Modernisation and the dialectics between

Nature and the City

Why Cities?

Cities are the largest consumers of resources More than half of world’s population dwells in cities.

Environmental discourses are directly related to the relationship between the city and nature

We cannot address the question of Nature without addressing the question of Cities

KEY QUESTIONS:

1. What is the relationship between Nature and the City in Modernity?

2. How has this relationship been treated in planning policy and practice in the last century?

3. What are the power relations involved in the production of new urban environments?

Who decides about interventions in the urban environment?

What kind of urban redevelopment strategies have been implemented in the name of improving the ‘urban environment’ and ‘nature’?

Who wins and who loses out of those changes?

4. How does the City/Nature relationship feature in contemporary urban development strategies?

KEY QUESTIONS:

1. What is the relationship between Nature and the City in Modernity?

Modernism constructed 2 types of Nature

1. Evil Nature INCLUDED:

a) Untamed Wild UncivilisedTo be tamed and conquered, Rationalised Controlled (wild rivers, uncontrolled weather, savages of Africa, not quite

human, women?)

b) Bad, metabolised nature inside the city- rivers as sewers)

Modernist construction of 2 types of Nature

2. Divine-Good Nature

clean green (flowers, forests, rivers) outside the cityMoral/ecological OrderGreen pastures, Cyclical order of nature,Organised Animal societies

Modernist construction of 2 types of Cities1. CITIES AS CANCERS “parasite on the natural and domesticated

environments, since it makes no food, cleans no air, cleans very little water” (Odum, 1989, p. 17)

Cancer, overgrown organ, which takes all the food, so much food it can no longer perform its proper function (Friedman, 1984)

Overgrown monstrosities, with gluttonous appetites for material goods and fast declining carrying capacities… only catastrophe awaits such a system of disharmony” (Mayur, 1990: 37-38)

Great consumers and contributors to env degradation (Breheny 1990)?

2. CITIES AS ASSETS Potentially more environmentally friendly than we

think (compact structure, economies of scale) Efficient structures for resources distribution and

Efficient use of natural resources Urban Density Reduces pressure on rural land

(pressure contributes to over intensive farming) Potentially make a great contribution to

environmental protection (per capital change of habits)

Create environmental movements voice against environmental degradation

CITIES AS ENVIRONMENTAL AND CULTURAL RESOURCES

Major economic cultural centres, producing often the cultural image of a country. Culturally and environmentally stimulating (greatest buildings and parks are in urban areas)

much of physical fabric of cities is non-renewable environmental resource ITSELF meriting some degree of environmental protection (OECD 1990, UNESCO) Taj Mahal, Parthenon, Stonehenge, Oxford

“The natural world supports the city” (Breheny 1990), But Cities and Nature are not as antithetical entities as they are often presented to be.

IN BOTH CASES: Nature as “the other”, from which the urban dweller has been alienated and with which he needs to get in touch

an externalised “other” (Bauman 1991) , (like women, like the orient)

a ‘thing’, that lies ‘out there’ outside human societies, outside ‘cities’, separate and distinct from them, to be either protected or conquered,

Depending on the discourse, and

On the politics of this discourse.

Good (moral/ecological

Order)Green pastures,

Cyclical order of nature,Organised Animal societies

ProgressThe hotbed of

Civilisation(Culture, arts)

UntamedWild

UncivilisedTo be tamed and

conquered(wild rivers, uncontrolled

weather, savages of Africa, not quite

human)

Evil(Anomie/crime)The cityThe city

NatureNatureModernist City Plans “Urban Living” Gentrification

Garden citiesNew Towns

Suburbanisation

For cities too: contradiction comes in ways we think plan and build cities

What is nature? = political question

Deep ecology: moral value and order – awesome = to be left alone by h. beings

Technocratic/Technocentric approach: endless resource, keep developing, econ. growth will “trickle down”, technology will solve the problems.

Ecological Modernisation: manage to the best of our ability without compromising growth. End of pipe solutions

19th Century – The Industrial CityCities = CancersNature = utopian ideal1890s London numbered 5.6 million people.Factories concentrated downtown, near rail and water outlets. Air and water pollution choked first industrial cities (Engels). Whilst middle and upper classes escaped from city centre.. Entirely new, segregated working class housed

near factories•The average tenement dweller had far less space than a prison inmate.

New York Dumbbells

“To get to them you have to penetrate courts reeking with poisonous and malodorous gases arising from accumulations of sewage and refuse …

Courts, many of them which the sun never penetrates, which are never visited by a breath of fresh air.... You have to grope your way along dark and filthy passages swarming with vermin.

