June Workshop Student Abstracts

Grace He
Multiculturalism in Urban Landscape
Research question:
How can urban design practice accommodate and enhance the intersection of diverse culture in the public/third spaces at Cook street west, and contribute positively to the social exchange within diverse communities?
Abstract:
This study explores the interconnections between multiculturalism, social integration  and public space. Insights into these relations were gained based on fieldwork from observing the social activities of different cultural communities in the public space within the research site – Cook street west and Investigate the perceptions and experiences based on the relationship between the Cook street west residents and its public spaces. By understanding the localised forms of social-wellbeing in this highly diverse neighbourhood, a conceptual design framework was developed to explore the renovation opportunities of inventing a new type of public places which would help in supporting the healthy growth of Cook street west - a unique ethno cultural neighbourhood in the Auckland.

Gemma Gao
How can urban parks be designed so they can act as evacuation places in case of volcano eruption in Auckland?
Abstract:
Auckland is a city built on more than 50 volcanoes. According to Auckland Civil Defence and Emergency Management Group Plan (2011), it is considered as a likely event and very high risks. Auckland Council offers comprehensive illustrations and related suggestions of various natural disaster, maps of tsunami evacuation zones and functions of regional parks could be use response to natural disasters. However, the evacuation routes and safe area for sheltering are not specified. More importantly, volcanoes eruption could result in other kinds of natural disasters such as earthquakes and tsunami in historical cases and the growing population could be additional risks. Thus there is a need to analyze problems referred. This research is aimed to design a model of multifunctional park that can serve as an evacuation zone or part evacuation route in case of natural disasters like volcanoes and related disasters like tsunami and earthquake. The findings of the research could also be applied to other places that have high disaster risks. The concept of multifunctional park is to fulfill the roles that the open space in both of emergency program and general program, to make city more resilient and prepared for the natural disasters. In this research, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) is technique support for site identification. Two parts consisted in the method: (1) finding out public open spaces suitable for natural disaster evacuation in Auckland Region and (2) developing a design strategy for one of these spaces in order to increase their capacity and appropriateness for evacuation.

Qian Wang


Children’s environments
School ground greening has their potential benefits for enhancing children’s close-knit relationship with nature, which this project will test with an educational approach involving landscape architects commitment regarding their education and enhance the health of local social and natural environments. Rationales for school gardens currently focusing on the issues that nowadays children and young people’ all round circumstance, for example, a lack of physical activity, obesity, inflexible educational systems, and a lack of interactive relationship with nature. By collaborating with certain school (including students), whether these schools provide this chance to their students, among other benefits, develop long term greenery plans.

Yet there are many school gardens are limited both in their scope and children’s participation, especially in their planning and design. Thus, combining these partnerships between schools and their community can lead to a diverse school gardens that contribute to sustainability education and promote biodiversity. And it might be possible to reshape their learning experiences to improve the professional performance of children; furthermore there will be an encouragement of the well-being of all participants event for the places.

Junjie Xu


Abstract:

How can landscape ecology assist in achieving sustainable outcomes for the brownfield development?

With the rapid development of the city and the increase of population, the area of the city is increasingly expanding and sprawling. However, the existing problems of brownfield site have seriously restricted the construction and progress of the city. The issue of how to effectively and efficiently redevelop and transform brownfield sites is increasingly being considered by agencies and a wide range of professionals throughout the world.

The definition of brownfield site is vital for development of a city or a region in different contexts. It can help to inform the direction of research, explore the development potential of site and deal with relevant urban issues.

Landscape is an effective approach to coordinate ecosystem on brownfield site to facilitate sustainable development for enhancing the relationship between human and nature. It is a good way to deal with a variety of social contradictions as well.

The objective of this research project is to enhance the connection between humans and nature. A series of theories and methods will be researched and analysed to improve the value of brownfield site, return more public spaces for local residents. Meanwhile, people’s requirements and Auckland council’s plans will be considered in this project. A sort of analyses have been processing on the test site. This will be effective to find out the most suitable approach to explore all of the possibilities of development. All of the processes will be helpful to develop the most rational project, even to help to achieve the goal of the world’s liveable city.

