Featured in the New York Times this past Wednesday (February 2, 2011), was an opinion piece by writer/food activist Mark Bittman. The piece is sort of a list of interrelated amendments to our nation’s food system that are interspersed with fiscal reform, health, environmentalism, and employment. Short and to the point the manifesto, leaves you asking the question… why arent these changes happening.
One aspect of the manifesto I find most critical and unique is Bittman’s suggested massive food policy reforms at the governmental level. First and foremost, everyone who studies the American food system knows that the USDA (United States Department of Agricultural) is principally concerned with export commodities and processed foods. The USDA spends around $16,000,000,000 (thats 16 billion) dollars a year on subsidizing commodity crops like soy and corn, very little of which is directly consumed by Americans. While the USDA has begun programs that emphasize healthy local direct food systems, continued funding polarities suggest that this department is much more interested in supporting corporate led international food politics than improving the health and communities here in America.
In addition to abolishing the USDA and minimizing subsidies for processed food and export commodities, Bittman argues more for the quality of our food than the quantity, by shifting more power to the FDA (Food and Drug Administration). The FDA, which regulates the quality of food and ensures food security, is inherently much more concerned with consumer related-issues.
While I agree that the FDA should be expanded along with the dismantling of the USDA and its excessive subsidies that if re-purposed could revolution American communities, my research suggests that other policy adjustments might be necessary.
Considering the 2000 census data, where 80% of America is urban and 50% is in highly urban areas (as oppose to sub-urban), food has to become more of an urban issue requiring urban-specific food policy. American’s and our policy makers continue an out-dated Jeffersonian view of America as a rural/agricultural utopia. While America does have some of the worlds most productive agricultural land, this is not where people live. Adding to Bittman’s complaints of the USDA, I would argue that the department is purely production (farm) focused. While farming, its productivity, environmental impacts, and the welfare of its workers is critical… America is made up some 230,000,000 urban eaters who have no connection to production and whose relationship to food is almost entirely controlled by private corporations with a nearly powerless FDA to regulate. In the American consciousness and in our government food is only considered as a rural issue. This is made most evident by reading the US department of Housing and Urban Development’s (primary federal agency involving urban issues and policy) 1997 report entitled The Sates of the City Report. Wile the report discussed housing, economic development, fiscal issues, crime, education, environment, jobs, and transportation, issues such as hunger, urban agriculture, malnutrition, food deserts are not mentioned. Actually in the entire report the word food is not mentioned once! This clearly illustrates the way in which urban food acquisition and consumption fall between the cracks of policy and regulation.
A seemingly small amendment to Bittman’s manifesto, new food policy must consider the fact that we are an urban population, utterly disconnected from our sustenance.
Bittman’s manifesto can be read here on the New York Times website. Also for more on Bittman watch his TED Talk entitled What’s Wrong With What We Eat
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
Park(ing) Day
With some luck and a couple of spontaneous “yes”‘s I was able to participate in several publicly engaging events this weekend. First was Park(ing) Day, an internationally annual event in which people convert metered parking spaces into temporary parks and public spaces for a day. The event inspires barbecuers, artists, and environmentalists, many of which support the event for its anti-car and pro-pedestrian undertones. The event has grown from San Fransisco to the globe, and as of last Friday, September 17 its participants included Syracuse University architecture students (including several from Crisis City). Our particular event and park were mostly organized and designed by Crisis City student Gabriella Morrone (for images of the the design and construction click here). I aided in the construction to a small extent, but mostly enjoyed hanging out in the park, enjoying a sunny day in the city, and engaging with visitors and workers in downtown Syracuse. Most passer-bys asked what we were doing, but as we explained that we were ‘participating to claim the street as pedestrian public space’, I was surprised so many people were so reactionary. While many people simply celebrated our cause, many people, asked, “What about businesses”, “where will we park”, “why does this matter?” The most recurrent negative reaction was a concern for business and visitors to downtown. It became clear that many people had a different attitude toward public space than I did, and although our aim was the same, simply advocating ‘public space’ is banal and open to misinterpretation. Throughout the day it became a challenge to offer my opinions on what public space meant, and to offer examples of positive results of public space initiatives (including economic). The fact that my viewpoints about something I see as generally critical as public space were not congruent with that of the urban citizen, I began to speculate on the essentially of public engagement. How can I design public space without considering the publics connotations towards it. The architect must engage with the city to correctly build in the city.
