Ben Winn, Occupying the Expanded Edge
Pima County, AZ
If extreme is another word for problematic then the nature of human settlement is extreme in that it creates a binary relationship between nature and culture that is both inefficient and unsustainable.
I am proposing a hybrid landscape within the monocultural cotton fields of Arizona by inhabiting and expanding the edge condition between agricultural and urban, residential and commercial, legal and illegal. This is done through the integration of housing for the migrant farm workers into the cotton fields that they harvest every fall. To accomplish this the intense environmental conditions dictate a need to provide shelter from exposure to the sun and heat during the day, warmth at night, potable drinking water, and a method to filter the site of fertilizers and pesticides.
These issues are approached by utilizing the one resource that the Sonoran desert has in abundance, solar energy. Photovoltaic panels are used to power pumps that collect water from aquifers and place it in solar stills where it is purified through evaporation. As the steam is collected it is stored underground where another pump can send it through exterior roof panels to absorb solar radiation, heating the water which is stored for later use. Solar energy is also used to filter the discarded domestic water through constructed subterranean wetlands which rely on plants to absorb and convert pollutants into benign by-products.
Batton Kennon
Columbia River Gorge, OR
The site is chosen based on the densest area for windsurfing along the Columbia River Gorge, the town of Hood River, Oregon. More specifically where the mouth of the Hood River meets the Columbia River.
The Hood River sailing basecamp should be seen as a didactic event intended to mix experienced sailors with casual spectators.
Along the gorge there are 9 major areas to sail from (these areas can range from small towns to local marinas) with many other unpopulated shorelines that attract sailors. Any one of the 9 major sailing sites can expect up to 100 people.
Year to year major windsurfing events across the country such as any US national event or US Olympic trail event can expect 150 windsurfers. The sailing basecamp should be capable of hosting such events as the official event site. This includes parking with places to store and drop off sailing gear. Places for windsurfers to gather for event instruction and rest are important for the success of major week-long events. The sailing basecamp should have as a goal to have the ability to house 50 people. The typical sailor or spectator seeking housing comes from around the country and has no local contacts or local housing.
The local windsurfing community is very active with their sport and with their environment. The windsurfing community is responsible for installing solar panel projects intended to support the local grid. Also many windsurfing and other sailing gear recycling events are held throughout the year. These events are called “swap meets” where sailors trade gear usually after making gear upgrades when sailors gain more experience.
This type of event can be coupled with other community markets. One example could be a market that sells fresh salmon and sturgeon (two local fish species), or a market that attracts the local community to be on the river. The Town of Hood River does not currently have an outdoor venue on the Columbia River. The basecamp should have the ability to facilitate multiple events with the expectation that there will be cross over events amonst sailors and the general public. The basecamp should also have the ability to be programmed for multiple events throughout the year.
The program coupled with a floodable site with many long range views of several mountains and volcanoes (i.e. Mt. St. Helens) has evolved into a park made up of several built berms. These berms are intended to be launch sites for the windsurfers of all experience levels. Areas within the park create zones sheltered from intense breeze making it more manageable for sailors to set up their windsurfing rigs. The geometry of the park and space making is marked by several axis that focus on the site’s surrounding. The berms are literally cut or grooved on site lines facing Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Hood. The berms also have within them places to gather and rest while watching the hundreds of windsurfers. The structure of the park is derived from the concept of a netted for intended for the park to become in trenched within annual flooding of the park. Sediment gathered from the shore’s run-off will be woven through out the park and create future windsurfing launch sites.
Noah Bolton, Appropriating an Architecture of Division
West Bank
The barrier being built today around the West Bank territory in Israel can be seen as the greatest architectural move implemented by the Israeli government in order to define a border and stake out what is and isn’t theirs. Opponents say that it is ruining the livelihood of both the Palestinians and Israelis (mostly Palestinians) and is in violation of international law. The proponents of the barrier argue that it is saving lives. Both are right.
