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Rebuilding the Site

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Rebuilding the Site AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini REBUILDING THE SITE A STUDY OF RESILIENCY, SUSTAINABILITY, AND REDEVELOPMENT IN THE CONTEXT OF GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE 1 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini “From the sea to the farming was the way that we survived; [survival] was through the land.” Isle de Jean Charles resident 2 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini CONTENT 4 | Thesis Statement 5 | Abstract 6 | Introduction 8 | Situational Case Studies 18 | Precedents 22 | Essay 29 | Thesis Site 33 | Program Case Studies 40 | Thesis Program 43 | Works Cited 46 | Case Study Citations 3 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini THESIS The dynamic site creates a new set of challenges in the wake of coastal erosion and the realization of global climate change refugees. As an alternative to resettlement, architectural design will intervene to combat displacement, negotiate its cause, and resolve the inherent issues associated with place attachment and involuntary relocation at its source. 4 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini ABSTRACT Displacement has continuously plagued communities for as long as society has existed. The refugee in response to climate change creates a relatively new facet in approaching relocation of a community due to circumstances that negate self-infliction and are product of irreversible external factors. As the coastal periphery of our nation continues to sink at nauseating rates, with it takes homes, green space, agriculture, and economic practices. In addition to a drastic alteration in the way of life, an emotional phenomenon of place attachment becomes dramatically exposed as mother nature strips a community of their native geography. Though proposals to relocate can be beneficial in the mere sense of avoiding the inevitable, the need to preserve a familiar landscape creates a set of design issues of architectural mimicry placed in differing context than its original intent. Structure is designed according to contextual parameters that aim to make ease of living and circulation. One must be aware of the nostalgic built form and its competition with a new set of parameters. Especially when reliance on urbanized economical growth and networking is introduced. This thesis takes a critical look at the approach and practicality of displacement and relocation, its relationship to the new breed of global climate change refugees, and its overall necessity in an age of vast technological advances. Architectural intervention will be investigated at the root of the problem rather than by proposition of dislocating geography based culture. In order to prevent further urbanization issues in respect to sprawl and social integration, what would it take, or start to look like, to keep a population at their original disappearing settlement? The Isle de Jean Charles and the Biloxi- Chitimacha-Choctaw tribe will act as the specific case study in developing a resilient and sustainable architectural catalyst. 5 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini SCOPE | INTRODUCTION The inspiration for this thesis comes from both a place of passion for architecture and its abilities to reimagine the concepts of living and a place of responsibility for the existing geography of our planet. As the coastlines flood and our cities sink, familiar landscape will be reshaped and the problem of how to deal with this change becomes more severe with every day. The research and project are intended to analyze current strategies of dealing with displacement, sustainability and a dynamic site while proposing solutions at a case specific regional scope. The applications of these proposals are intended to exist in multiple climates with a flexibility to adapt to differing sets of contexts. In order to focus on the programmatic elements and provide example, a specific community situated on the Isle de Jean Charles along the coast of Louisiana will be researched. The Biloxi – Chitimacha – Choctaw tribe provides the ability to get a first critique and study how our society responds to anthropogenic threats in the form of coastal erosion and permanent flooding. The initial case studies will first provide background on existing proposals and different communities that suffer from these issues and the varying of application depending on different regions. Due to Louisiana’s rapid rate of land loss, the conversations and concepts proposed by local architects, engineers, and planners are comprehensive and are quickly being discussed in order to solve the problem of communities losing their land to water. This information allows a realistically scaled and plausible proposal that allows research into the specific systems needed to live in a new climate. 