Essays Shenzhen

06.02.15 12:41 12:41 06.02.15 06.02.15 1 1 150206_Global_Schindler_Award_Cover.indd 150206_Global_Schindler_Award_Cover.indd artner artner P P cademic cademic A A artner artner P P cademic cademic A A r r e e artn artn P P ic ic m m e e d d Aca Aca Academic Partner Academic GLOBAL SCHINDLER GLO GLOBAL 2015 SCHINDLER AWARD AWARD 5 1 0 B 2015 AL SCHI SHENZHEN PROJECTS ARD 2 W ND A LER LER A ND W ARD 2 ESSAYS SHENZHEN AL SCHI 2015 B 0 1 5 AWARD GLO SCHINDLER GLOBAL AAcaAcademiccademicdemic AP PartnPartnercademicartnerer Partner 150206_Global_Schindler_Award_Cover.indd 1 06.02.15 12:41 artner P cademic A GLOBAL SCHINDLER GLO AWARD B 2015 AL SCHI SHENZHEN ESSAYS ND Edited by LER ETH Zurich Kees Christiaanse Fabienne Hoelzel Myriam Perret Dimitri Kron A W Journalist + Consultant Jessica Bridger ARD 2 Schindler Group Silvio Napoli Andrea Murer Neil Runcieman 0 1 5 AAcaAcademiccademicdemic P PartnPartnerartnerer 150206_Global_Schindler_Award_Cover.indd 1 06.02.15 12:41 Global Schindler Award 2015 | A 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS – PART A ESSAYS Foreword – Essays 6 Silvio Napoli Introduction – In Search of Approaches to 8 Contemporary Urban Intervention Challenges Fabienne Hoelzel Accessibility in Cities: Transport and Urban Form 14 Philipp Rode Rocking the Roadblock 26 Alexander Erath Future Infrastructure 32 Darryl Chen Preservation of the Public 40 Jiang Feng, interviewed by Jessica Bridger Urban Design Models for Urban Megaprojects 46 in a Global World Eirini Kasioumi Undermining the Authority 56 Ting Chen Chinese Urbanization through the Lens of Da Lang 66 Linda Vlassenrood Games with Frontiers 72 Kazys Varnelis Afterword – Essays The Elevator: From Social Ambition to Urban Necessity 80 Neil Runcieman People 84 6 A | Foreword – Silvio Napoli FOREWORD – ESSAYS Silvio Napoli In many rapidly expanding cities of the developing world, mass migration has led to urban sprawl, slums, pollution, and gridlock. In the developed world, congested roads, over-crowding, and no-go areas have come to be regarded as “normal” in the urban context. The tangled interrelationships of infrastructure, housing, and industry result in spatial challenges. All of this is subject to governmental, social, and economic forces that influence their development and impact. The Global Schindler Award presents design and design-based thinking as an approach to confronting what we see as the “normal” consequences of urbanization and globalization. The mobility problems confronting the world’s cities are undeniable, fundamental challenges to making cities more livable and sustainable. Demand for the provision of public transit and shifts in mobility modes due to cli- mate concerns are merely two of the many issues that will require inno- vative approaches in the 21st century. Although no consensus exists on the solutions or the costs – financial and otherwise – the scale is unquestion- ably enormous. As the engines of global growth, cities are responsible for generating the lion’s share of the world’s wealth as well as the bulk of waste and emissions. There is significant potential for pioneering approaches and solutions on the part of all urban stakeholders. Mobility systems can be leveraged as instruments for positive change. Mobility concerns do not begin and end with the journey: mobility is deeply integrated into urban life, affecting everything from the job opportunities for a single individual to the development of an entire country – not to men- tion global environmental conditions. The experience of the Schindler Group, a global mobility provider estab- lished in 1874, is that urban planners, architects, and engineers have the necessary expertise and technologies to develop inclusive models of urban development. The designers of cities can have a powerful impact on the future of our urban environments, one that can transcend the political, economic, and social spheres. Fresh ideas are needed about how the protago- nists of urban development can apply their knowledge and envision their objectives within a more holistic view of the possibilities available. That is exactly what the Global Schindler Award is trying to do. Students are pushed to research and observe the dynamics of urban development in the context of a real-world example and to use design-based responses to a specific task. Global Schindler Award 2015 | A 7 The award participants have to consider their project from the perspective of the people who will eventually inhabit the space. This means looking at the urban situation as a complex matrix, inclusive of basic needs such as housing, health, and welfare, with accessibility and equality in mind. As a companion to the Global Schindler Award 2015, the essays in this book present a selection of expert perspectives related to the concerns of the site and brief for the competition. This includes historical and cultural aspects, the reuse and redevelopment of city areas, the impact of technol- ogy, and more. Mobility is a recurring theme, and the focus is always on spatial conditions. The cover of this book, illustrated by architect and artist Matthias Gnehm, shows the breadth of the Global Schindler Award’s concerns. This book offers glimpses into the cutting-edge thinking in academia and practice with essays focused on specific topics – and the promise of a future genera- tion of designers and planners invested in their shared responsibility and powerful role in creating our shared urban future. 