The Babuk Report

Author: Administrator

Convenient Access by Car

While early industrialists had grand visions of mechanized buildings and cities that walked, many of those ideas were whimsical at face value. Mind you, when applied as small parts, they were very useful – like the passenger elevator. One of those side concepts probably came to be applied to personal transportation – the automobile – which I argue is a highly popular form of architecture. Unfortunately, it’s a half baked idea of the original concept, and a half baked idea that has turned tables on traditional architectural and urban planning principles.

Original El Rancho Hotel, Las Vegas

What got me going on this topic was a recent assertion that the original El Rancho Hotel in Las Vegas was planned specifically to be only accessible by car, not on foot. At the time, the Las Vegas Strip had some seemingly seedy elements to it. The thought was to start a brand new “strip” away from the original Strip. The new Strip would be elegant and – controlled. It was a specific tourist destination. To keep the new hotel a “controlled” atmosphere, the easiest way to do this was to limit the patrons only to those who had cars. It mitigated the seedy element.

At this point, one can easily imagine the sorts of gated subdivisions and target market power centres that populate suburbia. All too often, getting from one’s house to do shopping, go to work or school, or even to go to a neighbour’s house is virtually impossible on foot in a cul-de-sac’d subdivision. It’s all designed to be accessible by car only, leading to all sorts of social / economic ills. Maybe even obesity.

Back to Las Vegas – the new Strip grew. Eventually, it became larger than the original strip, all of the new hotels modeled after this “accessible by car” concept. Robert Venturi even wrote a book “Learning from Las Vegas” that looked at the intricacies of this new type of planning and the sort of spaces that just happened around the hotels. I thought that it was written tongue in cheek, but apparently he was serious.

Since then, Las Vegas has built sidewalks up and down the new Strip, and offered transit service along the road. The scale of the street is still built around automobile speeds, rather than pedestrian travel. Now, the automobile scale can be exciting in a way – think of Dan Tana driving up and down the strip in his classic Thunderbird.

West of Chicago, along Roosevelt Road – it has a highway designation, though I can’t recall the number – there is an endless suburb that stretches some twenty miles or so – so mind numbing that I can’t even convert the distance to metric measures. My daughter refers to it as the “Land of Parking Lots”.

“they paved paradise, and put up a parking lot….”

October 28, 2009
Burnham Plan of Chicago, and the Future of the American Metropolis

This is the last week for the Burnham Pavilions on display at Millennium Park in Chicago. They were meant as temporary exhibits and with the coming onslaught of a Chicago winter, it’s probably time. The Burnham Pavilions (see previous posts) were constructed to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Chicago Plan of 1909, sometimes referred to as the Burnham Plan, after one of its authors.

One final event was held last Friday, a roundtable discussion between Mayor Daley and Valerie Jarrett – currently Senior Advisor on Domestic Issues to President Obama, but formerly Mayor Daley’s Chief of Staff and even a Chairman of the Chicago Transit Authority at one point. About 800 people – mostly invited – packed the Rubloff Theater at the Art Institute of Chicago on a cold and dreary Friday afternoon in October. Where else could one draw a crowd like that but in Chicago?

Many of the attendees came from Chicago’s volunteer and charitable community – a setting unique for this city. Chicago runs on volunteer help and organizations.

While there was a fair bit said about high speed rail funding and public transit in Chicago; there wasn’t a lot said overall about “grand picture” programs for the metropolis overall as an American entity. While many European and Asian countries have cities, the United States has the Metropolis. I’d argue that the Metropolis is distinctly American (this coming from a Canadian), and in danger of fall from a variety of sources: downfall of manufacturing, suburban flight…. There was a fair bit of discussion about social programs, however.

Upon exiting the reception afterwards, the sky was already dark, the Burnham Pavilions shone in their lighting, as did various buildings of the Chicago skyline that peeked out between the wings of the Art Institute. I wish that my camera would focus in night time skies, Chicago truly showed itself off. Chicago is the American Metropolis, located in the Midwest.

A reception will be held this week for the display of the entries to the Burnham Memorial Competition. An Architect who interned under me years ago, Casimir Kujawa, submitted an entry that will be on display.

October 26, 2009
Everyone wants to be called an Architect

A recent television news series spoke of development of a new electric automobile. It appeared odd that the person interviewed wore the title of “Product Development Architect”. Many in the software industry also wear titles denoting some sort of “architect”, though they’ve never been exposed to issues dealing with public well being, building envelope issues, and professional licensure by a public entity or even (irk!) liability.

