The profession of architects is completely unpredictable and it varies from every individual, also depends of type of exposure and knowledge in the field of architecture. Hence one is able to see the variety of projects, which defines the city. But being an architect it is merely impossible to negate the idea of separating building from it is infrastructure, mobility, transit and expectation and incentives of people. The reason is building is meant to be occupied the people. They are going to be the part of the building in future, hence it is very important to determine the functionality of particular building depending upon its end users.

The question is what defines the context for particular building? Is it the roads? Is it mobility services? Is it the city fabric? Is it environmental factors? Or collective intangible factors for example: ambiance of building, micro climate created by the building, facilities?. Somehow I feel it is collective of both the scenarios, but it is almost impossible to achieve all the criteria hence one has to compromise and carry forward the one which is beneficial to the user in later use.  But there are certain projects which completely negated the idea of context still proved out to be one of the most beneficial projects of city and now absolutely fits within the context. For example Bilbao museum in Spain designed by famous architect Frank Gehry, located on the banks of river Nervion, majorly dead industrial area. The city was in financial crisis hence decided to build a museum to generate revenue, the project was too ambitious. The aim was to create iconic building.  The idea initiated with the building to look like a piece of crumpled paper. In order to construct this building various tools were developed which revolutionized the field of architecture.  But when the project was completed it was one of the most acclaimed project, It led the development of the river edge and hence generated river side activity, moreover the city financial crisis were meet up, the area which was dead was regenerated for recreational activities. Hence it can be noted in this case the building itself created its own context. There are many failures in imitating the similar scenario. A similar example of Infosys building in Pune, India designed by renowned architect. The building is completely covered in glass absolutely discarding the environmental conditions, during summers tends to heat up and its extremely uncomfortable for its users, moreover during monsoon the water leaks from the joinery. Hence it would be a diplomatic decision that in some case it works for some it could be absolute failure.

Developers are one of the most important group of individuals, since they are investing lot of capital in building a project, to get the returns is inevitable for them. Hence they are ready to compromise on certain factors which are economically feasible. The developers aim is to gain profit regardless of design, construction, context and facilities. But in order to get such profits he need to tempt buyers in investing their capital in the project. Thus developer tempts an individual by adding words of branding or cheat codes like sustainable, eco-friendly, recreational zones, and different amenities.  These things is either fake or never suffice the buyer at later stage. Similar is the case in India where developer attacks Low income group areas, buy land at cheaper rates promising of better homes or displacement to new homes in different location with better amenities. And then develops ambitious projects on land purchased at low rates and sell at higher rates. But scenario for LIG gets even worse. Thus Rich get richer and poor get poorer. Unless and until the developer do not change their ideal goal it is inevitable to get mutual benefits the developer and user. In order to overcome such situation it has to be collective and unbiased process where architects, developer and the user work collectively to achieve ideal buildings. A wonderful example of school in Bangladesh by Architect Anna Heringer is collective process of developer, users and architect. The school is constructed on extremely low budget, local materials of bamboo and mud, with the help of local people. The project is great success. Hence if even for a bigger project if end user, developer and architect collectively works on it. Then the scenario can be overcomed

Ref Links:

Guggenheim Bilbao Spain:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guggenheim_Museum_Bilbao

Infosys Pune:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:India_Technology.jpg

Handmade school Bangladesh:

http://www.designboom.com/architecture/earth-architecture-handmade-school-bangladesh/

I might say in this way, without human being, where the shelter is. The special space is turning up because human need it for the kind of weather conditions. Therefore, to mu mind, I can not totally separate from the that infrastructure of cities and mobility of transit. As an architect, I still believe that the notion of the building should always base on the natural instincts who are living in. Undoubtedly, environment is also the crucial part in the process no matter in design thinking or construction.