Sukkah City
In addition to Park(ing) Day, I was also given the opportunity to participate in the construction of Peter Sagar’s Time/Timeless Sukkah that was part of New York City’s Sukkah City competition. Peter, an architecture student in the UK had gotten in touch with a friend of mine living willow designer, Bonnie Gale (who Peter had chosen to pre-construct his willow roof), and she later got in touch with myself and fellow Crisis City members Timothy Gale and Dennis Harvey. We headed into the city Saturday and met Peter in New York that evening to begin assembling and finishing constructing his Sukkah on the Union Square site. Peter had began construction early that week with a carpenter named Josh in a studio space in Brooklyn. After the pieces that had been pre-constructed were delivered to the site, we worked through the night along with the 11 other Sukkah finalists, finishing to a crowd that morning at 9:00 am. Beyond the benifits of shared knowledge and experiences between Peter, Josh, Timothy, Dennis, and myself, building a hut in Union Square through a Saturday night and a Sunday morning, brought engagement with a diverse and inquisitive audience. Highlighted by spot lights, cranes, and police tape, the construction of the Sukkah’s initially brought a large crowd. As people realized we werent movie stars and they were not going to be on television, the crowds became more manageable and we began to have really authentic and generative conversations with New Yorker’s. Given the Sukkah’s role in Jewish tradition, many people stopped by with religious interests, but a majority of inquirers were designers, artists, and curious citizens. Although the promises to come back in the morning became less reliable as the morning approached and peoples interest became more diluted, I did recognize many faces the next morning. Working through the night with Peter was fun, it was tough, but the reaction from the crowd of visitors the next day was truly inspiring. Every architect wants to build something in New York City because of the cities rich architectural legacy but also because of the energy of its citizenry. Experiencing this vicariously through Peter and authentically through my own role in the projects realization was a priceless experience. Peter’s design was beautiful on paper, but seeing it realized and occupied towards such joy and and inspiration reminded me of the effect of architecture and the spiritual importance of beauty. There was also a more practical exchange based on the common material of plywood in which the structure was constructed. Many DIY’ers would simply ask us questions about detailing and structure. I taught at least 10 people how to sandwich wood without showing nails or screws. Architecture and art existing in or towards public space is one of the most valuable ways to use design towards positive change. Whether a park, an occupied building, or simply a rendering, architecture must have its aim at public engagement. Only then is it architecture, only this is it real.
The completed Sukkah City: Sunday morning September 20 at 10:00 am
Filed under: Links, Uncategorized, videos | Tags: London, New York City, San Francisco, Urban, Vancouver, video
Tilt shift photography utilizes a tilt-shift lens that sits off center of the sensor plane producing photos with an extremely skewed depth-of field. When these blurred photos are strung together in a high-speed time-lapse fashion, the effect is a miniaturization of reality.
The tilt-shift effect demonstrated in these videos of cities, allows for an unusual reading of city. The depth-of-field effect allows a unique focus that combined with time-lapse focuses on the micro movements of people and vehicles in a still macro built environment.
The miniaturization of reality allows the everyday city to be re-imagined.
New York
London
Vancouver
San Francisco
Cairo sits sandwiched at the source of the delta.
An image from the hillside looking back into Cairo
Model of the soon to be built 6 of October City
Golf course built in the desert surrounded by luxury housing
Read this article:
To Catch Cairo Overflow, 2 Megacities Rise in SandHaving traveled around Cairo last March, I was utterly shocked when Nilus Klingel sent me an article from the New York Times commenting on the development of 2 new mega-cities being constructed well outside of the city. They are the government’s attempt to try and control Cairo’s expanding population (believed to be nearing 20 million). The two new cities, New Cairo and 6 October City are expected to house about 5 million people by 2020 and are meant to relieve the city of congestion.
Similar to Mumbai, Istanbul, and Sao Paolo, Cairo is a congested (densest in the world), polluted, unplanned city in crisis with no foreseeable end. The unveiling of these two new mega-cities, reveals little hope for healing the cities wounds. While, poorer people are being invited (or displaced) to these cities, ultimately they are being designed as escapes from Cairo for the wealthy who can afford to live in the middle of nowhere. While Cairo is trying to sustain its growth and global competitiveness it is ultimately attracting more wealth which will just further intensify the polarization that is already occurring.
I suppose the only good news is that these cities are located in the desert high above the Nile Delta. As the river floods, and the delta’s sea waters rise, these desert oasis will eventually be excellent beach front.
Additionally, here are a few photos from my visit to give a more ‘on the ground’ view of the metropolis.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Alexandria, Los Angeles, New York City, Non-Urban, Rotterdam, Urban
“Cities are like armies“
Port of Singapore
Nazi rally in Nuremberg
To me this comparison seems intuitive. Perhaps it is too obvious, but I could hardly find a single mentioning of it in the internet. A google search of “cities are like armies” only returned two sources. One was from Frederic Harrison’s 1918 “On Society” in which he references French philosopher Augustus Comte who believed that industrial cities were like army camps. The second was from Paul Glover, the founder of the Philly Orchard Project who speaks about how cities have grown too far from there resources. I agree with them both.
