfront with the existing city, and placed priority on public access to the waterfront. Following this incident, public participation in general and public access to the waterfront in particular became entrenched in Vancouver’s planning doctrine, and would serve as a key model for future projects.

C O N C O R D PA C I F I C L A N D S A S B U I LT

G E O R G E W A I N B O R N PA R K , C O N C O R D PA C I F I C L A N D S

42

CASE STUDIES GRANVILLE SLOPES REDEVELOPMENT

F

ollowing this general shift toward including public access to the waterfront as a priority in the planning process, the focus began to move toward testing the effectiveness of specific design strategies in creating access to these waterfront public spaces. Since few if any cities had grappled with the public waterfront access/private residential redevelopment conflict before, the process was one of trial and error, in which policies slowly evolved in response to obser vations and research on previous development.

The fir st main “testing ground� was the Granville Slopes development, on the nor th shore of False Creek immediately to the west of the former Expo lands. The neighborhood is an approximately 10-block area, bounded on the east by the Granville Bridge and Granville Street, on the west by the Burrard Bridge and Burrard Street, and on the south by False Creek. Three blocks from the waterfront, Pacific Boulevard, a major thoroughfare, r uns through the neighborhood from east to west.

Pacific Boulevard forms the edge that historically separated the waterfront industrial area from the existing residential neighborhood.

G R A N V I L L E S L O P E S S C H E M AT I C P L A N

V I S U A L A C C E S S T O T H E W AT E R

C A S E S T U D I E S 43

E X I S T I N G W AT E R F R O N T

C O N N E C T I O N S T O T H E W AT E R : C R E AT E C O N N E C T I O N S F R O M T H E E X I S TING CITY TO NODES OF INTEREST ON THE W AT E R F R O N T

The main challenge faced in redevelopment of the formerly industrial area between the waterfront and Pacific Boulevard was to connect the new development across Pacific Boulevard to the existing neighborhood (City of Vancouver, 1984) In South False Creek, the development merely stopped at a similar edge created by a thoroughfare; it did not seek to integrate the two sides, instead seeking to create two distinct neighborhoods. After the public made it clear that this was undesirable because it impaired access to the waterfront, the Vancouver Planning Depar tment sought to test out a new approach with the Granville Slopes development (City of Vancouver, 2003). Rather than creating two separate neighborhoods, separated by Pacific Boulevard, the urban designers sought to unify the new development on the water side of Pacific Boulevard with the existing residential neighborhood on the land side of Pacific Boulevard (City of Vancouver, 1984).

C O N N E C T I O N S A L O N G T H E W AT E R : C R E AT E C O N N E C T I O N S A L O N G T H E W A T E R F R O N T, C O N N E C T I N G B O T H N O D E S O F INTEREST AND ACCESS POINTS.

To achieve this, they settled on a seemingly simple strategy with profound effects: extending the existing street grid across Pacific Boulevard to the water’s edge. As a result, both direct, unimpeded visual access and clear conduits of pedestrian movement to the water were created.

This set of connections to the waterfront then linked into the lateral connections along the waterfront created by the seawall pathway, creating a robust network of access both to and along the waterfront. This network provided strong and direct physical and visual access to the water, largely preventing many of the physical barriers that residential development can cause, as in South False Creek. This network method, of creating these two types of waterfront access (to and along the water) and intermeshing them, has become a highly successful and oft-repeated archetype, showing up in many later plans for cities elsewhere.

