Fall 2019

Edited by Nicholas Pevzner & Stephanie Carlisle

Infrastructure is always political, and energy transitions have always been contested, pitting established players against upstart technologies and new coalitions. How can a radical reimagining of energy infrastructure create opportunities for an inclusive and participatory conversation about climate change and social justice? Who has the power to talk about infrastructure, and who gets left out?
Introduction: Power
Community Power As Provocation: Local Control For Resilience And Equity
Our Energy For Our Country
Speculative Designs For Energy Democracy
The TVA, Fuzzy Spaces Of Power, And Other Purposes
The Missouri River Basin: Water, Power, Decolonization, And Design
Power Plant Power
Arctic Present: The Case Of Teriberka
Coal Ash Wastescapes: The Byproduct Of Our Coal-Fired Power Dependency
Biomass For All: Designing An Inclusive Biomass Infrastructure
China’s Giant Transmission Grid Could Be The Key To Cutting Climate Emissions
2050 – An Energetic Odyssey: Persuasion By Collective Immersion
The Blue Lagoon: From Waste Commons To Landscape Commodity
Territory Of Extraction: The Crude North
Daylighting Conflict: Board Games As Decision-Making Tools

Popular

    The Performative Ground: Rediscovering The Deep Section

    by Stephanie Carlisle and Nicholas Pevzner

    The landscape we see happens above ground, yet much of its true intelligence lies beneath the surface.

    Made in Australia: The Future of Australian Cities

    by Richard Weller & Julian Bolleter

    The Australian population is increasing at a rate of one person every 84 seconds. Taking population growth seriously means planning for an extra 40 million Australians by century’s end.

    West 8 Airport Landscape: Schiphol

    by Adriaan Geuze & Maarten Buijs

    To make sense of the fragmented territory of an ever-expanding Airport, West 8 planted a bombardment of trees. With hundreds, sometimes thousands at the same time, it was a strategy that worked everywhere.

    Landscape Urbanism: Definitions & Trajectory

    by Christopher Gray

    Long described as an “emerging” practice, landscape urbanism—with all of its ambiguity and complexity—has in fact already emerged and represents a significant 21st century design and planning ethos.

    Contested landscapes: Staking claims in Michigan’s copper country

    by Elizabeth Yarina

    The return of copper mining to Michigan has ignited fierce public debate over landscape value and public land. A diverse set of groups has made competing claims to the landscape, seeing it as vertical territory.

    Social Performance: Prototyping User Behavior

    by Michael Miller

    In order to form the basis of lasting urban interventions, projects must be not only environmentally sustainable, but socially and economically sustainable as well.

    Beyond Planting: an Urban Forestry Primer

    by Max Piana & Blake Troxel

    Urban forests are a complex system full of opportunity for study, innovation, and cross-disciplinary collaboration. This piece introduces key concepts, techniques, and challenges of urban forestry.

    A Monument to Mining

    by Alexander Breedon

    Australia’s economy and its cities are inextricably linked to coal. This proposal for a polemical “monument to mining” questions Australia’s relationship with coal mining and addresses the dualistic spatial relationship between the city and its regional territory.

    Coding Urban Metabolism

    by Mona El Khafif

    Yesterday’s models of zoning and planning are outmoded. Perhaps it’s time for a new ecological urban framework.

    Banyoles

    by Stephanie Carlisle

    Working with the flow of water, the project uses drainage canals to rediscover the medieval settlement built into the limestone. Water once again becomes a protagonist in the life of the city.