Permeable City: Mending the Urban Fabric Through Breaking Down Infrastructureby: Drew Powers

“But then the Depression came, and war, and a generation of Americans grew up who had apparently forgotten what a town was, or how a city was built and who were obsessed by enthusiasm for the free passage of the automobile at the expense of all other values. We were told that this was the way it had to be done by hero architects… ; and hero administrators… put it heroically, savagely, into practice, and the Bronx was destroyed, and l-95 and its connectors came to New Haven and smashed through between the railroad station and the old town, destroying everything in their path. And l-95 went on down the east coast, reaming out the centers of cities, scattering neighborhoods, mostly those of black Americans, all the way to Miami, where as its last act it obliterated Overtown, an African American community of long standing, where Cab Calloway had delighted to sing.”

- Vincent Scully, 1999

Communities have been severed and left for dead by the ever-expanding reach of urban infrastructure, often left searching for an identity within the larger construct of society. The hard edges created by infrastructure should be broken down to create a more permeable city, one that will promote interactions between communities and social classes. It is through architectural intervention that focuses on bringing people together in an open minded and learning environment that the gap created by social stratification can be bridged. By understanding the causes of stratification and the strain it puts on society one can then seek to repair and unify a shattered community.

i

Table Of Contents

Thesis Abstract............................................................................1

Objectives....................................................................................3

Key Words....................................................................................4

Research Essay............................................................................5

Visual Studies.............................................................................15

Conclusion.................................................................................24

Hypothesis.................................................................................25

Site................................................................................................27

Program.......................................................................................41

Design Method.........................................................................45

Timeline......................................................................................45

Evaluation Criteria..................................................................46

Ideas for Further Research..................................................46

Results.........................................................................................47

Bibliography..............................................................................49

Appendix....................................................................................53

iii

My thesis will explore the socioeconomic and cultural impact of urban

infrastructure on society. I seek to stitch together the urban fabric that

has been scarred by years of failed modernist planning and uncontrolled

infrastructural growth. By stitching, or reconnecting, the urban fabric

back together I intend to create a more permeable city, one in which

infrastructure does not create hard boundaries between communities.

This permeable city will foster more interactions and experiences among

all inhabitants. This will help to mitigate the alienation and separation

felt by many communities caused by the hard edges created by urban

infrastructure. By “infrastructure” I refer to man-made structures such

as highways and off-ramps, train tracks, canals, sewers, retaining walls

and electricity grids. These objects are inherently necessary for a

functional society, but they also impact the adjacent communities and

neighborhoods. I want to research the extent of their impact and what can

be done to alleviate the negative socioeconomic issues related to these

industrial structures. Unlike mid 20th century modernist planning, I do

not look to recreate a utopian society, but seek to reunite socioeconomic

classes through real world architectural and urban strategies.

Since the industrial revolution and the rise of cities, a lot of infrastructure

has been built to necessitate urban growth. However, little thought was

given to the impact of these large structures and systems on adjacent

communities. Much of this infrastructure was predicated on master

planning that ignored the needs and desires of these local neighborhoods

and communities. This infrastructure contributed to social stratification

and all the negative impacts we currently see in society as a whole. While

stratification is an inevitable construct in a modern capitalist society,

some of its strains can be alleviated if thoughtful planning goes into

infrastructural growth.

I plan to do further research on the impact of social and cultural

stratification on society as well as how built infrastructure impacts society.

My most important scholarly resources are books and journal articles that

chronicle the rise of infrastructure during the 20th century, as well as

the apparent take-over of the city by the automobile. An important part

of research is the sociological causes and effects of social stratification

within society. My sight research focuses on communities that have been

severed by infrastructural growth, looking at historic maps and land use

1

patterns to diagram the impact of the infrastructure through the course of

the century. Some precedents to do further research on include Boston’s

Southwest Corridor and Big Dig projects. These local examples have a

great amount of published data and are good illustrations, successful or

not, of my thesis idea.

Accomplished Objectives:

• Explore interests in socioeconomic diversity within a city.

• Investigate the impact of infrastructure on surrounding communities.

• Find a site where infrastructure has reinforced social stratification

within a community.

• Define a program that will help to stitch together stratified and

fragmented communities.

Future Objectives:

• Design a project that serves the surrounding community while

bringing its citizens together in an educational environment.

• Provide physical and visual connections across previously

impervious barriers within communities.