44

CASE STUDIES

G R A N V I L L E S LO P E S : PAC I F I C B O U L E VA R D A S A N “ E D G E ” / B A R R I E R

However, a pronounced perceptual edge still existed along Pacific Boulevard, creating a psychological barrier between the existing neighborhood and the new development and impeding access to the waterfront. Upon post-occupancy evaluation of the site, the reason for this disconnect became clear to the planner s (Beasley, per sonal inter view; July 19, 2011). While physical connections to the waterfront were adequate, there was still a psychological disconnect that caused existing residents to not perceive the waterfront redevelopment area as par t of their domain, and hence impaired their use of the waterfront public spaces. This sense of “edge” implied

by Pacific Boulevard was heightened by pronounced differences in building typology and public realm treatment on the two sides of Pacific Boulevard. The existing neighborhood was comprised of mainly low-rise buildings with some scattered taller apar tment blocks, all of a wide range of ages, materials, architectural styles, and states of repair. The new development, on the other hand, was ver y homogeneous, built at approximately the same time, designed by a handful of architects using a consistent palette of styles and materials, and of a high-density typology foreign to the city at that point. This, combined with pronounced differences in street treatment and

C A S E S T U D I E S 45

GRANVILLE STREET: SITE PROXIMITY

G R A N V I L L E S LO P E S : V I E W F R O M AC R O S S FA L S E C R E E K

condition of the streets, led to a distinct perception of difference between the two sides of Pacific Boulevard, heightening the edge and creating a perceptual barrier to access. These challenges were kept in mind in subsequent developments; the rest of the Concord Pacific Lands developments would face the exact same edge-condition challenge posed by Pacific Boulevard.

The main lessons learned from the Granville Slopes development were the effectiveness of extending the street grid to the water’s edge, providing visual access to the water, the importance of coordinating the public realm treatment, and the impor tance of instituting design guidelines that create similarities in built form between the existing neighborhoods and the new developments. These lessons were carried forward as design drivers for future developments on the Vancouver waterfront.

G R A N V I L L E S L O P E S : S E A W A L L P AT H

GRANVILLE SLOPES: ARCHITECTURAL UNIFORMITY

46

CASE STUDIES NEW APPROACHES: CONCORD PACIFIC PLACE

I

n the redevelopment of the former Expo lands on the nor th shore of False Creek, the city took these lessons from the South False Creek and Granville Slopes redevelopments, applied them on a large scale, and expanded upon them with additional new strategies. Beginning after the Expo ended in 1986, the city worked with developer Concord Pacific on a series of developments on the former Expo site, spanning two decades and redeveloping 166 acres of waterfront (City of Vancouver, 1990; City of Vancouver, 2003). This phased implementation, large scale, and similar site conditions allowed the city to fur ther test and refine the strategies it began investigating in the South False Creek and Granville Slopes redevelopments.

The early Concord Pacific Place developments sought to remedy some of the psychological barrier s to access that occurred in the Granville Slopes project, by employing a number of strategies to counteract the perception of homogeneity of the new developments (City of Vancouver, 1990). The overall plan was broken down into distinct neighborhoods, each separated by a major park. Each of these neighborhoods was given distinctive design guidelines specifying material, form, and style

of the buildings, creating variations between the neighborhoods and directly responding to elements in the adjacent existing neighborhoods (City of Vancouver, 2003). As well, the developer employed different architects for the various development parcels, leading to even greater aesthetic diver sity in the housing stock and increased variety of built form and public spaces.

However, because each section of the projects was still constr ucted at all at once, they still lacked much of the wide age variation of the surrounding urban fabric, reinforcing the perceptual edge between old and new devel-

C A S E S T U D I E S 47

C O N C O R D PA C I F I C P L A C E : S T R E E T S C A P E

C O N C O R D PA C I F I C P L A C E : G E O R G E W A I N B O R N P A R K

48

CASE STUDIES opment. As stated in a city-run post-occupancy analysis of the planning of False Creek, “[s]o much new development has happened so fast that it does convey a somewhat immutable, untouchable quality, almost too pristine. All great city neighborhoods develop, over time, a patina reflecting the full diversity of human endeavor and creativity, and this has yet to take hold in Concord Pacific Place” (City of Vancouver, 2003).