Then, if you are not driven back by the intolerable stench, you may gain admittance to the dens in which these thousands of beings who belong, as much as you to the race for whom Christ died, herd together….. here are seven people living in one underground kitchen, and a little child lying dead in the same room”Andrew Merns “The bitter cry of outcast London” (1883)

New York

In 1885, Alan Forman wrote in the American Magazine

“a seething mass of humanity, so ignorant, so vicious, so depraved that they hardly seem to belong to our species…. It is almost a matter of congratulation that the death rate

among the inhabitants of these tenements is something over 57%”

"How ugly Paris seems ... How one chokes in these narrow and dank corridors that we like to call the streets of Paris! One would think that one was in a subterranean city, that's how heavy is the atmosphere, how profound is the darkness!" -the Vicomte de Launay, 1838,(as quoted in Rice, p 9)

PICTURES FROM: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baron_Haussmann

Birth of Planning = find a solution to the socio-environmental problems, to

Resolve the City/Nature relationship

4 main ways in which Modernist Planning tried to resolve the

Nature/City relationship.

1. Natural Ordering: Controlling Bad Nature inside the City (urban rationalisation and sanitation projects)

2. Urban Utopias: Taking the City Out into Nature (Urban Utopias- Garden Cities, Suburbanisation)

3. City Beautiful: Bringing Good Nature into the City (The City Beautiful Movement)

4. The Power of Technology: Taking the City dweller quickly and efficiently out into ‘nature’.

Today, almost all kind of ‘nature’ we find in western cities is ‘good’ tamed: parks, artificial lakes, canals and rivers, ducks, geese, etc.

BUT 19th century: the Thames = NOT a pleasant river to tour on BUT “The great stink of London” (Oliver, 2000).

Houses of Parliament

Effect of environmental problems on life of cities.

The socio-environmental urban problems began to challenge the whole of the social edifice of modern societies. Demand for access to better environmental conditions (in terms of shelter, food, hygiene, medicine and consumer commodities) from all social classes

 

Embankment of the Thames (1864-1870)

“it is now widely acknowledged to be a national – and an imperial - humiliation that the very heart of the capital should be so vilely polluted “ (Luckin, 1986)

Unknown photographerPublisher: H. and C. F. FeistDate: c. 1906From the collection of John R. Mendelhttp://www.victorianweb.org/photos/postcards/mendel/18.html

Contribution to the appropriate, and appropriately civilised cityscape for a prosperous commercial society” (Ogborn 1998:101).Cultural amnesia: unregulated, water scapes have been forgotten. Embanked rivers became “the natural” way rivers are.

The Great London Sewers 1865Following an outbreak of cholera in 1853

The Great London Sewers 1865Sir Joseph Bazalgette, Chief Engineer to the Metropolitan Commission for Sewers

The encapsulation of the modern heroic engineer

DELAYED: Scientific War between John Simon (miasmatic theory) and John Snow the best practice to sanitize London allocation of public funding CURRENT DEBATE?

Discovery of link between dirty water and epidemics

Fairmount Water Works (built 1819-1822) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairmount_Water_Works

Abbey Mills Pumping Station Built: 1865-1868

Discovery of link between water and epidemics

Parallel between The human body and the “body” of the city:

William Harvey, 1628 De Motu Cordis" ("On the Motion of the Heart and Blood")

URBAN METABOLISM Sanitizing + Rationalising urban space = key

in producing a modern city + a modern self + key political and social issue

A NATURAL ORDERING going hand in glove with a SOCIAL ORDERING of cities

Sanitation of the city, eradication of physical ‘dirt’ combined with Eradication of social dirt (miasmata) cleared away.

A NATURAL AND SOCIAL ORDERING OF THE URBAN ENVIRONMENT

Rich neighbourhoods were the first ones to get connected to water distribution networks, and in big european cities it took over half a century for the poorer areas to get connected too.

Urban space socially segregated according to smell.

A NATURAL AND SOCIAL ORDERING OF THE DOMESTIC ENVIRONMENT

Domestic water supply and ‘Wet rooms’ became indicators of social status.

Only towards the beginning of the 20th century project for making working classes clean and healthy.

During the 19th century, in western cities through this modern project for mastering

simultaneously nature and society attempted to produce a

‘NATURAL’ FIX for all the ills and pains of modern urbanisation.

Thanks to this ‘natural fix’, cities could continue growing into the 20th century

Four main categories of Modernist Planning Projects:

1. Controlling Bad Nature 2. Taking the City Out into Nature (Urban

Utopias- Garden Cities, Suburbanisation)

3. Bringing Good Nature into the City (The City Beautiful Movement)

4. Taking the City dweller quickly and efficiently out into ‘nature’.

1.ANARCHIST UTOPIAS (a new city for a new society)

W Morris (grandfather ecologist) Natural Beauty and self-sufficiency as ecological solution to urban problems:

1891 “News from Nowhere” “ suppose people lived in little communities among gardens and green fields, so that you could be in the country in five minute's walk, and had few wants, almost no furniture for instance, and no servants, and studied the (difficult) arts of enjoying life, and finding out what they really wanted: then I think that one might hope civilization had really begun”.