Taking some instance of Hong Kong, we can realize obviously from the standard of living in the local people. As the developed country or rather says having the most influence power of economics around the world, there are approximately 36 million tourists every year. Let’s image how much property they can get from those people. Tourism, along with international trade and financial services are the three main sources of income for Hong Kong. However, having been developing under the kind of situation, Hongkoner do not live in the as luxury space as we thought. In fact, there are over half percent of spaces are used for financial option, even for tourism, therefore, as a fact that hongkoner would rather putting theirselves into the narrow situation. I might say they are the victims of economics development. From the other point of view, they probably do not have another choice, after all, the tourism is the main incomings for the all dwellers.

Banksy,  believes that “Branding “is everything. It can make or break your business. Companies that get this, spend millions in cultivating strong brands that secure them a loyal following. If you think about what consumers need vs. want, the majority of purchases fall in the “wants” category. Those desires are influenced by fantastic branding campaigns evoking emotion, fears/ fear of missing out, or even hate. A British graffiti street artist whose work has previously sold for over $1 million each, sold pieces for $60 at New York’s Central Park on Saturday. I suppose that is the best example for financially profitable is not actually equivalent to economically feasible. In these generation, there are too much invisible values just flying around the world, sometimes the money what you spend on is just your desire for something, not for real what you need. What I would like say is that there is no answer for yes or no, just depends on what you want at the moment. For instance, designers usually buy some decorations to fit to their design style, probably it is useless in practicability or somehow. However, bear in mind, trust yourself at the moment what you do, and where you are.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2282764/Hong-Kongs

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/10/14/234023611

“Within each of us is the ability to distinguish music from noise, poetry from drivel. In art we sense the presence of an order that is linked to the soul of man.  The human eye and thus the soul is able to discern sensitivity and thoughtfulness in a work.  It is when those substantial traces of humanity are embedded in a building that it begins to transcend the ordinary.”

Humanity have great stories to tell and build, architecture plays a big role of molding it. Architecture and economy are starting to build rivalry through times. Expectations are made for architecture itself as being one of a great factor of a growing economy, but why nowadays, people are satisfied by architecture visually? but more so theoretically, is architecture solving and living its role as one of an important factor in a country’s economical value and growth? Or its only becoming of an art itself and not being true to what living spaces should be or what people would really expect from it. what should architecture really be, an art? a science?, or trying to be both but merely not living its purpose.

Humanity leaves an infinite loop through its history using the media of language, art, knowledge and architecture. These loops are not simply viewed in the past; they are primary to our time and define our civilization and economy at any given moment, justifying our very sense of being human. This justification is important. Humanity exists in a constant tug for existence. We are vital, but we wish to become the maker and culture that would become success in this battle. Culture allows us to assert our existence to ourselves to the extent that we are not just ‘now’ but are- in essence- forever. There is a connection between the concerns and expectation in needs of every society or the situation it finds in ourselves and architecture, misuse of architecture is evident and rampant to create a narrative that is outside the built sustainable environment, many times we see architecture as a creation of dominance and power rather than creating a built environment that creates story for people, that serves people. Architecture has lost its value to create a society to create what people expect, to be the canvas of what people will stroke its brush and color it.  Architecture has lost its true value to the society. The first purpose of architecture is to create habitat and to fulfill the needs of society or individuals for places to work and live. Good architecture has to be aware of those aspects which may have economic impact and meet expectations of humanity.

Architecture in reality and not by books nor by good presentations, have its limits. Living spaces are turned into vertical spaces rather than a horizontal ground space, did we ever questioned ourselves why this kind of development are being pushed through? Is it because of maximizing one’s space, its profitability. Is it economically viable or feasible?  Economical feasibility does not need to be partnered with financial feasibility, as long as architecture creates good and livable space, a place to work, to play, to entertain, to live. The common definitions of social responsibility often leave out one critical dimension of sustainability, the necessity for profitability and economic viability. Sustainable Architecture must be able to meet some of the basic needs of people in today’s economy without compromising opportunities for those of future generations to meet their needs as well. In a sustainable economy, profits are the rewards for meeting the needs of people today while economic viability is the reward for being able to meet the needs of people in the future. All economic value is derived from either natural or human resources. An economy creates nothing; its productivity ultimately depends on nature and society. An Architecture that depletes the productivity of its natural and human resources is not economically viable over time. Regardless of how architecture must also survive economically in the present if it is to have the capacity to maintain its productivity and value to society into the future. At the end there will always be a question of  having big investments architecture are free to do the best with the design and the process that approach the things more professionally. And with big investments architecture that has no boundaries, tend to alienate rather than speaking for its people and for economy of it.