While this is a challenge for designers to directly address in terms of design strategies (save for phasing of development or adaptation of historic structures, it is rather difficult to have development in these spaces that isn’t perceived as homogeneously “new”), it is still a challenge in that it reinforces the perceptual edge between the existing city and the new development. Although designers’ effor ts to diversify the styles used in the newer False Creek developments did reduce this perceptual edge to some degree, they cer tainly did not eliminate it. Nonetheless, designers can only do so much to mitigate this effect in large-scale development. As a result, this is a continuing challenge in Vancouver’s redevelopment.

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CITY TO THE WATER/WATER TO THE CITY: OPEN SPACE STRATEGIES

D

espite the challenges at overcoming the building age barrier and reducing homogeneity in that regard, the designers of the various Concord Pacific Place neighborhoods employed a series of novel strategies to lessen the perception of this edge in other ways. These strategies expanded upon ideas that had been employed in the Granville Slopes redevelopment, which aimed at “bringing the city out to the waterfront” by extending elements from the existing city, across the edge formed by Pacific Boulevard, and out to the waterfront (City of Vancouver, 1990; City of Vancouver, 2003). Concord Pacific Place takes the idea of extending the street grid to the water from Granville Slopes and expands upon it by using consistent public realm treatments to unify the streets’ perception on both sides of Pacific Boulevard.

To mirror this “bringing the city to the water” effect, the designers also sought to “[bring] the waterfront back into the city” by extending elements from the waterfront, across the edge formed by Pacific Boulevard, and into the existing city, reducing the perceived barrier formed

by Pacific Boulevard in the process. The main strategy used here was the implementation of green streets, or streets with unique planting patterns and an emphasis on tree cover, percep-

C A S E S T U D I E S 49 tually bringing the waterfront parks back into the existing neighborhoods. By having consistent landscape and streetscape elements on both sides of the edge created by Pacific Boulevard, the edge itself was weakened and a sense of continuity established.

As a complement to the green streets, designers also created two large parks in the neighborhoods, David Lam Park and George Wainborn Park, that extend from the waterfront all the way back to the edge created by Pacific Boulevard. By pushing these public amenities all the way through the housing to meet the existing city, access is ver y directly created; these parks ser ve as a direct physical link as well as a perceptually public link to the waterfront from the existing city. To make clear the waterfront link in areas where these parks were too far from the waterfront to permit visual access, the designers incorporated elements with strong associations with the waterfront to “cue” what the park is about, provide a symbol of the waterfront, and draw people into the park. For example, flowing water features prominently in both David Lam Park and George Wainborn Park. In David Lam Park, the sound of waterfalls and sight of flowing water draws one in off Pacific Boulevard to an overlook from which one is given direct visual access to the water. From there, the visual pull of the water guides the user down a series of terraces to the water’s edge and seawall trail.

DAV I D L A M PA R K

D A V I D L A M PA R K : A P P R O A C H T O T H E W AT E R F R O N T

50

CASE STUDIES CLARITY OF PUBLIC AND PRIVATE REALMS With the incorporation of parks and other public- and semi-public spaces as key ways of moving people to the waterfront, the designers of Concord Pacific Place began to move away from the somewhat formulaic dependence on the street grid to create access as seen in Granville Slopes, opening up new possibilities in specific contexts where other methods could be more effective. However, in the process, designers created new challenges relating to perception of spaces as public or private. Early developments in Concord Pacific Place left semi-public spaces and privately-owned public spaces somewhat ambiguously defined, leading them to be perceptually “claimed” by the housing, perceived as private spaces, and not used to their fullest (Beasley, personal interview; July 19, 2011). In essence, any space not perceived as entirely public created doubt and hesitation in people’s minds, and in general prevented them from using the spaces.This significantly hampered access at what were meant to be key connection points to the waterfront. As a result, the need to create a clear demarcation between public and private spaces quickly became a priority for designers on the Concord Pacific Place project (Beasley, personal interview; July 19, 2011).