8 A | Introduction – Fabienne Hoelzel INTRODUCTION – IN SEARCH OF APPROACHES TO CONTEMPORARY URBAN INTERVENTION CHALLENGES Fabienne Hoelzel We live in an urban world. Globally, 54 percent of the world’s population resides in urban areas.1 Whereas the United States and Europe are close to reaching what is presumed to be the peak of their urban growth, large parts of Africa and Asia are moving into their “urban centuries.” UN Habitat describes the 21st century as the “Asian urban century”; no other region of the developing world has invested more in modern infrastructure than Asia. This has been undertaken to foster economic development through indus- trial expansion, research, innovation, and entrepreneurship, which in turn has enhanced the competitiveness of many cities in Asia.2 This publication explores the fascinating development of one of the most dynamic city regions in the world – Shenzhen, part of the Pearl River Delta in southern China – in the mirror of international trends. China has experienced rapid urbanization since the economic reforms of the late 1970s. The country’s level of urbanization has reached roughly 53 percent of the entire population, or about 712 million people.3 In comparison, to accomplish similar levels of urban development, it took 120 years in Britain and 80 years in the United States.4 Shenzhen, the location of the Global Schindler Award 2015, has not only developed from one of China’s first Special Economic Zones, created in 1980, to one of the largest cities in the world; it is also part of one of the most dynamic polycentric urban mega-regions in the world, the Pearl River Delta. The region represents both the hope and the challenges that come with urbanization. As the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki- moon, said, cities can lead the way with local solutions to global problems.5 How can urban designers contribute to this? What are the current social, economic, and environmental issues to be tackled, both in Shenzhen and in other rapidly urbanizing regions in the world? What can we learn from the mistakes of the past to guarantee a better urban future? How do we successfully integrate infrastructure planning with people- centered urban design? How can new and old structures be better assembled, and how do we bring the public into long-term planning processes? These are some of the questions that will be addressed in this publication, through theoretical reflection in the first part and through the results of design research conducted by student participants in the Global Schindler Award competition in the second part. Global Schindler Award 2015 | A 9 There is a fundamental relationship between economic development and Accessibility in Cities: Transport access to people, goods, services, and information in cities. Transport and and Urban Form urban form have strong correlations. The recognition of this interrelation- Philipp Rode (> p. 14) ship is particularly important at a time of unprecedented urban expansion, as Philipp Rode puts it in his essay. He highlights the unique policy opportunity that lies in the integration of land-use and transport planning. In urban design, there is a shift away from road-capacity-oriented street planning to a focus on finer-grain urban fabric. Smaller block sizes, higher building densities, and mixed-use development facilitate micro-accessibility, last- mile connectivity, walkability, and social interaction. While it is obvious that classic top-down planning strategies and imple- Rocking the Roadblock mentation are needed to coordinate large-scale metropolitan development, Alexander Erath (> p. 26) small-scale urban retrofit approaches can also greatly contribute to a more agreeable urban environment. Alexander Erath presents three examples of mobility metamorphoses, connecting these with his own personal walking experience in Shenzhen, which was planned as a car-based city, and where road designs do not offer much space, safety, or usability for pedestrians. Examples from Seoul, San Francisco, and Amsterdam show how well-de- signed public spaces can contribute to more livable cities. Erath’s findings are supported by UN-Habitat’s report on streets as public spaces and driv- ers of urban prosperity. Joan Close, UN-Habitat’s executive director, writes that when cities fail to integrate multifunctional streets, they tend to have less infrastructure development, lower productivity, and a poorer quality of life for their inhabitants.6 On the other hand, urban transportation nodes such as the subway offer Future Infrastructure the opportunity to extend the space of pure infrastructure with social activ- Darryl Chen (> p.

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