The Employee

There is an invisible ghost in economic values, wich you cannot experience every second but in the end you feel its impacts somehow. Cannot see it because it in the 4th dimension: “TIME”. It makes you magically save money, or evaporates money. You get your salary, the beginning of the month you see little expenses not important, buying an extra drink, having a pack of cigarettes, going to a bit more expensive restaurant, they are alright if you see a big number in your bank account every time. This psychological effect makes us in small scale thinking that we are doing fine. At one point it starts to feel insecure and then we start to se the fact : 7o percent of the salary is gone in 6 days. And there put on the brakes trying to recover from the situation and may be get in debt, if something goes wrong. A microscale example of what goes wrong all the time: forgetting the time dimension with all inputs.

On the scale of an employee, that can be quickly fixed next month, you stay home for 2 weeks and you are fine. But what if multimillion companies and even countries act this way. In architecture, cities are the “employee” making little decisions for momentary inputs, not sensing the whole. People with power (money or political force) shape the cities for their profit and make cumulative losses of energy and money in the city. That new shopping mall may bring investment to the city, but makes traffic a mess, commute times +10 minutes, making everyone lose cent by cent more than any positive input of the mall. People may approve this shopping mall construction because it is “value” without knowing end of the month it is their loss, if the calculations are done, like the guy who is buying an unnecessary pack of cigarettes every day for momentary joy and losing thousands of euros every year on that habit. For the second it was a good idea, it relaxes, but in total it makes you not being able to go to that winter vacation. It lowers “social welfare” which cannot be measured momentarily. You have to wait for the end of the month, even a decade to see the results of yor investment.

Recycling is Bullshit

This not computable, not measurable ghost of losing or saving money or resources is there again at the issue of recycling. People are obsessed with it, they feel good about it, even they think they save the world, save money for the nation and be a good person. That is something to do with a lot of benefits. At one point some people started discussing about the topic, putting every day hundreds of trucks with 4 different puroses for collecting organic, glass, paper, and metal (even plastic etc.) is a good idea for a city like Frankfurt. What you gain for that is worth what people have to wait behind big garbage trucks for minutes before going to work (they are already stressed) and consuming fossile fuels. What about them being spectical and obsessed about their consumption, in the end does a recycling factory do a benefit to the city with his ugly fog? Unmeasurable effects on the nation are visible, personally i was pretty stressed in Germany, sometimes i didnt know what category was my garbage, my flatmates were obsessed, i kept garbage in my room and in a dark night took it out threw it in the river. (the story might be a little fictional after some beers)

The Architect

The architect, who wants to speak about sustainability, and economic value generation, has to include a wide angle vision in his design with help of different disciplines, calculating the impact on the “city”, “nation” even “world”. Even if he will not be asked for every question politically or economically, even if he is not expected to answer, the vision is important, from the first line of the design, it is possible to think about sustainability on large scale, local resources, social impacts, energy and traffic congestion inputs even what will happen with the building after 50 years should be put on the first line of the design. So that we are not victims of the invisible money sucking monster at the end of the month, and we can go to that winter vacation.

“Utopia”
Courtesy of:  http://uncopy.net/tag/utopiadystopia/

• Do you actually believe you can separate buildings out from the infrastructure of cities and mobility of transit and the expectations and incentives of people?

• Why do people tend to believe that what is financially profitable (for developers) is not actually equivalent to economically feasible (positive impacts on social welfare)?

• How would you show that this does not necessarily have to be like this (but rather the opposite)?