Many of the later developments are clear and unambiguous about which spaces are public and which are private, incorporating fences, hedges, and other landscape elements to clearly demarcate private spaces. Public

spaces and POPS are also clearly marked as public, both through the very open form of the spaces themselves and through abundant signage detailing rules and restrictions in the spaces. This clarity, while seemingly simple to create, had a profound effect on use of the spaces (Beasley, personal interview; July 19, 2011). By using physical form and signage to very clearly indicate which spaces are public and which are private, designers removed much of the doubt and confusion that prevents full public use of the spaces.

C A S E S T U D I E S 51

C O N C O R D PA C I F I C P L A C E : P U B L I C / S E M I - P U B L I C / P R I V AT E S P A C E

52

CASE STUDIES SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK: CREATING CONNECTIONS ALONG THE WATERFRONT

F

ollowing the relative success of Concord Pacific Place, and spurred by a need for athletes’ housing for the 2010 Winter Olympics, the city turned to Southeast False Creek (SEFC) as the next site for development (City of Vancouver, 2007). The case study of SEFC and the unique challenges faced in its redevelopment represent a shift in focus away from the model developed in Concord Pacific Place and Granville Slopes, in that, in this case, there was no established residential neighborhood to connect to and provide access from. Rather, SEFC demonstrates the power of lateral connections along the waterfront in creating access to otherwise secluded public spaces.

In the case of Southeast False Creek, creating connections to the water was severely impeded because of existing light industrial land uses surrounding the site (City of Vancouver, 2007). The nearest residential or commercial development is well beyond the quar ter mile radius commonly assumed to be the fur thest that people are willing to regularly walk; the only interesting amenities for pedestrians also lay on the shores of False Creek itself. Thus, instead of concentrating on connections to the waterfront, the site’s designers turned their focus to the main strength

SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK: REDEVELOPMENT AREA AND CONTEXT

of the site: its position on the waterfront seawall path (City of Vancouver, 2007). In this example, the waterfront path became a major conduit of pedestrian and bicycle movement, linking SEFC to Concord Pacific Place, South Waterfront, and the Vancouver’s downtown areas. The design did not ignore the established strategies for creating connections to the waterfront, however ; it still provides the possibility for public access once the light industrial area surrounding the site begins to transition into housing. In the mean time, however, the waterfront path assures significant public use of waterfront spaces in SEFC that would otherwise be completely cut off from the city.

C A S E S T U D I E S 53

SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK: SEAWALL PLAN

SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK: SEAWALL

54

CASE STUDIES

C A S E S T U D I E S 55

56

A N A LY S I S

A N A LY S I S

A N A L Y S I S 57

Through these examples, Vancouver has arrived at a planning and design model that, while not perfect, addresses many of the conflicts between public access and private residential development in a way that creates abundant public access to the waterfront while also fostering extremely dense, private residential development.

From this series of case studies can be drawn a collection of design strategies that form a powerful toolkit for designer s and provide many lessons for how to create public access under the extremely challenging conditions posed by residential development on post-industrial urban waterfronts. This toolkit can be summarized in a diagram as follows:

58

A N A LY S I S C R E AT E K E Y S T R E E T S ( I . E . G R E E N WAY S ) T H AT P R O V I D E A H I G H LY V I S I B L E WAT E R F R O N T L I N K

E X T E N D T H E S T R E E T G R I D ; E L I M I N AT E DISCONTINUITIES, DEAD ENDS, AND BARRIERS

E M P H A S I Z E PAT H S T H AT L I N K T H E N E W DEVELOPMENT WITH THE EXISTING NEIGHBORHOOD

P R O V I D E V I S U A L A C C E S S T O T H E W AT E R AT THE ENDS OF STREETS

C R E AT E S T R O N G C O N N E C T I O N S A L O N G T H E W AT E R F R O N T T O M I T I G AT E T H E E F F E C T O F AREAS WHERE CONNECTIONS TO THE W AT E R F R O N T A R E P R O B L E M AT I C