2 3

Research Essay

Key Definitions:

Urban Infrastructure: Man-made objects that are built to serve the needs

of urban life. These include highways and off-ramps, train tracks, canals,

retaining walls, and electricity grids.

Hard Boundaries (Lines, Edges, etc.): The boundaries created by

infrastructure that are impossible to physically cross except at certain

locations such as bridges or pathways.

Socioeconomic: The relationship of social standing and economic factors

as they pertain to quality of living.

Social/Cultural Stratification: The tendency for people with racial, social,

financial, religious, or educational differences to segregate themselves

from one another.

4 5

Much of the research has focused on finding a common thread between

societal stratification and the impact of widespread infrastructural growth

that took place early in the 20th century. I sought to understand the

reasons that stratification is prevalent in almost all societies, and what role

infrastructure plays in it. I divided my research into three different research

tracks; the impact that the rise of transportation infrastructure had on

urban fabric, the causes and effects of social stratification on society,

and examples of actions taken to mitigate the impact of infrastructure on

communities.

The 20th century saw a great growth in both population and urban

sprawl. This growth inevitably led to a large amount of infrastructural

growth, which was often built on large-scale master plans. This large-

scale outlook often ignored the immediately impacted communities in

favor of helping the sprawling towns of suburbia. This frequently meant

that communities were ripped apart and left divided and in pieces as large

swaths of the urban fabric was destroyed to accommodate highways,

train tracks, and other forms of infrastructure.

The impact of transportation infrastructure on the urban fabric of cities:

There is no doubt that transportation has had an astounding impact on

the urban fabric making up most of our cities. It has reshaped the fabric

of many historic cities and dictated the fabric of newer cities.

Moshe Safdie discusses many of these issues in his book The City After

the Automobile1. Safdie expresses many of his views on the impact of the

automobile on the urban environment. He states in the introduction to

the book:

“If we look at cities over the past century, we can

see that each transformation in urban form has

been linked with some type of transportation

revolution: electric streetcars spawned the early

suburban towns; elevators begat tall buildings. And

the automobile, of course, burst all boundaries,

scattering new, low-density development across

1 Safdie, Moshe. 1997. The city after the automobile: An architect’s vision. Basic

Books.

the countryside.”

This sets the framework for much of my further research and reinforces

the impact that transportation infrastructure has had on the urban

environment. He further explains that urbanization in response to modes

of transportation has taken over many city centers and expanded

outward. He makes the claim that “the car and the freeway have become

the essence of the regional city.” He goes on to highlight the impact of

new infrastructure on many older North American cities:

“Common solutions to making older cities accessible

to cars have been widening streets (Montreal’s

Boulevard René Lévesque); displacing pedestrians

to underground districts (Montreal; Toronto) or

overhead walkways (Minneapolis); cutting new

traffic arteries between neighboring urban districts

(Seattle’s waterfront; Boston’s North End; downtown

Hartford, CT) or through the middle of cohesive

neighborhoods (everywhere)...As the highways have

taken over, the tightly woven fabric of urban streets

has been progressively destroyed.”

This assessment raises many of the key issues behind my thesis research,

and focuses on the on how the growth of infrastructure has shaped and

carved the urban fabric. The cities mentioned are precedents for further

exploration

Another very good source is Sprawltown: Looking for the City on Its

Edges2, by Richard Ingersoll. This book is a rigorously written source on

urban sprawl. Most of the book talks about the concept of suburbia, but

the chapter Jump-cut Urbanism talks about the impact of highways and

transportation systems on the urban form. He sites pieces of infrastructure

such as highways, ring roads, feeder roads, and flyovers as the basis for

a new city scale. This causes settlement away from city centers and

fragmenting urban fabric to facilitate automobile circulation. He goes on

to further describe the impact of the automobile on urban design, even

comparing the psychosocial impact to that of the advent of monotheism.

2 Ingersoll, Richard. 2006. Sprawltown: Looking for the city on its edges, ed. Jennifer

Thompson. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press.

6 7

It is this psychosocial impact that reinforced social stratification within

many communities.

Ingersoll, as did Safdie, describes the impact of earlier modes of

transportation, citing the impact of the locomotive on many historic cities:

“London, Berlin, Paris, and New York underwent

traumatic interventions to accommodate train lines,

often witnessing brutal demolitions and drastic

separations of one part of town from another.”