Rithy Heng
Remediation in Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Cities are the products of human civilization and settlement. They keep changing both physically and socially. With the advancement of technology and economic prosperity, urban lives in the 21st century have become more comfortable and easier. However, there are still some negative aspects arising from urban growth such as air pollution, traffic congestion, and inadequacy of public spaces where people can freely enjoy their time after work. The world has shifted the attention to the creation of a more livable and greener urban environment.
Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, is one of the oldest cities in Southeast Asia dating back to 1431 A.D. The city underwent a lot of changes both physically and socially. During colonial period from 1863 to 1953, Phnom Penh became a center of French colonial government that left some French-styled buildings to present time. From 1953 to 1969, Phnom Penh was developed into one of the most modern cities in Asia acquiring the name “Pearl of Asia”. Modern buildings inspired by Khmer concept were built with all green and public open space catered to amount of population at that time. In 1970, Cambodia plunged into civil war that destroyed almost everything.
After decades of civil war and instability, Cambodia is emerging as one of the fastest growing economies. Meanwhile, there is development challenge to be addressed. Phnom Penh, the capital, is suffered from absence of planning, population booming, pollution, traffic congestion, and constant flooding from storm water. The ongoing profit-driven developments give little consideration on livability and sustainability. Furthermore, reclamation of disused brownfield and environmental remediation are inevitable as Phnom Penh population is dramatically increasing. A former landfill and polluted lake will need to be reclaimed and restored to make way for development and provide green space to the city. Because of its location within the city, it has the potential of becoming a more affluent area by using green space and water as amenities. This project aims to provide alternative design approach by balancing livability, sustainability, and profitability to make it more appealing to developers and government. It will also serve as an awareness-raising campaign to advocate for more green space for city in future development.

Quin Luo

Abstract: Coastal erosion is a natural and ongoing process but it is commonly regarded as a problem when threatening human habitation or development (Auckland Council, 2015). According to Auckland Regional Council (2006), “Almost the entire length of the Auckland coastline is susceptible to coastal erosion, although the extent and level of risk vary”( p.1). When acceleration of coastal erosion happens, it will result in the loss of land and cause shorelines retreating closer to other buildings, posing a risk to shoreline buildings, infrastructures (roads, water, sewage and gas pipes) and coastal citizens’ life securities in Auckland (Auckland Council, 2015). After giving a general introduction about the drawbacks of engineering methods which are common used in Auckland, in this research, I will attempt to find a solution through landscape architecture to protect the coastal citizens’ properties, public infrastructures and natural reserves. I will focus on the beach erosion in Auckland. My research question is “How can erosion prone areas be designed so they provide opportunities for the urban sustainable development that works with coastal erosion?” The study will be developed under the basis of Ecological Urbanism and considered as a practice in order to answer my research question. Excellent techniques and case studies which are relevant will be studied in order to achieve the final goal in my research.

Komal Bhatt
Cemeteries as ‘Healing’ Landscapes
How can a Cemetery function as a place of ‘Healing’ for the many cultural groups in Auckland?
Abstract
Cemeteries play a vital role in all cities not only as a space for the dead to be placed, but also for the living to visit and remember their loved ones. Can cemetery landscapes act as a means of healing in the grief process? The loss of a loved one causes sorrow, grief, and mourning, shock and pain – a most difficult and lonely phase of one’s life.
People visit cemeteries to remember, pay homage and revitalize old memories in connection with the dead. Due to globalization, multiculturalism has brought with it a mix of death customs and traditions of mourning that play a pivotal role in the healing process from grief.
Cultural and religious groups from around the world have different beliefs about death and the afterlife. In India, particularly Hindus cremate the dead by burning the body at a very high temperature and the cremated remains are immersed in the holy river Ganga. As the dead are not buried there are no cemeteries which can serve as reminders and touchstones for the living to remember people and events. This motivated me to think about relation between man and environment which can be established through the means of landscaping.
The purpose of this research proposal is to gain an understanding the death rituals of various cultural groups and accordingly developing strategies and designing a cemetery that can act as a healing space. The psychological behavior on losing a loved one can vary dramatically from person to person and the duration of grieving process can also range dramatically. A study needs to be conducted that will define ecological and social design objectives which emphatically will reflect values from different cultures for development of cemeteries.
With the pace of urbanization, green field sites and even for that matter existing cemeteries are destroyed or re-located. This shows what kind of importance or respect we give the dead. The development of a cemetery will also create an open space and green graveyard adding to the ecological diversity and natural habitat of the area. With a focus on diverse mourning practices, the guidelines will incorporate therapeutic goals and suggest ecological solutions which will address the negative impacts of death on environment.


Riyasp Bhandari

Title:
The Urban Edge:
Using the sustainability framework to develop social spaces on urban waterfronts.

Abstract

The human domestication of landscape and environment has remained a prominent area of urban and environmental discourse over the past century. Contemporary urban waterfronts reflect and constitute changes in urban ecology, economic regulation and societal issues under the influence of coastal cities (Bunce & Desfor, 2007). The urban sustainability framework articulates the relationship between humans and the environment and needs to remain at the heart of urban discourse. This project explores the positive and negative impacts on Auckland’s waterfront, further understanding the values of cultural shifts, trade, productivity, transportation, social cohesion and ecology in the urban realm. This project will comparatively critique, analyse and assess urban waterfronts, through a set of criteria drawn from literature relating to sustainable cities. The scope of Auckland’s waterfront can be re-imagined through design ingenuity to support a sustainability framework that aims to further enrich natural systems in relation to enhancing human well-being (Wu, 2014).