ANARCHIST UTOPIAS (a new social organisation)

Kropotkin: Ecotopia: Ecological communities: a space for biology and evolution1902 “Mutual aid” Mutual aid, solidarity, cooperation, self-government, harmony, balance and community“Have the factory and workshop at the gates of your fields and gardens, and work in them … Not those large establishments … but airy and hygienic and consequently economical”

2. REFORMIST UTOPIAS (functioned within the capitalist economy)E Howard 1898 To-morrow: a peaceful path to social reform Garden Cities of To-morrowGreen, small, well-planned townsFactories at the periphery of Towns, Electrically powered tramwaysGood environment = happinessPublic propertyUnity of designBritish New Towns

“The objects chiefly kept in view have been to unite the greatest degree of order, symmetry, space, and healthfulness, in the largest supply of air and light, and in the most perfect system of drainage, with the comfort and convenience of all classes … And, in addition to all these, a large intermixture of grass lawn, garden ground, and flowers, and an abundant supply of water--the whole to be united with as much elegance and economy as may be found practicable. … simplicity, convenience, and economy, are the chief considerations, though ornament has not been neglected.”

Buckingham (1849) National Evils and Practical Remedies

“From the entire absence of all wynds, courts, and blind alleys, or culs-de-sac, there would be no secret and obscure haunts for the retirement of the filthy and the immoral from the public eye...

There being neither beer-shops, gin-palaces, dram-shops, cigar divans, pawnbrokers, gambling-houses, or brothels, permitted or possible to be established without immediate detection and suppression in any part of the Town, the host of evils thus avoided may be more easily imagined than described”.

The utopian city as a mechanism for social control

In both Environmental Control Practices and Utopian Thinking the ideal city treated as a piece of social machinery designed to function efficiently, but also reflecting an ideal social order and designed to ‘condition’ its inhabitants in the new or existing social order

Three main categories of Modernist Planning Projects:

1. Expelling Bad Nature from the City2. Taking the City Out into Nature (Urban

Utopias- Garden Cities, Suburbanisation)

3. Bringing Good Nature into the City (The City Beautiful Movement)

4. Taking the City dweller quickly and efficiently out into ‘nature’.

NEW YORK’S CENTRAL PARK 1857: the Greensward plan: Frederick Law

Olmsted with English architect Calvert Vaux 843 acre strip of nature

REVOLUTIONIZING the idea of PUBLIC SPACE

PUBLIC SPACE BEFORE CENTRAL PARK

EITHER: private squares and gardens defended against the threat of public use.

OR: Pleasure grounds at the edge of city: music games, traditional festivals.

BACKGROUND – RATIONALE: Sanitizing role of Nature: Curative

circulatory powers of green space; Inspiration from Behaviouralist Ideas and

Civilising role of nature : a well ordered city produces a well-ordered urban

society, a healthy environment produces a healthy society

Link to ideals of American democracy “Parks are the means to foster greater democratisation through the establishment of larger and more fraternal spirit in our social life”. Jackson Downing in “The Horticulturalist”(1840s)

Cultural elitism (civilisation = middle class tastes) Forcible education

Cultural and technological rivalry with European cities

DECISIVE ELEMENT

Growing importance of real estate speculation in urban design (Undeveloped lots 5th and 86th street were $500 in 1847 and over $20,000 by 1868.

Public expenditure = 7 million dollars. Increased value of property in 3 blocks =

22,5 million dollars

BEFORE CENTRAL PARK:plots undesirable for private development.

southern side = home to marginalized communities of the city:1600 residents of shantytowns (Irish pig farmers, German gardeners, black settlement, Seneca village 3 churches and a school)

ADMINISTRATIVE + LEGISLATIVE INNOVATIONS.

NY State legislature created Central Park Commission = first planning agency. End to uncontrolled development in Manhattan

NY State Legislature authorised the city to use the power of eminent domain to acquire land of 700 acres

Local tax base for creation of park

OPPOSITION: Local residents    Wealthy owners of property not in the

vicinity of the Central park: cost to taxpayers, opportunities for crime.

Progressive: overcrowding Republicans at state level (support) vs

Democrats city-based = outside interference to city management

20,000 people gathered outside city hall to denounce the state Legislature’s interference to public affairs.

1857 Olmsted’s plan chosen from 33 entries.

DESIGN FEATURES: http://

www.centralparknyc.org/virtualpark

1. Pastoral lane (Sheep meadow)

2. Semi-wild landscape

(the Ramble)

3. Formal elements: lakes, fountains, boulevards.

4. Roads at lower level = uninterrupted green space

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PROJECT

1. CITY LANDMARK, a flagship project for a NEW AMERICAN URBAN LIFESTYLE.

2. CHANGED PERCEPTIONS OF PUBLIC SPACE BEFORE: either: private squares and gardens defended

against the threat of public use. or: Pleasure grounds at the edge of city: music games,

traditional festivals.