The comparison between cities and armies begins with logistics. The term logistics (one of the fundamental concerns of this urban blog) originates from the Roman”Logistikas”. The logistikas were responsible for supplying and managing the resources of the different Roman legions. Like cities today, the legions, constantly in motion, relied on well calculated logistics to manage water, food, dwelling, transportation, and tools to provide order so that the army could achieve its assigned goal. No matter where a legion needed to go to complete its task, these ‘essential life resources’ (ELR’s) had to be made available for the army to have any success. So too the city, often founded for reasons beyond ELR’s has to find ways of sustaining the daily lives of its inhabitants. In this sense logistics are seen as secondary. They are the routine things that are kept silent so the primary goal can be focused on and accomplished. Therefor the very notion of logistics is the history of human advancement. Our ability to increasingly sustain our existence more effortlessly is arguably the exact cause of out ‘post animal’ self realization. In this since logistics are vital.
The simile “cities are like armies” can even extend beyond logistics. Cities defined as fixed sites of communal human living presumably first began with the notion of protection/defense. If people amassed together and shared/traded resources they would have an advantage in reserving ELR’s and thus surviving. Although rarely threatened by invasion, protection and perseverance are still of upmost concern to the city. Albeit terrorism, global competition, class wars, or environment ‘disasters’ cities are in a constant state of growth and adaption in order to survive… A constant motion, a constant fight, a constant crisis. Every city is trying to win (whatever that means) but whatever the cause may be logistics are what sustain it.
As the human project continues to polarize human needs and human desires, the logistics of our cities become increasingly critical. As cities swell the logistics of sustaining them become increasingly complex, threatening cities and human civilization. In this climate of crisis if a city wants to persevere, evolving our metaglistical infrastructures will be critical. Water, food, dwelling, transportation, and tools, the essential life resources, form the foundation of our essential LIFE INFRASTRUCTURES. Through researching, redesigning, and rebuilding the metalogitical infrastructures of our urban planet, cities and their inhabitants can thrive. This is the concern of METALOGISTICAL URBANISM.
The first significant project of this blog will be defining the contents minimal scope.
Over the next couple of weeks I will begin by tentatively establishing the basic essential life resources of our cities.
1) Water
California Aqueduct Pumping Station
2) Food
Currently Under construction: MVRDV's Rotterdam Markethall
3) Dwelling
Independence Plaza in Tribeca
4) Transportation
Alameda Corridor running from the Port at Long Beach to the Inland Empire
5) Tools
Bibliotech Alexandria
For each broad resource category there will be a quick introduction and some associated provocations. Please, if moved to do so, challenge these 5 essential resources or suggest other categories.
Spend the next minute thinking about the work that went in to suppling the last water you drank, the last food you ate, the room you are currently in, what got you there, and the electronic device beneath your fingertips. These architectures make up the underworld of the city.
I am seeking the non-urban. A recent conversation between a couple of my peers, Nilus Klingel and Gabe Jewell-Vitale, left us wondering what is non-urban. Taken seriously we found this quite a challenge. Here is a brief attempt to find it!
Beginning with Merriam Webster:
URBAN: “of, relating to, characteristic of, or constituting a city.”
thus:
NON-URBAN: not, “relating to, characteristic of, or constituting a city.”
The part of this definition that triggered our intellectual debate was this requisite of not “relating to a city.” The city proper is easy to define. It has buildings, density, a border, and political representation. But do you know anyone, living in any environment, that is not somehow connected to a city. Our lives are so incredibly irreversibly linked to the urban complex how could any of us be non-urban or live in non-urban places.
An innitial reaction to this question might ring off a list of assumed non-urban geographies, but closer analysis given the above definitions complicates these simplistic generalizations. First off farms, farms are most certainly related to the city. Every farm-scape is intricately connected to the city through infrastructure, and our expansive gastro-consumption. As farms become increasingly industrialized and corporate, the country is increasingly in the domain of the city. National Parks/Forests, this is arguable and is more a question of degree, but it offers an important case. Consider Yosemite National Park in California. Once one of the wildest, and most remote environments in the country, the park has increasingly become an urban spectacle. With urban California on its doorstep Yosemite attracts 4 million people a year, the equivalent to 11,000 people a day. These 11,000 people drive their cars into this valley, park, and hike on a host of dense trails, they may shop, eat, and they certainly will be entertained. While most people would admit to coming to Yosemite to escape the urban, one must ask is this collective escape authentic. Has the very act of dreamily escaping the urban, itself become an extension of the city? Would the park even exist if it didnt act in servitude to the urban mass?
Across the globe, what we have historically thought of as anti-urban is actually becoming a satellite for the urban. As cities and their resource needs expand when do areas we might have considered non-urban, siberia and northern canada (resource extraction), antartica (land grab for laboratory space), the artic (expansion of shipping lanes) become “related to the city”.
The ocean (shipping lanes, oil, recreation), the amazon (hydro power and luxury wood products), patagonia (hydro power and paper mills), the desert (Dubai!), deep space (space-station/satellites)
I give up!
My search is over. By whatever power is invested in me (little to none in actuality) I hereby temporarily declare the non-urban dead.
Did it ever have a chance? Should it?
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