Clearly is currently necessary to create infrastructure solutions that help to satisfy different social purposes far apart from the buildings, but it is equally clear that there is an urgent need to generate architecture more aware of the present global situation.

As architects it is imminent to think in “green” and generate architecture that goes beyond than a lonely building and achieve merge with the environment, becoming environmentally responsible buildings that can realize a significant change and contribute to the achievement of a sustainable future and ensure this a way that future generations enjoy continued access to natural resources.The counterpart of this is that currently the private initiative investment intends to get the investment returns as shorter-term as possible, in addition to being these same investment naturally outside of the sustainability issues. The little innovation in “sustainable” projects and the lack of interest on the part of society, creates great uncertainty to large capital investors.

But is possible to merge both ends if you take into account environmental requirements and are solved by technological advances to face environmental degradation through innovative architecture and friendly with the environment.

That is why is necessary to carry out exhaustive economic analysis to study the possibilities of projects and thus to substantiate adequate justification for its realization, since investors generally focus their attention to the project, as long as the economic aspect is attractive and generate economic savings.

Likewise, if society accept the idea of ​​designing “Sustainably”, the development of sustainable cities it could produce consistently and could transform cities into true detonators, combining architecture and sustainable reasoning would lead to obtain utopian results in political, social and cultural terms.

Therefore, I assume that the challenges for sustainable architecture are difficult but achievable.

But we must as architects still have confidence in our buildings performance and impact on the city, if we will reach the goal of growth in a more sustainable way. We must have big ambitions for our projects, so we may have a change to make an influence on for example our building developers. But it is at the same time important, that we have focusing on the most central parameters in the design process. We may have to change our mindset. In the crisis of 1930´s the goal was to increase the employment and growth was the means to it. Today the growth is the goal and not the means, because we live in a new world based on consumption. By focusing only the growth instead is a bad financial decision. In many example fast growth will increase for example increase of importing and cheap labor, which is not a got long term investment. Maybe the goal is not to increase the growth of wealth in the sense of social, natural and human thinking, but more how we react on the growth.

Some architects are simplifying the city as one continuous structure (read Eric Owen Moss) and believe that the truth lies in between possibilities. But actually most architects are trained to be captivated by the building or structure we have just produced, and not how it interact with the environment and the people occupying the space. We (architects) are for example satisfied with the building after seeing that the facade still have same green color as we were hoping it would maintain. But we are not asking the neighbors of the new building, if their wealth fare has increased after constructing the building. That is not sustainable, although the building might be very energy sufficient. I see one of the most important issues, which we can deal with as architects, is to rethink the public areas. How the spaces can react on people’s daily life, and react on the growth. We need to give the city the right “tools” so it can react on the growth when designing new areas. Indispensable tools for creating new sustainable areas are for example a good infrastructure connected to the public transportation. But sometimes it is not enough. In Denmark we planned a new area in Copenhagen called “Ørestaden”.  The area got a new metro connected to airport and the city, a great bicycle path and a direct access to the nature. Today the new city area is a “dead end”, and most of the apartments are empty and for sale, all though there are amazing buildings by for example Bjarke Ingels. One of the many reasons, why the area is not working properly, was caused by a bad economic decision. The politicians got a very good offer from a big mall, and they placed the giant mall in the middle of the new area. This was a very good financial idea, because the mall could pay for some of the construction of Ørestaden. But it turned out to be a very bad economic decision, because the area did not have room for local shops and cafées because of the effect of the mall. The mall also needed big roads and a lot of parking spaces. The result was a new city with big roads, and long distances between every building. The whole area became a dead end, a windy area, a place without pedestrians, many cars and no local development. The only reason to go to the area now, is to shop in the mall or to take an architectural sightseeing to some of the great empty buildings. Remember your car.

