It is possible to chip away at the harm architecture causes
the environment, and these proposals indicate what is evolving,
every step of the way by the industries which benefit from
trashing the earth (while architects continue to play minor
beneficial roles while being educated, paid, publicized and
lauded for escapist fantasies to glamorize the negatived
impact of depradations):
1. Buildings that produce sufficient energy to export surplus
rather than import nearly all needed now for power and lighting.
This approach is being developed in Europe, although projects
currently need governmental subsidy to operate -- as does
most of US infrastructure.
2. Garbage and sewage processed within the buildings which
produce it with none or little going to garbage dumps and sewage
treatment plants, with waste water converted to potable, and this
too is being developed in several countries including the US.
3. More buildings and support structures for work at home to
ease transportation daily costs (and the unpaid travel time
of workers) and the giant subsidized cost of transportation
facilities -- to construct, repair and maintain -- not to mention
the mass death and medical costs caused by vehicles, along
with their toxic spew.
4. Structures for communication, education, entertainment
to reduced senseless air travel in planes increasinly dangerous
and toxic as well as their burgeoning toxic airports.
5. Facilities for safe multiple uses rather than single uses in
which users attempting multiple activities risk life and limb,
and byways for temporary parking of vehicles are increasinly
hard to find. Ships pose an alternative to mono-use machines
like planes, subways, trains, taxis, automobiles and trucks.
I'm not sure how much experimental design work along these
lines is being done in schools under pressure from the architecture
profession to turn out drones for the real estate driven market --
the obnoxious architecture school accrediting boards should
be pilloried, tarred and feathered whether they appear on
campus until they require schools to teach countermeasures
to real estate predation, and give extra credit to schools who
bestow awards on the architects who design the most
environmentally damaging projects. (And state boards of
registration should issued warnings, publish lists to warn
unwary clients, and finally boot environmental offenders.)
None of this dreamworld, any more than health codes,
building codes, zoning codes, environmental codes, safety
codes, now security codes, once were -- and none of these
were implemented by the professionals in the fields, it took
an aroused citizenry to demand protection from the
professional hucksters, hacks and quacks, and it was
dedicated "amateurs," aided by a few covert practitioners
afraid of professional suicide, who did the arousing.
Unfortunately, some of the public benefit measures followed
major disasters, years after advocates attempted rational
means of persuasion against entrenched, boneheaded,
profit-addicted industries -- who, by the way, have long
understood that the effect of disasters is short-lived, as
we have seen at WTC, and it will soon be back to the backrooms
of business out of sight of the diverted public, as we have
seen with the exploitation of celebrated architects at WTC
to cloak the business as usual, as we have seen Muschamp
and successor assist the New York Times assist its
density-is-no-sin benefactors.
the environment, and these proposals indicate what is evolving,
every step of the way by the industries which benefit from
trashing the earth (while architects continue to play minor
beneficial roles while being educated, paid, publicized and
lauded for escapist fantasies to glamorize the negatived
impact of depradations):
1. Buildings that produce sufficient energy to export surplus
rather than import nearly all needed now for power and lighting.
This approach is being developed in Europe, although projects
currently need governmental subsidy to operate -- as does
most of US infrastructure.
2. Garbage and sewage processed within the buildings which
produce it with none or little going to garbage dumps and sewage
treatment plants, with waste water converted to potable, and this
too is being developed in several countries including the US.
3. More buildings and support structures for work at home to
ease transportation daily costs (and the unpaid travel time
of workers) and the giant subsidized cost of transportation
facilities -- to construct, repair and maintain -- not to mention
the mass death and medical costs caused by vehicles, along
with their toxic spew.
4. Structures for communication, education, entertainment
to reduced senseless air travel in planes increasinly dangerous
and toxic as well as their burgeoning toxic airports.
5. Facilities for safe multiple uses rather than single uses in
which users attempting multiple activities risk life and limb,
and byways for temporary parking of vehicles are increasinly
hard to find. Ships pose an alternative to mono-use machines
like planes, subways, trains, taxis, automobiles and trucks.
I'm not sure how much experimental design work along these
lines is being done in schools under pressure from the architecture
profession to turn out drones for the real estate driven market --
the obnoxious architecture school accrediting boards should
be pilloried, tarred and feathered whether they appear on
campus until they require schools to teach countermeasures
to real estate predation, and give extra credit to schools who
bestow awards on the architects who design the most
environmentally damaging projects. (And state boards of
registration should issued warnings, publish lists to warn
unwary clients, and finally boot environmental offenders.)
None of this dreamworld, any more than health codes,
building codes, zoning codes, environmental codes, safety
codes, now security codes, once were -- and none of these
were implemented by the professionals in the fields, it took
an aroused citizenry to demand protection from the
professional hucksters, hacks and quacks, and it was
dedicated "amateurs," aided by a few covert practitioners
afraid of professional suicide, who did the arousing.
Unfortunately, some of the public benefit measures followed
major disasters, years after advocates attempted rational
means of persuasion against entrenched, boneheaded,
profit-addicted industries -- who, by the way, have long
understood that the effect of disasters is short-lived, as
we have seen at WTC, and it will soon be back to the backrooms
of business out of sight of the diverted public, as we have
seen with the exploitation of celebrated architects at WTC
to cloak the business as usual, as we have seen Muschamp
and successor assist the New York Times assist its
density-is-no-sin benefactors.