6 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini PROGRAMMATIC GOALS + CONSIDERATIONS In Dynamic Siting 2 EXPANSION + FLEXIBILITY Flexibility + Regeneration 2 RESILIENCY + SUSTAINIBILITY Resiliency + Sustainability 7 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini SITUATIONAL CASE STUDIES 8 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini CASE STUDY ONE THE INUPIAT PEOPLE | centuries old hunting and fishing Native American community 4 SHAKTOOLIK, ALASKA | narrow spit of sand between Tagoomenik River and the Bering Sea SCALE | 1.1 square miles | losing 1 acre / year POPULATION | 250 CULTURE | a self-sustaining agrarian community that survives through hunting and fishing, including the hunt for beluga whales in Norton Sound. Hunting expeditions are a common daily activity and expected as a social norm along most age groups. PROBLEM | the changing climate has produced threats in the form of increased flooding and erosion to the 4 residing community. The village is ranked among the top four in a list, produced by the government, identifying imminent risk of destruction. The proximal location to the Arctic is causing Alaska to warm about twice as fast as the rest of the United States predicting uninhabitable communities by 2050. Pleas for government financing have remained unmet causing villages to “stay and defend” for the foreseeable future. Offshore ice that acts as a buffer from storm surge has melted with rising ocean temperatures to a point where it is no longer visible off Shaktoolik’s coast. The last big storm was recorded to have come close to turning the community into an island residing type. 4 Relocation takes considerable time, even years to process while residents still seek to live normal lives with the modern technologies and social systems required to sustain life and civility. Announcing the intent to relocate hindered request for government finance and the local clinic lost funds to continue operations. Current evacuation time takes five days. 4 9 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini SOLUTIONS | Kirby Sookyiayak (community coordinator) has a > $100 million wish list that includes: An evacuation road Improvements to the water system Improvements to fuel tank farm Increased berm fortification 4 Floodlight and lighted buoys for river New health clinic Fortified shelter in case of storm In Kivalina and Shishmaref (relatively proximal villages) the Army Corps of Engineers built sturdy rock revetments to armor villages, but any further protection must be matched funds by the community. Alaska experiences a financial crisis due to an economical reliance on the oil industry. Even in the event of a federal lawsuit filed by one village against oil and coal companies, the case went nowhere and compensation for air pollution to allow relocation never transpired. 4 $1 million from the Denali Commission (a 1998 founded independent federal agency providing services to rural Alaska) allocated funds to design new fortified berms in Shaktoolik, the rest is intended to protect the fuel tank storage. Obama’s administration allocated $400 million for relocating threatened villages in the 2017 fiscal budget but the “fate of that allocation is at best uncertain”. 4 10 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini 2 Future land figureground due to flooding in relation to settlement placement, exposing a common problem to all coastal regions 2 Topographical boundary + nuisance exposing existing isolation and a dependence on self-sustenance 11 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini CASE STUDY TWO NLE ARCHITECTURE | Kunle Adeyemi LAGOS WATER COMMUNITIES | concept design of 5 varying program for an increasingly dense city slum LAGOS, NIGERIA | water based community in Makoko POPULATION | 200,000 + CULTURE | an economy dominated by its fishing and trading markets. Their community has been somewhat autonomous for 120 years with non-existent government presence. Aspects of the community’s economy are completely independent from the main land of the large city. Residents navigate through canals with boats, while sightings of water being tossed 5 from households by bucket during springtime are common. These are attempts made to rid accumulated water from near-monsoon level rainfall. PROBLEM | this community faces several issues from both an environmental and cultural aspect in the forms or rising tides and bursting “megacities”. Large populations of over 10 million have pushed residents to live in conditions that we categorize as slums within a region that has reached a critical point in urbanization. The mere lack of space forces communities to expand off land and thus expose themselves to the threats of global climate change and 5 the accompanying increase in storm severity. In the absence of a governing system, policy and practice on how to handle this very specific form of urban sprawl is non-existent. This potential chaos poses a threat to a cultural way of life and systematic civility that has existed for over a generation. Threats of forced removal have been issued by the city of Lagos in the forms of the physical cutting down of stilts via chainsaw. 5 12 AHST 5110 Thesis Document | Eric McCutcheon | 11.27.17 | Eloueini SOLUTION | transition Makoko’s common quarters from dilapidated houses on stilts to floating a-frame residences.
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