Cycles in Urban Environments

Book - Cycles in Urban Environments

2010-05-24T14:17:00.001-07:00

The cycles in urban environment book is now published and available on amazon. Therefore only part of it will be accesible here.

My recent book (2010) Cycles in Urban Environments: Investigating Temporal Rhythms published by LAP is now available on amazon online. The content is based on my research work for my Masters Thesis at the Bartlett School of Architecture. In two parts this publication looks into temporal aspects of the urban environment, from individual movement to collective activities and observes cultural or socia constraints as well as possibilities. The second part of the book looks into possible applications in the context of a project for a floating city in the Thames Estuary.

Image by Fabian Neuhaus taken from Cycles in Urban Environment / Friday 07th, Cycles Memory, the London 7/7 Memorial.

Image by Fabian Neuhaus taken from Cycles in Urban Environment / Tuesday 04th, Cycles Season, Seasonal Life Cycles.

Published on: 2010-05-04, Original language: English, Binding: Paperback, 180 pages

Cycles in Urban Environment This book explores the appearance and impact of cycles in urban surroundings and, in a second stage, their potential for an urban proposition. Cycles appear in any part of life. Examples can be found in time, economics, environment or social activities. Cycles appear through a wide range of scales and often without referring to them. Investigating these patterns in a spatio-social context makes sense regarding urban planning and urban sustainability as well as from a theoretical point of view in the sense of a spatial-temporal concept. The first part, is designed as an observational study in an existing urban environemnt, where as the second part, is an application of some of the findings of part one in a proposal for a floating city in the Thames Estuary. Both elements are approached as one process and influence one another. Four included essays with a specific focus on a related topics help to set a wider context and guide the debate.

Open publication - Free publishing - More city

Neuhaus, F., 2010. Cycles in Urban Environments: Investigating Temporal Rhythms, LAP Lambert Academic Publishing.

Contact

2009-05-28T04:17:00.001-07:00

For feedback, questions, suggestions, just contact me.

email: fabian.neuhaus@ucl.ac.uk

or find me on facebook -- academia -- linkedIn

mail goes to: urbanTick, Fabian Neuhaus, CASA, UCL, 1-19 Torrington Place, Gower Street, London, WC1E 7HB

I will try my best to get back to you as soon as possible.

On Generative Systems

2009-05-28T04:01:00.000-07:00

On Generative Systems

Generative Systems essay,
UCL, the Bartlett school of architecture,
MSc Urban Design, UD 03.14,
Urban Evolution -
The Thames Gateway
Fabian Neuhaus 2006-03-24

Introduction - what are Generative Systems
Description and terminology gen-er-a-tive, adjective - of or relating to reproduction. 1) able to produce: the generative power of the life force. 2) Linguistics applying principles of generative grammar. Origin late Middle English: from late Latin generativus, from generare ‘beget’ sys-tem, noun - 1) a set of connected things or parts forming a complex whole, 1.1) a set of things working together as parts of a mechanism or an interconnecting network: the state railroad system | fl uid is pushed through a system of pipes or channels. 1.2) PHYSIOLOGY a set of organs in the body with a common structure or function: the digestive system. 1.3) the human or animal body as a whole: you need to get the cholesterol out of your system. 2) a set of principles or procedures according to which something is done; an organized scheme or method: a multi party system of government | the public school system. 2.1) orderliness; method: there was no system at all in the company. 2.2) a set of rules used in measurement or classifi cation: the metric system. 2.3) (the system) the prevailing political or social order, esp. when regarded as oppressive and intransigent: don’t try buckling the system [Defi nition from Dictionary Thesaurus] If these general defi nitions are now brought together, it can be read as reproduction of systems. Or more in the sense of the system itself, the system is able to reproduce itself or similar, identical systems. The generative aspect is not only focusing on reproduction in the sense of really produce a new system, it also means the system is generating it self new in parts of it and is able to organize itself according to any inputs or environment.
A generative system therefore is not only functioning, in terms of staying alive (not collapsing) or fulfi lling a function (target), it also is able to generate itself (self-control). This means it grows out of the technical term of systems like railroad or pipes, into a more nature like defi nition.
Therefore it could also be named as an artifi cial system with natural like behaviour.

General System Theory
The general theory of systems was fi rst introduced in 1968 by Bertalanffy.
He set out to replace the mechanistic foundations of science with a holistic vision: General system theory is a general science of “wholeness” which up till now was considered a vague, hazy, and semi-metaphysical concept. In elaborate form it would be a mathematical discipline, in itself purely formal but applicable to the various empirical science. For science concerned with “organized wholes”, it would be similar signifi cance to that which probability theory has for sciences concerned with “chance events” [Bertanalffy, 1968].
To make his point, Bertanalffy pinpointed a dilemma that had puzzled scientists since the nineteenth century, when the novel idea of evolution entered into scientifi c thinking. Whereas Newtonian mechanics was a science of forces and trajectories, evolutionary thinking - thinking in terms of change, growth and development - required a new science of complexity [Fritjof Capra, The web of Life - a new Synthesis of Mind and Matter, page 47].
Generative systems now bring together the reproduction and self organisation with the system approach. But does it goes as far as evolving systems. Does it bring in an evolutionary idea of growing systems that evolve, learn and decide?

Selforganising Systems
Pattern and structures
Throughout the history of Western science and philosophy there has been a tension between the study of substance and the study of form. The study of substance starts with the question, “What is it made of?” the study of form with the question, “What is its pattern?”
The key to a comprehensive theory of living systems lies in the synthesis of those two very different approaches, the study of substance (structure) and the study of form (or pattern). In the study of structure we measure and weigh things.
Patterns, however, cannot be measured or weighed; they must be mapped. To understand a pattern, we must map a confi guration of relationships. In other words, structures involve quantities, while pattern involves qualities [Fritjof Capra, The web of Life - a new Synthesis of Mind and Matter, page 81].
Is there a common pattern of organization that can be found in all living systems? This is the case. Its most important property is that it is a network pattern.
Whenever we encounter living systems - organisms, parts of organisms or communities of organisms - we can observe that their components are arranged in network fashion. Whenever we look at life, we look at networks.
The first and most obvious property of any network is its non linearity - it goes in all directions. Thus the relationships in a network pattern are non linear relationships. In particular, an infl uence, or message, may travel along a cyclical path, which may become a feedback loop. The concept of feedback is intimately connected with the network pattern.
Because networks of communication may generate feedback loops, they may acquire the ability to regulate themselves. For example, a community that maintains an active network of communication will learn from its mistakes, because the consequences of a mistake will spread through the network and return to the source along feedback loops. Thus the community can correct its mistakes, regulate itself, and organize itself.

The Aspects of Living Systems
In a machine such as a ipod the parts have been designed, manufactures, and then put together to form a structure with fi xed components. In a living system, by contrast, the components change continually. There is a ceaseless fl ux of matter through a living organism. Each cell continually synthesizes and dissolves structures, and eliminates waste products. Tissues and organs replace their cells in continual cycles. There is growth, development and evolution. Thus from the very beginning of biology, the understanding of living structure has been inseparable from the understanding of metabolic and developmental process.
This striking property of living systems suggests process as a third criterion for a comprehensive description of the nature of life. The process of life is the activity involved in the continual embodiment of the system’s pattern of organization. Thus process criterion is the link between pattern and structure [Fritjof Capra, The web of Life - a new Synthesis of Mind and Matter, page 255].
These three aspects can be seen as a description for living organisms. Recent computer simulation are able to simulate simplifi ed artifi cial versions including these aspects. From studying these simulation we are able to learn more about systems.

