Artificial Ecological Infrastructures
An alternative work method to those of traditional urban planning, based on interaction and on simulations
Marco Poletto & Claudia Pasquero
noisescape in Kentish Town (dynamic simulation of the sound wave produced by traffic at Kentish town junction) – London 2002 – Marco Poletto and Claudia Pasquero (consulting in collaboration with Chora).
Modern day cities are defined by the complex interaction of a multitude of physical, socio-cultural and economic systems: the result is an incessant motion, which animates the giant bionic ‘ecosystem’ that we’re part of.
This fascinating perspective of the city is now widely spread over various branches of research applied to the built environment. Nevertheless, it has still been possible on a few occasions to test the effects produced by the intrinsic dynamic quality on the ecosystem view. The interest lies in the fact that this quality has the power to seriously question the effectiveness of tools commonly used in urban planning, particularly in the case of sustainable urban planning.
A practical awareness capable of reevaluating the power of “élan vital”
The German urban planner Philip Oswalt recently coined the term ‘shrinking city’ to identify the reality of the post-industrial city, victim of a rapid reduction of the number of inhabitants (Detroit and Liverpool are existing proof of this). Oswalt’s studies demonstrate how the traditional way of depicting the system is unable to consider a city’s future because it only takes into consideration its current state. In this way, local rules are overlooked in favour of the regulatory plans underway.
The German urban planner draws similarities between shrinking cities and urban phenomena with diametrically opposed effects (South American ‘growing cities’ characterized by enormous barrios or favelas) having in common dynamics of an explosive nature and, consequently, an ‘emergent’, or as it is often improperly defined ‘informal’, urbanization.
This interpretation calls for a work methodology that is capable of defining another type of procedure (or organizational apparatus), based on interactive rules (defining the interaction between the units making up the system) and on simulated representations (capable of describing the dynamics of the examined system as well as scenarios taken from its possible states of equilibrium). With a view to developing a practical awareness capable of reevaluating the power that Bergson defined as ‘élan vital’, perhaps redirecting it towards a balance that is more suitable for truly sustainable development in today’s urban society.
In this context, the condition for sustainable development is considered the inevitable starting point. However, rather than becoming a constraint applied to existing reality through a pre-established plan, it is transformed into an adjustable mechanism, an input for creativity, operating by grafting new conditions (or development rules) and new components for prototypes that are capable of proliferating in the urban landscape, generating new ‘ecological infrastructures’. Although this emergent infrastructure operates on a landscape scale, its prototype units operate on a local scale, in direct relation to the vital units of the city. Interactivity becomes a key instrument in evolving the vision of an emergent city into a renewed paradigm of a sustainable city.