It is a common opinion that developers in the building sector are more driven by financial needs than social economic. Often it is all about placing as many squaremeters as possible . But a new awareness of sustainability has occurred in many new projects. Projects are developed in more long term matter, rather than a short term financial solution. Demands from for example EU can protect the cities from unsustainable projects. But it is crucial that we set the right parameters in the regulations, that the social economy into account. But to manage to create better sustainable spaces, we  need a good client (both in the city and private), which might have even higher ambitions than the architect. We need to understand which mindset drives the politicians to make their decisions. The case from Ørestaden, Copenhagen, is an example of how a solution made out financially profitable not is equivalent to economically feasible. Or at least on the function of the new city. A better example could be the new area of the Olympics games 2012 in London, if the plan will have a happy ending. London used the “one time” financial investment (and of course mayor income) to rebuilt and improve the city and placed the Olympic Village in an area, which needed improvements. Many of the structures from the Olympics will be transformed into healthcare centres and community facilities, which will integrate with new housings in the area. The area is totally renewed in maybe 20 years. So we have to wait, to make the final judge about the project.  But the new area surdenly have the right tools to react and move with the growth. But we need to relie on the decisions makers or try to lean some new tools to interact with them. I think it is crucial that architects are more visible in the public debate. If we, as architects, can learn how to transform our drawings into economical graphs, we could make a big impact on the decision makers, and we might be helpful to increase the sustainable growth.

It is very tempting to seduce ourselves, as architects or as anybody keen on architecture or otherwise involved in the design process that the answer to our problems lies with buildings. Do you actually believe you can separate buildings out from the infrastructure of cities and mobility of transit and the expectations and incentives of people?

The buildings are what form a major part but not necessarily the most important part of the infrastructure of the city.  Whether it is the transportation networks, water supply and other such systems that results in the buildings or in most scenarios the demand for modes of transportation or incentives that arises due to the existing buildings it cannot be ignored that both are a result of factors that cannot be independent a rely heavily on financial, political and social context. Thus the architecture of the city may not entirely depend on the design of buildings in isolation but the idea is nesting it to the surroundings so that it is adaptable to future developments or sets well within the existing systems. So no I don’t believe that they can be separated or even clearly distinguished from one another.

Why do people tend to believe that what is financially profitable (for developers) is not actually equivalent to economically feasible (positive impacts on social welfare)? How would you show that this does not necessarily have to be like this (but rather the opposite)?

The general tendency for developers is usually looked as being only financially profitable as it is assumed that short term benefits are more visually and easily understandable than long term profits or social welfare. This is not necessarily the same in every scenario; a simple example of the same can be seen while a country hosts the Olympic Games. Here although the developers make huge financially benefits at the same time huge amount of social welfare can be seen through the development of the overall infrastructure required to conduct the events which help improve the life the of the people living in those cities.

We can use this very negative approach as a positive goal to strive for, however. If “cool” is what will attract financial investment, why not invest in being cool? why not aim to make sustainability “cool”?

Vectrix – an electric maxi-scooter in mass production and distribution up until the Global Financial Crisis, used the slogan “Cool  People Ride Electric”. It worked – attracting many young and enthusiastic investors.

Growth, in terms of urban development, has occurred throughout human history for a number of reasons, most of which can be summarized by the word “agglomeration”. Historically, agglomeration has meant safety (kingdoms, law enforcement, etc). In recent history agglomeration has meant ease of access and better networks of communication and transport between companies, and people. To put it simply, it is cheaper to be located close to a business with which you trade on a frequent basis; it is cheaper and easier to live close to your workplace.

The population of cities has been caused by “ease of access”, and the continued growth of cities is due this, and the optimized networks provided.

The age we are moving into, however, could suggest a shift from this agglomeration phenomenon. There are more and more examples of “tele-working” from many major and minor companies around the world. This is due entirely to the ease of communication afforded by technology. In the age we live in it is easier, cheaper and faster to send an email than a letter – rendering the parameter of distance useless.

What will this lead to? A decentralized world perhaps? We will no longer be confined to maintaining close proximity to those with which we do business. “International companies” will no longer be termed as “international”, but just as companies – as the normal.