It it these “brutal demolitions” that rip communities apart, often leaving

them permanently fragmented. The cities referenced will be further

explored in later research. He goes on to link many of the urban highway

projects to the “urban renewal” programs of the 1949 Housing Act, stating

that it “led to the largest nonmilitary destruction of cities ever executed.” He

sites many cities that were affected by the renewal, claiming that 40 acres

of land would be taken for every mile of new freeway. This is a startling

number, and the damage can be seen throughout many American cities.

He singles out the damage done to Boston:

“The demolitions in Boston were most tragic from a

historical point of view, eliminating the dense fabric

of the only ‘medieval’ city in the U.S. To build the

central artery, and elevated freeway that crossed

the center of the city, more than twenty thousand

residents were evicted”

The Boston central artery is an important case study into the damage

caused by infrastructural growth, but also later on how communities tried

to repair the damage.

My research into the effect of urban infrastructure on Boston continued

with the book The City in Mind: Notes on the Urban Condition3, by James

Howard Kunstler. The book highlighted many cities throughout the world

and the different forces that have shaped them throughout the 20th

century. I found the chapter on Boston to be the most helpful. It presents

a good amount of information on the different highway initiatives in the

city and the impact they had on the neighborhoods. He talks first about

3 Kunstler, James. 2002. Boston. In The city in mind: Notes on the urban condition, 195-

224. New York, NY: The Free Press.

the Massachusetts Turnpike (I-90) extension that was brought into the

city below the Fenway4 destroying a once stylish neighborhood and

creating a large swath of traffic between the Back Bay and Roxbury. He

later describes the impact of Interstate 93 on the downtown district of

Boston:

“The new elevated artery sliced clear across the tip

of the old Shawmut Peninsula, around the financial

district, cutting off the historic North End from the

rest of the city with a great wall of noise, perpetual

darkness, and tailpipe emissions.”

Kunstler also describes the corridor of the city removed to build Interstate

Highway 6955 and the large amount of land taken by imminent domain

for that project. It is these examples that really demonstrate the impact

of large-scale urban planning on the cityscape. These highway projects

carved Boston into pieces, leaving fragmented neighborhoods, and often

times dividing people with impermeable barriers.

One final source that frames some of the issues I am looking at is the

book Perspectives on Urban Infrastructure6, which compiles essays by

different authors. The chapter The Evolution of the Urban Infrastructure

in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries highlights all of the great

movements of modern infrastructural growth from the late 1800’s through

the 1980’s. It gives the reader a great foundation on the development

of urban infrastructure. The section about the “automobile revolution”

went into depth on the impact of the car on the urban form, stating that

the “radical innovation” prompted huge changes in urban infrastructural

systems, with great investment in new and improved highways, traffic

systems, and the redevelopment of downtown areas. This, like the previous

authors discussed, draws a strong connection between the advent of

transportation systems and the form that urban areas have taken. This

4 The Fenway is part of the series of parks and green spaces designed by Frederick

Law Olmsted that has become know as The Emerald Necklace.

5 Interstate 695 is an un-built highway project that was meant to be an “inner belt”

for the city of Boston. The project was abandoned in 1970 after strong community

opposition.

6 Tarr, Joel. 1984. The Evolution of the Urban Infrastructure in the Nineteenth and

Twentieth Centuries. In Perspectives on Urban Infrastructure. 4-66. Washington

DC: National Academy Press.

8 9

sensation can be seen in urban areas worldwide, with great impact on old

European and Middle Eastern cities with ancient urban fabric, as well as

newly formed American cities with new urban fabric.

Social stratification within society:

Social stratification has been a part of society from the very beginning

of civilization, and is an inevitable construct of every modern society. That

being said, there are certain factors that can either reinforce or break

down the forces causing social stratification. The goal of this realm of

research is to understand these forces and their effects on society.

The most informative source on social stratification is Society: The

Basics7, by John Macionis. The chapter titled Social Stratification, as the

title suggests goes into great depth on the causes and effects of social

stratification and gives a good foundation for further exploration. The

book states that social stratification is based on four important principles:

“Social stratification is a trait of society, not

simply a reflection of individual differences…

Social stratification carries over from generation

to generation… Social stratification is universal

but variable… Social stratification involves not just

inequality but beliefs as well.”

It is these four points that outline the main features of social stratification

within all societies. It goes into further discussion siting examples of

stratification within societies throughout the world. It even states that

stratification makes societies more functional and prosperous. It goes

into great depth to describe the factors that cause stratification and the

feelings it causes amongst the social classes.

