Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

Hybrid Urban Infrastructures by Wei Chu Chen

Š June 2020 Wei Chu Chen

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science, Urban Design School of Architecture Pratt Institute June 2020

Hybrid Urban Infrastructures by Wei Chu Chen

Received and approved:

_________________________________________________Date: June 27, 2020 Thesis Advisor Signature Ariane Lourie Harrison _________________________________________________ Thesis Advisor Name

Hybrid Urban Infrastructures Wei Chu Chen

PRATT INSTITUTE, SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE Graduate Architecture & Urban Design (GAUD) David Erdman, Chairperson GRADUATE ARCHITECTURE AND URBAN DESIGN (MSAUD) Ariane Lourie Harrison, MS Coordinator 2019-2020

Program Introduction Matrix City

11- 19 20

Precedents

22 - 23

Seminar & Studio Statements

24 - 29

Structural Precedents

30 - 33

Floating Plugin Bolck Frame

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Precedents

36 - 37

Seminar & Studio Statements

38 - 43

Urban Interiority

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Site Perception

46 - 47

Proposal Montages

48 - 53

Autonomous Spaces

54

Studio Statements

56 - 65

Research Statement

66 - 69

References & Image Citations

70 - 71

Annotatied Bibliography

72 - 73

MS Urban Design Program Introduction We began the 2019-2020 MS program year musing on the dense block as a figure of the Anthropocene, the geological period marking the undeniable impacts of human activity on the planet; we concluded the program with urban hybrids and entirely new learning conditions that, on some level, usher in the “post-Anthropocene.”

What does it mean to be post-Anthropocene? The term “post” may be lazy, realistic or optimistic. We might suggest that “post” yokes us to our prior condition: we cannot just dive into new terminology and ignore it. “PostAnthropocene” then means we wrestle with our anthropocentric exploitation of the planet; that we examine and acknowledge the inextricable relationship between racism and environmental degradation; and that we look at the manner in which social inequity is inscribed in the built environment, in particular regarding access to urban transportation systems.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

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Program Introduction

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

Pandemic brought us into new dialogues with the effects of the Anthropocene.

Infection is not limited to animals and humans, but describes, as well, a structure of interactions that are reconfiguring around pandemic, racism, isolation, and environmental catastrophe. The conventional physical aggregation of non-diverse academic bodies makes way to zoomed discussions across time-zones and perspectives; studio reviews, the province of top down expert monologues makes way for new platforms of committed listening, engaged looking and real dialogue.

The Covid-19 crisis atomized urban space. Self-quarantine and isolation, necessary to fight the epidemic, are spatial practices that inscribe intimate boundaries and that counter the ideals and, in fact, the very idea of public space. Urban parks, considered the lungs of the city, today become potential hot spots for respiratory illness; access to verdant material and fresh air is increasingly constrained by life circumscribed by one’s interior space. Yet any “nature” left in the city is highly unnatural: it is constructed, cultivated and maintained by man and machine. It has few if any provisions for non-human species. Yet the “garden” remained lodged in our urban imaginary, ready to be reconfigured by alternative transportation systems and novel figurations of the urban block.

The pandemic cast a harsh perspective on urban mass-transit. We had grown accustomed to the crowded bustle of the subway, the churn of buses and the vagaries of train schedules, but had not been prepared for Covid-19’s dismantling the very raison d’être of the city: its masses, its community. The MS Urban Design’s research on micromobility and alternative transportation seemed prescient: we had already begun to allocate streets to new circulation rhythms. The blurring of façade and street to create variations on the “porte-cochère” anticipated our spring 2020 reality: a street-scape in which pick-up and drop-off of goods, food, supplies required the infrastructure of awning, archways and canopies. The interface between building façade and street would prove complex and contentious.

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Program Introduction

We became newly allied in virtual space, linked by our screens; we grew physically distant from the lively makers’ spaces of Pratt studios yet joined in the spaces of activism. Pratt itself has been transformed: the understanding that 3D printers could produce frameworks for emergency workers PPE set design activism at the top of our agendas; the imperative of self-isolation made us critically evaluate our home-spaces; the requirements of quarantine made us reflect on the critical role of accessible and distributed greenspace in the city; the needs of our families, our health and wellbeing, impressed a new shape of concern on this spring’s culminating projects.

To arrive at this result, the MS Urban Design project worked across several different scales with Studio faculty (Jonas Coersmeier, Oliver Schaper, Ferda Kolatan) and studio instructors (Emilija Landsbergis) and studio partners, RXR’s The Hall (David Gise), HK Development (David Dobkin) and EA Creative (Erich Arcement, Charlie Cunningham). The, starting with a dense urban block, expanding to an expansive urban context that took note of transit deserts, flood zones and pollution hotspots, and finally returning to The Hall in Wallabout to explore the interface between Hall Street and its flanking blocks.

The culminating studio examines how the integration of autonomous vehicles (AV’s) reconfigures the very understanding of the street as a hybrid space.

Ferda Kolatan, leading the culminating studio, suggests in the UD 903 course syllabus the manner in which the hybrid provokes new questions for the postAnthropocene city: “Is it possible to think of the objects brought along by AV technology as vital counterparts to the existing (and new) artefacts of the city’s architecture? Can we perhaps produce truly novel urban hybrids that combine technology, design, and even “nature” in unprecedented ways? If so, can these hybrids further articulate new conceptual and theoretical strategies for the 21st century city without reversing back to the modernist tropes of technological positivism?”