C R E AT E A C C E S S T O T H E W AT E R F R O N T

REDUCING PHYSICAL BARRIERS C R E AT I N G A C C E S S T O U R B A N W AT E R F R O N T S REDUCING PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIERS

REDUCE THE PERCEPTION OF AN EDGE BETWEEN NEW DEVELOPMENT AND THE EXISTING NEIGHBORHOODS

C R E AT E A C L E A R D E M A R C AT I O N B E T W E E N P U B L I C A N D P R I V AT E S PA C E S

C R E AT E A C O M M O N , I D E N T I F Y I N G C H A R A C T E R T H AT U N I F I E S T H E T W O A R E A S

R E D U C E D I F F E R E N C E S B E T W E E N T H E E X I S TING CONTEXT AND THE NEW DEVELOPMENT

U S E PH YS I C A L FO R M ( BE NC H E S , WA L L S , HED G ES, G R A D E C H A N G E , E TC . ) TO C L E A R LY S E T P R I VAT E S PA C E S A PA R T F R O M P U B L I C S PA C E S

INCO RPORATE ELE ME N TS F ROM TH E E X I S T I N G N E I G H B O R H O O D I N TO T H E N EW D EVE LO P M E N T

A M O U N T O F V A R I AT I O N I N N E W D E V E L O P MENT REFLECTS THE DIVERSITY OF THE EXISTING DEVELOPMENT

PR OV I D E WAY FI ND I N G S I GNAGE

INCORPORATE ELE ME N TS F ROM TH E N E W DEVELOPMENT INTO THE EXISTING NEIGHBORHOOD

B UI LD I N G M AT E R I A L S , ST Y L E , A ND M A S S I NG A R E CONSISTENT BETWEEN NEW AND EXISTING AREAS

PROVIDE INFORMATIONAL SIGNAGE DENOTING WHETHER A SPACE IS PUBLIC OR PRIVATE

STREET GRID AND STREET TREATMENTS ARE CONSISTENT BETWEEN NEW AND EXISTING AREAS

A N A L Y S I S 59 PHYSICAL BARRIERS

PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIERS

The strategies for reducing physical barriers are by far the most straightforward; physical access is much easier to create than psychological. Within the physical barriers categor y, the design strategies can be divided into two main approaches to creating connections: connections to the waterfront, and connections along the waterfront.

The strategies for reducing psychological barrier s to access to the waterfront focus around two main goals: reducing the perception of an “edge” between new development and existing neighborhoods, and clear ly demarcating which spaces are public and which are private to ensure that spaces aren’t under used because of ambiguity.

Connections to the waterfront include strategies such as extending the existing street grid to meet the water, creating greenways and other highly visible streets to link to the waterfront, and creating visual access along street corridors. The emergence of these strategies can be obser ved as beginning in the Granville Slopes project, before being developed much more fully through the different phases of the Concord Pacific projects.

Connections along the waterfront come together with the connections to the waterfront to form a network of access. As such, connections along the water can both strengthen networks of access, and compensate for areas that have poor access to the waterfront. In Vancouver, the continuous, publicly accessible path along the seawall provides connections along the water, linking the access points into a larger network.

Southeast False Creek provides another example of the power of these lateral connections.

The former focuses on overcoming the perception of new development and the existing neighborhood as two separate districts, separated by an edge that inevitably becomes a psychological barrier. As such, the strategies focus on creating consistency between the new and old areas, such that they are perceived as one district unified by a consistent set of characteristics, including street treatment, building form, material palette, and architectural styles. To say that these factors should be consistent between new and old areas is not to say that they must match perfectly or that the general r ule must be rigid; perception leaves a lot of gray area in which designers may operate. Rather, the main goal should be to create a “common, identifying character” consistent between the redevelopment and the existing city (Lynch, 1961).