One very helpful source that starts to stitch together the correlation of

social stratification and urban infrastructure is Common Place Revisited:

Repairing the American Metropolis8, by Douglas Kelbaugh. This source is

very in depth, but I found the chapter Paved With Good Intentions to be

the most helpful and on topic with my tracks of research. It focuses on

7 Macionis, John. 2009. Social Stratification In Society: The basics 10th ed. Leah Jewell. 206-245. New Jersey: Pearson.

8 Kelbaugh, Douglas. 2002. Common Place Revisited: Repairing the American Metropolis,

University of Washington Press.

repairing what he considers culturally fragmented cities:

“We would be better sustained if our communities

were more mixed in socioeconomic, racial, and

ethnic terms. It is better to take out our differences

with our fellow citizens on a day-to-day basis in

mixed communities, where we rub shoulders in a

true public realm with everyone, including people

we don’t understand and don’t like. Many small face-

to-face encounters, however unpleasant, are better

than infrequent but cataclysmic violence, whether It

be mugging, civil insurrection, or terrorism.”

He also talks about the tendency for the upper class to settle outside of

the cities in suburban areas:

“This kind of separation breeds Ignorance and

misunderstanding and builds tension. This tension,

allowed to fester long enough, is likely ultimately to

erupt in violence and confrontation.”

This supports my claim to bring socioeconomic classes together, that

through interaction and face-to-face experiences some of the negative

effects of social stratification can be mitigated. He also sites that many of

these neighborhoods have been fragmented in the past century by great

expansion and new urban planning methods. He argues that cities are

complex organisms that have been built over many generations:

“They must be designed and built incrementally,

evolving slowly and laboriously – the sum of many

acts, some large, some small. And, like any self-

regulating system, they must correct and recorrect

themselves continuously.”

It is this long-term mindset that can be taken when looking for strategies

to remedy many of the issues caused by the advent of large-scale

infrastructural systems.

10 11

Actions taken to mitigate the impact of urban infrastructure on

communities:

There have been many attempts in the last few decades to try to undo

much of the damage caused by the urban planning of the early and mid

20th century. Many communities have sought to bury or bridge over large

pieces of infrastructure in order to stitch together pieces of fragmented

neighborhoods. The two case studies I researched both took place in

Boston, and they are good examples of how a historic city has tried to

repair the scars left by infrastructural growth.

A journal article that appeared in Harvard Design Magazine discusses

the Big Dig9 project. The article, titled Paved with good intentions:

Boston’s central artery project and a failure of city building10, goes into

great depth on the initial plans and eventual failures of the project. It sites

the initial goals of the Big Dig as wanting to reconnect the divided sectors

of the city and bring new life to the zone inhabited by the double-decker

highway. The resulting area, named the Rose Kennedy Greenway11, has

been met with criticism as doing little more to unite the neighborhoods

than the highway it replaced.

Douglas Kelbaugh12 talks about some of the issues that face the

greenway. Citing that the space should not be left entirely open as it is

today:

“Twenty-seven acres is a lot of land in the urban

setting. It could be composed to contain tremendous

civic amenity, activity, and value, without skyscrapers.

Indeed, if the old city is to be truly knitted back

together, this land must be built upon.”

This shows that the strategy often employed by contemporary urban

planners of leaving large areas of “green space” can be detrimental to

the urban setting if not also mixed with a certain quantity of built forms.

9 The Big Dig was the nickname for the project to bury Boston’s central artery

highway under the city as an attempt to reconnect the financial district and the

North End of the city.

10 Murray, Hubert. 2005. Paved with good intentions: Boston’s central artery project and a

failure of city building. Harvard Design Magazine (22) (2005): 74-82.

11 Named in honor of Kennedy family matriarch Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy

12 Kelbaugh, Douglas. 2002. Common Place Revisited: Repairing the American Metropolis,

University of Washington Press.

The book Breakthroughs: Re-Creating the American City13, discusses the

project to build I-695 and the eventual community backlash that led to its

abandonment. The project eventually became known as the Southwest

Corridor and is a great example of a project that tried to repair the

damages caused by the clearing of land to create the highway. The book

catalogues the project from when the highway plans were abandoned

through its development into the early 90s. It highlights the power of

community opposition and how united communities feel empowered to

fight against fragmentation.