The growth of the city will be entirely dependant on lifestyle choice and social proximity. With the notion of the “sea-change” being promoted throughout most developed countries around the world, there is a high possibility that we will see a depopulation of the major cities, and in place, population booms of suburban and rural areas (this is already happening in Australia, where many professionals are moving away from Melbourne and into the country-side, to be closer to the sea, wine growing regions, etc.).

To answer the proposed questions -

The first question prompts two arguments, each depending if you are talking about the individual or the mass.

Economic theories tend to follow a common theme which promotes the notion that one can predict the movement, thought or actions of 1000 people, but cannot predict those of one individual.

I believe that if we look at the scale of the individual, then we can indeed separate the building from the necessary infrastructure – it is just that: necessary. However, when visiting a building – for example a public building such as a museum – the individual will hold a certain expectation, and will visit, revisit, and promote the museum to their friends based on their individual experience. This can be highly influenced by the infrastructure and transport networks to and from the site, yes, but if the building itself is above and beyond expectations, then it will create in itself an incentive for increased use.

However, when studying the larger scale, the building can be rendered almost useless if the infrastructure and transit networks are far below what the general mass expect or require. To pput it simply, if there is no bus/train/tram/metro station near the museum, nor a car park in the vicinity, then many people will be highly inconvenienced when attempting to reach the building, and it will only be the few who will cycle or walk (if such routes exist so as to provide access) who will not see a great disincentive.

Whilst we must completely understand both scales, and the infinite levels between them, it is clear that no, one cannot separate the building from the infrastructure and mobility, unless dealing with a private dwelling with a very extravagant client.

The general consensus of developers and the buildings/site which they produce has a highly negative history, and hence the current thought of developers is very negatively weighted in terms of social welfare. In particular, due to social housing developments in many countries, where comfort, form and function have all sacrificed continuously to come in at a lower budget.

The view that developers are developing sites for the top profit is a very easy conclusion for one to reach, simply because of the connotation held with developers.

However, this viewpoint is rather ignorant. This is formed by a pre-set mindset, which assumes that all developers are just looking for top dollar. There are examples, if one looks hard enough, of developers seeking solely the benefit and welfare of their occupants. This can be seen in the UK from Kevin McCloud (the presenter of Grand Designs), whom began developing social welfare housing to create communities which would benefit the residents, develop friendships and improve quality of life. Sadly, cases such as this are isolated and often considered media stunts. To put it frankly, the best developers (the ones which develop the most land and continuously grow their property portfolios) are the ones whom are making the most profit, and hence can afford to undertake more projects than the developers looking to maximise end-user satisfaction.

Kevin’s Grand Design (www.telegraph.co.uk)

To push away from this norm would prove very difficult, but surely not impossible. How? incentives. Their must be incentives for developers to look at the quality of the product, as opposed the to the profitability. This is happening, however. In Australia there is a social welfare project – National Rental Affordability Scheme : where social houses built to a high enough level of quality can have significant tax benefits and government guaranteed long term rental agreements from tenants deemed to also surpass a level of quality. How do you determine which social welfare tenants should qualify for such high quality, highly subsidised rentals, is another question and perhaps one left for political debate.

NRAS Property Development (onyx.net.au)

The Australian Government is committed to stimulating the construction of 50,000 high quality homes and apartments, providing affordable private rental properties for Australians and their families.

http://www.dss.gov.au/our-responsibilities/housing-support/programs-services/national-rental-affordability-scheme

In a world driven by financial incentives and the mandate for prosperity – particularly from public companies whose interests are less in the products and more in satisfying the share holders (whose own interests can be completely removed from the product altogether), the vision of development aimed at positive social welfare as opposed to profitability is an unlikely fantasy. Increases in incentives are seen as the responsibility of the public sector – the government, and not at all of the private sector. How to make this a reality?