As of now the flow of people, goods, and services funnel themselves through strategic check points established along the wall. These links become vital outlets and important opportunities for exchange. How can these checkpoints be reinterpreted in a way that continues to provide security but also promotes a new cultural exchange? How can they become generative rather the degenerative? These checkpoints can be re-imagined in order to provide vital goods and services to both Israelis and Palestinians ie; places of commercial exchange, schooling, and medical care.
Jay Quarles
Jackson Glacier, Montana, USA
Glacier National Park is in a state of continual decline and change.Founded on the notion of capturing the imagination of tourists by making available the glacier-sculpted backcountry of Montana. Initial campaigns of tourism for the park catered to the idea of the Swiss Alps with historic rustic chalets staffed by young women dressed in traditional Swiss apparel. Later on, the park truly made the mountains accessible to everyone when they tamed the rocky slopes with the now historic Going-To-The-Sun Road, a paved highway that cut through the mountains and forests. However, through growing financial problems, increase in park maintenance, and the shear amount of time and energy to maintain the famous road, the park finds itself at a monumental threshold of turning its back on the original goals of the park.
As the namesake glaciers disappear by 2030 and the fragile ecosystem of this alpine region devastatingly changes, new methods are needed to allow the tourist to experience this national treasure. This project seeks to redefine the initial campaign of backcountry lodging and accessibility into a series of systems that allow the tourist to experience the park in an ecologically sensitive and affordable way; while providing an adaptive lodge/habitat for the education, research, and analysis of the changing ecosystem that would be staffed by this emerging didactic form of tourism.
Ngoc Tran, Cai Rang Floating Market
Mekong River Delta, Vietnam
The future sea level rise due to global warming will have a major economic and lively hood impact on settlements along the shorelines and low lying areas. Vietnam’s rice basket relies on water as the most essential resource for growth. People here have learned to live with the love-hate relationship: the flood brings destruction while at the same time replenishing the nutrients and water supply that flushes the salt water intrusion in this vast agricultural flood plain. Thinking about a new approach within its historical context, the design positions Cai Rang Community Exchange Center as a catalyst to facilitate sustainable agricultural, housing, and community development through out the region. The proposed environment is supported by an armature system (that composes of structural bridging core and peripheral scaffolding, water filtering and collecting devices) that expands over time. In the end, it is an attempt to create a sustainable community living that couples with agricultural production that can be adaptive to both land and water conditions.
With the current fast development along the water front that causes great damages to the water’s ecology, the site is calling for a new development model for the larger region to follow. This exchange program provide spaces for small market, research & education, performance & exhibition, housing for the care takers, temporary lodging catering to tourists and Can Tho University’s researching students. More importantly, it would also integrate agriculture and aquaculture production while sustainably filtering waste, and harvesting rain with energy. Hence, the end result of this effort is stimulating the sustainable growth to ripple across the larger regions.
Robert Couch
Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania, USA
Although we all live as a collective agency in the production of waste we remain unaware of the accompanying risk of our consumption. When sites of post-nuclear production are returned to the public use, the risk associated with its continued toxicity is masked through a “camouflage approach” (Engler) that conceals histories of site and subverts connections that may give meaning to a public which identifies with the associated images of production and consumption.
The reoccupation of these “disturbed sites” (Meyer) has the opportunity to physically manifest the relationships that are known to exist in a post-industrial wasteland but are either invisible to the public or remain unacknowledged. Through the revealing of the remediation processes necessary for inhabitation, the meaning and memory of site becomes manifest. Current and future inhabitants are forced to examine the risks of living and recreating in close proximity to these facilities, while also confronting the long-term effects of consumer waste. The Three Mile Island Wellness Center seeks to reconcile opposing concepts of man and nature, growth and decay, and revealing and concealing that are evident in the processes necessary to satisfy the appetite of consumer consumption.