3. A NEW METROPOLITAN NATURE AESTHETIC. Landscapes of consumption (recreation, tourist

engagement, reproduction of perceived “wilderness”) Landscapes of production (agricultural land, plantations

“Democratic development of the highest significance on the success of which, in my opinion, much of the progress of art and aesthetic culture in this country is dependent”.

F L Olmsted

Even today, “Central Park is … the major recreational facility of Manhattan … a preservation of nature the exhibits the drama of culture outdistancing nature”

A man-made nature, more perfect than nature itself?

Rem Koolhaas

Four main categories of Modernist Planning Projects:

1. Expelling Bad Nature from the City2. Taking the City Out into Nature (Urban

Utopias- Garden Cities, Suburbanisation)

3. Bringing Good Nature into the City (The City Beautiful Movement)

4. Taking the City dweller quickly and efficiently out into ‘nature’.

From The NATURAL SUBLIME to the TECHNOLOGICAL SUBLIME

1920s Scientific innovation, scientific organisation of industrial production, Taylorism, Technological modernism, the Era of the Fordist New Deal

The machine became the model for industrial, for social AND for spatial organisation

Revolutionizing industrial production: Taylorism Revolutionizing industrial production: Taylorism General Motors Mile Long Willow PlantGeneral Motors Mile Long Willow Plant

 Rationali-sation of production Efficiency Productivity Control over workers’ time and effort

The machine as a model for organizing labour time

                  

                                                                     

Modern Times 1936

modern times

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8LxscnmdNY

Modern Times (1936)

The machine as the model for social AND for spatial organisation

Citrohan House, Le Corbusier

Solution to the Nature/City problem = TECHNOLOGICAL

Technology would help to take quickly and comfortably the

urban dweller outside the city

Moses: THE URBAN PARKWAY

A new synthesis bringing together:

technology and landscape design

Or….The automobilisation

of the American

landscape

BRONX RIVER PARKWAY  TRIED TO COMBINE:

Ideals of American modernismWITH Technocratic Logic of landscape change

 Part of a wider National PROJECT:

THE INTRODUCTION OF TECHNOLOGY AS THE NEW LANDSCAPE AESTHETIC TECHNOLOGY not NATURE BECOMES THE INSPIRATION FOR A BETTER SOCIETY

 Magnificent approach” to nature and specifically to the newly completed Kensico Dam as a means to “inspire civic pride in the citizens of NY”.

http://www.westchestergov.com/wcarchives/Kensico/dam_construction.htm

Central Park created an imaginary “authentic” natural Urban landscape, Brought nature into the city

Bronx River Parkway = created an utopia supposed to reflectan “authentic” ideal American non-urban landscape. Brought the city dweller out into nature

A NEW URBAN PASTORAL New sensitivity towards american

ecological heritage. Nature more ACCESSIBLE yet more

DISTANT.“A new dimension to the urban pastoral, offering

spectacular display of primary forms of nature: earth, sun, water, sky- but nature here appears with an abstract horizontal purity, and a luminous clarity that only culture can create” Marshall Berman.

DEVELOPMENT OF NEW LANDSCAPES OF CONSUMPTION

New generation of mass recreational facilities for the city

Automobile: means to foster new kind of decentralised urban form

Parking lots for thousands of cars (unprecedented feature)

Contribution to development of suburban living.

A privatised public space

Parkways to Jones Beach could only be experienced by cars.

Techno-pastoral garden open to those who possessed the “modern machines”.

THE PARKWAY MODELFULFILLED early C 20th middle class American

Dream = greater freedom, leisure, mobility. BUT ALSO: Established irrevocable dynamic of social

and spatial separation A SOCIALLY STRATIFIED WAY OF EXPERIENCING

NATURE Roads carefully twisting and turning to avoid ‘sore’

sights through golf estates and manicured lawns. Screening out rural slums. Access to landscapes of consumption ONLY via private

car.

MARGINALISING NATURE FROM PLANNING PRACTICES

Argument for provision of nature within the city lost its power

Nature outside the city became easily accessible.

Cars dominated urban landscape THE PUBLIC NATURE OF C19TH

URBANISM vs. THE PRIVATISED NATURE OF

C20TH URBANISM

1930s onwards: The end of Nature as an inspiration for

the Ideal City

A New ParadigmASSERTING TECHNOLOGY’S POWER

OVER URBAN FORM

Not NATURE, but TECHNOLOGY, SPEED AND MOBILITY = inspiration and defining elements

FROM PARKWAYS TO HIGHWAYS

state funded large scale infrastructure projectsParkways: transformed technology into architecture, science into art, nature into culture (Gandy 2002).Highways: Post 1950s modernism very little inspiration from nature, in contrast to earlier modernism. 

http://www.nycroads.com/roads/west-side/

1950s 60s: Expressways Through the Heart of the City

1950s 60s: Cross Bronx Expressways Through the Heart of the City:

 NATURE marginalised from urban planning discourses

Technology became the basis for dreaming a new urban society.