A very unlikely possibility would be take an example from history. Ireland in the beginning of the 19th century (prior to the potato famine) was subject to a fascinating architectural phenomena. Many catholic families whom were subjected to renting low quality, isolated farms and cottages throughout rural Ireland were subject to the constant threat of being evicted from their homes, without any necessary forewarning or reasoning. Any alterations or improvements made to the dwelling would be ignored. this led to many dwellings becoming run-down, derelict, with no incentive from the tenant to improve the building (due to the constant threat of eviction), and the landlord holding no legal responsibility to make the dwellings nice, comfortable, or even safe.

However, there is a region in the south of Ireland, named Ulster, where “tenant right” dictated that tenants must be compensated for any improvements made to their farm or dwellings. This led to constant development & refurbishment, and improved quality of life and quality of architecture for the residents of such areas.

“the superior prosperity and tranquillity of Ulster, compared with the rest of Ireland, were due to tenant right.”

Woodham-Smith, Cecil (1991), The Great Hunger

What lesson can be taken from this? Should it be that tenants should improve or renovate their apartments/houses? This would surely lead to a high number of buildings being constantly updated by unskilled, on-the-budget tenants whose interests see no further than the several months of few years which they will occupy the space?

It is indeed a very difficult topic, to discuss the possibility redirecting development from profit into welfare. Is it possible, in a capitalist system, without government intervention? A greater link between the tenant/end user and the developer is entirely necessary.

To summarise: incentives are at the core to any form of change. Financial incentives are the easiest to implement, and produce the fastest results. But easy is also simply a shortcut. Finding an easy solution is not going to create long-term improvements. More difficult incentives to implement and promote would be attractivity, or even morality. The “moral card” is being played currently – without much success. Therefore we must make welfare more attractive. We must make economic welfare COOL. 

The goal of economic wealth is to meet human needs in such a way that life becomes in some respect richer and better in the process. It is not simply to produce as many stuff as you want. Stuff is a means. Yet the present aspect of the people on economy has always been focusing on means.

We tend to define the health of a community, a city, or a country according to how much economic capital (like cash flow and property value) and how much cultural capital (like birth of museums or festivals it holds) it has. But by taking only economic and cultural capital into account, we are missing a huge part of the whole thing here. We all know things can run smoothly, and sometimes very effectively accelerated with only individual to individual, a household to a household, a neighborhood to another neighborhood, but what about the connections?  Networks and mutual support systems among the residents of a community. Architecture couldn’t even live a day without these connections. It would be dead, deserted, and malfunctioned. Even a self-sufficient building couldn’t survive. This has happened to countless of Summer camp. We architectural students try to put our know-how into the hand of children in rural area. There has never been good connections between people from the city and those kids. The only connection would be a good will. Without studying of how lives there go on each day, studying of history, studying of surroundings materials or geological balance, mimicking ourselves as them, we could never make a connection. So no, without the linkage between whatever the city, the country or the people  is offering to the architecture, a part of the building will always be counted as social capital loss.

Of course as long as the money is the easiest way to define prosperity, the fastest way to get that financial gain back is to get the money. We can’t deny that this happens every second we are designing a building (as a developer or an architect) When it’s time for us to choose between two material for interior partition, one last very long and very toxic while the other looks green but ugly. When we couldn’t decide between two equivalent things, we use the cost to hand down the decision. The less we invest, the faster we got the profit back. So until there is another way to define wealth rather than money. (Well there is actually, with the carbon credit or LEED beneficial advantages, but they are not directly accounted for what we gain.) And it would be a huge leap of faith to imagin somehow there is a way to turn those benefits into money. Anyways, that is far from architects responsibility. The best we could to to turn things around is to perform our profession like we are going to live in the building we are designing and it will be ours, our children’s', our city’s and we have to take responsibility of everything the building costs, causes or crumbles into.

Both forms of capital, however, obscure the social role that architecture plays and the way in which buildings do not just represent financial or cultural value, but also social value.