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

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Program Introduction

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

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Program Introduction

The culminating studio developed hybrid architectures comprising building facades, sidewalks and street, basements and scaffolds. Hall Street transformed accordingly, becoming an AV scaffolded greenspace, a carbon garden, a plastic-sequestering street mural, and infrastructural façades for new art spaces and for a vertical vineyard. The final projects demonstrate the hybrid functioning of AV technology, street and building, but also produce a compelling vision for our rapidly transforming city. This work is the subject of Pratt GAUD’s “The Street of the 21st Century” virtual exhibition, designed by Jeffrey Anderson.

It is a testament to your resiliency, your commitment to your education and your understanding of the significance of this spring — that this period of pandemic, protest, national quarantine and national protest – will mark a significant change for architecture and urban design. We are different now. Your culminating projects suggest that we have already ushered in the post-Anthropocene: that, in acknowledging the blinkered perspectives of the Anthropocene period, architects and urban designers will now envision, fabricate, and script more inclusive engagement in a global environment circumscribed by pandemic, climate change and inequitable socio-economic policies.

Ariane Lourie Harrison MS Urban Design, Program Coordinator

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

Matrix City Plan The advent of modern cities in the 20th century responded to the industrial revolution by building around mobile transportation and zoning regulations. However, the major cities of the 21st century have started to face our current environmental issues, such as increasing urban density and sea level rising. To improve these conditions, modern urban planning must pay attention to the multiple layer arrangement and elevated urban infrastructure.

The idea of this project is revitalization of existing and to make large developments above them. The main concept is to create a mega structure as an organism that develop the city spraw more natural and energetic.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

Megastructure as Urbanism Megastructure is an architectural and urban concept which images a city or an urban form. Megastructure could consist of a massive single man-made structure or a relatively small number of interconnected structures. In a megastructure project, orders and hierarchies are based on the large and permanent structures supporting small and transitional ones. John W. Cook and Heinrich Klotz, “the meaning of megastructure is an over-scaled, colossal, multi-unit architectural mass”. The post-war megastructure movements led by avant-garde architectural groups such as Metabolists and Archigram regarded megastructure as an instrument to solve issues of urban disorder. Megastructure was once the dominant tendency in architecture of the 1960s, which resulted in numerous radical architectural proposals and a few built projects.

The megastructure grows on the ground. It was planned to take giant strip of the city, swallowing entire neighborhoods. If Paul Rudolph’s 1967 plan for the Lower Manhattan Expressway had been built, much of Soho and Tribeca would have been obliterated (Figure A1). Prechteck avoids this erasure by limiting the building’s base to the parameters of the site studied, and by displacing and restoring the lost ground to the structures above. Taking a note from Yona Friedman’s Spatial City projects, giant segments of the prechteck’s billboard are suspended above, while the urban fabric at ground level is presumably preserved.

Figure A1:Paul Rudolph, Lower Manhattan Expressway, 1967.

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Matrix City Plan

Megastructure as Organism The megastructure formed by the organic type creates more natural space that change the approach of life to achieve the sustainable environment. In this case, famous city center of Ivry, consisting of triangular housing called “The Stars”, which built by by Jean Renaudie and his partner Renee Gailhoustet between 1969 and 1975 (Figure A2). They have abandoned the square for the diagonal and multiplied the points of view thanks to the large windows. The complex was characterized by the disorderly stacking of different homes, where all the compositions are based on triangular geometries. The result is a random accumulation of houses that have their own plant ecosystem, because most of the residences have large garden terraces, which adopt all the expressive prominence of the building.

The multiplicity of sharp angles, the bare concrete, and the complexity of both public and private sections strongly contribute to the uniqueness of spaces. This aesthetic is ambiguous: opinions of the residents and neighbors often diverge but many attribute a certain sense of ugliness to the complex, while members of the “creative class” appreciate its complexity. However, appreciate the fact that no apartment has an alter ego. In the case of the Casanova building, this uniqueness strongly contrasts with the typical plans of social housing that tends to repeat dozens of times the same simplistic layout.

Figure A2: Ivry-sur-Seine Social Housing Complex © All rights reserved by vaumm & captain hoovie

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

Megastructure as Urbanism The strategies of megastructure, especially the impacts of density city, are a respond with the natural organic pattern (Figure A3). Instead of traditional square grid, nearly rounded grid creates a more flexible way. The prosperity of cities depends on the smooth movement of people and sustainability of environment. Additionally, it is getting more difficult with the increasing sprawling developments where large portions of density are not utilized, so houses, shops, and workplaces are very far from each other.

The idea of this project is the innovation of urban infrastructure to make large developments above natural environment. The main concept is to create a mega structure as an organism that mutates depending on the attached infrastructure. This is a city within the city where habitants will work, live, and play in the city.

Figure A3: Organic conception of initial proposal.

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Matrix City Plan

Figure A4: Mapping of buildings cluster, open space connection, and flooding area.

Vertical Level Variation: Creating Multiple Layer In the future of urban growing, assumption of density about the existing urban texture will increase different layers for human being and interact with diverse urban contexts, at different height from sea level, ground level, and sky level (Figure A4). The expansion of conventional urban development and horizontal exploitation of the surrounding land, has the limited land and created severe damage to the environment. Additionally, in the bigger and higher dense cities, over-population issues cause the urban environment to deteriorate. A general solution of this urban issue, is the vertical city which not only offers more space for population growth, but also helps maintain a natural environment outside a city, creating a more sustainable environment for generations.