RESULT: Extensive Technological Transformation of The Urban Landscape

West Side improvement Highway

1973: “an ugly traffic wall between the city and the river”

The NY Times

http://www.nycroads.com/roads/west-side/

West Side improvement Highway 1937: “one of the most magnificent

urban highways on earth”The NY Times

Georgy KRUTIKOVThe Flying City 1928http://www.kmtspace.com/krutikov.htm

Promethean Landscapes and the Technological Sublime

Fuelling ‘Progress’ but also Nationalist Ideologies

Ecuador Franco’s Spain Mussolini’s Italy Greece

Fascist Techno-Natures Fascism as

conservative modernization (Barrington Moore, 1971)

Fascism as a stage in the process of modernization (Organski, 1965) Land reclamation machinery, 1936

Fascist New Towns in the Pontine Marshes

Pontine Marshes saw an extensive programme of land reclamation and new town construction (5 towns built in under a decade during 1930s)

Contradictions between:

tradition/modernity expressed with in fascism’s attitude towards

nature

Fascism: a bearer of Traditional Values Incorporating “traditional” social values into

the “fascist” value-system Rurality Virile (rural) male Will Power Romanita` Mussolini as the embodiment of Fascism and the

Ideal Fascist Male

Fascism: a Modern phenomenon Fascism: a modern

phenomenon Milan Industrialization Technology Infrastructure New Towns Land reclamation Use of radio, cinema and

newsreel propaganda Mussolini the Faustian

Developer

Mussolini on a Fiat tractor in the Pontine Marshes, 1936

New Towns as expressions of Fascism’s Contrasting Ideals:tradition vs. modernisation

a) Nature and tradition

Idyllic nature and the ideal of fascist rural life

b) Nature and Modernity

The mastery of nature as an expression of fascist power

a) Tradition: Idyllic Nature nature as idyllic

Rural life as ideal “fascist”

life

Rural male as the ideal

fascist male

The fascist male works in

synergy with nature

Mussolini threshes grain in the Pontine Marshes, 1935

a) Tradition: Idyllic Nature The fascist female:

Leads a Rural life Works in synergy with

nature Supports family values Subordinated Fertile

Peasant woman, 1936

Tradition

1936 – Peasant women salute Mussolini in the Pontine Marshes.

b) Modernity: Tamed Nature Mastery of nature

Nature as wild, non-fascist

“War” against nature

Role of technology

Fascist male: has the willpower to tame nature

New Towns mastering nature, 1934

Tamed Nature

An expression of fascist power: the rural army in the Pontine Marshes, 1933

Tamed Nature

The Italian flag flies above the reclaimed marshes, 1933

Tamed Nature

Pipework with “Hooray for the Duce” inscribed on it, 1934

Tamed Nature

Warlike modernization – land reclamation machinery, 1933

The Victoria Embankment under construction in 1865. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/

Image:Embankment_Construction_of_the_Thames_Embankment_ILN_1865.jpg

The Importance of Water Engineering in “Freeing” the city from the constraints of nature:

Modernity’s Promethean Project

“Water had been subjecting [the Medieval] city to its power by moulding it at will, forcing the streets and buildings to adapt to its winding path.”

Guillerme (1994: 6).

The Victoria Embankment under construction in 1865. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/

Image:Embankment_Construction_of_the_Thames_Embankment_ILN_1865.jpg

“Freeing” the city from the constraints of nature:

Modernity’s Promethean Project

Aswan High Dam Source: NASA satellite imaging http://

earth.jsc.nasa.gov/sseop/EFS/lores.pl?PHOTO=STS102-303-17

Dam projects announced the moment when nature was not simply controlled, but literally recruited in the service of urban development.

The Cultural Politics of Dam ConstructionsThe Marathon Dam, 1926

How dam constructions became:

Intertwined with ideas of nationhood and patrimony.

Catalysts for the promotion of

Techno-Nature as the new countryside aesthetic ideal.

The Marathon Dam, 1926

Athens in 1834: A capital in RuinsSource: Mpiris 1939

Ulen & Co, an American construction giant Project’s budget of USD 10 million = bigger

than the combined stock and reserve funds of the National Bank of Greece

A symbol of Greece’s path to Modernization From 1926 onwards per capita availability of water increased

from 10 to 18 lt. per day All new buildings in the city centre

connected to the water supply network, all new houses fitted with bathrooms

The first tree-lining of the boulevards of Athens http://www.elibron.com/english/other/img_cltn_detail.phtml?cltn_id=545

Dominant ideology of modern Greek state.

A DUAL ASPIRATION Become part of the west Reconnect modern Greece to its ancient past

A symbol of Greece’s reconnection to its ancient past

Source: EYDAP photographic archive

1. Location choice

“ the final victory against a nature induced

water scarcity, which had tormented the capital of Greece and its inhabitants.”

