Hou, J. (2023). Seattle’s CHOP Guerrilla Garden as a “Thick” Space of Civil Resistance. Local Environment, 28(2), 189–202.
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Abstract
More than just everyday acts of appropriation, guerrilla gardens have appeared in a growing number of civic protests. During Seattle’s Capitol Hill Occupied Protest (CHOP) in 2020, a guerrilla garden was featured prominently within the six-block area taken over by protesters following a standoff with the Seattle Police. Through informal and semi-structured interviews with the garden leaders, volunteers, protesters, and neighbours who lived near the site, this study examines the garden's role and significance during the month-long protest. Findings suggested that the CHOP garden provided opportunities for social interactions among protesters as well as non-protesters. Through expanded engagement, the garden brought a wider range of individuals to the protest site. With its ability to engage broader participation, the garden helped mobilise additional human and material resources for the movement. Furthermore, the garden functioned as a place of learning that deepened the meanings and narrative of the movement. It also served as a place of refuge and relief during the tense occupation. Lastly, the social networks and relationships that emerged from the garden serve as a vehicle for sustaining the movement beyond the protest. As a place that facilitated these multilayered processes, these findings suggest that the CHOP Garden functioned as a “thick” space of civil resistance. The notion of thick space highlights the importance of specific spatial practices that can contribute significantly to the transformative outcomes of social movements.
Keywords
Guerrilla garden; protest; civil resistance; thick space; CHOP
Rottle, Nancy, Bowles, Mason, Andrews, Leann, & Engelke, Jennifer (2023). Constructed Floating Wetlands: A “Safe‐to‐Fail” Study with Multi‐sector Participation. Restoration Ecology, 31(1).
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Abstract
The Duwamish River Floating Wetlands project designed, built, and deployed constructed floating wetlands in the estuary of the urban Duwamish River in Seattle, Washington, during the 2019 and 2020 outmigration seasons for juvenile salmon. Using a “safe‐to‐fail” methodology and adaptive management strategies, these innovative floating wetland prototypes were custom designed to provide the native plants, invertebrates and slow water habitat that juvenile salmon require during their transition from fresh to salt water, and were monitored for these outcomes. This paper will provide insight into the prototype designs, adaptive management strategies and plant performance, and unique public‐private‐academic‐community partnerships that supported 2 years of design and research.
Keywords
community science; cross‐sector collaboration; designed ecosystems; Duwamish River; ecological restoration; green infrastructure
The College of Built Environments launched a funding opportunity for those whose research has been affected by the ongoing pandemic. The Research Restart Fund, with awards up to $5,000, has awarded 4 grants in the second of its two cycles. A grant was awarded to Manish Chalana, faculty member with Urban Design and Planning to help support his efforts to carry out archival research and fieldwork in India for his new book exploring the history and memory of non-dominant groups…
Feng, R., Wang, F., Liu, S., Qi, W., Zhao, Y., & Wang, Y. (2023). How Urban Ecological Land Affects Resident Heat Exposure: Evidence from the Mega-urban Agglomeration in China. Landscape and Urban Planning, 231.
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Abstract
Resident heat exposure (RHE) is becoming more severe in the coming decades owing to rapid urbanization and climate change. Urban ecological land (UEL) provides important ecosystem services, such as mitigating the urban heat islands effect. However, the impacts of UEL on RHE remain poorly understood. This study quantifies the effects of UEL and its interaction with the natural-anthropogenic environment on RHE in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, a mega-urban agglomeration in China. The results showed a tight spatial–temporal coupling between the UEL and RHE: UEL transitioned from degradation-fragmentation in 2000–2010 to recovery-agglomeration in 2010–2020, while the RHE distribution evolved from intensification-expansion-inequity to mitigation-contraction-equity. The average explanatory power (q value) of UEL and its structure on RHE also increased by 75.99% and 70.79%, respectively. UEL patch diversity gradually dominated the RHE distribution, and the spatial marginal effect of UEL dominance increased by 234.97%. Moreover, RHE shifted from being dominated by UEL and anthropogenic heat emissions interactions to being jointly driven by UEL and natural-anthropogenic factors (especially the interaction of patch fragmentation with topography and built-up land expansion). The results of this study provide valuable information for nature-based (i.e., UEL) landscape planning and management to develop “human-centric” RHE mitigation strategies.
