The above sketch (click to enlarge) is an illustration of the evolution of the reading of the city with respect to the employment of convergence media. The top part of the sketch shows a timeline, which corresponds to a series of four sketches depicting how a city is read.
1 The first sketch illustrates how the current (generic) city is read, as a system of nodes, junctions, cross-streets (particularly in Los Angeles). The reading of the city obeys its physical infrastructure. Its urban forces - e.g. traffic flows, pedestrian circulation patterns, economic patterns arising from the accessibility of shop-fronts, and so on - can directly be mapped onto their relative positions with respect to these infrastructures.
2 The second sketch depicts the evolution of that urban environment after physical densification, which Los Angeles is employing as a strategy of connecting the "piecemeal" city. Yet, even while densification occurs, the existing infrastructures continue to bound the city, and the city continues to be read as an environment which is defined by existing physical boundaries.
3 With the introduction of GPS, cellphone and ubiquitous computing technologies, and the continued densification of the city, the urban environment continues to become more undefined. The difference is this - the physical city begins to lose its significance once the city is read as a series of nodal points, with GPS systems. The sense of hierarchy in the city becomes diluted, as locations are defined by vectorial relationships, coordinates, relative positions between points.
It is at this juncture that the Remapping LA project becomes highly relevant. The use of convergent technologies, coupled with the provision of the LA State Historic Park as the central media park, is definitive of the urban scenario where experiencing the city through media becomes as significant as navigating/reading the city through its physicality.
And as new media experiences are created, via the architectural employment of media environments, a new layer is added onto the city.
The involvement of the end-user as a contributor to that layer of the city, in effect, empowers the public. As it is human nature to control one's environment, this represents a channel for one to create a change in the mediascape that he experiences.
4 A continued trend of the employment and wide usage of convergence technologies would lead to a city whose hierarchies become dissolved, and whose urban environment is read through layers of media and "metadata".
1 The first sketch illustrates how the current (generic) city is read, as a system of nodes, junctions, cross-streets (particularly in Los Angeles). The reading of the city obeys its physical infrastructure. Its urban forces - e.g. traffic flows, pedestrian circulation patterns, economic patterns arising from the accessibility of shop-fronts, and so on - can directly be mapped onto their relative positions with respect to these infrastructures.
2 The second sketch depicts the evolution of that urban environment after physical densification, which Los Angeles is employing as a strategy of connecting the "piecemeal" city. Yet, even while densification occurs, the existing infrastructures continue to bound the city, and the city continues to be read as an environment which is defined by existing physical boundaries.
3 With the introduction of GPS, cellphone and ubiquitous computing technologies, and the continued densification of the city, the urban environment continues to become more undefined. The difference is this - the physical city begins to lose its significance once the city is read as a series of nodal points, with GPS systems. The sense of hierarchy in the city becomes diluted, as locations are defined by vectorial relationships, coordinates, relative positions between points.
It is at this juncture that the Remapping LA project becomes highly relevant. The use of convergent technologies, coupled with the provision of the LA State Historic Park as the central media park, is definitive of the urban scenario where experiencing the city through media becomes as significant as navigating/reading the city through its physicality.
And as new media experiences are created, via the architectural employment of media environments, a new layer is added onto the city.
The involvement of the end-user as a contributor to that layer of the city, in effect, empowers the public. As it is human nature to control one's environment, this represents a channel for one to create a change in the mediascape that he experiences.
4 A continued trend of the employment and wide usage of convergence technologies would lead to a city whose hierarchies become dissolved, and whose urban environment is read through layers of media and "metadata".
Note: The sketches of the "evolution of the city" is an adaptation of Chip City, an architectural thesis project done at the Berlage Institute, published in Hunch 5. While the project in does not draw directly from the Chip City project, the parallels in the "spirit of the age" with regards to the role of convergence technology in the experience and interpretation of an urban environment cannot be denied.
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