Gerontas and Skouzes’s (1963: 132)

2. Material Choice: Marble cladding with marble from Penteli (same as the one used to built the

Parthenon

Source: EYDAP photographic archive

Source: EYDAP photographic archive

Marble cladding – a decorative job for women

Source: EYDAP photographic archive

Source: EYDAP photographic archive

3. Erecting a neo-classical temple at the foot of the dam

The Modern Temple at the Foot of the Dam

The ancient Temple, at Delphi http://www.culture.gr/2/21/211/21110a/00/lk10a013.jpg

A patriotic investment ““[buying shares is] the most patriotic

investment that a Greek can ever make … since the support of large scale infrastructure projects … guarantees the country’s economic and social progress.” (The bonds of the loan for the water supply, 5 October 1926: 3, Empros).

Water engineering projects as anchor points for national ideologies

Mussolini’s land reclamation projects in the Pontine Marshes (Caprotti, 2003)

Franco’s National Hydrological Plan (Swyngedouw, 1999)

Kensico Dam (Gandy, 2002)

Spoiling National Pride

Affirming Ulen&Co’s commitment“How can a company that fulfils all its promises, offers jobs to over 1,500 Greek families, and works towards your civilization and progress … with undisputed conscientiousness … be faced with … complaints and accusations? … Those who try to poison the Greek public opinion against the company with unsubstantiated rumors and allegations are leftist workers. ... It is high time the blabbermouths shut up and bowed in front of the Divinities of Work and Progress. … For while they are wasting their time manufacturing rumors, Ulen&Co is piercing the rocks of Parnitha day and night in order to deliver, any time now, one of the elements of civilization. WATER.”

(The American business culture in Greece, 4 June 1928: 6, Empros; original emphasis).

Ulen&Co’s President as the new Themistocles

“[I feel] very privileged, that 2,300 years onwards [I am] honored with the task to continue the work of the immortal Themistocles, to whom the ancient Athenians had entrusted their city’s water supply”

(The Municipal gala, 26 April 1925: 4, Empros).

Linking ancient forms with modern achievements: not a uniquely Greek phenomenon

Ladybower Reservoir Cosgrove Roscoe and Rycroft (1996)

Weimar and Nazi Germany’s ‘reactionary modernization’ Jeffrey Herf (1984)

Mussolini’s hydro-projects succeeded where “even the Romans had failed” Caprotti (2003)

Using historical forms to veneer modern technological achievements Offered a link between technology and discourses of

nationhood and patrimony Provided an easy way out of the requirement to find a new

architectural language for new functions. “Ready-made” historical styles could conveniently vest technology’s new functions.

Helped make the massive transformation of socio-economic landscapes publicly acceptable (Tsotsoros 1995; Cosgrove, Roscoe and Rycroft 1996: 549). The historical forms were presented as an aesthetic antidote to the de-humanizing aspects of industrialization and modernization. They would “democratize” technology and ”dignify progress” ((Schorske, 1981; Chant 1989; Picon 1992; Kaika and Swyngedouw 2000).

Fairmount Water Works (built 1819-1822) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairmount_Water_Works

Abbey Mills Pumping Station Built: 1865-1868

Transmuted Landscapes.Before and After the Atatürk Dam

Landsat7 image, post-Atatürk Dam, Harran (24 Aug 2002)Source: NASA

Landsat7 image of pre-Atatürk Dam, Harran (20 Aug 1983)Source: NASA

Promoting techno-nature as the new countryside aesthetic

Eder Dam, Germany, 1910Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Eder_dam.jpg

Praising the new engineering aesthetic “What will become of our idyllic currents [after the

construction of dams]? They will of course disappear. Trees will also have to be felled in order to make space for building reservoirs. But the scientists assure us that this loss will be compensated. We may lose our currents and rivers, but we will gain a lake. … Water is beautiful in all its forms. … We can even introduce small leisure boats on the lake … To be sure, this is not the first time in the history of humankind that natural beauty is sacrificed to social needs … to the need to supply everyone with water and electricity.”

(The Dams, 2 June 1921:1, Empros).

The 19th century’s romantic quest for a “pristine” nature gave way to the 20th century’s civic pride over a man-made, transmuted socio-nature.

Deluxe Hoover Dam TourDuration : 7 hours

Description : When you visit Hoover Dam, it will only take one minute to understand why it is rated one of America's seven modern civil engineering wonders. Completed in 1935, the Hoover Dam remains the number one sightseeing attraction in Nevada. It is simply an experience and photo opportunity that is not to be missed. You’ll also enjoy a relaxing buffet lunch at the Hacienda Hotel and can stroll through the Desert Botanical Garden at Ethel M’s Chocolate Factory and savor a piece of their world famous candy. Your deluxe motor coach tour to Hoover Dam, which originates in Las Vegas, allows you plenty of time to also enjoy the optional Bureau of Reclamation Discovery tour. For only an additional $10, you can tour the center, watch a movie on the Hoover Dam’s construction and visit the museum and enjoy many of the facilities exhibits. Informative talks by the Bureau’s staff are presented at separate locations.

http://www.city-discovery.com/las-vegas/tour.php?id=905

A new way of experiencing the countryside 18th century: favourite objects for countryside visits =

gardens and the estates of the famous 19th century: urban dweller travelled into the

countryside in search of “wild nature”. Green (1990: 80)

20th century’s pilgrimages to dams signalled yet another qualitative shift in the way the urban dweller experienced and appropriated the countryside:

No longer in search of the beauty of a divine pristine nature, but in conscious pursuit of the splendour of a man-made, pride-inducing “second” nature.