Horizontal Boundaries: Reimagining Ground Level In anticipation of rising seas and shifting boundaries between land and water, rethink spatial planning so that it takes ocean and marine environments into account. Most future land use plans and community visions in coastal cities do not include mention of the water environment, but reflect an outdated approach to urban planning that fails to fully recognize the connections between cities and their natural surroundings. At Navy Yard, there is not only the boundary of river shore, also a boundary of artificial express way construction, those are the main issue of transportation connection and community interaction.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures Communication and Community

In the Navy Yard, there are several distinctive attributes, which are its skyline,

boundaries, and neighborhoods (Figure A5). The mappings at Navy Yard analyses the datas about communication and community (Figure A6). Community diversity is the key of urban context to create urban fabric and environment more vivid and dynamic.

Interestingly, the communities surrounding Navy Yard are composed of different groups, including Jews neighborhood, old messy projects, and some recently finished luxurious apartments. Considering to mix the distinctive communities into a common life circle properly in Navy Yard, collecting the data of ethnic distribution is one of effective way to speculate and relocate the new infrastructure. As strategies for communication and community (Figure A7), the infrastructure of new city changes the utilization of the ambient land and raises the value of land. At the same time, the establish of new infrastructure tremendously effects the direction of city environment in the following development of city. On the flip side, the poverty condition in different areas also plays the role of the priority of new projects situating. On the other perspective, the accessibility of transportation is a crucial reason that effecting the value of buildings and the composition of residentiary. Furthermore, the ways to communicate for people by different vehicles, such as subway or bus, are important indicators. Thus, the subway stations and bus stations are not merely change the existing neighborhood also reset some new potential stations which also influence the situation. Therefore, the strategy of connecting the transportation nodes establishes the comprehensive network system, and it activate the dead zones and revive the neighborhood positive way.

Figure A5: Collage of Navy Yard’s context by skyline, boundaries, and neighborhoods.

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Matrix City Plan

Figure A6: Mapping of communication and community.

Figure A7: Stategy of internal rallying hubs and external access nodes.

Figure A8: Ground level circulations and sky level circulations.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures Innovative Typology Take the block typology from previous precedent that studied by German architect Oswald Mathias Ungers in 1975. Those typologies generated in the “Roosevelt Island Housing”, a competition for planning of a neighborhood on the East River in front of Manhattan. Unger’s scheme arranged different housing types (appropriated from Manhattan) around a miniature “Central Park” and sized-to-fit street grid. Typological chart showing possible variations for the single blocks inside a common volumetric framework.

Stems from the original block condition in Brooklyn, several types of distinctive program and attribute will be recreated (Figure A9). Private space, such as residential and small retail, will situate on the horizontal block, which mainly elevated on the second level.

Furthermore, the top of horizontal block will be terrace and connected to sky street that provide the interactive common space for private and public. On the other side, the vertical blocks are mainly served for the public functional program as example as commercial, business, or office. Therefore, two distinguished types represent their function which obviously manipulating the shows a different future urban fabric.

Figure A9: Diagram of new block type.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures Megastructure Engineering of Main Vertical Buildings To achieve the elevated structure, the precedent of the structure is referred by El Palacio De Exposiciones Y Congresos by Santiago Calatrava (Figure A10). Two buildings with a diagonal structure are references in this project. The main supporting structure of building is composed of 6 parallel portals made of steel. The buildings have three floors and an accessible roof. The structural system for the three buildings has been designed as a rigid frame structure of steel supporting composite floors. The structural system of the buildings consists of a frame including columns and beams made of standard steel.

These frames are connected between them by means of beams that again are made of standard steel sections of different sizes.

The cantilevers that form the end of the two buildings include a strong element that gives continuity to the main portals in their plane and inner steel frames. These sets were pre-mounted on the ground and afterward were elevated, one by one until their final position in the buildings. The composite floors of the levels 2, 3, and roof are connected to the girders of the transverse steel frames. The composite floor of level 1 is also connected by means of studs to the upper edge of the horizontal girder of the main portals.

This makes that the concrete slab of this floor has a higher quantity of reinforcement steel bars because, apart from its main function as a floor, it also plays the role of strengthening element for the main portals.

Figure A10: El Palacio De Exposiciones Y Congresos by Santiago Calatrava.

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Matrix City Plan Megastructure Engineering of Ground Level Circulations The secondary plan to elevate the circulationi on the ground level is refered by Stuttgart main station in Germany by Christoph Ingenhoven Architect (Figure A11). In this project, the structure elevated secondary plan which above the railway station platform creates the space to public gardens. Hence, the original tracks may well be replaced by a new urban area. Plus, the gardens are Stuttgart‘s lungs and will gain in importance as the city expands. The park will be extended from other places across the underground railway station. The concept transforms the old station into a meeting place with restaurants and shops, so it not only opens the floor of the existing station hall in order to interconnect all levels of new station but also integrates the historic fabric into the new design.

Most important design is the “light eyes� that serve simultaneously as a attractor and a creative means for distributing light to the station below. They will trigger an experiential sense of the subterranean station even to passersby above ground. This infrastructure features complex double curved concrete geometries. The roof transforms into structural columns thus providing daylight openings for the underground station. It efficiently used of natural energy resources that coordinately improve the experiential quality of the site and increase material performance of the infrastructure. To promote public transportation, it is viable in an implement for reusing existing structures while offering a flexible plan that can accommodate natural ground.

Figure A11: Stuttgart main station in Germany by Christoph Ingenhoven.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures Megastructure as Engineering of Sky Level Blocks To build multiple layered urban infrastructures, rethinking the limits of the buildable - engineers and architects are constantly faced with this challenge. A good example of this is the new Adidas World of Sports Arena by Behnisch Architekten (Figure A12), have been raised 13 meters above the ground. Subsequently, 67 inclined composite columns were mounted under the construction, on which the building was then discontinued. The upper floors of the 140 x 115 m building are elevated 12,5 m above the ground after completion of the assembly work. The steel construction of the first two upper floors was pre-assembled on approximate 2m high auxiliary supports. The entire structure was then brought into its final position in several steps with the aid of hydraulic presses. A total of 67 V-shaped composite columns were then mounted under the construction before the latter was then lowered onto them. Eventually by this strategy, the mulitple urban infrastructures will be achieved.

