SUMMARY

This semester learning how to analyse the city has been extremely  interesting for me and I have learnt a lot over the past 13 weeks. I think I see the cities especially Brisbane, in a totally different way then before. Having learnt how to investigate the city from the point of people and also in the architecture element I think it is very relevant in today's world where design needs to give something back to the city and the people of that city. Working through the lectures and the tutorials and understanding how a city works is a skill that I will use in future projects. I think the main element that should be looked at when designing a building is the wider scope of the urban environment and how this building i am design will be influenced by the surrounds or if it will influence the urban environment. Every element in the city comes together to form the city so each element is important. Before this unit I only looked at sun patterns, wind direction and could not really anaylse an urban envirnoment. After the 13 weeks I am able to create maps and produce diagrams that critically analyse the surrounding envirnoment and allow others as well as myself to get a better understanding of how the space (city) works. I  also think the online discussion was a fundamental learning source for this unit as it allowed us to see what other people thought on the topics and also provided feedback on our projects.

Looking back on the first week 1 reflection activty now I think the casino does not fit into the urban environment in which it is situated for obvious reasons such as the materialistic qualities, scale and the untraditional geometry. I think this building definetly influences the surrounding urban envirnoment it, when looking at the site plan I can see how it does not restrict movement in the space but rather directs it. Also the way the building steps up in heights could be used to reflect the change in building heights of the buildings heights around it as they go up the slope toward the mountain. It also looks like the traditional window styles has been incorporated into the facade of the building.

WEEK 12

Presentation and model:

 

Final model of the Moreton View Bay Tower and Villas. All laser cut out of acrylic. The model fitted onto the existing block and blended in with the surroundings. Analysing the building and applying the concepts learnt throughout the semester allowed me to see how this building influenced the surrounding urban environment and how the building is influenced by the city.

 

Final panel applying the concepts learnt throughout the semester to the building. I looked at how the building sits in the surrounding urban environment and how the coty influences the building.

WEEK 11

Pr Peter Richards talked in the lecture today about "Urbanism." Some key questions he highlighted was, what is the purpose of making buildings, what should the buildings look like, what need for immediate users and possible future users.

........if architecture is for people the artifact of people must be the city.

how will the building suit the users in the future?

an example in Brisbane of a building that has adapted from its past use to suit the needs of the current users is the Brisbane Power House. Once used as a building to generate power it is now a building that offers an array of performing arts, visual arts, festivals and free community events.

http://www.brisbanepowerhouse.org/

 Peter explored the relationship that the building has with the surrounding context something which i found relevant to my project on the Moreton View Towers and Villas. How does this building respond to the surrounding context?

The integration of the natural environment seems to be a key feature in the building with plants being used to create a sort of barrier between the inside and outside. Fits in with the surrounding park areas. Every floor has outdoor balconies which is ideal in the Queensland environment where natural ventilation and sunlight is key in all designs.

The key points Peter explored that were key to urbanism were;

• WALKABILTY- the first pre-requiste for urbanism
• DIVERSITY- a rich mix of activities
• PROXIMITY- the rich mix within easy distances 5min or 400m
• CONNECTIVITY- activities are connected to each other for walking, cycling, bus or train etc
• ACCESSIBILITY- something to walk on, choices of routes, permeability
• LEGIBILITY- easily finding your way around
• COMMUNITY- experiencing the life of communities on your journeys

Urban design anaylisis of a good urban place-

• paths
• edges
• nodes
• landmarks
• districts

Applying this points which were from Kevin Lynnches book to the area around Moreton Bay Tower and Villas. I generated the following sketches.

Some floor plans of the building i use to generate the laser cut model. The layout of the rooms is ver linear and balconies are positioned to recieve sunlight from the north and south.

WEEK 10

This week the lecture consisted of three topics: Eco Cities, Parkour and Architecture and The Future of Cities. I think the future is very much directed at the sustrainabilty side of architecture however many of the sustainable design seem to use very expensive methods of construction which are not economical viable at this stage which is the main reason I believe why designers tend to stay away from this however there are more simple ways to achieve a sustainable design.

http://www.trendir.com/house-design/desert-home-sustainable-house-design-1.jpg

This is an example I have looked at before in a previous assignment on sustainabilty in architecture. In eco cities i think it is important to go back to the basic's of what it means to be sustainable before looking at highly complex systems.

Also the TED talk 'How food shapes our cities' by Carolyn Steel was very interesting, outlining the transformation of agricultural functions into industrialised functions in cities. This shows how cities have been disconnected from nature and how humans have took control of natural landscapes and create their own 'utopia'. Personally, this talk was bias without taking any considerations of how over time population increases causing many more demands in not only food, but also other industrial and economic necessities. This is how cities grow and evolve.

Week 09

Todays lecture was on cities and memories and we looked at how these memories are generated by architecture. Mirko looked at how laction, locale and sense of place all create an identity or memory of a certain place.