Keywords
Urban ecological land; Resident heat exposure; Spatial-temporal effects; Natural-anthropogenic factors; Interaction effect; Mega-urban agglomeration
Hou, J. (2022). Building Community Capacity as Just Urban Design: Learning from Seattle’s Chinatown International District. In K. Goh, A. Loukaitou-Sideris, & V. Mukhija (Eds.), Just Urban Design: The Struggle for a Public City. The MIT Press.
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Cho, I. S., Križnik, B., & Hou, J. (Eds.). (2022). Emerging Civic Urbanisms in Asia: Hong Kong, Seoul, Singapore, and Taipei beyond Developmental Urbanization. Amsterdam University Press.
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“Just Urban Design: The Struggle for a Public City” (MIT Press 2022) features a collection of chapters and case studies that apply a social justice lens to the design of urban environments. Sixteen contributors, including Rachel Berney of Urban Design & Planning and Jeff Hou of Landscape Architecture, examine topics ranging from single-family zoning and community capacity building to immigrant street vendors and the right to walk. The book is open-access and can be downloaded from MIT Press here.
De Almeida, Catherine. (2019). Performative By-Products: The Emergence of Waste Reuse Strategies at the Blue Lagoon. Journal of Landscape Architecture, 13(3), 64-77.
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Abstract
Materials and landscapes associated with waste are perceived as objectionable. By reactivating and embracing waste conditions as desirable opportunities for diverse programmes rooted in economy, ecology, and culture, designers can form hybrid assemblages on waste sites through the exchange of waste materials—a landscape lifecycles approach. This frame-work is applicable to not only design research, but also as a critical lens for evaluating the landscape performance of existing projects that engage with waste reuse. The Blue Lagoon in southwest Iceland materialized as a spa industry out of geothermal waste effluent from the adjacent Svartsengi Geothermal Power Station, reusing undesirable materials and transforming a waste landscape through diversified material recovery strategies. Featuring an industrial by-product turned economic generator, this case study reveals the opportunities for reusing geothermal ‘waste’ in these emergent landscape conditions, which hybridize economies with recreation, research, and ecology, and shift the conventional relationship with waste from passive to performative.
Keywords
Waste reuse; Blue Lagoon; material lifecycles; Iceland; landscape reclamation
Li, Guanghao; Cheng, Qingqing; Zhan, Changhong; Yocom, Ken P. (2022). Evaluation Strategies on the Thermal Environmental Effectiveness of Street Canyon Clusters: A Case Study of Harbin, China. Sustainability, 14(20).
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Abstract
Urban overheating significantly affects people's physical and mental health. The addition of street trees is an essential, economical, and effective means by which to mitigate urban heat and optimize the overall thermal environment. Focusing on typical street canyon clusters in Harbin, China, landscape morphology was quantified by streetscape interface measurements (sky view factor, tree view factor, and building view factor). Through ENVI-met simulations, the correlation mechanism between streetscape interface measurements and thermal environment was evaluated, and optimization methods for assessing the thermal environment of urban streets were proposed. The results revealed: (1) The thermal environment optimization efficiency of general street canyon types was greatest when street tree spacing was 12 m. At present, the smaller spacing has not been simulated and may yield better thermal environment results. The average decrease in temperature (Ta), relative humidity (RH) and mean radiant temperature (MRT) was 0.78%, 2.23%, and 30.20%, respectively. (2) Specific street canyon types should adopt precise control strategies of streetscape interface according to their types to achieve the optimal balance between thermal environment optimization and cost. (3) Streetscape interface measurements and thermal environment indexes show quadratic correlation characteristics, and are critical points for further investigation. The conclusions are more specific than previous research findings, which are of great significance for decreasing the urban heat island effect at the block scale, improving residents' physical and mental health, and improving the urban environment quality.
Keywords
Heat Mitigation Strategies; Urban Green Areas; Sky View Factor; Cold Region; Comfort; Tree; Landscape; Park; Simulation; Density; Street Canyon Clusters; Streetscape Interface Measurement; Envi-met Simulation; Thermal Optimization
Way, Thaisa. (2012). Richard Haag: New Eyes for Old. Sitelines: A Journal Of Place, 7(2), 6 – 8.
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