With those structure precedents, the proposal project conceptually apply these three categories of natrual stucture which are roots, trunks, and leaves to three different structure conditions (Figure A13). The entire area section demostrates the three-dimetional urban stucture with different layers of artifical and natrual (Figure A14).

Figure A14: Section of relationship with ground level and sky level.

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Matrix City Plan

Figure A12: Adidas World of Sports Arena by Behnisch Architekten.

Figure A13: Three types of conceptual structure diagram.

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Floating Plugin Block Frame A compact city will be designed with the vertical direction by regeneration and densification of the urban area create new urban infrastructure. Thus, contributing to a more flexible development in its broadest stuctrual and environmental. Thought out the issue of modern transportation and communication, with the future vertical extension instead of the horizontal occupation by exploitation.

The density of city will contribute differently with past idea and continually develop on to the sky. However, densification always determine the quality of life condition, such as light, air, and public open space, and green environment. Thus, how to create an innovative urban structure with high density and high quality is a significance issue in future.

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Future Scenario In the future, the cities located near ocean will be submerged. The sea level will increase about 50 feet (according to “New york 2140”), thus ground level will be flooded (Figure B1). The block in city will be isolated by water. To prepare emergency situation, urban

planners aim at this speculation to rethink an innovative urban structure to response and resolve the potential risks. Furthermore, human starts to utilize the advanced technological equipment as individual ejective suits or passenger drones for communication. This trend will change the building plan. Core; stair, and elevator is not inside of building, it pulls over to outside. Based on this innovative strategy, the entrances will be change our traditional perception of architecture.

Figure B1: After sea rising 60 meters, major cities will be inundated.

Plug-in City To rethink the high dense city, plug-in city is one of potential approaches to achieve this.

Plug-in City is one of many vast, visionary creations produced in the 1960s by the collaborative British architecture group Archigram (Figure B2). A megastructure integrates residences, access routes, and essential services for the inhabitants. Plug-in City was designed to encourage change through obsolescence: each building is removable, and a permanent “craneway” facilitates continual rebuilding. It is ranging in inspiration from technological developments to counterculture, from space travel to science fiction.

Regarding to this concept, this idea changes traditional ways of living, including detachable units and circulation—mobile, flexible, impermanent infrastructure that would amend the cities of future.

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Floating Plugin Bolck Frame

Figure B2:Archigram by Peter Cook, between 1960 and 1974.

Plug-in City Demonstration In this proposal, the basic infrastructure is akin to a three-dimensional frame arranged by the size of program spaces, in the meantime, those spaces are attachable and detachable to accommodate flexibility of future variation, even for artificial nature environment in between each unit. The three-dimensional frame itself also serves the function of circulation based on the future elevator inside which can move horizontally and vertically.

Thus, people can communicate freely in extended spaces from the exterior to interior above the existing buildings (Figure B3).

Figure B3: Diagram of combination: structural circulations and plugin units.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures Superblock In the proposal of superblock, the strategy of dentification is focused on solid space, void space, and circulation. To create the high density and better quality spaces, the interiority and spatial linkages are the main ideas that define this superblock. Furthermore, relocating and rethinking the streets, public space, and urban corridors in the vertical matrix will be the priority of multiple layer. The family variation of units based on the a 4-floor-housing volumm and enlarge the void space in the court yard by changing the distance between each other. Local aggregation demostrates the duplications of units by differently rotating and mirroring (Figure B4). The circulation system is not only for human to communicate also combines with the main structure system, so the various units of building are able to plug in and plug out that increase the flexibility and expansibility of future growing. ducing natural elements, such as trees, vegetation, and sun-light into a dense space to improve the quality of life, and preserving the natural resources on the ground level in order to sustain natural elements (Figure B5).

Three-dimensional framework construction creates varied heights of buildings that overshadow each other and brings new problems such as sunlight. To solve the negative effects and reinforce the quality of life, the relationship between public and private play an important rule. Hence, introducing natural elements, such as vegetation and sunlight into dense city as public facilities is constructive to improve the living atmosphere(Figure B6). Take a precedent for example, generous sky gardens and soaring atria have become a common feature of office towers since SOM, Norman Foster and Ken Yeang led the way. By raising the ground plane and opening up interiors with semi-public spaces, they transformed the spatial character of the tower type (Abel 23).

Additionally, below the high dense building clusters or tall buildings, sunlight can does not easily reach the ground and shine on plants, so the scarcity of light decreases the vital environment of a ground level. Architect Wang proposed “sky gardens� that thrive in densely settled cities, taking advantage of the climate and the degree of sunlight, while strategically relating to the building’s context, orientation, proportions, structure, and circulation zones (Wang 48). Therefore, this manipulation of sky parks rarely maximizes the sun light by allowing it to penetrate through the dense clusters of buildings, nor do they compensate for the scarcity of ground-level parks.

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Floating Plugin Bolck Frame

Figure B4: Family variation of units and local aggregation.

Figure B5: Proposal construction is builded above the existing block buildings.

Figure B6: Big public spaces (green), structural circulations (red), small private units (white).

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Floating Plugin Bolck Frame High Dense Urban Construction Instead of unplaned high dense city which bring out the worse life and environmental issues (Figure B7), deliberately creating high dense infrastructure exerts positive results.