• Memorial- tells who i am
• Landmark- tells where i am
• Monument- telles why the city has its layout

Memory= Identity:
Everybody has memories connected to places and every place has a history. Cities and Architecture communicate memories and histories. Architecture is four dimensional where the values of a society are transmitted through architecture.

"Architecture is the physical expression of the highest human thoughts." (W.Gropius)

 

 

http://www.bauhaus.co.il/bauhaus_files/bauhaus-school10.jpg

 

Working in an urban envirnoment means dealing with society's memories, people's memories and history and heritage.

 

Australia does not have history???

 





Many people think Australia does not have history, compared to other countries such as Rome, Australia's history is not as evident. Architecture in Australia's was not used to display the history but rather the land which has shaped who we are.

Ways we can preserce the identity of our cities mentioned in the lecture was;

• single buildings can be listed and preserved
• planning and legislation can impose ties to the transformation of the urban environment in order to preserve its character

Examplars showcasing a connection with the urban environment was the paving used in the public spaces in Portugal, Madeira, China and Rio.


In the workshop for the Brisbane model group we discussed with Mirko what building we were going to build or model on and drafted a CRA sheet to be assessed against.

The feedback we got from our presentation we got was good we just needed to fix up a few minor things in the nolli and figureground map and that was it.

WEEK 08

Our final prezi presentation for Haifa.



Overall we were very happy with the work we produced. As a group i think we all worked well together and produced a high standard of work.

Our final laser cut model of Haifa. This although looks fairly simple is actually quite complex because of the topography of the site which we had to take into consideration. This was difficult to laser cut as we needed cuts outs on certain layers where buildings were sitting in the side of the hill.

WEEK 07

This week was project week, with no lecture we looked at finishing the scale model off and finalising our drawings for the final presentation. The model was finished and we decided to focus our attention onto the report. We looked over lectures and tried to apply the theories to our city and incorporate this into the report.

The street section of the main street in Haifa shows the planned formation and linear forms of the street which is a direct contrast to the other streets in Haifa which are very organic and are influenced by the surrounding Mt Carmel.

WEEK 06

In this lecture we looked at some examples of work produced by students which set the standard of work that we were to be expected to produce. The lecture was about "Around the world in 8 cities", Mirko looked at the relationships of typologies of different cities that informed those who occupy it. It was interesting in understanding the types of planning in the cities which made me start thinking about the relevance this had to our city, Haifa.

ASSIGNMENT:

 

 

 Highlighted in the figure ground map is the axis line which runs from the Shrine of the Bab down toward the port. This is the only straight or planned development in the town. Haifa is a very religious town with the population booming after the 1900's when a railway joined Haifa to the north and allowed for trade and transport to arrive from Egypt and the north. In the figureground I have decided to highlight the mountains in grey as they are a key factor in the design of the city.

The forma urbis shows the town as a very organic form. The large mountains (Mt Carmel) prevent any further development upwards. The main highway is highlighted which connects Haifa with the northern town called Acre.

 

The graph shows a mass increase in population around the 19th century which was when the German templars ruled Haifa. They linked the city by railway with Damascus and Egypt. Population grew from 4,000 to 150,000.

Old Haifa- 37BCE to 640AD

Haifa Middle Ages- 640 to 1291AD

Modern Haifa- 1761 to 1918

In 1868 the German colony arrived- first planned farming village and largest most important in Israel at the time. 30meter wide tree lined avenue on north-south axis. (Ben Gurion St)

Haifa the British Mandate period- 1918 to 1948

Some sketches of some key buildings in the area which are of significance. Buildings 1-5 are all religious buildings of the Bahai faith and are found in the gardens.

The buildings are highlighted on the map. There was no hidden spaces (eg. plaza's etc) that could be highlighted in the nolli map. All of the buildings apart from the ones highlighted were off similar build, all domestic with commercial use underneath.

Building the model of the city was very hard due to the steep gradient of the topography. Having the buildings cut into the hill and lining up each layer was crucial. This week we analyses Haifa's urban morphology. By using street view and google earth we were able to make accurate estimates of the heights of the buildings and used this to generate our map.

The information we used to generate the historical map was gathered from a wide range of online journals and books from the library which we used to estimate the urban sprawl.

WEEK 05

DESIGN OF THE CITY:

In this lecture Mirko anaylised the deisgn of the city with the key points in designing being:

• the Utopia
• Suburbia
• the View
• the Grid
• the Power

DESIGN THE UTOPIA:

from the lecture, Claude Nicolas Ledoux design layout ideas of the Royal Saltworks at Chaux

DESIGN THE SUBURBIA:

Perfect city= social theories + transport = SUBURBIA

DESIGN THE VIEW:

The introduction of the perspective, the design of towns has been riven by the visual experience for the city users. In a more modern context I found this image of a contemporary building to which displays this aspect.

http://www.trendir.com/house-design/modern-geometric-house-design-built-around-the-view-7.jpg

DESIGN THE GRID:

The grid has different characteristics in different civilizations.