We tend to think of architects as trained and licensed professionals who work with stone and concrete, and who understand builders’ lien laws. Architecture is regulated in some fashion by governing jurisdictions, and only certain individuals – usually distinguished by education, experience and examination – may wear the title “Architect” or practice “Architecture”.

Although one side of me is elated that this person wore the title “product development architect” as opposed to “product development engineer”; still, how would someone who designs software or leads a product development initiative think that they could be called an architect?

Perhaps, in taking one portion of the practice of architecture – visionary project leadership – and forgetting about the legalese, one might craft a definition of ‘architect’ that could describe this position. But that’s just dealing with the people who want to wear this title, what about the practice of architecture?

Architecture historically has been rooted (no pun intended) in solid buildings with form foundations tied to the earth. While many professionally licensed architects have been responsible for designing and producing items ranging from tea kettles (Michael Graves) to aircraft interiors (Cambridge Seven) to farm tractors (Clifford Wiens), those actions have never been termed “architecture”. Mind you, at its introduction, the design of the current Volkswagen Beetle led many to describe it as an “architectural” car.

Is this architecture?

However, in describing architecture as a machine for living, perhaps the object isn’t to limit who may be an architect. Rather the object may be to expand the definition and scope of what is architecture, allowing architecture to move beyond structures rooted in the earth built of masonry or steel.

And that may be good for society’s overall growth and advancement

October 22, 2009
It’s Autumn

Glowing Trees

Waking up on an overcast morning, the multi-hued tree leaves were irredescent. They glowed, and spilt a dazzling display of colour into a darkened interior space.

October 22, 2009
If Buildings Could Walk…

A previous post described “if walls could talk”, but what about if buildings could walk?

It’s not that far fetched an idea.

Taking cues from the railroad industry, it wasn’t uncommon at the turn of the 20th century to find fixed structures – buildings – with large moving parts.

Bridges were prime examples.

It took the use of steel used as structure to give rise to this. The first structure built of steel was a bridge built in 1775 over the River Severn near Coalbrookdale, Shropshire, in the western midlands of England – the “Iron Bridge” as it’s called today. Steel was a lighter-weight material that permitted more flexibility in shape than did masonry, with the advantage of superior strength when compared to wood. Moving ahead a century or so, shipping lanes along rivers located on flat plains required a way for bridges – built relatively low to the ground – to be built so as to give way to permit relatively tall shipping traffic to pass.

Turntable Bridge, Chicago, 1898

Confining this description to bridges found in Chicago: some of the first bridges designed for this were turntable bridges. There still are a couple of these left in Chicago. They are configured as steel trusses set onto a central pier in the middle of the river. Train tracks were built inside the truss structure. When shipping lanes were needed, train traffic would come to a stop, and the entire truss – hundreds of feet or dozens of metres long – would rotate around this pier.

Pennsylvania RR Bridge, Chicago, 1908

Turntable bridges had their limitations, not the least of which was the central pier becoming an obstruction in a shipping lane. Finding ways to raise bridge sections vertically, rather than rotating them horizontally, became the issue at hand. Those types of bridges appear in all sorts of variants. Some have a truss spanning between two towers, this central truss raises and lowers between the towers. Still others rotate truss sections vertically to give clearance along the waterways, the most dramatic examples are those with truss structures raised above, rather than below the track bed.

Western Avenue Pennsylvania RR Bridge, Chicago, 1907

Beyond bridges, other railway structures rotated (roundhouses with turntables) and lifted materials (coal towers and granaries).

The SS France – a complete floating community of thousands of people

Railways – and shipping lines – gave rise to buildings – entire communities – that were mobile. It could be possible for one to live their entire life on an ocean liner; all lodging and dietary needs cared for in addition to entertainment, recreation, socializing, even employment and well being. In a stretch, one may make the same case for a transcontinental train.

The Walking City, Archigram

Going back to our history lesson studying some of the early modernist architects: many – like Le Corbusier – had a vision of “buildings as machines”. Looking to what’s traditionally defined as architecture, this concept taken to mean “buildings that move” really hasn’t come to pass, save for a couple amusement park rides, or visionary works from think tanks like Archigram.

In a mobile society, having one house that could move with its occupants could be a sustainable concept. It reinforces the notion of small housing, since that would take less energy to move around. Part of one’s housing could be detachable and self propelled for personal transportation. Perhaps a workplace concept also becomes something that one takes with them and “plugs in” to a workplace community.