Cellular Automata
To simulate these self organising systems developers looked for the simplest way to simulate a network of cellular processes embodying an autopoietic pattern of organization. This meant that they had to design a computer program simulating a network process, in which the function of each component is to help produce or transform other components in the network. As a cell, this autopoietic network would also have to create its own boundary, which would participate in the network of process and the same time defi ne its extensions [Fritjof Capra, The web of Life - a new Synthesis of Mind and Matter, page 190].
A cellular automata is a rectangular grid of regular squares, or “cells”, like a chessboard. Each cell can take on a number of different values and has a defi nite number of neighbour cells that can infl uence it. The pattern, or “state”, of the entire grid changes in discrete steps according to a set of “transition rules” that apply simultaneously to every cell.
These “machines” or simulated systems are because of complexity reasons mostly depending on one time cycle. Whereas living structures are dealing with a large number of different time cycles. Some of these cycles even can be contrary. Maybe this is just a question of time in terms of computing power? Or are living systems complex enough that they can’t be simulated in all their complexity?
Maybe to use a picture for this we can refer to fractals. Images like the Mandelbrot form show an endless borderline. You can zoom in as much as you want and there is still a new picture with this pattern, self-similar to the previous. But the exiting thing to me is the understanding of infi nity. To be endless does not necessarily mean to be a straight line running a head forever. It is found in quite small patterns like the Mandelbrot form. Maybe this image can be transferred to complexity. Complex systems may not need to look like hard, dense packed patterns of knots. I can imagine them to be quite light and fluid.

Development and evolution
As it keeps interacting with its environment, a living organism will undergo a sequence of structural changes, and over time it will form its own, individual pathway of structural coupling. At any point on this pathway, the structure of the organism is a record of previous structural changes and thus of previous interactions. Living structure is always a record of previous development and ontogeny - the course of development of an individual organism - is the organism’s history of structural changes [Fritjof Capra, The web of Life - a new Synthesis of Mind and Matter, page 215].
However, rather than being determined by outside forces, it is determined by the organism’s own structure - a structure formed succession of autonomous structural changes. Thus the behaviour of the living organism is both determined and free. Moreover, the fact that the behaviour is structure-determined does not mean that it is predictable.

Conclusion
Simulation
It all seems to come back to “the rules” and “the point”. “The rules” to defi ne the structure, patterns and process, to defi ne the interaction and action the system can undertake.
“The point” on which someone (planner?) says stop, here we start building it. In this case the generative system is used only as a quite complex simulation of a process to fi nd structures to be built. Therefore a evaluation tool would be needed to pick up the possible solutions out of all produced solutions and evaluate out of these the one output that matches the criteria best. In actual examples developers use genetic algorithms to implement a kind of selection tool (see John Frazer, an Evolutionary Architecture). It turns out to be very important to evaluate the outcome. Maybe this is even more important than the input (the rules). Through to our recent computing power we are able to generate more than we can handle. Therefore the reduction of all outcomes down to these few possible ones is a new diffi cult task. It seems to me that this should be already considered a the very beginning.
Understanding
But could it be possible that we do not see generative systems as a simulation? Is there more into it? Maybe if we go more into the process and rather be far from the common thinking of planning and building.
To see a new development as a process is a must for this. The question may lays in the cycles. Where are they? What do they cause? How are they related to structure, pattern and process?
Especially in the fi eld of urban design, hardly a project is built in one go with only one planner. And then during the life time, projects turn out to have many similarities with living organisms, due to host, being used and adapted by people.
Of course in planning somewhere we have to start building, whether it is a house, a street or planting a three. But despite all planning and thinking rules the process goes on. Any introduced element becomes immediately part of a system whether the project is fi nished or not. Life takes over, time is moving, and they’re not waiting for the project to be finished.
The idea of anyone saying stop is only in theoretical simulation possible. But in the real world the people start using it and adapt it to their daily life. For me, at this point, this is the big issue in system thinking and knowing about selforganising structures. Every action we undertake is done in a living (in terms of changes and exchanges) environment. And as the system is able to organize itself it is going to deal with the input, in one way or another. This does not mean it doesn’t matter what we put in, the opposite would be through. A project sets up a structure but live’s (people) is going to fi ll, use and change it. This for, it has to be designed. The project has to a low the people to generate their networks but itself has to be integrated into a network and this means also it has to be able to change. There is no point of talking only about simulation. It is more about understanding the function and according to this to set up a design to allow structures to nest, act, maybe grow, but to communicate.
Project
In terms of our project the introduction of process, network and organization goes beyond individualization - introduced through the starting idea of mobility - and brings the elements back together. This may set up the city, may not necessary in common terms but in terms of system thinking. The overall idea turns out to be a system that can be read as a city.
City therefore doesn’t need to be a city in common terms, more in terms of conglomeration of single individuals forming a network that allows them to interact and through this (self-) organization occurs automatically. City is also about no isolation, being connected.
Size in this case matters only in terms of surviving. Therefore the limitations of size in both directions big and small have to be explored. Are there any such boundaries?

Bibliography

Fritjof Capra, The web of Life - a new Synthesis of Mind and Matter, London, Flamingo, 1997

John Frazer, an Evolutionary Architecture, London/Oxford, Architectural Association Publications, 1995

Kevin Kelly, Out of Control, Basic Books, 1994

Manfred Wolff Plottegg, Generative Systems, http://plottegg.tuwien.ac.at/vo030205.htm [accessed 2006-03-22]

On Sustainability

2009-05-28T03:49:00.000-07:00

On Sustainability

Sustainability essay,
UCL, the Bartlett school of architecture,
MSc Urban Design, UD 03.13,
Urban Evolution - the Thames Gateway
Fabian Neuhaus 2006-03-24

Introduction - what is sustainability
Official description and terminology Sustainable development meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs [World Commission on Environment and Development, Brundtland Report, 1987].
The actual model for sustainability is called the three-dimensional model. It is bases on the image of three circles for the target dimension of environment, economy and society, to witch are added the time and north-south dimensions [are - Amt für Raumentwicklung, Defi nition Nachhaltigkeit, 2004].

Point of view - how to see it
Why isn‘t it clear to do so?
If sustainability is talking about the way everyone and everything is performing in a respective way to the surrounding, there is no point of not acting it in such a way. It sounds to me; as such behaviour is a natural act of being. It is not understandable to me why there are other behaviours in such a large number that we have to fear the next century.
It is all about someone else will do it....
If the single person doesn‘t bothers about, at least a company should do. If the fi rm‘s not doing it at least the government should. If one country is not taking care about it, at least the whole world should do it...
But maybe it is the other way round. If the whole world is not doing it, at least the single state should take care about. If the single state doesn‘t do it, a single company or a city should do it. If the city doesn‘t take care, the inhabitants should do it...
Every action matters, there is no question about scale or size. Even more, actions have to be connected through all scales. It needs to be a consistent line, an overall policy.
For me sustainability is the lived part of understanding system theory. That is, in a short saying: every object and action is connected to many others. Everyone creates visible and even more invisible impacts by acting. Sustainability is about acting in aware of these connections and not overdose impacts.
The Atom is the past. The symbol of science for the next century is the dynamical Net. The Net is the archetype displayed to represent all circuits, all intelligence, all interdependence, all things economic and social and ecological, all communications, all democracy, all groups, all large systems [Kevin Kelly, Out of Control in Richard Rogers, edited by Phillip Gumuchdjian, Cities for a small planet, page 146].
It seems to be a question of education and knowledge. To understand things in such a way, of course there is education needed. I don‘t think it is an accident that sustainability appears together with a systemic understanding of the world in the early seventies of the last century. The discovery of the system description enables to become aware of action impacts and raises the key questions of sustainability.
The first satellite picture from outer space in 1959 gave these new thoughts an image. The whole world could look at it self and capture the fi niteness of our living room. And it is maybe still the most powerful image to support all activities around sustainability.
Sustainability is also about images > Spaceship Earth [in Buckminster Fuller, Critical Path, New York, St. Martin‘s Press, 1981]

Question of general understanding of everyone‘s environment
Generally, it is thought to be learned as a child from the family, how we shall act in our environment. The terminology of respect, faith and dosage is said to be taught in this tiny element of the society. But maybe this way of seeing it denies the importance and complexity of the task.
And maybe it needs more educational knowledge to understand and especially discover the systemically connection in everyday life to act accordingly. It is a fact that a large number of the world‘s population haven‘t the chance to access an education system like we know it. How can all these people be integrated into a large discussion and acting program around sustainability if they are not able to capture the range of it?
Sustainability is also about education.