Elevated streets and circulation in new urban infrustructure are positioned in different heights of layer, so they can enlarge a space and effectively meet the demands of an urban population. If we move in a more vertical direction, it creates different layers for urban public utilities, such as transportation and recreational plazas, that will only cover a limited amount of land area. Thus, this strategy of multiple levels enable one to reduce the horizontal extension of urban areas which greatly increase our consumption of time and energy, and natural resources. Most importantly, the proportion of solid and void is the most concerned to reidentify. Namely, the public space, such as sky streets and sky gardens, and private property like residential and office will be arranged properly to communicate and interact with neighborhood.

To elaborate, the use of land needs to be intensified by layering urban and rural environments- residential, recreational, commercial, agricultural, and infrastructural- above and below the existing ground level of a city (Wong 47). The layered approach introduces “multiple ground levels” of various functions at strategic horizons in the sky (Figure B8). When a major city constructs itself vertically, the city becomes based on a threedimensional matrix instead of a two-dimensional grid. Another example is the project for Barangaroo by Ji, Yuen and Zhou. They proposed mixed-used “stack-rise”, meaning those stack of floors arranged like giant beams –the designers call a “stackrise” – span between vertical circulation towers in a manner reminiscent of the megastructure projects designed by Japanese metabolists, creating continuous elevated spaces and “streets” thought out the whole complex.

Figure B7: High Density in Hong Kung.

Figure B8: “multiple ground levels” of various functions at strategic horizons in the sky.

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Land Exploitation to Land Preservation Ultimately, elevated urban infrastructure preserves the natural resource of land on the ground level, such as trees and vegetation. Thus, those natural regulators actively effect the miniclimate on the local environment of neighborhood. The common ways of buildings construction always exploit the land. Therefore, releasing more land resources for the fauna and flora gives a hand to biodiversity and a sustainable ecosystem (figure B9). In 2016, in the international conference CTBUH, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, the architect Wang mentioned that when the towns became cities and cities became megacities – land has been taken for granted, as an infinite horizontal site for building, farming, and mining. The effects of land exploitation have led to the degradation of land quality and quantity, the depletion of nonrenewable energy sources, and the rise of global warming (Wang 46).

Because of that, the innovative urban infrastructure will no longer occupy excess land area by horizontal buildings. Therefore, based on the above theoretical assumptions, in recent years, many of architects have proposed different significant project. Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron has unveiled ambitious plans to develop the abandoned Badaevskiy Brewery on Moscow’s Taras Shevchenko Embankment near one of the famous Seven Sisters high-rises, Hotel Ukraina (Figure B10). Thus, the elevated construction offers an opportunity for people wanting to stroll around and enjoy the new green park land and river sides. At the same time the new building remains connected to that same ground of the city by means of stairs, lifts and slopes like an elevated lodge in the forest.

Figure B8: Land exploitation Reference.

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Figure B10: Moscow Brewery into “Floating Horizontal skyscrapers”.

Floating Plugin Bolck Frame

Figure B11: Section of sequent spaces and urban interiority.

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Urban Interiority Today, cities are getting denser and crowded. These trends bring about new views of urban design strategies to address environmental problems, resource conservation, and the conflicts within growing populations.The intensive energy use, increasing population, and intensive land utilization require new perspectives on close relationships among buildings, so the concept of urban interiority has occurred. Unlike conservative architectural designs based on urban contexts, urban interiority pursues an alteration, object-hood, and centripetality.

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The urban interiority includes the conception of mysterious, centripetal, pressurized, thick, directionality, involuted, and concavity which are required to achieve the qualities of the interiority space. By altering the existing urban condition by three distinctive approaches: infill, additions, and subtractions to regenerate the urban condition which is benefited from both densification and interiority.

In this case, Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, BQE, is confronting multiple urban issues involving the dead-zone, neighborhood gap, and activities discontinuity. Especially as a subsequent plan of Navy yard’s master plan, this proposal is located near to the Navy Yard. BQE has been acting as a cross-line which divide North and south district.

Figure C1:Aerial view of map

Figure C2: Area division

Figure C3: Mysterious Direction

Figure C4: Centripetal Direction

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Urban Interiority

BQE was opened in 1954 and has played a role as a bridge that connects Brooklyn and Queens. Its value of urban infrastructure heritage which can be a boost.

Along with the aging of the road itself, existing structures in urban infrastructure are major assets to create new values. Therefore, this proposal mainly attempts to regenerate its potentials by two of interiority qualities: mysterious and centripetal.

Under the BQE, centripetality is enhanced by the single-point perspective with the repetition of the columns and girders. Secondly, mysterious is appeared by the parking lot under BQE, the volume of the structure, and the enclosure of trees. Given these circumstances, the subtraction of the underground was applied to create spatial cohesion while maintaining current urban traffic flow.

Figure C5: Existing section relatioinship

Figure C6: Proposal section relatioinship

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In the aerial view, Iwan Baan’s photo (Figure C7) expresses the mysterious which is created with the independency of object and enclosure of surrounding trees (Figure C8).

With this idea, the isolation from the environment and different objects powerfully generate the contrast relationship, as well as give prominence to the object itself. Thus, in this aerial view of the proposal, the BQE obviously divides both two sides of the neighborhood from north to south (Figure C9). Additionally, not merely the existing street but also the trees on the ground disconnect the integrality of context. As a result, this area gradually became a dead corner of the community. Fortunately, there is an open parking lot that could be regenerate a new space object to reconnect the separated relationship.

Figure C7: Iwan Baan’s photo.

Figure C8: Analysis of Iwan Baan’s photo.

Figure C9: Existing condition in aerial

Figure C10: Analysis of existing condition.

view.

