August Abstracts

Vandita Ahlawat
Beyond Net Zero Neighborhoods:

How can the inherent pressures of urban sprawl be used as an opportunity to design communities as net-positive resources for our natural environments?


This research explores the impact of the expanding city through a lens of long-term urban resilience. Despite the apparent negativity associated with urban sprawl, case-studies show that net-zero neighborhoods are economically feasible, and can provide some ecological significance to community design. The critical problem of community development actually rests in the assumption that development is necessarily damaging to natural systems. From this, the designer’s role must then be to mitigate the level of expected damage. Yet, the pressures of development may offer opportunities to enhance our natural environments. Whereas projects that seek a net-zero energy communities are increasingly able to meet greenhouse gas and carbon targets, what is needed is an urbanism that understands community design as net-positive value to ecological and social environments. The goal of this project is to design a model community that achieves this goal by exploring the relationships between net-zero neighborhoods and resilience theory.

Lahari Iynala
Students are increasingly anxious to achieve specific results in K12 education, especially with the weight of University entrance and applications for professional post secondary schools that gear students toward choosing lifelong practices of professions. While many studies have focused on most suitable educational curricula to best prepare students for careers and future learning, there is still little attention given to the environments that actively shape learning and understanding. This research explores how spatial environments of K12 educational facilities may become more directly engaged in the curricula and pedagogy of K12 learners, and do d ii a way that support engagement with both discovery and invention within subjects. The goal of this project is to understand how the landscapes and built environment can be designed as an active learning environment that ultimately supports and promotes deeper understanding and love of learning, and relaxed and yet motivated learning capacity in students.



Kael
Reclamation Park
My research question is how to make coastline in Auckland more accessible to public? The aim of project is to deal with this issue in different types of coastal areas and make coastline and foreshore more accessible to the public. there will be an introduction at first which introduce some limitations to get access to the coastline, some problems and debates in New Zealand. Then there will be methods includes case study, classify different types of coastal area in Auckland, choose a site as example and my own design to deal with the issue.

Sravani Khambhampati
Desokota City in Auckland NZ
 How can the urban cities help in developing the neighboring peri-urban area?
 How can we reduce the growing carbon footprint of new urban development (India) through preservation of existing groundwater, flora and fauna?
 How can we save the existing landscape in urban development and make use out of it for aesthetic pleasure?
 How do we inculcate landscape architecture into upcoming construction?
 How can a developer be persuaded to install low maintenance landscape?
 How can the provision of green space in Andhra Pradesh be based on ecological principles?
The new state is developing occurring like Malaysian Town and Singapore Town which are just copies of eastern development pneumatic urbanism and have nothing endogenous representing our environment, heritage and culture. Ultimately because of this they will be unsustainable.
My reason for choosing this particular field for research stems from having witnessed massive changes in the natural environment around my home. Being aware of the adverse results of damaging the natural landscape of a place with reckless abandon, I wish to make a contribution towards helping prevent said damage without causing a dent in the development of my country.
Which landscape architects/ architects have developed ideas and techniques the methodology to ensure an environmentally sustainable model for new urban development?
The path I propose to take for arriving at solutions to the above problem is to learn as much as I can about both contemporary methods of landscape architecture, and urban development. Based on research via extensive case-studies of contemporary landscape architecture (both sustainable and otherwise), I intend to contribute towards developing methods of sustainable landscape. The end result of my project would be to arrive at more sustainable alternatives to the traditional methods of landscape architecture, while not compromising on real estate value. Further, I wish to explore methods of landscape architecture which could be more affordable, while not compromising on aesthetics or sustainability


NGUYEN THIEN NGAN
Vertical Village in the heart of CBD
Auckland CBD area has been focused to be leading New Zealand’s business and economic development. The initiation of building projects ,which mostly occupied for commercial and residential purposes, is growing progressively in Auckland CBD area .Due to high migration net flows and blooming of business activities in Auckland CBD, these building projects appears to be essential in order to capture the society demand and also adapt the population growth.Traffic congestion therefore becomes a high burden on the residents who must commute to and from work in Auckland CBD, especially on Queen Street. It has affected the employee commuting issue and also their productivity. A large number of organizations also support their employees by providing flexible workplace to adapt the trend of business process.With many people now working longer hours, it has become increasingly important for their work to fit in around other commitments, family and a social life. The flexible time has to be offered by all employers if a worker can provide a good case for it, but with the increase in enabling technologies, mobile devices, the traditional office is becoming superfluous as increasingly remote worker and home working becomes ever more realisable. Therefore, the project is about to bring back the principles of Model Village in a smaller scale and also use the ideas of  Office-tel concept into the same building design, based in Auckland CBD. The scheme is envisioned as hybrid programs that does not only combine office spaces and compact residential units. The self-contained building design does not only encourages communication between neighbours, strengthening the sense of community but it also provides fully amenities and public areas within the building.

Andrea Murray

The Christchurch Residential Red Zone -A Memorial Landscape Honouring Displaced People

The Red Zone, known as the RRZ, feels like a very sad place.  Even a brief drive through the vacant land disturbs the viewer.  It has a dark cloud of loss hanging over it.  The viewer shakes their head; how can that vast space (1000 acres) be used in a way that is honest and meaningful to the people?  10,000 people lost their sense of place on the land (Turangawaewae- Place to Stand) after the earthquakes, in addition to 185 families losing a loved one. It was the ‘Land’ and its extraordinary power that caused the deaths and the displacement of so many.  Maybe it can be the ‘Land’ that helps the people of Christchurch heal and gain a sense of closure?   The Red Zone as a Memorial Landscape is not about making everyone forget about earthquakes and the pain of loss, in fact the opposite.  A Memorial Landscape should honour the disaster and all the displaced people who lost more than their homes, a Memorial Landscape to honour a sense of  place on the land,  Turangawaewae.

This loss of place on the land is a huge global problem, (as are earthquakes and tsunamis), the enormity of such problems can make us feel out of balance.  A Memorial Landscape in Christchurch should honour both disasters and displacement and aim to restore a response of balance to the visitor. Creating a Memorial Landscape should not try to make us forget, rather it should make us remember displaced people and that we are grateful to have a place on the land (Turangawaewae).