The ideas are endless, and seemingly appropriate.

October 17, 2009
A Change in the Weather…

Last year at this time, the weather in Chicago seemed practically like summer. It gave rise to theories of global warming. But it was absolutely beautiful weather.

Parade Marshalls – and the Hilton – against a cold, grey sky at noon

This year, it has come to be very chilly, very suddenly. No global warming this year.

Take this year’s Columbus Day Parade – which actually celebrates Canadian Thanksgiving, but no one has caught on to that. It was downright chilly. At least it wasn’t windy. It was a very grey, urbane looking day, with the kind of sky and sunlight that make Mies van der Rohe’s buildings sparkle. And Chicago has a lot of Mies buildings.

2009 Fiat 500, in white

2009 Fiat 500, in black

Through the marching bands, the floats, the people and whatnot, what caught my eye were two brand new Fiat 500’s, brought in from Detroit by Chrysler, now owned by Fiat. They may have been shorter than my Mini – quite a feat! Definitely higher, though.

After the parade, as everyone from the Thistle and Heather Highland Dancers sought to collect their odds and ends out of the Mini, a parade of vintage Italian cars passed by. They were the best! Low and behold, what happened to be in the middle of the Italian car parade but… a vintage Fiat 500!

Vintage Fiat 500, in yellow

October 13, 2009
The Single Level Largesse

In a quest to directly avoid any specifically Olympics related topics today…

Recently, the Oak Park YMCA recently announced cancellation of its plans to move from its older, multi level facility in the middle of Oak Park, to a sprawling single level facility in a nearby town. Fundraising in this economic environment wasn’t going as hoped. The comparison of both facilities provides an interesting contrast, and a lesson in city planning.

The existing facility was built in the late 1950’s, admittedly in need of repairs and upgrades. Like many YMCA’s of its day, it located a gymnasium on a second floor overtop a natatorium located on a basement level. Smaller spaces – meeting rooms, locker rooms and the like – filled in around the larger spaces. This layout allowed the overall facility to fit on a tight building site, surrounded by other buildings – a city site. It was common for athletic facilities to be juxtaposed in the heart of the towns in which they were located. Consider the 1893 YMCA Association Building in Chicago. It not only stacked a gymnasium over a swimming pool, but fit a 1000 seat auditorium in between the two spaces. Athletic facilities in the middle of the neighbourhood they drew from contributed to an overall public well being.

1893 YMCA Association Building, Chicago. Arcade Place elevation. Note the varying window heights above the "Burrito Beach" sign, indicating previous double height spaces over what was the ground floor natatorium

The proposed facility was spread out over a single level, requiring much more land. It had a parking lot that met village ordinances for providing parking facilities; the original building did not. To digress: I recall a friend attending grad school at a university in west Texas. He spoke of driving from the student dorms to go workout in the campus gym – an oxymoron, I thought.

Back to the subject: though the sprawling site had the advantage of playing fields, it drew on a wider spread population. The concept encouraged users to approach the new facility by car, not on foot.

These days, opinion is that athletic facilities must fit on one, maybe no more than two levels.

It’s like comparing the former Chicago Athletic Association with the newer Olympic Training Facility in Colorado Springs. Both produced successful Olympians, it very different settings. They also speak of how we live our lives in both eras: one being an extroverted part of a community, the other being an introvert, hidden behind suburban fences.

October 2, 2009
One Last Bit about the Morning Commute

Just to wrap up the past couple posts:

When North American cities were first developing, we commuted on foot. It had its limitations, was endured during inclement weather, but gave us exercise.

Various forms of mass transit came to be, which allowed for a larger commute area. The commute in to work became something social: one could converse with their neighbours and colleagues, perhaps read the morning newspaper. Eventually, some trains had “commuter cars” so one could enjoy a cup of coffee on the way in.

Eventually, public transit systems were allowed to decline, in favour of individual transit – the private automobile. This mode of transportation had a sense of excitement about it, because of its newness, and giddiness. One could propel themselves along a “freeway” type of road –previously unseen – in a vehicle that looked more and more like a spaceship with chrome and fins. And one didn’t need to share it, this was theirs to display. At first, it made even longer commute times enjoyable.

But, like all things new, the private motorcar on the freeway experience came to be old hat. Commute times lengthened, we were living further and further away from work. And the private motorcars themselves came to be, well, monotonous. They lost their imaginative zeal and came to look the same.

