"Rendering of Nature-City", WORKac
What would new suburban developments look like if we embraced social and natural diversity?
Designed by Amale Andraos and Dan Wood of WORKac, Nature-City, proposed for Keizer, Oregon, is a dynamic plan for “town-country” living. According to Andraos, the design incorporates the best of the town and the best of thecountry to create a garden city. The proposal is modeled after Ebenezer Howard’s 1899 concept of the town-country, “a classic feature of the Garden City that combines the conveniences of urban life with the health benefits and access to agriculture of country living”. In Andres Duany’s “General Theory of Sustainable Urbanism”, many elements are considered to determine the “right” proportion for successful habitats. Nature-City draws from several of Duany’s urbanism types with emphasis on the impact of social and natural diversity throughout its design.
The first “paradigm” of urbanism is called Old Urbanism, or traditional, as it describes the original urban designs, such as Manhattan, for example. Characteristics included dense housing, walking and taking transit to public places, but nature was not a focus of Old Urbanism. The proposal for Nature-City boasts five times the density of the existing suburban developments in Keizer, Oregon. There are no major roadways within the development and public transit is accessed on the edge as a connection to the existing area. From there, residents, visitors, and merchants are encouraged to walk between spaces or a combination of riding the transit loop and walking.
New Urbanism, as seen in the first development of its type- Seaside, Florida, imports the high density element from traditional urbanism, but aims to infuse a certain amount of charm and nostalgia of 1930s living. As modeled in Seaside, the architecture tends to run away from modernism by attempting to create a warm and cozy “safety net” feel for its residents. Another design element found in New Urbanism is the idea of “gradualism”. For Seaside, the plan was to only build twenty houses at a time so only a few dozen newcomers arrived each season and everyone stays “familiar”. Therefore, Seaside’s “social fabric kept pace with the physical growth”. Gradualism seems to resemble small town growth, but in New Urbanism this principle was being applied to suburban developments near larger urban areas. Nature-City is definitely modern and innovative in its architectural design. It does not aim to capture a nostalgic appeal and is not described as growing over time, but the diversity of housing typologies within Nature-City creates this gradualism effect. There are fourteen different housing types proposed to include low-rise homes, tower of homes, garden homes, terraced housing, and a housing bridge, for example, flow in an organic manner, unlike static suburnan sprawl. This allows for great social diversity.
"Housing Typologies", Nature-City
Landscape Urbanism, the last paradigm Duany discussed, is definitely prevailing in the Nature-City proposal; however the architects have taken the context of nature to another level. Landscape Urbanism is described as primarily therapeutic to the public,but the elements planned for Nature-City are extremely functional as well. The proposed ecological infrastructure allows for “three times the open space” of the current town. Also, the design team was cognizant of diversity- plant diversity, animal diversity, as well as human diversity, through mixed-use buildings and shared landscapes. With its restored nature habitats, pass-thrus, and urban farms, the garden city truly does invite “country” into the “town”.
"Shared Landscapes", Nature-City
The social and natural diversity of Sustainable Urbanism Duany described is very much alive in WORKac’s Nature-City proposal for Keizer, Oregon. Indeed, there are many ideas at work, many of which are drastically different from its adjacent existing communities. However, by eliminating the failed elements of suburban sprawl, such as excess vehicle travel and commute, proposals for communities like Nature-City are impactful models for transforming American housing, lifestyles, and the economy as a whole.
Sources:
Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), “Foreclosed: Rehousing the American Dream”, 2011,
Accessed February 27, 2012, http://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2012/foreclosed/keizer
Andres Duany, “The General Theory of Sustainable Urbanism”, Ecological
Urbanism Edited by Mohsen Mostafavi with Gareth Doherty. (Lars Muller
Publications, 2010) 406-411.
Sarah Boxer. “A Remedy for the Rootlessness of Modern Suburban Life.” The New York Times, August 1, 1998.
Kurt Andersen. “Design: Building a Down-Home Utopia.” TIME, April 18, 2005.
Erica, I liked your "breakdown" of the different types of sub/urbanism described by Duany and related to Nature City. Do you feel that one of the types (Sustainable, Landscape, New) outweighed any of the others in Nature-City? I became highly interested in this particular project too, but I kept coming back to the concern of a lack of Gradualism. I wondered how this city would "emerge" or evolve into it's enormous neighborhood being shown. I feel that overall, this project certainly weighs all of the elements (nature/transit/work/play/diverse living/farming/socializing) in the most even manner, but if it incorporated the idea of gradualism, would one or some of the elements be left out in the mean-time? I did think your explanation of gradualism and how you explained the diverse housing structures (14 different types) to be a part of this was thoughtful, and something I hadn't considered. Perhaps because of the balance in this project and from the ideas of WORKac's design team, gradualism isn't a factor when it comes time to making this community successful. Because they have decided other factors like sustainability, multiple types of housing, transit, farming, energy conservation, jobs, and social spaces to be much more important. I felt you did a great job explaining and breaking-down all of Nature-City's strengths in your essay!
ReplyDeleteKrystal,
ReplyDeleteThe strongest type as defined by Duany is the "landscape urbanism". The design team placed emphasis on the idea of bringing the nature to the city (ergo, "Nature-City") and implementing these features to live harmoniously and often in out-of-the-box applications, such as a swimming pool on top of the compost hill. I agree with you a struggle to determine the "gradualism" effect in this proposal. In this case, I wonder if the natural elements that were said to grow and develop over time would carry this theory. Different from the rate at which a neighborhood might be developed over time, but similar in that landscapes morph and have the ability to indicate age of a neighborhood. I can imagine if Nature-City were constructed the initial draw might not be as strong as ten years down the road, or longer?