• Roman grid- the grid is oriented taking into consideration the main feature of the landscape.
• Spanish grid- grid is rotated 45 degrees with respect to the north point in order to maximize the shadows in the public spaces.
• American grid- north-south layout organise the rural and urban landscape

DESIGN THE POWER:

Cities are the main stage where a society represents itself. There are 3 main components.

"a public space is for living, doing business, kissing, and playing. Its value can't be measured with economics or mathematics: it must be felt with soul."

 

ASSIGNMENT:

We began our background research into the city of Haifia and the over layout. We searched for maps of the area but had trouble findings maps that were of use. Mostly tourist maps kept showing up. We changed our search words from english into Arabic which provided us with many more maps.

خريطة المدينة



These maps were used for the historical analysis. Looking at the maps it is obvious the city/town centre was located near the ocean for commercial reasoning. Haifa being a port city and the economy directly dependant on trade and farming.

 

These maps helped us to see how the city has evovled over time. Some key buildings we found that influence the layout and how the city has changed was the Shrine of the Bab which runs on an axis down towards the port. Large garden areas surround this and is the centre for the Bahai religion.

WEEK 04

STREETS AND SQUARES THE ELEMENTS OF THE CITIES:

In this week 4 lecture various aspects that make up the city environment was discussed. These included streets, squares, canals, parks, urban facilities and mobility facilities.

STREETS:

Mirko talked about the street being more than a traffic corridor and looked at how important it is in the urban environment. The street can be seen as the boundary between the public and private spaces, its a division between areas (FIGURE 1).


FIGURE 1: BOUNDARY BETWEEN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE.

Every street has an economic and social significance (FIGURE 2). The street forms a display for the workings of the city.

FIGURE 2: http://www.touropia.com/famous-streets-in-the-world/

Wall Street is the historic heart of the financial district and the home of the New York stock exchange
 

The street is more than a traffic channel it is a complex civic institution, it is culture specific and is a host for various activities (FIGURE 4).


FIGURE 4

Mirko than talked about the street being a connecting place and the different street typologies he talked about were;

• Residential Street- Terrace house typology & Courtyard typology
• Commercial Steet- Courtyard typlogy & Tower typology
• Boulevard
• Avenue- Commerical & Residential
• Promenade
• Esplande
• Mall
• Monumental Mall

SQUARES:

"the square is where we exercise our franchise, out sense of belonging"

 

Paul Zucker's classification of urban space.

• The closed square- the space is static and self contained
• The dominated square- the space is dynamic, it is directed toward a object
• The nuclear square- space is formed around a central element
• Grouped squares- a series of spaces are connected
• The amorphous square- the space is formed by the intersection of other units

 

Joseph Stubben talks about the square having a harmony between the buildings and the square itself which can be achieved by applying symmetry or using a public building which gives character of the square. An example in the local CBD area that I find relevant to this would be the new Brisbane City Council building. The building is connected to the square where markets are usually on. It creates an atmosphere.

a public square.

 



Types of squares discussed;

• connection of different urban section
• access square
• intersection square
• monumental square
• town hall square
• grouped square- on axis, around a building & with layout
• amorphous square
• harbour square
• residential square

Other elements which form a city that were looked at were, parks, canals, urban facilities and mobility facilities.

ASSIGNMENT:

This was the first week of our assignment, we choose to go with the Mediterranean market cities and decided to go with Haifa which is located in Israel and is the second largest city. Our group consisted of 4 members, me, alana, dan and dutchey. We first sorted through the items required and divided them up inbetween the group.

Alana:

• context
• stats
• history

Me:

• forma urbis
• city pattern
• usdefull sites found (openstreetmap.org) (topomapper.com)

Dan:

• context
• historical expansion
• functions of the city

Dutchey:

• timeline
• history

WEEK 03- ANALYSIS THE CITY

HISTORICAL ANALYSIS:

The maps which were used to analysis the expansion of the Brisbane city area were from the following years, 1820, 1840, 1858, 1875, 1895, 1920 and 2013. After the 1920's no much really changed as the main city area had already been extensively developed. A key development however was the Storey Bridge which connect the north to the south and was completed in 1940. The Botanical Gardens is one area which has remained untouched over this period of time.

MOBILITY ANALYSIS:

A mobility analysis provides information on the main roads and infrastructures and clearly shows how traffic should flow through areas. They can focus solely on one method of transport, or cover everything from road vehicles, pedestrians, bus routes, railway and even water transport.

FUNCTIONAL ANALYSIS:

A functional analysis allows for an understanding of how the urban space is being used. It highlights the different land uses in the area and attempts to differentiate blocks or areas in relation to the activities that occur in those spaces (function).

URBAN MORPHOLOGY