Picture credit : http://makovskyblog.blogspot.com.es/2009/07/sometimes-love-equals-money.html

(Life shouldn’t be printed on dollar bills.  ~Clifford Odets)

“The diversity and mixed use of the space  for increased the diversity of the city, in order to create new activities and typologies”

Diagram of Mixed Use of the Space, by Trinidad Gómez and Miguel Juárez.

With the past of the time, the word “sustainability” have changed depending on the place in which will be developed or because of the people that is applying this concept; this way of thinking has always existed, people from faraway communities, little towns or without enough resources, have always been self-sufficiency and have found several ways to live only with what they have in the surrounding space;  the only thing that have changed is that in the modern era took a great importance and the architects, urban developers or anyone involved in the design process, tried to apply into a big scale, like cities, thanks to this, buildings, communities, colonies, and every kind of new infrastructure, began to be designed with new materials, technologies and resources; the problem that surged after this new development, was that the plus value of the buildings increased and it only could be affordable for people with highs amount of money, besides that almost all of this projects were made in super expensive areas. 

In the contemporary era, the New Urbanism emerged and with it new ways of thinking were applied in the city, with this theme is which I will respond the first question of the blog post; I do not think that we can separate buildings out from the infrastructure of cities and mobility of transit and the expectations and incentives of people; I believe that the answer lies in the correct integration of these elements without to forget the main actor for we are designing: people.

Applying concepts like the ones in New Urbanism, we can create a system that works with everything and for everyone; the urban connectivity which consist in connect different points of the city to achieve a faster communication and to avoid the pollution because of traffic; urban spaces have to be designed to be walkable spaces, not for private motorized vehicles; the diversity and mixed use of the space  for increased the diversity of the city, in order to create new activities and typologies; and the most important ones: an intelligent urban transport that maximized the resources for an efficient connectivity; the other, an urban sustainability not only in environmental aspects, but also in economic, politic and social aspects; all this to accomplishes an adequate use of the available elements in benefit of the community.

“The urban connectivity which consist in connect different points of the city to achieve a faster communication and to avoid the pollution because of traffic”

Diagram of Urban Connectivity, by Trinidad Gómez and Miguel Juárez.

With this explanation, I can continue with my opinion of the second question phrased by Gonzalo Delacámara: Why do people tend to believe that what is financially profitable (for developers) is not actually equivalent to economically feasible (positive impacts on social welfare)? How would you show that this does not necessarily have to be like this (but rather the opposite)?

I believe that the problem lies in the fact that people feels cheated by certain kind of “developers” who only cares about money, instead for a good site analysis that allowed a good project; another problem is that constructors, urbanists, designers, politics, etc., always wants to create the perfect place starting from zero, instead of interventions inside the city to avoid the boundless growing of the urban sprawl. How would I show to people that what is financially profitable for developers is equivalent to a positive impact on social welfare? With Curitiba, Brazil, the most remarkable example of a city (in my personal point of view) that achieved positive impacts on social welfare, an equitative economy and a correct growing of the city by using Transit Oriented Development, or TOD.

“Accessible public transportation is prioritized when choosing housing and commercial building locations”

Diagram of TOD, by Trinidad Gómez and Miguel Juárez.

Curitiba is an excellent example of TOD, which mainly implies that residential, business and recreational areas should be built in high density areas and close to public transport stations. In addition, TOD proposes land use mix to reduce the travel distances. Accessible public transportation is prioritized when choosing housing and commercial building locations. High traffic areas such as shopping centers and high rise apartment buildings are conveniently located next to public transportation stations. This level of accessibility has reduced automobile dependence. By coupling the development of a pedestrian friendly community with an efficient low-emissions Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system and lower car parking availability, Curitiba has successfully reduced the overall travel of its residents.

With the correct formula we can achieve not only an economical sustainability, but also a political, environmental and social sustainability. It depends on the “how?” and the “why?” always having present the “for who?” For sure Curitiba is not the only successful example in the world, but it is one of the most advanced. The secret lies in to keep developing strategies according to the changes in the city, because we cannot forget that the city is alive and always evolving.