Kelbaugh further elaborates on the importance of the community

opposition movement:

“A coalition of forces now formed that ran across

class, party, and ethnic lines from rich Brahmins

in Milton to poor working Irish constituents of

Congressman Tip O’Neill in blue-collar Cambridge

to “black power’’ militants in Roxbury, some of

whom stood to lose their homes to l-695· The issues

came into focus. They’d all had enough of urban

freeways slicing and dicing the city. They wanted

better streetcars, subways, and commuter rail.

They wanted to rescue the historic city from the

Highwaymen.”

This community opposition movement is a key part of the movement

to remedy the issues created by urban infrastructure. It shows that the

communities recognize the impact and the benefits of having cohesive

and non-fragmented communities. The desire to re-unite fragmented

communities is the core argument of my thesis.

After conducting the research, the parallels between social stratification

and the growth of urban infrastructure can be identified. It is apparent

that the automobile has had a profound impact on how cities have grown

and changed over the past century. The infrastructure built to facilitate

the automobile often ran directly through existing communities, leaving

13 Guskind, Robert, and Neal Peirce. 1993. Breakthroughs: Re-Creating the American City.

New Jersey: Center for Urban Policy Research.

12 13

them severed and disconnected. This only served to perpetuate the

construct of social stratification that is apparent in all functional societies.

There have been attempts at reconnecting the fragmented communities

in many cities, but many have been unsuccessful. It is important to learn

from these precedents so that future reparations can be made more

successful.

Visual Studies

15

Much of the exploration process fo-

cused on visual and image based

studies that help to build a foun-

dation and understanding of ideas.

The investigation started with broad

ideas and through production was

narrowed down to reflect the cur-

rent thesis ideas. A running blog of

these explorations are available at:

www.drew-powers.com

The mind maps to the right

explore the main ideas of the

thesis, and emphasize the key

terms for further research.

16 17

Collaging was used as a way to

express and explore ideas. Digital

montage as well as physical collaging

allowed the expression of integral

concepts of the thesis.

This collage expresses the idea

that a barrier such as a highway

or railroad track can often divide

people of different socioeconomic

backgrounds, leaving them

separated by feet but living

worlds apart.

18 19

This physical collage uses two webs

to represent different social classes

within society that are then “tied”

together through bonds within

society.

20 21

This visual abstract compiles a series

of images that show the impact

infrastructure has on the urban

environment.

22 23

After conducting the research, the parallels between

social stratification and the growth of urban

infrastructure can be identified. It is apparent that the

automobile has had a profound impact on how cities

have grown and changed over the past century. The

infrastructure built to facilitate the automobile often

ran directly through existing communities, leaving

them severed and disconnected. This only served to

perpetuate the construct of social stratification that

is apparent in all functional societies. There have been

attempts at reconnecting the fragmented communities

in many cities, but many have been unsuccessful. It

is important to learn from these precedents so that

future reparations can be made more successful.

By stitching together and reconnecting communities

that are interrupted by pieces of infrastructure, one

can break down the hard lines and prevent them from

reinforcing social stratification within society.

24 25

Site

26 27

Site Criteria

• Urban Setting in a city that has older urban fabric and modern infrastructure in conflict

• Neighborhoods that have been interrupted or divided by built infrastructure

• Unique socioeconomic situations on either side - Preferably some type of glaring extremes (financial, racial, age)

• Should have space for new interventions with minimal demolition or disruption to existing buildings and infrastructure

• Look for areas that can be “activators” to stitch the urban fabric back together

Site: Interstate 90 - Allston/North Allston

Interstate 90, as known as the Massachusetts Turnpike, was built in the 1950s as a means to connect Boston to the fast expanding suburbs west of the city. It sits on the old right of way for the Boston & Albany Railroad. The highway runs directly through the neighborhood of Allston, leaving the two sides segregated with only a few points of physical and visual connection. This separation has caused the two sides to grow differently over the years, leading to different demographics and sense of identity on either side. While an exact site has not yet been determined, the area is definitely intriguing, and the need for re-connection across the Pike is necessary to activate both neighborhoods.

aerial image of site overlay shows the area impacted by the pike

site plan

28 29

1776

1779

Historical maps show the conditions over the centuries. The overlay shows the amount of urban fabric currently inhabited by the Mass Pike.

figure ground - shows the void in the urban fabric and difference in building density on either side

figure ground - shows what the urban fabric could look like if the area had grown naturally with its surroundings

30 31

1924

1908

33

1954

1930

35

1967

1955

37

current

39

Program

41

Foster Community AwarenessVoyeurism

Break Urban Boundaries

Unite Social ClassesLocal Government

Sharing KnowledgeSharing Experiences

ArtsSocial InteractionConversation Physical Activity

Education

The program I seek to bring to the sight should help to bring social classes together and foster social interactions and experiences between them. The program should have an emphasis on education and the arts. The building could take on the form of a performance arts center or school that focuses on the performing arts. This will create an environment that will foster the interactions and experiences that I seek to create. If children from the surrounding communities attend the same school or activities it will lead them to be aware and respectful of one another regardless of their socioeconomic position.