Xu Gao
Coastal Cities
Abstract
How can we develop coastal line as a part of urban area for future and can we develop coastal line with tourism as well? The idea is about coastal cities development through tourism ways, and also protect local resident’s lifestyle.  As one can see, Auckland is the world famous city, and the city’s 70% area consist by coastal waters. Obviously, from the geographical features shows that Auckland belongs to a coastal city, and have many of coastal resources, nevertheless most of Auckland’s coastline is still in undeveloped state, some beach even appeared natural erosion or man-made pollution. However, the most coastal cities in the world always development this region as a regional priority, perhaps because of economic factors, as well as, because of environmental factors. As a coastal city, Auckland in this area have great potential for development, whether it is from the perspective of urban development or ecological protection or basic services for the residents. Then, form the other side, with the Auckland rapid development of urbanization, land has become the main reason for limiting the future development of Auckland, but for New Zealand as an island country, coastline is the most abundant resource, which may also be able to Auckland’s future development towards providing a valuable reference. Moreover, for coastal development, both in the construction of infrastructure and transportation should be relatively easier than construction in inland area.
In addition, as the largest city in New Zealand, Auckland has been the role of tourism as a transit point, so if we can keep these potential economic resources as a driving force of urban development, coastal development may be able to play a great help.
This project will base on those questions and find the way to deal with it, through the concept of eco-tourism and eco-design, which is environmentally and friendly idea for landscape architecture technology practice. However, to scan this topic should be including aesthetics, recreation, leisure, early investigation of sociological and ecological features, involvement of coastal shareholder, local population in the planning process, exactly of site selection and environmentally design.

Shan Kangatharan
Water transport urbanism in Auckland
Research questions
1) How transport infrastructure will effect/determine the future growth of Auckland?
2) How can Auckland become the least congested city through enhancement/improvement of water transport infrastructure?

Abstract
Transport infrastructure networks play a vital role in urban growth. Due to this reason, from the 1840’s, the transport network and roads have decided the urban growth of Auckland (Auckland Council, 2012).

 Auckland is the biggest and fastest growing city in New Zealand. The major controversies of Auckland, however, are poor transport networks and traffic congestion. This is why Auckland is currently placed as 10th most liveable city in the world by The Economist Intelligence Unit. Auckland only scored 92.7 points for infrastructure while it was scoring 100 points for education, 95.7 points for healthcare, 97 points for culture and environment (Ryan, 2014).

Auckland is also surrounded by water and according to Toy (1977) water is a great asset for urban development. Auckland Transport (2013) indicates that it is necessary to rethink the future of Auckland’s ferry services. In particular, the fare structure and ownership of ferry services. It is undeniable that current water transport facilities of Auckland are insufficient. At the same time other public transport networks including bus and train also have poor linkages in peri-urban areas.

Transport infrastructure can also be studied as a network consisting of nodes and edges. Different types of transport can be represented as different networks with specific properties.

Thus, the aim of this project to enhance the development of the Auckland transport network through further development of water transport. It means, add more nodes by designing ferry terminals to connect existing and proposed transport nodes by new edges.

The project will take into consideration of stakeholders’ current and proposed plans and policies as well as contemporary ideas, concepts and theories that are concerned with the relationships between urban growth and transport infrastructure, and that study of infrastructure is based on network viewpoints.

Shoujun Chen


How can we create a model for the radical transformation of an industrial food system into a locally-based, sustainable model in peri-urban areas, Auckland?


Peri-urban agriculture is the production units close to town, which operate intensive semi- or fully commercial farms to grow vegetable and other commercial crop. Today the industrial food system in Auckland has to meet the pressure from climate change and urban sprawl. Auckland Council report has found that nearly 10 percent (8.3%) of the best quality land has been converted from food-producing land to urban developments in recent times. Soil erosion, subdivision, water depletion and pollution have brought a growing public awareness of the social, environmental economic impacts of industrial agriculture. On the other hand, peri-urban agriculture has its unique competitiveness due to its closeness to food and labor market. Farm markets have emerged as an alternative option for distribution and retailing, which leads to the increasing demand for small scale farming land in peri-urban areas.
The design based on permaculture theory, green belt and agrarian urbanism, through transforming agricultural land and residential area in peri-urban areas to a farming-centered residential areas. The purpose of this research is to find out the way to build a sustainable agricultural system in peri-urban areas.

Zara Jawadi

Shasha Li (Nemo)

Shayne Noronha
Rising Tides and the Future of New Zealand’s Coastal Communities
Climate change will tremendously influence the design of landscapes and urban areas before the close of the 21st Century. Studies suggest a rise in global temperatures between 0.9°C to 5.4°C, and a rising sea level upward of 1m. Yet a more substantive threat remains in the unknown intensity and frequency of future storm events. While designers are now aware of these projections, and certainly familiar with the significant value of coastal development in New Zealand, present-day mitigation techniques still exclude broader social, environmental and economic values of coastal communities in preference for engineering efficiency. (Jabareen, 2012). Landscape design strategies can add value to engineering approaches in urban and coastal ecosystems by including 'coastal resilience' as part of the mitigation outcome strategy. Landscape architects can lead collaborative work at coastal edges and provide opportunities for resilient urban development.