Within that, the focus should be on creating a “thematic unit” of characteristics unique to

60

A N A LY S I S that district, that unify new development with the existing neighborhood into one district (Lynch, 1961). In The Image of the City, Lynch gives the example of Boston’s Beacon Hill, describing its thematic unit as containing: “steep, narrow streets; old brick row houses of intimate scale; inset, highly maintained white doorways; black trim; cobblestones and brick walks; [and] quiet … The resulting thematic unit was distinctive by contrast to the rest of the city, and could be recognized immediately” (Lynch, 1961).

From this example, we begin to see the sor ts of physical characteristics that create the perception of a district. It is this sor t of thematic unit of consistent characteristics that Vancouver’s Concord Pacific Place developments have begun to explore as a means of unifying the existing neighborhoods with the waterfront neighborhoods such that they are perceived as a single district.

This is cer tainly not to say that new development should merely duplicate what exists; such a reactionar y approach would ultimately impede urban progress and (sorely needed) design experimentation, and ultimately be counterproductive with regards to the overarching goal of creating new types of inclusive urban

space, and using design to foster more amiable relations between developers and local residents. Rather than this purely backward-looking view, there should be a conversation of sor ts between new development and the existing neighborhood, in which thematic elements from the old neighborhood are worked into the new development, and thematic elements from the new development are worked into the existing neighborhood. This is a process of co-evolution, with the two urban assemblages transitioning together to form a composite image over time, one that is perceived as an internally consistent whole. In doing so, the area can be perceived as one district, rather than as two separate districts divided by an edge that inevitably becomes a psychological barrier to access. Invariably, this will involve pioneering new approaches to development that allow for phasing and adaption over time as the neighborhood establishes itself, counter to the prevailing master-planned approach. Ultimately, however it is achieved, this perceptual edge is a major access-limiting issue of which designers must be conscious in ever y project.

The latter of the aforementioned psychological barriers to access, a lack of clarity between public and private realms, appears at first glance to be simply solved: through better signage and clearer frameworks for usage, the ambiguity of use from which many of these spaces suffer can

A N A L Y S I S 61 be countered. However, this somewhat simplistic approach overlooks a major underlying issue. In many cases, the greater public use of semi-public spaces (often required of developers against their wishes) works against the desires of safetyand image-conscious developers and proper ty owners, who tend to seek out ways to thwar t or reduce public use of these spaces. Simply put, it is not in their economic best interest for these spaces to be occupied by the public. In response, ways of actively programming the ground floors of developments so that they welcome (and, potentially, profit from) public activity, such as adding cafés, shops, and other public uses, can work to bring the economic interests of developers and the social and recreational interests of the public into alignment.

The physical form and ar ticulation of these spaces also plays a key role in determining if the spaces are perceived as public or private. Certain items, such as hedges, grade change, signs, and so on can be used to clearly “cue” that spaces are no longer par t of the public realm, without needing to resor t to more heavy-handed approaches like walls and fences. As well, where public spaces’ forms leave their role more ambiguous, signage is impor tant in ensuring that they are still perceived as public and used; both way-finding and informational signage are effective toward this end.

T

hese strategies, physical and psychological, combine to create a powerful toolkit with which designer s can begin to address the barrier s inherent in post-industrial waterfront sites. The aforementioned lessons, gleaned from Vancouver’s experience over the past for ty year s, form the basis for a set of best practices of post-industrial waterfront development. From the themes in this research can be drawn a basis for a more comprehensive theor y of development on post-industrial sites, to be explored in future research.

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A N A L Y S I S 63

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C O N C L U S I O N S 65

T

hrough this examination of a series of case studies from Vancouver, we see the example of a city that, in solving one problem— creating physical access to waterfront sites, in the context of residential development— uncovered a much more challenging problem: overcoming psychological barriers to access.