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Urban Interiority

The proposal idea (Figure C11) primarily reconnects the divided spaces into a coherent sequence of the urban context, in the meanwhile, maintain the existing traffic on the road and even combine with a new BQX system. The subtraction of ground linking the activities via the underpass still possesses the attribute of mysterious by surrounding tremendous trees at the eye level. Additionally. the downwards stair not just for walking under the road but also offers the seats for people to interact with the flexible space beneath the street, such as a performance stage, an exhibition space, or a water storage container. Most importantly, as a chain of spaces, the parking lot was changed to an ecological park that provides a natural environment enclosed by natural elements.

Therefore, this park linked with the activities under the BQE will effectively activate these areas instead of being abandoned.

Figure C11: Montage of proposal in aerial view.

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The close view is a single-point perspective beneath the BQE which referring to the attributes of Mike Hollman’s photo. The symmetrical picture shows a powerful centripetality which is compressing the sense of space, plus the gigantic ceiling surface covering most of the above space enhances the perception of compression. Furthermore, the repetition of structures with a downward vanishing point increases the sense of depth which exponentially shortens the distance in between. This type of space language creates a strong and endless effect that exerts the extensive visual field horizontally. However, eventually, this pressure is relieved through the atrium in the center of the end and the reveal of the above skylight.

Figure C17: Mike Hollman’s photo.

Figure C19: Existing condition in close view.

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Figure C18: Analysis of Mike Hollman’s photo.

Figure C20: Analysis of existing condition.

Urban Interiority

However, in the existing condition of this project, the space beneath BQE construction mostly have been abandoned and be utilized for parking, because both sides are current street for traffic and the above bridge blocked sunlight to lighten space. With those disadvantages, this area is bound to be a dead-zone which creates community difficulty and risky corners. To create a more friendly space for the neighborhood, in the proposal, the depression of ground and opening of the above construction extend the sense of space in the vertical direction by the increase of height. Certainly, the space beneath the ground connects to both sides of project buildings and ecological parks to form a chain linking those spaces in order to achieve the continuity of urban facilities.

Figure C21: Montage of proposal in close view.

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The montage on the street view at the project side is referring to the Pawel Paniczko’s photo. The composition of the photo is divided nearly in the center. The image basically composed of two parts, one is centripetal and radial direction on the left, the other is vertical and horizontal direction on the right. However, there is a subtraction of the rightside object which made the middle space became more open. In the proposal scene, although the view is based on a single-point perspective, the BQE and road present the centripetal on the contrary, the building shows a certain degree of the horizontal element on the right side. Thus, the strategy is using the subtraction on the project building and the stairs below the BQE to build urban interiority effectiveness.

Figure C12: Pawel Paniczko’s photo.

Figure C13: Analysis of Pawel Paniczko’s photo.

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Urban Interiority

In the existing condition, the space beneath the BQE is a parking lot that brings this area into a useless refuse area. Also, the sidewalk beside the project is often full of rubbish.

Thus, in the proposal, the sidewalk will be reopened and combined with the new void space which is subtracted from the project. Additionally, this additional spare area also links to the posterior park behind the project, as well as combines with the anterior under ward stair. This underpass connected to the green space beneath the BQE and integrate with the new BQX system. Therefore, the spaces located on both sides of the road collectively encircle the urban interiority. It will exert a positive effect on the community and constructively energize those areas.

Figure C14: Existing condition in street view.

Figure C15: Analysis of existing condition.

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Figure C16: Montage of proposal in street view.

Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

Autonomous Spaces This project mainly attempts to harness the city’s autonomous vehicle system to redefine the existing building facade. Facade containers will be shipped by autonomous cars on the street and conveyed on the elevation. Thus, the pixilation of containers redefines the conventional storage method and revives the monotonous facade of a building. Meanwhile, the empty space between containers reforms additional balconies which offer extra function. Containers and handrails follow the original facade grid, they not merely create their own rhythm but also consistently woven each other in harmony.

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Figure D1: Aerial perspective.

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Autonomous Spaces

The project combines the autonomous vehicle technology and storage to

redefine the street condition with building and create the new interface, namely new facade system. The site is at the corner of Navy Yard, isolated by the enclosure of BQE and natural environment, those factors bring out the community desert here. In more detail site condition, diverse small community activities are happened in this block including fitness clubs, artistic workshops, and photography studios. At the other side of block is a storage building with a lot of dead spaces inside. Thus, this project mainly focuses on the storage building which is rented out the additional space for private use.

The facade circulation led the people to access from the ground to the top

and walk through the exterior to the interior. People from the exterior first floor walk on the stair to the second floor and walk into the interior space and walk up and up. In this process, people will meet artists in larger spaces which are rented by artists for studio open houses. The public can walk on the circulation and interact with others on both sides of the facade. Therefore, the artists can rent some parts of space for temporary studios and hold their open houses to invite people for visiting. Those balconies provide a new public circulation for visitors to walk on the facade even to the rooftop and be one part of community activities.

Figure D2: Diagrams of circulation from exterior to interior.

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Figure D3: Elevation

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Autonomous Spaces

The faรงade system includes three different layers. The first one is the conveyer

mechanical system which is built on the original structure and following the grid with a little rotated language. The second part is the container distribution which would be consistently change to meet the requirement of different artists studio or different situation. The third is the public vertical circulation which has continued route from the ground level to the top level by walking though the exterior and interior. Although the facade is changed with the exterior appearance, the interior still maintain their original condition with the existing floors and structure. However, there are sill some ways to access in the original area. Therefore, the new system is separated with existing space but hybridize with the facade structure together.

Figure D4: Diagram of facade system.