Suzanne Mathew, Wat[er] Wonderful World
Kotchi, Kerala, India
This project seeks to examine the potential of water to generate a dynamic, productive landscape that can adapt to seasonal and long-term climate changes in an urban environment. The city of Kochi, India is located 1M above sea-level and experiences annual flooding during a 6-month monsoon season. While the city embraces industrial growth its ability to provide potable water and agricultural resources to its inhabitants is facing immediate depletion. By creating an infrastructure that submerges, raises and floats the layers of Kochi’s urban landscape, this project presents an urban model that uses water to weave together the productive layers of the city and create a dynamic infrastructure that changes over time.
Ali Quade
Victoria Falls, Zambezi River, Zimbabwe, Africa
Cutting a large swath into the continental shelf, the Zambezi is an extension of the East African Rift, the divergent plate system that extends from Lebanon to Mozambique. Located at the boarder of Zimbabwe and Zambia, Victoria Falls is the largest volume water fall in the world . Over the past 100,000 years the corrosive power of its falls has slowly eroded the bedrock receding 18 miles towards Zambia, and leaving the remnants of 7 fall lines in its wake. These geological ruins today harbor some of the world’s most extreme white water conditions, including the highest commercially run rapids in the world. The site for Basecamp Zambezi is along one of the historic fall lines in Zimbabwe, 350 feet above the intrepid waters of the river.
Already a site of pilgrimage for extreme kayakers, the Basecamp works to create an place of exchange between adventure seekers and the local Tonga guides. Similar to the sherpas of Nepal, the Tonga people of the Zambezi have intimate knowledge in guiding and training kayakers. They are seasoned paddlers and under appreciated experts in the adrenaline-filled world of extreme paddling. Like many people in Zimbabwe, they face an uncertain future due to a complicated political situation. This project provides economic stimulus to the local area, safe housing and a place for authentic cultural exchange while treading lightly on an historic site.
Basecamp Zambezi combines permanent housing for the guides, flexible sleeping space for guests, classroom and training areas for kayaking as well as classroom and work space for a field school in the off-season. Negotiating the 350 ft gorge, the Basecamp relies on a tensile structure that adheres to the rock and sand cliff. The armature collects water, provides shade, harvests energy and accommodates sleeping shelters when needed.
Kurt Petschke, Hawaii!
Hawaiian Archipelagos, USA
The BASECAMP operates within an expanded discourse on sustainability and design. Its primary objective is to erase the boundary between our everyday participation in global productive and consumptive flows and the very real material effects this participation has on an extreme, remote location. Here, the BASECAMP demonstrates how revaluing “waste” has the potential to empower undesirable materials in ways that ultimately change our everyday bad behavior.
The BASECAMP supports an autonomous, offshore economy in the North Pacific Ocean founded on the usurpation of an established tourist industry and the exploration, extraction, and exportation of plastic marine debris. The result is a re-adaptation and hybridization of island morphologies, exploitative offshore technologies, and leisurely tourist activities. The program emerges out of this overlay, exploring the possibilities of reprocessing this immense waste in the service of creating something just and beautiful, all the while sipping on a mai tai in the setting sun.
Graham Peterson
Uluru, Australia
The Australian Outback is one of the most remote and extreme locations on our planet. This desert terrain hosts some of the rarest plants and animals, and is home to the oldest culture on Earth, the Aboriginal peoples of Australia. In recent decades, the heart of the Outback, specifically Uluru-Kata-Tjuta National Park, has become an increasingly popular destination for tourists and scientists alike.
I propose to design an integrated Outback Research Center [ORC] at the base of Uluru, a World Heritage Site and one of the continent’s largest monoliths. Here, interested students in the fields of GEOLOGY, ECOLOGY, and ANTHROPOLOGY will have the unique opportunity to live and conduct research for periods of six months to a year. Fellows in this program will be privileged to reside in one of the oldest and most preserved sites in the world, while studying the enchanting flora and fauna that habitate solely in this extreme environment.
