Parametric Approaches to Urban Design Yokohama North Dock Redevelopment

Historically urban design has been framed within time based paradigms based on conventional approaches to the city making process. These include major movements such as the rationalists and the empiricists, where the tension between abstraction and experienced learning processes was part of the disc...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor Principal: Romero Vargas, Felipe
Formato: Trabajo de grado (Bachelor Thesis)
Lenguaje:Desconocido (Unknown)
Publicado: 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:http://babel.banrepcultural.org/cdm/ref/collection/p17054coll23/id/1167
Descripción
Sumario:Historically urban design has been framed within time based paradigms based on conventional approaches to the city making process. These include major movements such as the rationalists and the empiricists, where the tension between abstraction and experienced learning processes was part of the discourse. Now, however, cities are facing multiple challenges based on megagrowth and rapid urbanisation - the ecological and spatial demands of hyper-modernity. One significant Japanese movement (Metabolism in the 1960s), started the exploration of how cities can be understood from a different perspective to traditional planning and design. Part of this new perspective was based on the idea that a city can be conceived as an evolutionary system based on ‘metabolic cycles?, i.e. able to grow and change through organic processes. Today through the evolution of computation and programming, ?parametric design thinking? has emerged as a powerful method to understand and drive urban growth and change in the 21st century. This research aims to explore the influence of parametric design as a new means to transform how cities can be conceived and shaped, and also as a method to avoid ‘the rational urbanisation and generic’ processes that major urban centres are facing through a new city making challenges. This design thesis posed the research question: Can parametric thinking transcend the conventions of mainstream urban design represented by ?transformative urban morphology? (Fraker 2007) to meet the challenge of hyper-modernity in cities of the 21st century? As part of the parametric approach, the design investigation was driven by two major inputs. The first was generated by the identification of important nodes (attractors), created by the conditions of the area and its possible relationship with the surrounded urban fabric. In this case, the first level of interaction was defined by the underground metro system; then by the definition of active frontages at street level; and then followed by the synergy of the pedestrian framework. The three basic levels of interaction generated the second input, a vertical relationship that can be expanded and continued as required. The generation of these elements allows major density to be controlled in the multiple nodes, managing the demand and supply of each different element in order to avoid the hyper-modern collisions currently seen in the densest parts of Tokyo. Taking the Yokohama waterfront as a case study, this project explored urban design from a parametric/transformative perspective. Parametric thinking was deployed in two different modes: design (form) exploration and the use of computational tools applicable to urban design and relative design processes. This process has led to an understanding of the city as a multilevel system, able to grow, responsive to complex direct and indirect forces. To control the over-production of elements in the city (hyper-modernity), parametric thinking can be applied by using live data tools to generate multiple design outcomes. This manipulation can be done through an evolutionary model that can purposefully address over-demand, at the same time can integrating and extending the dense points in the city. From an urban design perspective, it is important to recognise how this methodology can shape the urban fabric and the way that society consumes (understand) cities but also the influence of transformative architecture in urban design.