The creation of physical access has proven to be a relatively straightforward task; the model that Vancouver has developed of extending the existing street grid, ensuring visual access by preventing street-ends from being blocked, and creating continuous connections along the waterfront. However, the large-scale redevelopment of these areas has combined with physical barriers inherent in the sites to create strong perceptual edges between existing neighborhoods and new developments. These edges form psychological barrier s, impeding the full use of these waterfront spaces. Vancouver has had mixed results in countering

these psychological barriers, with effor ts thus far successful in some ways and unsuccessful in others. Designers have attempted to break down the differences between the old and new areas by developing consistent thematic units of characteristics that can be used to allow old and new areas to co-evolve into an internally consistent whole. While this has not been fully applied in a development as of yet, the initial applications of elements of this strategy in the Concord Pacific Place developments show some promise. By combining this attention to psychological barriers with provision of robust networks of physical access, Vancouver has gone a long way toward making its waterfront publicly accessible while also accommodating high-density residential development.

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CONCLUSIONS AREAS OF FURTHER STUDY While these case studies from Vancouver provide initial guidance and insight into the creation of physical and psychological access to waterfronts, a number of areas warrant fur ther study. I have divided them into three main areas: fur ther psychological research on perceptual determinants of access, the role of program and use in determining access, and broader applications of the access framework to areas other than waterfronts.

Perceptual Determinants of Access: While Lynch’s theories on perception of urban environments have provoked much discussion and debate over the past fifty years since The Image of the City was published, the question of what exact physical attributes contribute more or contribute less to the perception of edges or districts needs fur ther research before it can become a definitive basis for design. To do so, designers and planner s should collaborate with environmental psychologists, sociologists, and geographers to fur ther study the behavior of people in these situations. The histor y of redevelopment in Vancouver has demonstrated the impor tance of these characteristics and of perception in general to creating access; however, much of their approach so far has been based off of experimentation, anecdotal evidence, and conjecture—trial

and error, effectively—rather than scientific research and controlled experiments. While Vancouver’s experiences have demonstrated the relative effectiveness of cer tain strategies, it has also become clear from the limitations of these developments that fur ther psychological research into perceptual barrier s to access is needed.

Program and Use: By choosing to limit my scope to the physical and perceptual/psychological components of access, I have excluded a third and perhaps equally impor tant component of access: program and use. In my study, I have examined how people are physically able to get to the waterfront; fur ther examination of why people go to the waterfront and what activities they want to par take in when they arrive there is needed. Simply put, creating spectacular physical and perceptual access would make little difference if there were little reason for people to go to the waterfront, and little to do once they got there. In this, there is great potential for exclusionar y effects; for example, if one cannot afford waterfront amenities, one has little reason to go to the waterfront. In the case of Vancouver, these unaffordable amenities are an ongoing challenge. For instance, waterfront cafés and shops that focus largely on the wealthy residents of the surrounding residential developments limit the number of

C O N C L U S I O N S 67 things that people of other social classes can do once they visit the waterfront. Including a sufficient mix of uses and price-points to match the mix of potential user s is ultimately key to the long-term inclusivity and vitality of urban waterfront spaces. Fur ther research is required into this aspect of access; based upon my obser vations, I would expect this to be one of the major limiting factor s on waterfronts similar to the Vancouver waterfront.

Broader Applications: The potential for generalization and broader application of these access-creating strategies in similar urban contexts is great. While my study focuses on the specific example of waterfronts—which represent an extreme case of creating access in that the residential development is ver y concentrated, and both pre-existing and development-created barrier s are more pronounced due to the post-industrial waterfront context of the sites—these design strategies for creating access could be extrapolated to apply to anywhere that high-end development occur s near a public amenity.

Creating robust networ ks of connections that link zones and neighborhoods of different socioeconomic statuses can help equalize access to public amenities within a city. Waterfront par ks are but one example; this could equally apply to other city par ks, plazas, transit stations, cultural attractions, and other amenities.

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