Money - [S] = luxury? 3rd world? China? America?
Does it become a question of money and wealth? Is it an accident that sustainability becomes such a popular trend in rich countries of Western Europe like Switzerland and Germany? Is it more than just chic to move into a single-family house, where anyone says it‘s an eco-home?
What about millions of people who dream of having a car in china? Maybe they understand the impact but who can tell them not to enjoy what we in Europe or America enjoy for years and now are fed up with, because there‘s a new hype? Or the really poor people in Africa, why shouldn‘t they destroy their nature to built some energy ineffi cient holiday resorts for rich tourists?
In these cases it seems to be a decision between desires, desire of goods and articles the western people showed their power with for many decades, and sanity of the natural call for acting within the system.
In this way of looking at it, there seems to be a gap between systemically action and economy, money and wealth versus sanity and naturalness? But is there no other choice? Is there really only on or the other, is it only black OR white?
Sustainability is also about combining and integration.

Problems - how and why
Who does it - who doesn‘t
In professional circles in central Europe it starts to be accepted that the question of sustainability has to be addressed and integrated. There are a large number of campaigns on different scales in every media. Sustainability is a big thing.
Lots of people are talking about it, but it seems that even more don‘t understand a word.
Of course it is high time that the London boroughs run campaigns on waste and recycling. But do people on the street get the message? Do they get the image of millions of used nappies get buried under their potential single-family home site? Do they know the alternatives, can they even imagine some?
As discussed previous, a big part of it is highly connected to education and the understanding and care about every ones own environment. But also there must be given a chance to do so. Every action matters and every element of the society acts as an example for others - without scale.
Sustainability is also about information.

Definitions - measurement - certificates
As a relatively young clime in different - or all? - aspects of life, it is the question of how to compare sustainable actions and activities. There are lots of discussions about sustainability and how to do it, but what are the guidelines? How can sustainability be measured?
On an architectural scale of single buildings arisen in the last few years a number of different standards. ECO, Natural, Low Emission, Low Energy, Zero Energy, Sustainable Life cycle... each of them with a howl lot of studies, facts and numbers to proof anything. A big business, and a big confusion.
It seems that by now things are getting sorted out and there are a number of certifi cates going to be installed at least on national levels to clean up and set the same base for discussions. At lest on architectural Levels.
How about larger scale projects?
In Switzerland, the Federal Offi ce of spatial planning developed a tool called MONET to kind of measure or monitor projects on sustainability. This thing needs over 100 indicators to give you some output.
Sustainability is also about complexity.

Urban design - integration or living it?
Important points
Sustainability as said in the introductions, is constituted in offi cial terms out of environment, social, and economy. These tree factors have to be in a balance to create sustain living.

Strategies of integration
Sustainable development requires fi tting in the wider environment, reusing existing systems and features and securing priorities to slow modes of transport, ecological values, human well being and safety. This should be achieved by integrating sectorial contributions, involving the public and other administrative levels and building commitment of all involved [in The European Council of Town Planners, Try it this Way - Sustainable Development at the Local Level, page 31].
Doesn‘t this sound like a description of planning? Why should a project be different in any general points from this description? Is there a point of planning something unhealthy or unsafe for people? Why would someone plan anything without fi tting it into the wider environment or not reuse existing systems? This is one major point of confusion. On a logical base there seems to be no point of talking about these obvious points of general planning, but there is!
Waste
The idea of the endless cycle of design and production promises from the wasteful industrial systems of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The new design model provides a continuous assembly/disassembly line that cycles the product and its constituent matter - rather than recycling it - in a never-ending loop of improvement [in Bruce Mau and Jennifer Leonard, Massive Change, page 181].
Energy
The worldwide grid: The future of our planet depends on our redesigning the current power system, which relies on large-scale, centralized entities. We need to produce energy locally and distribute it globally [in Bruce Mau and Jennifer Leonard, Massive Change, page 83].
Concepts
Whether there is a general defi nition or a standard, concepts of integration rather than exclusion and concepts of connection rather than disconnection seem to appear more sustainable.
Monocultural, monotony concepts out of the early 20th century appear in these days point of view as a complete failure. Today the key seems to be diversion and mixture - only a trend, who knows?
Another key could be the infl uence on the surrounding by stating an example. The point is not to be totally and best sustainable. It is more important to be known and seen as sustainable in combination with a successful project. This could have impacts on others and is way more likely to be copied.
Sustainability is also about setting trends.

Conclusion
New point of view? - What changed?
It is not about one fi eld of action where sustainability haste to take place in such a manner. First, sustainability has to take place through all scales up to a global level in all fi elds. If you believe in being able to extinguish traffi c jams by installing round a bouts you wont succeed with on roundabout per city.
Every action is embedded in a system of elements, relations and impacts; every action has to be taken in awareness of this fact.
Every action matters through all the scales. But all partners need to be on the same level of understanding.
Sustainability is also about equal rights.
If you want to build solutions for the future and have people working with you, every citizen has to understand the system very well. You have to have a commitment with simplicity. Every child should know the design of his or her own city. They should design the city even, because if you can design the city you can understand the city. If you understand the city, you will respect the city [Jaime Lerner on public transport in Bruce Mau and Jennifer Leonard, Massive Change, page 59].

Bibliography

Richard Rogers, edited by Philip Gumuchdjian, Cities for a small planet, London, Faber and Faber Limited, 1997

The European Council of Town Planners, Try it this Way - Sustainable Development at the Local Level, South Tyrol, Department of regional and Townplanning, 2002

Jack W. Lapatra, Applying the system approach to urban development, Dowden, Hutchinson and Ross, 1973

Bruce Mau with Jennifer Leonard and the Institute whitout Boundaries, Massive Change, London, Phaidon Press Limited, 2004

United Nations Sustainable Development, Agenda 21, Rio de Janerio Brazile, June 1992

Geoff Mulgan, connexity - how to live in a connected world, Harward Business School Press, 1998

Buckminster Fuller, Critical Path, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1981

Sustainable Development ARE, http://www.are.admin.ch/are/en/nachhaltig/defi nition/index.html, [accessed 2006-03-03]

UN Department od Economic ans Social Affairs - Division for Sustainable Development, http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/, [accessed 2006-03-03]

On Systems - it is more than a bunch of simple pieces

2009-05-28T03:33:00.000-07:00

On Systems - it is more than a bunch of simple pieces

Theory essay,
UCL, the Bartlett school of architecture,
MSc Urban Design, UD 02.05,
Urban Evolution - the Thames Gateway
Fabian Neuhaus 2005-12-0

Introduction
What is a system? Four our purposes we shall think of a system in the most general way as a collection of entities interrelated in a specifi c way to accomplish a particular objective. The members of the collection are usually termed “subsystem.” Clearly, with this defi nition we can include almost anything.
The bicyclist pedalling down a city street is a system with two obvious large subsystems: the person and the bicycle. Smaller subsystems include the wheels, the operators eyes, and his nervous subsystem. This viewpoint indicates that any system we choose to consider must itself be a collection of objectives in a hierarchy. The bicyclist is a member of the city bicycle traffi c of that moment, the bicycle traffi c is a subsystem of the transportation network, and so on trough the grouping levels (in Jack W. Lapatra, Applying the system approach to urban development, page 4).

The nature of systems - things are connected - how they get along
To describe a system we will use two different types of members. First we have the elements, which describe a static thing, or a probably time based conglomeration of things, facts or actions that turns into fi x item. For example an ipod is a physical element or the bicycle traffi c is a temporary conglomeration of used bicycles.
These elements stand in relation to each another. They have something to do with each other. Some elements depend on others - a glass rests on the table, the ipod charges only trough the laptop. Some stand in a neighbourhood - the bin is placed beside the bike, that’s why I can’t pass. And others go along very well and support each other - the door and the door handle.
Whit out talking, interacting these elements stand in relations. Trough their relations they become all part of a system, they belong to my household. But they also describe subsystems - the door and the handle can be read as a system itself. The door can only be opened by using the door handle, the door handle is more useful in relation to the door, than in connection with the ipod. Differentiation trough a subjective view.
The bike and the bin may not really have enough relation to create a functional subsystem as the door and the handle. But in the fact that I can’t pass trough because of their relation they appear to me at that moment as a system. A system that in the combination of its elements makes the way for me impassable. In general, for a larger group of people the bike would be seen as a system itself, or maybe as a subsystem of my sport activities, but not in relation to the bin. The fact that when the bin is placed back in the kitchen the next day and I can pass trough beside my bike, makes the bike and the bin a temporary system. Where as the door and the door handle in a stronger and durable system stay.
The relations intensity between the elements do make a system. Subsystem can be divided from the system by looking at inner system relations.

