Archive for November, 2010

How Berlin’s Urban Design Has Changed Over The Past 50 Years

berlin-urban-design

When traveling, I realized that most of Berlin has little traces of the actual wall. The footprint of the wall remains throughout the city represented in a brick line, but other than that, buildings and roads have replaced any signs of the wall. I feel that this is partly because the residents of Berlin want to try to forget about the wall. They know it is part of their history, but they don’t want to show off a part of their past that they are not proud of. None-the-less the wall has made an impact on the urban layout of the city. Places where the wall was are now replaced by streets and sometimes even are covered up by buildings.

Can Los Angeles Ever be a Walkable City or Are People Happy With the Way Things Are?

LA-suburbs

According to a recent column in the LA times, the Los Angeles residents and city officials are happy with the way things are and the majority are not open to change. The author Christopher Hawthorne talks about how he sees a growing number of people opposed to a more pedestrian friendly Los Angeles.

China’s 3D Express Coach: The Bus That Can Drive Over Cars

3dexpresscoach

China is currently developing a bus that is elevated above the road leaving it possible for cars to drive underneath it. This new bus is a great idea for China because it removes the necessity to widen the existing infrastructure (roads.) The Shenzhen Huashi Future Parking Equipment Company is calling this new bus the “3D Express Coach.”

Hidden Treasure: Abandoned Subway Stop in NYC

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An unused subway stop located under New York City is starting to attract people. The photos below show the “City Hall” stop that was opened in 1904 however it has not been used for many years. The reason for this is that the “City Hall” stop had very curved tracks. When the train has redesigned, this created a gap that made it dangerous to enter and exit the train.

What is New Urbanism?

new-urbanism

New Urbanism is an urban design idea that encourages building walkable communities. The idea is that to be sustainable we must start with our way of life. Introducing green techniques and green building methods do their part in helping the environment but the real way to be sustainable is to live sustainable. By building walkable communities it encourages people to not own cars, live closer to the city, own smaller homes, etc. The hopes of many new urbanism designs are that people live in work in the same area.

Genk Masterplan: A proposal by 51n4e

genk-masterplan1

Contrary to what is assumed by its administration, we do not believe that Genk is in need of a city center. The city of Genk is a juxtaposition of rather indifferent parts developed along its main roads. Traditional notions of urban continuity are scarce and only revealed on a pedestrian level. This basic duality (extreme car accessibility combined with loops of pedestrian traffic) is taken up as the driving force of the masterplan: Slow Genk Fast Genk.

Archollective: An Online Pin-Up Space for Architecture Students

archollective

Architects and architecture students are always looking for someone to critique their work. The more feedback you get during your design process the better your overall project will be at the end. Archollective is a new site to give designers additional feedback when working on their architecture project. This web application gives you the option to critique other people’s work or upload your own projects and start receiving feedback from the rest of the community.

Christoph Gielen: Photographing the Bird’s Eye View of Urban Sprawl

suburbs-aerial1

Christoph Gielen is a photographer born in Germany but currently lives in New York. He has been taking pictures of landscapes in America, particularly pictures of urban sprawl. These photos (or aerial studies) are a look at land use in American and are meant to explore how art and the environment relate. These photos are meant to examine and reconsider the way we are designing the built environment. He understands that the way we are currently building suburbia is not sustainable and this type of development needs to stop.

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