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Figure D5: Section perspective

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Autonomous Spaces

As a storage building, this facade appears in uninspiring language. Also,

inside of the building, the storage spaces are unified and unrecognized. Additionally, the street condition is always stuck when cargo was loading and unloading. Thus, the idea attempt to harness the advantage of the autonomous vehicle to revive the facade and activate the community activities in this block.

Three facade sections explain the process of shipping cars. From the left side,

the car gets in the building, the interface between the existing floors and facade which are more close to each other. The second section is in the medial of the building which of the containers is conveying up and down by the mechanical equipment. Because the existing storage is still for private, there is more void space here to separate with new public circulation. However, in the third section, it remains one way to connect to the original building spaces. On the first floor, it is still for a loading dock to grabbing containers into the convener system on both sides of the facade.

Figure D6: Diagram of 3 sequent section.

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In the aerial shot, the street condition will be changed because the totally dif-

ferent manipulation of autonomous vehicle. In the street strategy, shipping vehicles will enter the building on the right, loading or unloading the cargoes on first floor and leave on the left. The other general autonomous vehicle will go the other side. Because of the autonomous technology, new street is creating the new public small entrance plaza for pedestrian to stay and enter the building. This plaza also provides the space for parking the micro-mobility, such as bicycle or e-scooter. The pattern on the ground are not the boundaries, they are indicator for autonomous vehicle to recognize the street condition.

So those void pattern is for people to walk in the medial of street and the cars drive on the side.The design of street lamps are another “Signal transmitter� to remind the vehicle to make a turn in this area.

Figure D7: Diagram of street strategy.

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Autonomous Spaces

In the elevation, the variation of facade are mostly created by the pixelized

Containers and linear handrails. The containers are randomly arranged with different size the depth which exert the vitality to the building. In the meanwhile, we can still see some part of original existing appearance. Additional, when the containers are assembled on the facade, the facade coloration become more vivid to attract public people to visit here. Therefore, it’s time to bring the community activities in. Furthermore, the balcony and stair with the linear hand rail are based on the cavities which are created by the containers.

Figure D8: Top view of street strategy.

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Research Statement

Since the technology have progressed for several decades, human already

created various deleterious products which affect our environment in short period.

Global warming, ocean pollution, over land exploitation, those current severe issues are deteriorating our mother Earth, so I attempt to invent certain innovative approaches to confront those issues and establish a better future. Based on my background of growing in Taiwan, which is one of countries located on the Pacific Rim, so our home country always confronts the natural disaster as example as typhon, earthquake, tsunami, and flooding. Rooted from these reasons, I am curious of that why the small technological devise such as cell phones always improve life of human but the big inventions such as buildings, cars, and boats, are still not enriched to recuperate the disease of planet.

Shouldn’t I foresee the incoming mishaps and prevent those happening misfortune.

Therefore, as an architecture and urban professional designer, I strive to reinvent the relationship between the natural influence and artificial construction. For me, the architecture is not merely a container for inhabitation or an art structure for entertainment but a resolution for sustainability.

Figure E1: Pacific Rim

Figure E2: Original and current forest cover

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Research Statement

Therefore, I pay attention on the new approaches to dispose the conflict be-

tween nature and buildings in the field of architecture, by arranging different formations of space which create the coexisting condition of natural and artificial in harmony.

Regarding to the balance of human beings and ecosystem is not mean to deny the entire advanced technology but appropriately harness them to preserve nature and prevent problems. The general strategies are separating the construction from the natural resources, preserving the condition naturally such as trees and grass, and fully utilizing the recyclable resource by more eco-friendly technology, such as solar panel system, wind power generator and water power generator. Every time I start a new project, I research the local environmental issues, so that I able to consider whatever the space or construction could respond and react with these conditions and solve them architecturally instead of generating more additional tragedy. Beside the building itself, I also want to deliver the significance of sustainability to public by my design of building and city, so the material of construction and the meaning of space are relative with the natural elements and reflect on the environmental issues. Therefore, the concept of saving Earth is not just a slogan but also a cynosure which can be achieved by everyone in the daily routine. Since I finished my design proposal, I always feel that I contribute the positive effect to our planet again.

Figure E3 Natural disasters, typhon, earthquake, tsunami, and flooding near ocean countries.

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In recently proposal, I perceive the condition of major cities in the world is

facing some serious problems, the increasing density, deteriorating living quality and raising sea level. I start to rethink a new potential space arrangement and structure in urban scale, so I levitate the structure upon the ordinary ground level and greatly change a new type of circulation of people and vehicles which create different city framework to solve the sea level raising dilemma. Circulation is the most significant gear in the city to comminute people from place to place which as similar as our veins in body circulating nutrition and substantial matters, as long as the challenge of circulation have been settled down and avant-garde streets are created, another city context would be easily and appropriately constructed. On the aspect of buildings, I transmogrify the urban fabricate from the original two-dimensional grid to three-dimensional matrix, thus the multiple-layer city offers an opportunity to increase dense and additional space for vegetation and plants which effectively ameliorate the living quality. However, for this idea, the feasibility of structure is a huge confrontation, due to the weight of material nowadays, those construction approaches are required the material which not only strong and solid enough but also light and durable. Accordingly, the priority of the interrogation is inventing an innovative structure or new principle of material to push the architecture and city to the next promising generation. In the future, based on the sufficient resources and skills with various of different professional, I will exert the experiment and investigation on the effective structure and reasonable space to achieve the goal by project to project in order to consistently express my principle. Undeniably, this tremendous mission is relied on plenty of people, so most importantly, I will attempt to deliver the advantages of this idea to public and convince the people who has the same intention and effort on this goal into reality.

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Research Statement

Figure E4: Precedents of ocean floating city.