System borders- a separation trough connections
Relations that connect the elements are then exposed to personal judging. They are objectives of subjective seeing and feeling. The bin has for me something to do with the glass on the table because they both belong to my household. But for my neighbour’s my bin has more to do with his bin, because it is the same model. But I d’ rather see my stuff together and not related to my neighbour’s belongings, he’s not my friend.
Troughs the fact that I make my household a system all elements in my household are elements of my system. They get into relation trough me and my defi nition of my household. By buying a new chair I can expand my system or by throwing something into the bin I can change my system and its subsystems.
- My own little world.
But back to the door and the door handle, most of my friends will also say that they see it as a subsystem of my household. But their friends my only see it as a system in itself or maybe as a subsystem to the apartment (which is not mine, only rented). But I could agree with others, who can be strangers, that the door and the door handle can be seen as a system. We agree about the fact, that these two elements have a really close relationship that separates them from other elements in my household.
Stronger connections can separate two elements from others to create a subsystem. “Borders” in this sense are described trough connections. The inner relations rather than trough an outline.
Borders are whit in this defi nition no longer excluding factors. The lines brake up and are open for overlapping and diffuse drifting from one to another. They are able to integrate movement and fl ow (translated from Roger Diener, Jacques Herzog, Marcel Meili, Pierre De Meuron, Christian Schmid for ETH Studio Basel, Die Schweiz ein Staedtebauliches Portrait - Grenzen, Gemeinden - Eine kurze Geschichte des Territoriums, page 252).

Relations
It could be interesting to have a closer look at relations as a member of the system. As suggested above these relations are responsible for the actual borders of the chosen system. But as we saw in the example above with the bin and the bicycle, these relations are often rated trough a subjective view onto the system. Even my mood or my planed action can affect my creation of the system. If I don’t plan to charge my ipod, the ipod - computer system is not “existing”. The system of the ipod and the speakers is taking over, because I am listening to some music. In this sense time is an aspect of the system.
But there are pre-rated relations where a large number of people would agree that these elements have a qualitative relation and this group would see it as a system in a similar way. For example the door and the door handle. This is kind of a cultural agreement trough a similar background, knowledge and education.

Subsystems
“This viewpoint indicates that any system we choose to consider must itself be a collection of objectives in a hierarchy” (in Jack W. Lapatra, Applying the system approach to urban development, page 4 - mentioned in the introduction). The mentioned hierarchy is maybe not the right word to describe the relation between a system and its member, which can also be seen as a system. According to Christopher Alexander’s essay “a city is not a tree” to implement a real hierarchy, like the one in the army, is probably simplifying the system to a tree.
The tree - thought so neat and beautiful a mental device, though it offers such a simple and clear way of diving a complex entity into units - does not describe correctly the actual structure of natural occurring cities, and does not describe the structure of the cities we need (in Christopher Alexander, A City is not a tree, page 54) - and so does the system. Systems and so called subsystem can therefore easily stand beside each other may even have special relations.
As mentioned by Christopher Alexander (in Christopher Alexander, A City is not a tree, page 55) we tend to simplify impressions in our mind to get hold of too many inputs. With our cultural background we are used to order most of the impressions in a strict hierarchy order. We simplify the inputs to a tree or further back to the question of good and bad. Trough growing up in the same culture environment, going to a similar school, we all practice for many years how to bring things into a strict hierarchy - basically we learn how to turn anything into a tree.

Working within a network - understanding the function - complexity
Complex systems are diffi cult to understand. Sometimes they appear as black boxes. This means that in the box is a unknown mechanism. I can give an input to the box, and get an output. But I am unable to fi gure out the way it functions. I can’t propose any outcome beside the fact that I will get a reaction even if noting happens.
The city can be seen as a highly complex system. Because it is more than its elements together. It includes highly active relations and activities and is able to organization itself. This means it is an open system that can adapt by itself to changing needs or new inputs. It can on its own easily integrate new elements or creating or changing relations.
As we saw before there is the possibility to see part of the system members as an other system or “subsystem”. This can be seen also as different zooms. My ipod goes with my computer. They both belong to my household. My household is in the city. But even the city can be seen as a member of a city network or a state, on and on till we reach the universe where we don’t know whether it is expanding stable or shrinking?

Conclusion - what does it tell me - myself trapped in the web
This is what makes the system theory that much interesting. Very soon you get into a kind of a self-similar circle. And it is spinning around. Was the chicken fi rst or the egg?
Up to now all examples were shown whit out me as an system member. I acted as a kind of hidden observer. But in fact my person, my body but also my actions, are members of my household system or the city system. In this way I can see myself observing the system. It is me sitting in the black box trying to act and react with my surrounding.
It is not me solving out a problem, I can see myself realizing a problem. Or even more, I can refl ect on seeing myself realizing the problem.
It is not longer me working towards the solution of the problem, it is me acting in relation to my surrounding. The “problem” is no longer a “problem with one special solution” it becomes a question with any possible reactions to it. My part is it to fi gure out how I can act whit in these reaction.
The big difference is the understanding of it by including myself into the solution (or taking especially myself out).
For the human mind, the tree is the easiest vehicle for complex thoughts. But the city is not, cannot, and must not be a tree. The city is a receptacle for life. If the receptacle servers the overlap of the strands of life whit in it, because it is a tree, it will be like a bowl full of razor blades on edge (in Christopher Alexander, A City is not a tree, page 55).

Bibliography

Jack W. Lapatra, Applying the system approach to urban development, Dowden, Hutchinson and Ross, 1973

Oliver Coutard, Richard E. Hanley, Rae Zimmerman, Sustaining urban networks - the social diffusion of large technical systems, Routledge, Oxon - New York, 2005

Michael Batty, Papers in Planning Research - 11 - On System Theory and Analysis in Urban Planning, University of Wales, Cardiff, 1980

Christopher Alexander, A City is not a tree, essay, 1965

Roger diener, Jaques Herzog, Marcel Meili, Pierr De Meuron, Christian Schmied for ETH Studio Basel, Die Schweiz ein Staedtebauliches Portraet - Grenzen, Gemeinden - Eine kurze Geschichte des Territoriums, Birkhaeuser, Basel, Berlin, Boston, 2005

Wikipedia online, http://de.wikipedia.org, http://en.wikipedia.org, for system theory, system theory of the evolution, social systems, (accessed 2005-12-07)

General system theory, http://www.istheory.yorku.ca/generalsystemstheory.htm, (accessed 2005-12-07)

Christoph Alexander online, http://www.uni-weimar.de/~donath/calexander98/ca98-html.htm, (accessed 2005-12-06)

Vilem Flusser online, http://www.hyperkommunikation.ch/personen/fl usser.htm, (accessed 2005-12-07)

Hyperbibliothek online, Crashkurs, Systemtheorie, http://www.hyperkommunikation.ch/bibliothek/crashkurse/crashkurs_systemtheorie/ckst_einleitung.htm, (accessed 2005-12-07)

London - as a gateway between water and land

2009-05-28T03:23:00.000-07:00

London - as a gateway between water and land - A moving element combined with a static settlement

History essay,
UCL, the Bartlett school of architecture,
MSc Urban Design, UD 02.05,
Urban Evolution - the Thames Gateway
Fabian Neuhaus 2005-12-09

Introduction
There are different reasons to bring a city into being. Some are brought into existence by the will of individuals or political expedience, some are related to special universe and star constellations. London, however, is the outstanding example of a city which is so favoured by position and circumstances that so long as commerce and industry endure it must continue to be great centre of activity and trade (Port of London Authority, The history of the Port of London, Page 1).
A static structure for an urban settlement accomplishes the Thames as a neverending stream of water with constant changing in its nature. To elements that get into a powerful symbiosis, as a base for a world-class city.

