Architectural design is creative leadership
with a limited vision that is not applied at the proper level of authority. Its
position has been eroded by project thinking and a pattern language vocabulary
that prevents accurate communication with the public it wishes to influence. This
has severely restricted its ability to reach the people, places, states, and
nations that require shelter for increasing activity within geographic limits
that do not expand to threaten their source of life. Sprawl contradicts the
concept of geographic limits and is a threat currently being met with an
inadequate language of isolated, uncorrelated, and contradictory zoning
regulations. Architectural relevance will improve when its leadership language
can offer a better alternative. Capturing this potential involves a new design
language based on the accurate measurement, evaluation, and prediction of shelter
capacity and intensity options. Understanding the impact of these options can
lead us to reduce and eventually eliminate our random consumption of land for
shelter. The first is our source of life. The second is our source of survival.
The challenge is symbiotic correlation.
The components of a site plan aggregate to
form projects, neighborhoods, districts, cities, and regions. The threat of
sprawl cannot be addressed without a comprehensive understanding of these
cellular components and their mathematical relationships. These relationships form
shelter capacity and intensity options, but the options must be limited before
shelter capacity can be provided for growing populations without excessive
intensity.
Shelter capacity is the gross building area
produced per buildable acre by a building design category. It is influenced by
the building design category chosen and the values entered in its design specification
template. These values can also be measured at existing locations for
comparison, evaluation, and accumulation of knowledge. Shelter capacity options
produced by design specification values and floor quantity alternatives are predicted
by an architectural algorithm and master equation that are related to a building
design category. The values entered in the category’s design specification
template represent decisions that may be modified to test alternatives. The
gross building area options predicted for a given buildable land area represent
shelter capacity options per acre. These options can be occupied by any
activity, assuming zoning and building code compliance. These shelter capacity options
are translated into levels of intensity by a universal measurement equation. It
is a critical measurement, since intensity affects our physical, social,
psychological, environmental, ecologic, and economic quality of life within the
Urban and Rural Phyla of the Built Domain. We have attempted to escape
excessive intensity with sprawl, but are now realizing that sprawl is a disease
and a threat to our source of life.
Our primary policy must become symbiotic
survival. Shelter is an indispensable consideration. It is served by movement,
open space, and life support within the Urban and Rural Phyla of The Built
Domain. The goal is to provide shelter for growing human activity without
excessive intensity on geographically limited land areas that protect our
source of life – The Natural Domain. To achieve this goal, we must be able to
address the problem at its cellular unit of growth.
Urban form shelters cellular aggregations
of activity. These aggregations must be correlated with economic data to
protect the physical, social, psychological, environmental, and economic
quality of life created. The effort requires city design that correlates many
related technical specialties. Architects are uniquely qualified to address the
massing correlation required if they choose to accept the challenge with a new
vocabulary and language that is equal to the level of authority and credibility
required.
The language begins with a set of forecast
models. Each model is related to a building design category within a universal
list. Each category is represented by a design specification template,
architectural algorithm, master equation, floor quantity template, and forecast
panel. The panel predicts the gross building area, shelter capacity per acre,
and intensity options implied by the values entered in its design specification
and floor quantity templates. The values are correlated by an architectural
algorithm and master equation to accurately forecast shelter capacity options
for land. Unfortunately, we presently convert this land from its ecological and
agricultural role at random to form metastasizing sprawl.
Forecast models can be placed in the cloud for
global access, but the values entered in their specification templates will be
based on empirical knowledge until a research institute focuses on the
distinction between desirable and excessive values. Built Domain
classification, building design categories, specification templates, and shelter
design values represent an initial vocabulary for the language of city design.
Together, they represent the initiation of a science that can address the
anatomy of sprawl at its cellular level of formation.
I’ve previously published “Comparing
Shelter Design Decisions” to briefly outline the classification system,
building design categories, design specification templates, and master
equations that form the vocabulary, language, and science of city design. If
I’ve maintained your interest, you may wish to review the document.
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