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11.332J Urban Design Studio
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4.163J/11.332J Urban Design Research Studio: South Boston Waterfront Professors John deMonchaux, Eran Ben-Joseph TA: Brent Ryan 0-12-9 Units H-Credit Fall Semester 1998 Tuesdays and Thursdays 200-600 PM Fridays 200-400 PM Room 10-485 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This studio will use a systematic approach to urban design to investigate the spatial, sensory and social issues raised by developing urban design proposals for a small portion of ex-industrial land located along the South Boston waterfront. Taking into account an already existing master planning process for the area, students will measure the impacts of their designs on potential users by sequentially testing and measuring variables of the design against specific spatial and sensory outcomes. These outcomes may be viewed as 'benchmarks' that help to refine and resolve the design, producing as an ideal result an environment that fulfills as many as possible of the human needs of its users. The site for this systematic exploration of 'configuration variables' and their 'performance outcomes' is located in the center of the currently much debated South Boston waterfront. The site is presently the subject of current use, road and transit proposals authored by its owners/lessors, Massport and the City of Boston. Their proposals will be introduced at the beginning of the studio to help the class understand the context and to provide the background against which students will develop alternative ideas. A wider review of ideas for the future of the Boston Harbor is available from the results of the Boston Harbor Conference convened last Spring by MIT and the Boston Globe. The building program will consist of a mixed-use complex including recreational, entertainment, residential, office, and open space components. Each student group will work with an identical program, the intention being to vary the mix, form and relationship of of program components rather than their specific content. The studio will be collaborating with parallel studios being conducted at the Technical University of Darmstadt in Germany and at the University of California-Berkeley. Each of these parallel studios is looking at a water related site in their region, with the common concern being to seek to imagine how these waterfront settings can be configured to be good hosts to a future society in which the boundaries between work and 'non-work' are much more blurred. Objectives The studio is aimed specially, but not exclusively, at second year MCP students seeking a structured introduction to urban design concerns. The studio is intended to offer students an opportunity to: - engage and become familiar with the range of issues and concerns that are entailed in achieving good urban design; - formulate configurations of use, built form, public space and access systems that together respond to those issues and concerns; - become familiar with digital environments for the analysis, sketching and presentation of urban design proposals; - develop abilities to work in multi-skilled teams; and - produce evidence of arguments and ideas in a lucid and publishable form. Timetable The studio will begin with a week long workshop in which the class will be joined at MIT by a group of students and faculty from the Technical University of Darmstadt (and possibly UC Berkeley) to speculate about the possible form of development of the site and discuss general issues raised by waterfront development. The three studios will operate in parallel during the semester and efforts will be made to keep each other aware of progress and issues in each setting through a series of internet conferences. Thereafter the studio will be phased in a series of two week- or so long 'chapters', each focused on a particular subset of performance outcomes. Another workshop will be convened in Darmstadt in January to review the results of the semester's work. Efforts will be made to underwrite at least part of the costs MIT students would incur to attend that event. The studio will meet on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 2 to 6 PM in 10-485. Part of the same time period on Fridays will be used for seminar sessions with guest speakers on the current topics in the studio and for reviews of work. For more information contact: John de Monchaux, Room 10-402, xt 3-8299 or by email: demon@mit.edu Eran Ben-Joseph, Room 10-485M, xt TBA or by email: ebj@mit.edu Brent Ryan, Room 10-485, xt TBA or by email: bdr2@mit.edu | |
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