The site - a geological explanation
It starts a long from bringing goods from one place to an other. Humans practice this forever. Trough the Romans who brought the „over sea“ more „over canal“ trade into live, it became important to distribute goods from the south ports all over UK. To this action the Thames was a barrier.
The Thames was a barrier not because of its width, but because of the instability of its fl anking marshes (Wooldridge + East: The geography of the Port of London, Page 23). The river today is a relatively narrow stream. In prehistoric days it used to be broader without clear borders. The water stream turned into shallow water and marshes smoothly. A long the Thames where only a few possibilities to establish a durable crossing. The lowest possibility was in London close to the present London Bridge. To bring many goods from one place to another it was easier and cheaper to use a boat for. Trough the tide the Thames could be easily used in both directions upwards and downwards.
To allow long shipping distances, the port had to be as far upstream a possible, according to the tidal limit. But for the shipping a bridge is a barrier where you can’t pass with larger boats. A balance between water and road had to be found.
London in this sense seems to be best achieved at the current site of London.

The settlement - a symbiosis on land and water
The construction of an early bridge across the river the spans would be very narrow. This means that the larger ships, used for the canal crossing, could not pass trough any more. The distribution upwards along the Thames needed to be carried out trough smaller or different boats. Close to the bridge a transshipment process needed to take place. A port was brought in to place. The bridge served the settlement, the settlement protected the bridge. The Port supported the trade across the bridge and was served by the settlement.
These three elements cam into a spin where they could support each other but also highly depended on each other.
Out of the constant fl ow of the water, the settlement created an other fl ow. The fl ow of goods and trade.

Growth around the new business - fl ow makes a living
The town development of London around the 14th century was still on a lower level. It was clearly orientated to the river with the backside to its protecting wall. Also the wealth distribution shows a centric image. The rich areas are in the heart and on the waterfront of the settlement.
In all the great developments that took place till the Elizabethan times, London took the lead over the ports of the country. This is shown by the fact that at this time half the Customs revenue was collected in London; Southampton contributed 9 per cent; Newcastle 5 per cent; Bristol 3 per cent. Liverpool and Cardiff had not then become into prominence as ports (Port of London Authority, The history of the Port of London, Page 4).
The plague of 1665 temporarily straggled the trade of the Port and the Great Fire of the following year destroyed practically the whole of the existing wharf and warehouse accommodation. The reconstruction was partially paid trough a tax on goods brought into the Port. Up to the time of the Fire, London straggled along the waterside, the river being the main highway for passengers and goods and the limits of the city being in easy reach of the waterside. The streets were narrow, ill paved and of little use for traffic.
Along with the rising business of the trading exploded the amount of inhabitants in London. Till 1700 the population grew up to half a million inhabitants. It had become a major metropolis with almost ten per cent of the English population.
The resultant pressure on housing in the already overcrowded medieval city necessitated massive building outwards into the suburbs. Much of this city growth fell out of the existing city walls. The pressure on existing housing which this created resulted in the appearance of a new generation of buildings and alleys which spread over a wide area of former fi elds to the east of the City, fanning out from the ribbon-developments which already fl anked the approach roads into London, mostly towards the east, the East-End was born.
In the west a growth limit was set up. This prevented the area from unstructured growing and lead to spacious squares fl anked by elegant houses for gentlemen and aristocrats. The East End on the other hand was fast becoming a mixture of houses and small industrial concerns. These industries fl ourished outside the city because of several factors: the low cost of rents; the exclusion of certain trades from practising within the walls; the failure of the city authorities to control the industries springing up in these areas; and really important because of its relation to the activities at the port.
The East and West End was emerging which was to have profound long-term consequences on the geography of London - government and service industries were based to the west of the city, fi nancial service were located in the City itself, and manufacturing spread out to the east (Hough Clout ed. The Times: History of London, page 55).
In the days of the 17th century the trade doubled its value every 20-25 years. Trade became a „big“ business. But the infrastructure wasn’t able to handle this rising amount of goods. It laid exposed to the weather and thieves for weeks. It took years to catch up by the built infrastructure to the growing of the trade business. The catch up was managed by building wet docks into the marshes. Out of several institutions and owners grew several different docks and with this ports along the river.
Pushing out the former essentials - expansion place is needed [over write the starting places - pushing the business down the river] The new docks and warehouses were constructed on sites in east London. Several reasons leaded to this. On of them is the river crossing it self. With the amount of goods, the ships grew in size and needed deeper canals and wider streams. They weren‘t able to pass the London bridges. It was easier to unload and load them on the east side of London. With this development the differentiation between East and West London tied up. The East side got deep into this dock and ship working with accomplished industry and smaller concerns. While on the west side the richer people didn‘t want to get down to the dock workers. But still got the money from there.
The port with its trade has always been accomplished with industry. There where the imported goods used as raw material or where goods for the export produced. During the 20th century the Thames in London and further down accommodated the following industries with direct relation to the water as a transport route: Public utilities such as power stations for electricity, gas, oil, coal and fuel; cement works; Paper mills. The need of the industry changed and with the growing size of the transported goods grew the transporting ships. Now it was the river that couldn‘t handle any more the size and the amount of the incoming ships.
Together with the new needed space for larger amount of goods, more industry, larger ships and the inner pressure to the city development by rapid inhabitant growing the port industry was moved slowly further east out of the inner city. London then lost its direct relation to its once highly important moving element.
At the moment there is a planning process on the way for a new port on the site of the old shell haven close to Southend on sea. This is maybe the latest point on the Thames before the sea.

Bringing live back to the water - ideas, but solutions? [Re-discovering the old waterfront - get back in touch with the moving element]
As the Thames‘ economic importance has declined, Londoners now slowly rediscover the river as an amenity, as a visual theme and a place to visit. The Port of London Authority (PLA) identifi ed in the mid 1990 over 250 access points to the foreshore on London - stairways and slip ways - a legacy from previous eras when the Thames was London’s principal thoroughfare (Greater London Assembly, John Biggs AM, Access to the Thames, Page 3). But hardly any of them were accessible to public.
The brown fi elds and former industrial areas of the inner city are now turned into housing and shopping facilities. It became „chic“ to live in old warehouses or industrial buildings and have a loft. Of course with the great view on to the moving strip of endless water.
The closed industrial river shores turn into closed private housing grounds. The main moving element of the city stays buried under private interests. But after movements of the trade and industry have been pushed down the river, a new moving element discovers the water, the tourism. The city now makes a good living from travellers and guests. But they, as well as the Londoners, want to get in touch with the romantic side of the water. They ask for public access to the river shore.
London has to establish a new gateway between water and land. The National Thames Trail is only one project.

Conclusions - what remains - these facts will carry on [It‘s history makes London the way it is]
The East West differentiation in this world city is as we now see strongly related to its economy and business. Impacts from the geographical and geological perspective over to the development along the docks and ports to the complicate structure of the society were many factors working on the establishment of this separation. It remains as a historical gift whit that London will have to go along in the future.
London is diffi cult to describe. More than once was the question asked whether it is really a city or just a bunch of villages grown together. How can this agglomeration of villages be described, and further more how can this be a world-class city. The same questions can be asked on the port. It is really hard to point out „the London Port“. There is the Port of London Authority, which cam out of many different docks, ports and ownership, but only as an institution. The port it self has no constant appearance, nor has it continuous form. The more is it a theoretical construction trough the institution of the P.L.A. Maybe so is London to understand as a construction to circumscribe an urban conglomerate of former villages.