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Hybrid Urban Infrastructures

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Publishers, 27 June 2011, aplust.net/blog/megatrend_by_samu

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Conjunto de edificaciones Buenavista en Oviedo. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://docplayer.es/48104322-Conjunto-de-edificaciones buenavista-en-oviedo.html “El Palacio De Exposiciones y Congresos.” El Palacio De Exposiciones y Con

gresos / Oviedo (Gallery) - Santiago Calatrava – Architects & Engi

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gresos-oviedo.html?view_mode=gallery&image=1.

“Expo: ‘Imagine There’s No Countries’ De Geert Goiris, Photo, Crédac Ivry.”

Paris Art, 18 July 2018, www.paris-art.com/imagine-theres-no-

countries/.

“Gallery of Mateusz Pospiech Proposes a Megastructure to Replace Iran’s

Dried Up Zayanderud River - 1.” ArchDaily, www.archdaily.

com/616127/iran-s-dry-rivers-student-proposal-to-replace scar-with-a-megastructure/551d75b6e58ecef247000115- visualisation_1-jpg?next_project=no.

GmbH, Stahl- und Verbundbau. “Projekte.” Startseite , 13 Jan. 2020, www. stahlverbundbau.de/projektliste/projektdetails/adidas-world-of sports-arena-herzogenaurach.html.

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Luco, Andreas. “Adidas World of Sports Arena / Behnisch Architekten.” Arch

Daily, ArchDaily, 4 Sept. 2019, www.archdaily.com/924171/adidas-

world-of-sports-arena-behnisch-architekten?ad_medium=gallery.

Patricia, Victoria, and Jose Antonio Rivas. “Archigram.” PROYECTOS 7 /

PROYECTOS 8, proyectos4etsa.wordpress.com/tag/archigram/.

Per, Aurora Fernandez. Why Density Debunking the Myth of the Cubic Water

melon. a & t Architecture, 2015.

Timothy, Beatley, “Blue Urbanism Exploring Connections Between Cities and

Oceans”, 2

“The Interlace.” ARQ (Santiago), Pontificia Universidad Católica De

Chile, Escuela De Arquitectura, scielo.conicyt.cl/scielo.

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“The Plans for the Lower Manhattan Expressway.” Slate Magazine, 15 Sept.

2016, www.slate.com/podcasts/placemakers/how_jane_jacobs_

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“Stuttgart Main Station (S21).” Werner Sobek, 30 Oct. 2019, www.wernersobek.de/en/projects/focus-en/structures/s21-under ground-station/.

Wong, Mun Summ, Richard Hassell, Alina Yeo. “Garden City, Megacity: Rethink

ing Cities For the Age of

2016, pp. 46–51. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/90006409

Global Warming.” CTBUH Journal, no. 4,

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Annotated Bibliography Abel, Chris. “The Vertical Garden City: Towards a New Urban Topology.” CTBUH Journal, no. 2, 2010, pp. 20–30. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/24192177.

The author point outs that Ebenezer Howard’s original concept of the

Garden City has been developed in other ways at far lower densities than intended. In response, most planning authorities in Australia are now implementing strategies of urban consolidation and densification. In this paper, several proposals will able to introduce the prototypical Vertical Garden City produced different universities in Australia and the USA. In conclusion, the author argues that the future development and success of the Vertical Garden City model ultimately depends on an expansion of the public realm above ground into private territory. The work reference is reputable initiated from the International Conference in 2010.

“Connecting the City: People, Density & Infrastructure.” CTBUH Journal, no. 4, 2017, pp.20–27. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/90020906.

This Journal article stresses out the future of humanity depends on the collec-

tive benefits of urban density; reducing both land exploitation and the energy consumption to construct and operate the horizontally dispersed city. Tall buildings must now be the promising vehicles for creating increased density, not just through sheer height, but by connecting multiple layers of the city. Hence, this evidence could be incited in the paper to prove that the future urban structure. Also, the usage of these examples in the conference explicating the fertile ground of Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane, Australia; all of which are praised worldwide for their high quality of life, nevertheless they are facing contemporary global-city challenges. This resource was published on the 2017 CTBUH international Conference which is reputable.

Hewitt, Lucy, and Stephen Graham. “Vertical Cities: Representations of Urban Verticality in 20th-Century Science Fiction Literature.” Urban Studies, vol. 52, no. 5, 2015, pp.

923–937. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/26146021.

This book intends to convey current trends in urban research. It emphasized

that established convention of idea concerned with urban space have tended to develop the horizontal extension and to neglect of their vertical or volumetric expansion.

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Annotated Bibliography

Additionally, it reviews the interest from some social scientists in the validity of fiction, especially speculative or science fiction. In this book, it evidences that the vertical urban life that have featured in representative works of 20th-century science fiction literature and reality topics in contemporary urban analysis. This source would be regarded as a critical commentary and a base of knowledge that can exist reciprocity with nonfictional proposal.

Wong, Mun Summ, Richard Hassell, Alina Yeo. “Garden City, Megacity: Rethinking Cities For the Age of Global Warming.” CTBUH Journal, no. 4, 2016, pp. 46–51. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/90006409

In this conference review, Mun Summ Wong presented his presenta-

tion “Garden City, Megacity: Rethinking Cities for the Age of Global Warming” in the Opening Plenary: The Sustainability of Density & Vertical Urbanism. It is constructive for the paper to provide several illustrators which was published by notable architect about the vertical urban, specifically centered around sustainable and high-density issue in the future. This report shares the authors’ strategies and vision for the Garden City Megacity that is hyper- dense, connected, and vibrant, with a diverse, interdependency, and generous public realm. This material is reputable because of it came from CTBUH Journal reports the International conference in 2016.

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