I feel that they can create gradualism just as seaside did in the past. They can build housing units as needed and rely on the City of Keizer for basic utilities. Only when it grows much larger and denser should the large infrastructure(composting, water treatment, etc) be built. This will allow for the social and ecological aspects to grow together into what will soon be a sustainable alternative to suburban living.
DeleteAll urbanism is going to account for gradualism in different ways. Dan brings up a good point in terms of what necessities can successfully accompany the growth of the area during different times. Landscape urbanism however, plays with gradualism at an entirely different level. Nature-City took urbanism to new heights, implementing an entirely different design of urbanism and its relationship to nature. The integration of harmony between the two could work, as long as the concept stayed consistent with gradualism.
DeleteAgreed. The development of nature will certainly change over time and produce new effects on the neighborhood. Also, the growth and change of families could, over time, produce the "gradualism" effect as families upgrade to larger homes, downgrade to smaller homes, etc. Do you think WORKac has considered large amounts of growth and how to incorporate it within the project?
ReplyDeletegood point Krystal. I feel this design has done a great job in taking into consideration different demographic groups and being sure to accommodate for people in every branch of life. But, what this design lacks is flexibility in housing systems. If you look at the break down there are roughly three styles of living conditions that you rotate through. There doesn't seem to be any consideration on an individual level that would encourage people to remain at a single residence or even an attempt at creating an environment that can be altered to allow for expansion.
DeleteIn all, I think that this concept of withholding nature with urbanism is fabulous. It is taking one and extreme from the other and finally unifying them in a way that could potentially work. There are many things to consider, one being change. It has been one of the issues of suburbia since day one. The thing to remember though is that WORKac accounted for target residents in terms of their income. A lifestyle is being highly considered here, and they have already taken into account the growth of population. If something is planned as such, only so much gradualism is controlled, however will MOST LIKELY be maintained to keep up with the consistency of the rest of the city. The other important thing is that even though this is one cohesive design, the partaking in construction and development influences how successful this could really be. Maybe there would be realization on how wonderful one of the structures would be, so maybe we should try another... etc.
ReplyDeleteI'm really intrigued by the fact that there are no major roads within Nature-City, encouraging everyone to walk or ride the transit loop. That is definitely reminiscent of old urbanism! I think the idea of gradualism in new urbanism is a very important factor to the ultimate success or failure of a city, or parts of a city. If there is too much growth on one city who was not expecting the growth, the outcome could be overwhelming and devastating for businesses and homes alike. That being said, I think the idea of gradualism can be applied on varying scales. In smaller towns, gradualism would be an extremely slow growth so the town could keep up with the demand an increase of residences apply on businesses. In the case of Nature-City, I think there still would be the effect of gradualism, although it would happen at a quicker pace. That wouldn't cause devastating problems as long as that growth was planned. Realistically, I think a city like Nature-City would be built over time and would therefore be able to keep pace with the changes.
ReplyDeleteI, too, am always intrigued about the being able to walk an entire "city" without vehicles in the path, but at the same time it is sort of daunting to think of not being able to hop in a car that is conveniently parked inside your personal garage to head to work, school, etc. Suburbanites, and I'm one of them, have been conditioned so long to rely on vehicles, that this will definitely take some getting used to. Most of the proposals were planned for close proximity to transit and public spaces (if not developed immediately within these spaces) so suburbanites customed to living farther out would soon realize the many benefits of being able to walk or hop on transit.
DeleteKim and Erica,
DeleteWith past conversations we have had and in some of our readings, with technology and changing lifestyles, will this help push the poulation to the healthier lifestyle this design promotes? With people becoming more homebodied, do you think this will multiply? Don't get me wrong, all of the houses we read about intrigue me, I just still wonder why these are not catching on quicker. A week or two ago we were talking about the time we waste driving, another asset to this project, but how do we sell it to people that are used to years and years of driving?
I think the project is mixture of Landscape, Sustainable and New Urbanism with natural areas, energy producing and saving , and construction style. The idea is amazing because, natural areas always seems attractive for community. imagination of living in there should be wonderful.They thought everything for creating a livable town such as gardens,farming,social areas, energy producing, public transportation network and animals. Also,the team created a town which opens to improvement as its sustainability. It looks like paradise without car. The project offers healthy life as physically and psychologically. The project not only contribute the community who lives in there but also, helps nature as producing energy.
ReplyDeleteI agree with all of the comments above...I want to throw this thought out there: how do we convince Americans that this is the answer to suburbia? In our past readings the underlying message has mostly been that the,cookie cutter single family home is what grows. How do we approach the roadless community above and help it thrive. When I go online and look, I see many architects and companies with great green, sustainable, out of the box ideas but I don't cities embracing or moving toward this trend. What do you think holds them back? Why are these ideas not multiplying?
ReplyDeleteI think Candace that part of this attitude towards new styles of housing is people's fear of it only being a trend. It has taken several for Going Green to start to take an effect on society. At first people just brushed it off as a tree huggers trend but now with how long and how well it is being promoted more and more people are asking questions and starting to participate in this movement. I think the longer and more available these communities become the more society will see that this style of living is not just a fad that will die out rather than an advancement in the housing industry and a motion towards this lifestyle is the right move for them. In short it's hard to argue with what people are use to but keeping it in there faces will make them curious and more likely to participate.
ReplyDelete