Bibliography

S.W. Wooldridge, W.G. East: The geography of the port of London, (London: Hutchinson University Library, 1957)

Maurice Ash: A Guide to the Structure of London, (Bath: Adams and Dart, 1972)

Port of London Authority: The history of The Port of London - up to the advent of the Port of London Authority - Working for the Tidal Thames from Teddington to the Sea, London: 1993

Hough Clout ed. The Times: History of London, Times Books, London, 1999

John Pudney, London’s Docks, Thames and Hudson, London, 1975

Britania express, London History, http://www.britainexpress.com/London/anglo-saxon-london.htm {accessed 2005-12-04)

London Bridge Museum, education trust, http://www.oldlondonbridge.com/saxonnorman.shtml (accessed 2005-12-06)

City Farmer, Canada‘s Offi ce of Urban Agriculture, http://www.cityfarmer.org/, (acessed 2005-12-06)

East London History, http://www.eastlondonhistory.com/, (accessed 2005-12-02)

wikipedia online, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London, (accessed 2005-12-03)

Bibliography

2009-05-28T02:48:00.000-07:00

BOOKS
-
Liberto Andreotti, Xavier Costa - editors, Theory of the dérive and other situationist’s writings on the city, ACTAR Barcelona, 1996

Donald Appleyard, Kevin Lynch and John Myer, The view from the road, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cabridge, 1964

Walter Buckley, sociology and modern systems theory, Prentice-Hall, New Jersey, 1967

Sophie Call, m‘as-tu vue, Centre Pompidou, 2004

Sophie Call, Exquisite pain, Thames & Hudson, 2005

Sophie Call and Jean Baudrillard, Suite Venitienne/Please Follow Me, Bay Press, 1988

Fritjof Capra, The web of Life - a new Synthesis of Mind and Matter, London, Flamingo, 1997

F. Stuart Chapins Jr., Human activity patterns in the city - Things that people do in time and space, John Wiley & sons, London, 1974

Michael Hebbert, London, John Wiley & Sons, Chichester, 1998

Frank Coffi eld, Vandalism & Graffi ti - the state of art, Calouste Gulberkian Foundation, London, 1991

Merlin Coverley, Psychogeography, Pocket Essentials, Herts, 2006

Mark Crinson, Urban Memory - History and amnesia in the modern city, Routledge London, 2005

Paul du Gay, Jessica Evans and Peter Redman, Identity: a reader, Sage Publications, London, 2000

Peter Hall and Ulrich Pfeiffer, urban future 21, E and FN Spon London, 2000

Bill Hillier, Julienne Hanson, The social logic of space,

Kevin Kelly, Out of Control, Basic Books, 1994 Cj Lim, Ed Liu, Realms of impossibility: ground, Wiley-Academy, Chinchester, 2002

Cj Lim, Ed Liu, Realms of impossibility: water, Wiley-Academy, Chinchester, 2002

Cj Lim, Ed Liu, Realms of impossibility: air, Wiley-Academy, Chinchester, 2002

Kevin Lynch, The image of the city, The MIT Press Cambridge, 1960

Kevin Lynch, What Time is this Place, The MIT Press Cambridge, 1972

William Mitchell, e-topia, Urban life Jim - but not as we know it, The MIT press London, second printing 2000

Anika Mittal, Juergen Haepp, Fabian Neuhaus, AKA the book, Portfolio UD 2006

Saskia Sassen, the global city: New York, London, Tokyo, Princeton University Press London, 2001

Richard Sennett, the use of disorder - personal identity and city life, The Penguin Press, London, 1971

Kian Tajbakhsh, the promise of the city - space, identity, and politics in contemporary social thought, University of California Press, London, 2001

MAGAZINES
-
Reto Durrer, An den Grenzen der Standardisierung, Archithese, nr. 4, 2006, p. 34-39

Ludger Hoverstadt, Strategien zur Ueberwindung des Rasters, Archithese, nr. 4, 2006, p. 76-84

Anne Cronin, Urban Advertising: a Machine for Thinking?, Urban Design, winter 2006, issue 97, p.10-11

WEBSITES
-
AKA fl oating city, www.jafud.com, Anika Mittal, Juergen Haepp, Fabian Neuhaus, UD 2006

Live Cycle Assesement, http://www.gdrc.org/uem/lca/lca-defi ne.html, Accessed 060718

Wikipedia - the free enziklopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page, accessed 060718/

Conclusion

2009-05-28T02:28:00.000-07:00

I would like to summarize the previous 10’000 words. Not by repeating it, but by bringing together the result of the work on this report. To take it ahead I really enjoyed working on this subject and found very interesting aspects along the path that I think could inform the project work. But now fi st some facts about the work.

The project
The project is closely related to the previous stage of AKA. Many elements are reused and therefore establish continuity.
There is no doubt that the cAKA part does not answer the remaining questions on the project of a fl oating city. It remains an utopic project but more and more realistic explanations are introduced. Especially the cycles bring in much more sense of live and activity. It brings somehow an understanding for the structure beyond the physical elements. This was actually what I was interested in from the beginning. To look at these mechanisms that drive fl ows and trough this form an environment.
The cycles therefore are a perfect tool to use in a development. It provided me with a new set of criteria to take decisions and strengthen the chain of arguments on how something is proposed like it is.
Still, the project is a huge collection of ideas that kind of feed into one proposal. Most of them have actually real sources like the new airport, which for already proposals in a similar way exist or are worked on. Or the fact that there is lots of fl oating structures to be reused, especially in the future as all the gas and oil rigs run out of natural recourses. There are also some elements that are newly introduced in the cAKA part like the cyclical seasonal exchange of units between the Thames River in winter and the Thames Estuary in summer. The weekly and daily cycles bring the structure to live. Most of it is quit trivial but essential, to sense how this theoretical proposal could gain live and move towards reality.
I think the aspect of the introduced cycles in the three scales yearly, weekly and daily give some kind of overall input. There could be some more detail work on the cyclical aspect to bring up even more details and a sense of how live there actually could be. It would be interesting to go into more detail again on a personal scale of different inhabitants for example.
But in general I found the input of the research work very helpful. It brought in a different perspective and it was fun again to work further on the same project with the new focus.

The research
It is the main part of the report that is occupied by the research work and its translation into this report.
The decision to look at my personal cycles along my activities was, seen from now, maybe a bit too strong and coloured the report and the writing in general with a strong subjective opinion.
Probably there are some more objective elements left out because of that, but in an overall picture I still think that this focus from the beginning helped to step into the subject and discover it from the bottom up.
I would love to go on now, considering a more objective focus and look into details of the proposed topics of orientation, identity and memory. Or search for more effects in the terms of points and repetition.
The big picture of how the cycles actually are or could work together is only partially covered by the proposal. There could be some more theoretical aspect be needed to see into more aspects of how cycles actually interact.
So lots of missing elements and areas to do some further research. But this does not mean that I am not satisfi ed with the work that is now in this book. I am quite happy with the output. It also opened my eyes differently to see my surrounding here in London. Despite the fact that I have, as it looks like, this boring routine of every day the same route, I discover always new things or see elements differently. To pay attention to my daily routine shows my activities in a new way and adds a lot to my experience of London. I can also take a lot from it personally.

Tool
The cycles are in the proposal mainly used as a tool to work but also as generators for the project. I found this very useful and can imagine using it in further works. To fi x certain aspects that are repeating means also, to have some constant elements that are supporting every other element and this helps to build up a story.
Maybe the stories around the cycles are almost buried at the moment beneath facts and explanations around structures and functions of Clock Bank. The by product kind of took over from the initial starting point. But to some extend this makes sense as the project gains more independence and is not just a transformation of the research.
On the other hand to degrade the research work to a tool can be understood wrong. And it can be seen as not enough translation into a proposal. I think it has to be seen as I present it in the report: two parts that form a whole and inform each other in the order they are undertaken. Therefore both have their independence but have infl uenced another.
To some extend I can even think of further use of the cycle term in planning as a tool. It could be used in case studies and scenario developments.
Specially in scenario development where programs are dealing with many unknown aspects cycles could bring in more or less predictable key points to any future plans. Just as a short introduction scenario planning is about projecting different images of a situation into the future. By comparing them one can get a feeling of which way to go and what kind of consequences this might have. But like all foresee techniques, the further it goes into the future the more blurry the picture becomes.
It was developed, like many things, by the military in the late 19th century and had it high time somewhere between the second world war and the sixties. In the last twenty years there where many computer based models developed. Many different work types are using such techniques. Insurance companies, banks, analysts, but also scientists in research - for example environmental [very detailed models exist around the global warming] and of course planning in spacial terms have integrated such tools in their work..
Many scenario planning strategies rely on predicting the current trend as on scenario, but I can imagine a scenario predicted by different cycles, also taken from the current situation, could be much more accurate. Combined with some planned actions and maybe predicted happenings, cycles could provide very detailed pictures even in midterm future.
Obviously there is one point that is not discussed in this report, the special event - the accident - the lucky number and this one will still be crucial in scenario planning.
But never the less, it is not about getting any scenario right or wrong, it is about getting trough different scenarios a picture of what actually to achieve. It is more about building up an idea and communicate a path along it.
Cycles are actually as mentioned earlier in the research part of this report very similar to computer programs. They have a rather simple script but a huge effect. So they could be implemented into a program easily and run trough out any process and highlight different key locations.
For these key locations the introduced terms meeting points, repetition, time, orientation, identity and memory could set up a fi eld of parameters along them indicators can be developed or even taken as an output.
Maybe it is just an extension pack for Sim City.

