Architecture Program
Date of this Version
Spring 5-9-2009
Document Type
Article
Abstract
Costal architecture in the 21st Century carries an inherent concern with regard to its future viability as global sea levels are inching higher. Costal cities and urban infrastructure around the world will face the prospect of being uninsurable, unsaleable, and uninhabitable. From an architectural and sustainable standpoint, abandonment of coastal cities, infrastructure, and property is an unthinkable solution to a very real problem. Perhaps an even more dismal forecast includes the possibility of mil-lions of climate refugees and their respective loss of local cultures. This project aims to call attention to a very real threat facing this generation of emerging professionals by designing a dense/urban mixed use structure that quite literally weathers the changing ground conditions where the archi-tecture meets the earth. This mixed use structure will contain live/work space, retail, and cultural amenities. Ground conditions, entry, access, linkages to infrastructure, and external forces acting on the building structure will be of paramount concern.
Also, the title of the project speaks to the reality of a globalizing society where national borders and geography fade in importance. In lieu of this, one could even approach this thought with a more speculative sense. These structures could possibly detach from their initial place of construction and perhaps migrate to other locals to link into existing infrastructure. As capsules of culture and human activity these onshore/offshore urban structures would be an expression of global unity in a fight against a global problem. In addition, the project hints at the notion that society may be viewing itself as more of a global collective rather than through the limited nature of self identifying through a par-ticular geographic nation-state. Through this, the title of the project underscores this thought toward a global benefit because in an abstract way, no one would be a citizen of New York because everyone could be if this typology were to actually exist.