In the middle of the transmuted landscapes of modernity, the urban dweller could trace down the stigmata on a mastered nature that enabled his/her city to function and metabolize.

Dams as the collective technological sublime

http://www.chinaodysseytours.com/yangtzecruise/why_cruise.html

Yangtze River Cruisesand the Three Gorges Dam Tour

To sail across the natural wonder: Three Gorges

"The mighty Yangtze river and its Three Gorges has long been one of Asia's most revered and dramatic nature attractions."- by Mr. Richard Carroll

To see the world’s-largest dam - Three Gorges Dam

Time flies fast! When you are still hearing the debating on "to or not to" build the dam, it is already there! The hydraulic power has already been supplying cities like Shanghai and Suzhou. Come to see the HUGE dam, and your ship will cross the 5-level huge lock.

Iconography and Discourse play the role of the ideological negotiator between the destruction of the idealized countryside pastoral and the creation of an ideal modern urban landscape

  Selling Sustainability THE GREEN CITY

You'll be mesmerised by Hong Kong's natural habitat. Lush lowlands, bamboo and pine forests, rugged mountains with panoramic sea views, and secluded beaches - this is the little-known alter ego of Hong Kong. Nearly 70 per cent of Hong Kong's total area is comprised of open land, and an incredible 40 per cent of the territory has been officially conserved in protected country parkland. The ecological and natural environment in and around Hong Kong is surprisingly diverse. There's dolphin-watching, bird-watching, trail-walking and hiking in country parks and along nature trails.

THE INSTITUTIONALISATION OF SUSTAINABILITY Along with “Diversity” “Pluralism” and “Culture”, “Sustainability” another buzzword institutionalised to the

point of becoming ‘empty word’. What exactly do we mean when we say we want a ‘sustainable city”? More open green spaces in our cities? Cleaner environment for our cities? OR: Express concern about global ecological impact of urban activities? Given that:

richest 20% of world pop.consume 86% of alum., 81 paper, 80 iron (Brown 1995). 1990 per capita CO2 emissions: 5 tons US, 0.1 tons India average UK meal travels 2,000 miles

A green local environment (water) and a comfortable lifestyle is not necessarily friendly for the global environment.

Can we seriously claim that we want our cities to simultaneously: a) attract an international élite AND b) be more ecologically friendly?

ASK• What do we wish to sustain? heritage,

environment, urban life-styles? Livelihoods of core population?

2. In what form? romanticised factory sites,urban parks, ability to experience ‘urban’ life

3. Who gains and who loses?

4. WHO DECIDES?

THE NEED TO RE-SET THE POLITICAL BUT ALSO THE ACADEMIC/TRAINING AGENDA.

Training Programmes:Emphasis on technical rationalityTraining of professional ecologists Production of professional technical analysts and administrators. Deal with env crisis on “sound scientific and technical grounds.”Curriculums focus on: resource risk and recreational managerialism. =

“infrastructuralization of nature” (Luke, 1999 in Hajer and Fisher (eds) 1999) = use tools borrowed from the market, such as risk-benefit analysis for making judgments about environment and society.

Students enter professional schools in search of the wisdom of Leopold or John Muir and leave as technocratic practitioners of ecological risk analysis and environmental management.

Result: students learn to rationalise and automatically think of environmental problems as market problems and try to find solutions through performative norms embedded at core of capitalist practice. Not stop and question anything, perpetuate the status quo. – All a matter of good management!

Graduate ecology programmes (US, UK) = sites for constructing understandings of and policy approaches to the environment and nature. Reproduce bodies of practice and discourse which the top executive management of contemporary economic and political institutions regard as “objective” valid”, “useful”.

Think different !

An Optimistic Outlook? Environmentally and socially efficient

practices (i.e. green housing, social housing) are not necessarily alien to new redevelopment schemes.

Mechanisms for making unstable, flexible institutions contribute fairly for the privileges they enjoy in the city and for the environmental impact of their activities

Political Will and Courage !Think different !

Problem:Cities cannot tap into the wealth of corporations

Lack political mechanisms to make unstable, flexible institutions contribute fairly for the privileges they

enjoy in the city WHILEMaintaining competitive advantages to attract

investment.

CHARACTERISING

BROWNFIELD SITES:

Not everything marked as ‘brownfield’ is brown

Spitalfields Market http://www.smut.org.uk/

Think different !