Personal
There is not much left to say as the whole report is written on a very personal level. Sometimes this is too much and a more objectivity would help the work, but on other parts this triviality brings up exiting aspects. It probably doesn’t fi t for a scientifi c paper, but for a story about cycles for me it matches.
This report is the last work in a series undertaken during the Urban Design course at the Bartlett School of Architecture in 2005/2006. I think it kind of summarizes all the topics that came up during the year, ether in the very beginning with the patchwork city work about how to fold a city, or during the heterotopia week with Dr. Graham Shane and of course during the AKA project with endless hours of discussions around mobility and process. The course was a whole was very intensive in a positive way and for me a could gain a lot for my future work.
I guess I could get used to live in London...

About cAKA

2009-05-28T01:47:00.000-07:00

cAKA is not a second edition of AKA. It is a further development with a special focus on how the cycles act in this environment. In the zoom is the area of Clock Bank. As on of the centre areas of the whole development it is a key point.
The cycle informs the project in three different time scales. It is on a yearly, weekly and daily level that cycles are looked at. The different topics orientation, identity, memory, time, points, repetition as introduced before will be used to explain how the cycles act in the development.
It is no longer such a clear separation between these introduced categories of cycles. They overlap a lot and sometimes merge totally.

>AKA diagram with the three cycles in three different scales. First line: yearly cycle with two sales in spring and autumn, showing the growing and shrinking during 365 days.
Second line: Crawler - weekly cycle of supply.
Third line: AKA diagram. Fourth line: Daily cycle of the tide with changing density.

About AKA

2009-05-28T01:37:00.000-07:00

But first of all a short introduction to the project. AKA is actually called Arkway and means a fl oating city. It is developed under the program for expansion of London along the Thames in the Thames Gateway in the urban design course at the Bartlett 2005/2006. The project is located in the Thames Estuary between the cities of Southend on sea, Canvey, Sheppy.
Different ideas led to the development of a floating city, but the main one was mobility. It was the aim of creating a structure that is fl exible to changing needs of inhabitants and is able to deal with different impacts in relatively short time. The fact of being floating on water supports this.

The proposal includes three major elements; the fi rst one is a new airport for the region of London, AKA international. As it is offshore, there are fewer impacts on housing areas; therefore operating hours can be expanded to a 24 service. Second a new large offshore port that fi nally brings together the many different ports of London provides deep water access - also for the next generation of super large container carrier - and serves the whole UK but also acts a major distribution point for the North Sea. Third is a whole new heavy industry. It is about recycling and reusing old fl oating structures in order to build the structures of the floating city itself, but also to produce and export large scale products in the field of renewable energy such as windmills. The provided flexibility and easy access to distribution is a big benefit. The project has its own web site. Visit www.jafud.com and get more detailed information by surfing trough the pool of information.
In the portfolio, AKA the book, order-nomadscycles, the work on AKA was already concluded. There where already many cycles introduced and on path is entirely about cycles. This is where this report grew out. But I would like to introduce a few key cycles the earlier project already talks about.

Water flow - Landscape
The main environmental element on the site in connection with water are the different fl ows. In the Thames Estuary we have to deal with two different types.
The Thames as a river stream that constantly brings water down to the sea. The other one is the tide that is coming on from the north sea. The two overlap and this impact is even in London very present.
In a second step these streams have an effect on the actual site in both environmental and physical terms. Especially the sandbanks in the Thames mouth are formed by these streams. They change over time and shift their location. This underwater landscape forms different channels and islands that guides the navigation trough out the area .

Adjust the timetable - Living with [by] forces The effect of the tide schedule on the individual schedule of the inhabitants in the tide area is quite strong. But this connection to a ‘higher’ force would be quite reliable. In this example, a fi sherman has to wait to earn a living due to a gap in the work schedule. From today’s point of view, it looks a bit nostalgic to be connected to such a plan [is maybe what we thought to be overcome by technology].
In connection to the profession of the fisherman, this is also about making a living from nature. His work place is on sea. It is about getting food to survive- Survival in all senses [Anika Mittal, Juergen Haepp, Fabian Neuhaus, AKA the book, cycle path, fan June 2006, Portfolio UD 2006|.

Blacktail - The gate to the seven seas
Most goods of the world trade are transported on water. They are shipped from one port to the next one and travel all around the globe.
The UK need of goods is still rising and therefore a major port is needed. In history, the ports of London have once been the biggest in the world. This was during the high time of the colonies. Since then, the port activities have declined and the ports moved out along the Thames due to different circumstances.
This new port is laid out as an off-shore solution to offer access to even the next generation of super containers ships without expensively digging out the Thames channels.
To save time, the big containers ships do not need to moor, they get unloaded and loaded during their journey into the Thames mouth. These smaller pontoons bring the goods or containers back to the edge of the tidal zone where they are stored or transferred to the rail [Anika Mittal, Juergen Haepp, Fabian Neuhaus, AKA the book, cycle path, fan June 2006, Portfolio UD 2006|.
The new port also acts as a major economical factor for the AKA development. It provides a starting point but also huge investments to get such a development going. For the area this can grow to a source of work place provider.
To handle this big loads of goods such a infrastructure would have a 24h activity cycle, with working in three shifts. The same applies to the AKA international airport and probably to the heavy industry. These three big work place providers would generate a activity cycle regarding the work that is in a overall view 24hs. On a individual perspective this varies between the three different shifts. For a majority of the inhabitants this means that their work cycle is different from normal offi ce hours. Even if they are not directly employed by on of the three, there is a big impact on second and third party work places.
Compared to the earlier research work [part one, activity cycle] where the cycle of the working hours with morning and afternoon rush hour, this around the clock, three shift work could cause three rush hours.

Offshore industry fields
For oil drilling, the time is running out. For the North sea area, the forecast is around thirty years to go, but then this place will be out of black gold.
At the moment, there are around 350 oil and gas rigs located only in the North sea. But what to do with these really big steel structures if their time is up?
AKA could develop a need for existing oil structures and set up a reuse cycle to transfer them into for the development usable units. Once transformed, they could host living, working or retail or they can be used as fl oating support structures.
This reuse process could be opened up for all different sorts of fl oating structures such as oil tankers and container ships.
This transformation process would mean heavy industry work and lot of waste and hazardous material would be involved. But the steel structure itself can be reused and brought back into a sustainable cycle [Anika Mittal, Juergen Haepp, Fabian Neuhaus, AKA the book, cycle path, fan June 2006, Portfolio UD 2006|.

Process network
AKA as a city is built of fl oating singular units. They cluster at some places and attach to each other. This network then provides walkable surface for people but also allows the units to communicate. They can exchange informations and the system as a whole knows about its confi guration and shape.
Every unit has needs, but can also provide something. Over the network these informations can be exchanged and the network it self can reconfi gure accordingly.
This applies for example to energy consumption and production. Parts of the development that a more exposed to natural forces can produce more energy trough wind, wave and sun than more sheltered units. The system is trough the network able to distribute this energy to places where it is needed.
By using the repetition of the cycles the system can learn and adjust it self to changing impacts and conditions. As explored in part one the repetition provides the possibility of feedback that inform the system about ongoing processes.

Multiple use
Multiple uses of spaces can be a solution for lack of space. Certain spaces that are not used during a particular time in a day or a week are occupied by other functions. To manage these gabs cycles have to squeeze into and adjust to other cycles.

>>Next four pages: site pictures

PART TWO - cAKA

2009-05-28T01:29:00.000-07:00

With this background of research work on cycles trough my observations in the city of London I go back to the AKA project and apply certain new aspects. It is on one hand a tool to develop a project but on the other hand it is also kind of a test run to see what certain aspects of cycles as described before really mean in a urban environment and whether the interpretation is useful.