42 43

Potential Program Inclusions

Performing Arts School and Exhibition Center

Performance Center/Auditorium..................................................10,000 sq ft

Classrooms (qty undetermined)........................................................700 sq ft

Gymnasium/Recreation Space.......................................................6,000 sq ft

Administrative Space...........................................................................1,500 sq ft

Undetermined........................................................................................3,000 sq ft

Design Method

As I move forward with my explorations, I will continue to research

the issues pertaining to my thesis. This will include many site visits to

understand the socioeconomic dynamics of the surrounding community.

Strong understanding of site forces and demographics will be very

important in creating a successful intervention. The goal will be to create

a project that serves to reconnect communities and mend the bonds

broken years ago. This will foster a strong sense of community identity

and involvement.

44 45

Timeline

46 47

Evaluation Criteria

The following is some of the criteria I believe that my

final thesis project should be judged on:

• Does the thesis explore new territory or advance

the discourse on a subject in architecture?

• Does the designed project embody the ideas and

goals of the thesis idea?

• Did the design process engage with and reinforce

the thesis idea?

• Is the project site appropriate for the thesis idea?

• Are the ideas represented well both graphically

and through text in the final presentation?

Ideas for Further Research

The thesis project should raise many questions for

further research and exploration:

• Can architecture bring fragmented communities

together?

• Do stratified communities want to be united or do

they seek to stay separate?

• Will educational programs serve to bring social

classes together?

Results

The results of the thesis should advance the discourse

on the impact of urban infrastructure on surrounding

communities. It should represent one solution to

mending the broken urban fabric that has been

destroyed by decades of uncontrolled infrastructural

growth. This should raise awareness that there is a need

to address these communities instead of looking past

them in the push towards new urban environments.

48 49

Bibliography

50 51

Giovannini, Joseph. 2009. Highway High: A Progressive Public School

Repairs an Architecturally Fragmented Neighborhood. I.D 56 (2)

(2009): 79-80.

Guskind, Robert, and Neal Peirce. 1993. Breakthroughs: Re-Creating the

American City. New Jersey: Center for Urban Policy Research.

Ingersoll, Richard. 2006. Sprawltown: Looking for the city on its edges,

ed. Jennifer Thompson. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural

Press.

Kelbaugh, Douglas. 2002. Common place revisited: Repairing the Ameri-

can Metropolis, University of Washington Press.

Kunstler, James. 2002. Boston. In The city in mind: Notes on the urban

condition, 195-224. New York, NY: The Free Press.

Macionis, John. 2009. Social Stratification In Society: The basics 10th ed.

Leah Jewell. 206-245. New Jersey: Pearson.

Mann, Roy B. 1991. Boston’s Southwest Corridor: From Urban Battle-

ground to Paths of Peace. Places 7 (3) (Spring): 46-61.

Murray, Hubert. 2005. Paved with good intentions: Boston’s central

artery project and a failure of city building. Harvard Design Maga-

zine(22) (2005): 74-82.

Safdie, Moshe. 1997. The city after the automobile: An architect’s vision.

Basic Books.

Schultz, Anne-Catrin. 2007. Carlo Scarpa Layers. Trans. Lize Klavina.

Everbest Printing Company.

Tarr, Joel. 1984. The Evolution of the Urban Infrastructure in the Nine-

teenth and Twentieth Centuries. In Perspectives on Urban Infra-

structure. 4-66. Wasington DC: National Academy Press.

52 53

Appendix

54 55

Some early collages experimenting

with the concept of biomimicry (below)

as well as Light & Shadow (right)

Mind maps were used as a tool to

explore our interests and find common

ideas amongst them.

56 57

57

Permeable City: Mending the Urban Fabric

Through Breaking Down Infrastructure

Drew Powers

www.drew-powers.com