HIGHLANDS' GARDEN VILLAGE

Denver (Elitch Gardens amusement park)

Perry, developer of affordable housing in Denver, and Rose, New York-based developer

although conventional thinking says that mixing expensive and more affordable housing in the same neighborhood doesn't work, Perry and Rose have successfully sold the market-rate houses at prices above their own projections - as high as $275,000.

ZED FACTORYZero-Carbon emissions development, Carbon neutral development Zedfactory (zero energy

development) http://www.zedfactory.com/home.htmlRATIONALE: - A typical UK family’s annual carbon emissions are

approximately a third for heating and powering their home, a third for private car use, commuting and travel, and a third for foodmiles – with the average UK meal travelling over 2000 miles from farm to dinnerplate

- There is no point in producing energy efficient buildings, if transport and foodmiles are not addressed. working with the BioRegional Development Group –

- Community car ownership- design the lifestyle before the buildings. It is this holistic

and thorough approach to sustainable development that volume house builders find so challenging.

PRINCIPLES: http://www.zedfactory.com/bedzed/bedzed.html1. PREDICTED DEVELOPMENT COST FOR INNOVATIVE

PRODUCTShave sourced, negotiated and fixed the price of all the

innovative products. highly researched, well honed design solutions that in turnenables development costs to be predicted before site

purchase. 2. FUNDING THROUGH HIGHER DENSITY ALLOWANCESenables clients to trade environmental performance with

planning gain at very early stages of most projects, frequently obtaining permission to build the extra accommodation that funds the green construction specification.

3. NO LARGE CENTRAL GOV. GRANTS 4. BUILDING ON “BROWNFIELD” SITES = LOWER LAND COST

http://www.zedfactory.com/arrivals/arrival.html

Why cruise Yangtze river2.mht

http://www.chinaodysseytours.com/yangtzecruise/why_cruise.html

Yangtze River Cruisesand the Three Gorges Dam Tour  When you are still hearing the debating on "to or not to" build the dam, it is already there! The hydraulic power has already been supplying cities like Shanghai and Suzhou. Come to see the HUGE dam, and your ship will cross the 5-level huge lock.  To sail across the natural wonder: Three Gorges"The mighty Yangtze river and its Three Gorges has long been one of Asia's most revered and dramatic nature attractions."- by Mr. Richard Carroll  Experience the authentic local people's life and cultureTo visit the local countryside area and see the common people's life - which you can not see in big cities like Beijing, Shanghai, etc.  Great Onboard ExperienceTake part in various activities onboard and learn about Chinese culture. Most of the cruises provide Chinese culture presentation, staff show, and very nice food with Chinese cuisine.  Enjoy the relaxation and comfort as other cruisesAs the dam has locked the water flow, the Yangtze river is not so "mighty" as before. Bigger ships have been built and old ships are refurnished. Cruise on Yangtze is much more comfortable than before!

TECHNO-Natural Transformation DID NOT HAPPEN IN A VOID

Dramatic transformation of city’s economic base industry starts moving out, service and admin

sector moves in Big corporations (CBD)

In the 10 largest American cities between 1920-1930 Office space increased by 3,000%.

By 1929 56% of america’s national corporations had located their headquarters in NY city and Chicago.

Skyscrapers sprouted, aided by the earlier inventions of elevators and steel frame constructions.

The CBD dominating Corporations emerge as the new actor/growth engine

for cities. Cities become the arena / stage for heads of business

corporations to assert their power and concretise it in urban form.

Take on the role of the city’s patrons and take pride into producing the city after their own image.

AN IMAGE OF POWER AND DRAWS LITTLE IMAGINATION FROM NATURE; TECHNOLOGICAL POWER IS THE NEW INSPIRATION.

Competition over money power translated into competition over symbolic power. Don’t fund parks but Skyscrapers bearing their names. Rockefeller centre, Chanin building, Heinz building, Mellon building Pittsburgh

1929. A tribute to Irwin 1929. A tribute to Irwin Chanin’s rise Chanin’s rise to power and to power and wealth. wealth.

a major New York a major New York developer of the 1920sdeveloper of the 1920s

Exuberant style in:Exuberant style in:

colored glass, stone, colored glass, stone,

metal, bronze, Belgian metal, bronze, Belgian marble and terra-cottamarble and terra-cotta

Almost erotic relationship between the Almost erotic relationship between the Urban elites and ‘their’ city.Urban elites and ‘their’ city.

City is their stage, City is their stage,

the physical space for the function of their the physical space for the function of their economic activities, but also economic activities, but also

the symbolic space for their personal the symbolic space for their personal glorificationglorification

1920s – 1940s

Corporate Funding for Iconic Buildings

Generous State Funding for Infrastructure The collective means of consumption

(Castells, 1977)

The Moment of Social Housing

late 1940s: ‘Urban Managerialism’