Abstract

2008-11-27T08:20:00.000-08:00

This report explores the appearance and impact of cycles in the urban surrounding and in a second stage their potential for an urban proposition. Cycles appear in any part of live. Examples can be found in time, economics, environment ... and can be seasons, day, technology, events, life cycle, but also particular happenings like rush hour or basic needs such as eating and sleeping. Cycles appear trough a wide range of scales and often without referring to them. They appear out of subsystems evolving over time and generations. The speciality of cycles is the fact that they are closed systems in terms of their repetition. Each cycle repeats itself along its script. This applies a particular rhythm to urban life. But as they are not synchronized they interfere/overlap/top/disturb/... one another. This can be the source of movement and action in urban life. A very abstract picture for this could be a clockwork - of course, here all the different wheels are highly working together for one goal - but maybe cycles in a system are doing this too, just in a different sense, in the sense that the urban system adapts to it. The fi rst part of the report is about research work carried out during the month of July 2006. I observed my personal interaction with the city in terms of different cycles in order to explore different types and their impact. The second part translates different conclusions from the research work onto a proposal based in the Thames Estuary. This work builds up on the AKA project developed by Anika Mittal, Juergen Haepp and myself earlier during the Urban Design Course at the Bartlett School of Architecture. The previous AKA project is taken as a base to test the potential of cycles for a new proposal named as cAKA. The new proposal builds on the ideas of the fl oating city in the Thames Estuary as a new development for the growth of London in the Thames Gateway. It is not the aim of the cAKA proposal to answer all the remained questions on the earlier project, but to densify certain aspects of cycles within an environment of a proposal. The research work therefore acts as a fund of many new aspects to be looked at in this very special environment of an urban development on water.

Keywords
Cycle, Cycles, Rhythm, System, Urban system, Arkway [AKA], Thames Estuary, Clockbank

Word count
About 14’300 without bibliography and addendum.

Content

2008-11-12T08:21:00.001-08:00

Abstract 1
INTRO c
On cycles 6
PART ONE - research
What is a cycle 12
Cycle examples 12
Introduction theory 14
Examples 24
Cycle elements 32
Cycle effects 36
PART TWO - cAKA
About AKA 50
About cAKA 68
Seasons - the Yearly cycle 70
Supply Unit - the weekly cycle 76
Tidal Changes - the daily cycle 78
Clock Bank 84
CBshell 104
CBmiddle 108
CBstage 118
CBcanveypoint 122
Conclusion 128
Bibliography 132
ADDENDUM
Addendum 01 136
Addendum 02 142
Addendum 03 148
Addendum 04 156

INTRO c - On cycles

2008-11-12T08:21:00.000-08:00

Changes and recurrence are the sense of being alive - things gone by, death to come, and present awareness. The world around us, so much of it our own creation, shifts continually and often bewilders us. We reach out to that world to preserve or to change it, and so to make visible our desire. The arguments of planning all come down to the management of change [Kevin Lynch, What Time is this Place, p 01].
This short research work aims to explore the impact of different cycles on the urban environment of a city. The more I try to search for cycles in my surrounding, the more I see all actions going in cyclical operations. It seems to me as if the city life is kind of programmed along these patterns of repeated actions in daily routines. Due to their repetitive pattern it can be easily compared with a computer program that just repeats its commands along a defi ned string of codes. But for me, cycles in real life seem to be more, more fl exible, more adaptive and more playful.
The fi rst picture I had in mind of cycles in the city was the mechanical clockwork like the ones used in analogue watches. But the further I develop this research and later the transformation into the project, I realize how deeply the cycles are connected to actual urban life. And this life is probably the essential element of the city, the one thing that makes any environment lovely, enjoyable and familiar. In one of my earlier essays in this course, I wrote on system theory. I thought of the city as a system in relation to the system theory that evolved from Bertanalffy‘s work on natural systems [Bertanalffy, 1968]. I looked at this theory of systems and subsystems and how they are constituted out of elements, how they defi ne their dynamic borders through relations between themselves. „The whole is more than the sum of its parts“ [Aristotle, in the Metaphysics].
I can imagine cycles to be a element in this picture of a system. It could be the element that brings in a third aspect, the aspect of movement. This can be all different kinds of movement - pedestrian movement or material fl ows; or on an abstract level just the representation of life and time. Besides movement, the cycles introduce a tool of constant feedback inputs through repetition. On this basis the system can take decisions and deal with changing environments and different impacts.
This developed brought about a second picture of how to look at the city.
In the following I would like to introduce, how the idea of looking at cycles evolved from. The AKA project of a fl oating city in the Thames Estuary, developed in a group with Anika Mittal, Juergen Haepp and myself earlier this course, talked about a lot of different things like reconfi guration, process and self organisation. But the main topic from the beginning was mobility and movement. We had the picture of total mobility that would become possible on this water-based site in the Thames Estuary. In our case, the city is able to adapt its physical confi guration to needs and changes in a short period of time. So it was always and is still the question of how do people move and how does the city confi gure. The second main element of the AKA project was the fact that living on water creates a totally different environment. Mainly the connection to nature is different as one is exposed to the natural forces and can feel the constant move of the waves on the fl oating boat or platform.
These two elements, the natural forces that appear in cycles, and the movement pattern led to this research work on cycles. I found I could integrate the two in this one topic due to their similar behaviours in terms of repetition and permanence.

I will explore in the second part of this report the question of whether these cycles can be taken as a constant factor and therefore as an element guiding the design, or whether it is a design element itself and part of the design. This part fi nally brings a cyclical structure back into an urban environment. It is a trial on how the research on cycles can inform a design work. Here I tried to work out cycles with the main focus on how they interact with the proposal. The previous project AKA acts as a base to run the trials. This second work is not intended to be a direct further development of the project as such. It therefore has not the aim to answer all the remaining questions on the AKA project. But the special focus on cycles within this environment could lead to new ideas and give other sets of inputs and maybe clarify or densify certain singular aspects.

About my personal cycles
I choose to observe my own daily activities over a period of time to get into the cycle topic in more detail in the sense of scale. These records are on a very personal level integrated into the urban environment. I wanted to look at the very normal and maybe trivial things. I do not know whether these records can be labelled as some kind of average daily activities but they are certainly not exotic. Not only my personal activities are subject to research, also the activities of other people‘s live and moves around the city, are part of these records. There is no time I am not crossing anyone else‘s path.
These crossings are here of much importance. They tell stories about interactions and intersections of cycles. The crossings just in time, in the sense of clashing into one another, are usually avoided. But these crossings can still be traced after a while, they do not necessarily need to be on time. For the research work I therefore started a collection of lost or left behind objects, where each of them tells a story about someone else‘s path I just crossed. To extend my records I traced my route in the city on a daily basis with a gps device. The data set maps my spatial activities and tell the story of my personal interaction with the city environment.
How my day structures are - a short story. I live in some kind of family household with tree members: Malik, age 20 month, Sandra, age 27 and me, age 26. We try to coordinate three very different activities with a clear structure. We fi nd very helpful to have a quite strong rhythm to orientate and give security to our lives. The structure is based on a rhythm to best meet all the needs of the three of us. Malik, Sandra and I, all have different perceptions and needs. With this rhythm we are able to give enough stability to allow each of us to change positions, take some time off and come back into the family structure.
Malik with his 20 month of age needs far more rest and recovery time. This gives some kind of basic elements in the daily structure. Basically this is: breakfast, a snack at around ten, a nap of between two to three hours at noon, lunch, an afternoon snack around four, dinner and then going to bed after seven. During the morning and afternoon units either Sandra or I take care of Malik. Usually the other one can go to work or school. There is a third unit added on, in the evening wile Malik is a sleep, which is mainly used to work. On a weekly basis we have fi ve days of work/ school activities. Malik goes to the nursery two full days a week. Two days of activities for all three of us at the weekend provide some family time. On Saturdays we have one fi xed family activity, the weekly food shopping, and the rest we plan day by day on the basis of what we are up to.

This is a raw structure which, of course, is adapted to the everyday changes of our lives and the changing tasks of urban live. This can be seen as a list of personal cycles that structure my activities. Some of them are imposed from outside sources and others are created by the three of us as our personal layout of living together. This simple example already shows the complexity of cycles and how different factors are involved. Cycles do not appear isolated they are integrates in a highly interconnected system. Nothing is experienced by itself, but always in relation to its surroundings, the sequences of events leading up to it, the memory of the past experiences [Kevin Lynch, The image of the city, p. 1]