Which describes a modern-day predicament.

Transit systems seem to be on the way up, however. Maybe we’ll go back to the day of travelling en masse and getting to know our neighbours on the way in to work.

September 30, 2009
Architecture in Motion

A colleague described a project in Atlanta years ago. It was a building sited off of an expressway. Although the building was envisioned to have the typical sort of menu of architectural experiences – approach, enter, inhabit – it was noted that most people would experience this building differently. Most would experience this building while in motion – at a high rate of speed while travelling along the expressway. They would never experience the interior spaces of this building. My colleague described a new software program that simulated this experience while travelling in either direction down the expressway.

My previous post questioned the sensation of the morning commute, it was an argument based on the mode of conveyance being architecture in itself. This post, however, is describing the sequence of events that experience architecture, and describing that experience in motion as being architectural in itself.

The Seattle Monorail travelling through the Experience Music Project

Take the Seattle Alweg Monorail as an example. In itself, the Monorail may be “architecture’, the Monorail in itself has that sort of exuberant giddiness that makes a dreary commute quite special. Its glassy rail cars take a route from the Seattle Center going Downtown that travel through a succession of differing spaces of differing sizes and scales, a kind of spontaneous architecture. Recently, the Experience Music Project, designed by Frank Gehry, was built along the Monorail route. Though the Monorail does not stop at the EMP, it travels through it, as a very conscious architectural experience. The Project is experienced in motion, and it was planned that way. The motion of taking the Monorail through the EMP becomes a musical experience in itself. Some believe that travelling through the EMP by Monorail is as important as is the more traditional experience of approach, enter and inhabit while on foot.

Our cities have individual “nodes” of architectural experience, but fall short of planning the path between the nodes as an architectural experience. Nothing superlative or the sort the usual arguments that get touted as the reason why an architectural experience can only consist of goobers stuck on a roadway, and that these goobers add another twenty per cent to the cost of a project, making everyone wonder – quite rightfully – why we should pay anything extra to have goobers on our roadways. What I’m advocating is to simply plan and arrange the elements in between to offer an architectural experience while in motion. We work with spaces that large, just plan them architecturally.

As an aside – sort of – Chicago is mourning the closure of an amusement park “Kiddieland”, located just beyond the edge of Oak Park. It had juvenile sized amusement rides, and even some larger attractions. No one is going to forget the Ferris wheel, the Little Dipper roller coaster, the Scrambler, the log flume, the Tilt-a-Whirl, the Flying Elephants, the antique Carousel and especially not the Kiddieland Express. No one will forget them because they made motion very amusing. Even the path these amusement rides took provided a structured sequence of experiences that provided a rudimentary “architecture in motion” experience. Few people are realizing that this structured sequence is what made Kiddieland so enjoyable, and so memorable.

Kiddieland: A place with tremendous experiences of spatial motion approached by a very dreary sequence of spatial experiences

Not at all difficult to achieve in our overall built environment.

September 29, 2009
Is your morning commute still fun to drive?

Time was, driving was a fun recreation. From a casual Sunday excursion, to a cross country trip, to something energetic like Nascar racing, the experience generated by being catapulted through ever changing scenery was exciting.

A happy way to commute…

Automotive design enhanced the experience. Swooping masses of sheet metal clad in bright colours, outlined in shiny chrome, housed behemoth power plants and sumptuous interiors swathed in deluxe upholstery.

It was a see and be seen experience. People actually drove with their windows down, weather permitting. That morning commute into work just didn’t seem half bad.

But then, the morning commute was far shorter then than it may be now. The US Census Bureau has since started to measure the number of “extreme commuters” who spend more than 90 minutes a trip commuting from home to work. Regardless how fanciful one’s wheels may be, that much time down the same roads in the same traffic day in and day out can’t help but become dreary.

And dreary may best describe current automotive design. Body styles are generated by current trends in wind tunnel testing; cars are distinguishable only by slight nuances in wrinkles or folds along sheet metal. Grey – or rather, silver – is a popular colour. Interiors offer much the same choice, perhaps with a cloth or leather option; higher priced cars sport two toned colour schemes.

Given parameters, powerplants have improved but that may signal the difference in concept. New powerplants exhibit engineering prowess, as does the styling. Styling – for the sake of styling – played a larger role when the morning commute was still fun.

Imagine the morning commute in this !

Still doesn’t say why we started living ninety minutes away.

September 26, 2009