20th CENTURY NEW TOWNS. ARCHETYPES AND UNCERTAINTIES. Conference proceedings

Internacional Conference 20th CENTURY NEW TOWNS ARCHETYPES AND UNCERTAINTIES 3RUWR(6$3$XGLWRULXP0D\  &HQWURGH(VWXGRV $UQDOGR $UD~MR ĚĞƉĂƌƚĂŵĞŶƚŽ ĂƌƋƵŝƚĞƚƵƌĂ ĞƐĂƉ 20th CENTURY NEW TOWNS Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference proceedings Edited by Paolo Marcolin and Joaquim Flores DARQ| Departamento de Arquitectura CEAA| Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo (uID 4041 da FCT) Escola Superior Artística do Porto (ESAP), Porto, Portugal May 22-24, 2014 Title: 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties. Conference Proceedings. Editors: Paolo Marcolin & Joaquim Flores © of the authors and CESAP/ESAP/CEAA, 2014 Grafic design: Joana Couto Design of the cover: Paolo Marcolin Edition: CEAA | Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo DARQ | Departamento de Arquitectura Escola Superior Artística do Porto Property: CESAP | Cooperativa de Ensino Superior Artístico do Porto Impressão e acabamento: CEAA | Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo Porto, Portugal 1st edition, Porto, May 2014 Print: 200 CD Rom copies ISBN: 978-972-8784-57-7 CEAA | Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo DARQ | Departamento de Arquitectura Escola Superior Artística do Porto Largo de S. Domingos, 80 4050-545 PORTO – PORTUGAL Telef: 223392130 / Fax: 223392135 e-mail: [email protected] ; [email protected] www.esap.pt - www.ceaa.pt 20th CENTURY NEW TOWNS Archetypes and Uncertainties The planning and settlement of new towns were originated by different reasons. In twentieth century cities perhaps the largest reason was to determine new territorial and urban planning structures that would allow a better organization of the territory, ensuring the development of more efficient and balanced socio-economic models. In some cases the construction of these cities was inspired by the principles of the nineteenth century English utopias, reflecting a strong concern in integrating the urban and natural components and highlighting the role of the natural landscape, understood as a city matrix on which articulates the urban structures. In other cases the inspiration come from the rationalist ideals of the modern movement, seeking to personify the idealistic and democratic spirit of a new world order, producing rational and functional solutions and even if sometimes they do not fully overcome certain obstacles, an important contribution to the urban and architectural theory and practice advance was made. Furthermore, other cases relate to the post-modernism and the emergence of critical views of the modern movement. These towns were born to give an answer to the problem posed by the large settlements deindustrialization and de-urbanization, assuming the role of organized urban extensions needed for controlling the sprawl of existing cities which was made through a process of unordered and peripheral urbanization. Some focused mainly on a completely physical, economic and administrative independency in relation to major urban centres. Others, even if based partially on these principles of independence and geographical isolation, were planned as secondary structure networks dependent from a main urban conurbation. Many of these experiments have already been object of diversified studies addressing more or less specific thematic areas, seeking to define and apply critical and analytical methodologies to better understand and decode the processes and design criteria that were the basis of their urban and architectural morphologies. Opting for an analytical prospective directed to re-contextualizing the urban and architectural contributions of these experiences, the conference 20th century new towns – archetypes and uncertainties aims to discuss their real effects in the present being especially welcome papers focusing on the following two aspects: I. Archetypes | Spatiality, materiality and identities which persisted over time, not only because they have a high symbolism or because they are the emblematic testimony of a precise thinking about how to re-understand the city in a particular historical moment, but also and especially to continue maintaining the answering capacity to functional and practical demands of contemporary society. They are, in short, realities that did not required significant or radical changes to fulfil their function properly. The reasons for these archetypes remaining active and appropriate may contribute to recognize them as meaningful and timeless, distant from temporal gestures which respond only to contemporary needs. II. Uncertainties | Parts or components of the urban system that remained incomplete, leading to realities that persisted “open” or that were completed through different intentions, appropriation processes or intervention criteria from those planned in their original design. The nature of these uncertainties could be a further indicator of the effects produced by these archetypes in the city development. Additionally the conference will focus three main thematic/panels covering the post-war satellite towns (as the New Towns Programme and other European similar experiences), the modern cities (as Brasilia or Chandigarh) and a more local perspective embarking the Lusophone New Towns (mainly in Lusophone Africa, but also in Brazil). The conference peer-reviewed call for papers will cover these topics and the communications will be organized under the respective panels, not excluding the possibility of accepting other related topics if they reveal pertinent for the global aims of the conference. Contents 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Contents KEYNOTE ADRESSES ÁLVAREZ MORA, Alfonso – New Towns as fragmentary urban projects. From ‘Barcelona’s Ensanche’ to ‘Madrid’s Linear City’ / p. 9 BUTINA-WATSON, Georgia – Transferable Lessons from the British New Towns / p. 23 MORPURGO, Guido – Foundations and Fundamentals. Urban centralities for european suburbs and new towns: a comparison of case studies from chinese post-metropolis to north-african “pure desert” / p. 43 TOSTÕES Ana – The 20th Century New Towns. The Searching for an Ideal City / p. 45 PAPERS BADIEE, Azadeh – An investigation on landscape structures in Iranian New Town development – The case of Fuladshahr New Town (1963-2013) / p. 49 BLASCO SÁNCHEZ, Carmen; MARTÍNEZ PÉREZ, Francisco, DELTORO SOTO, Julia – British New Towns through compared examples. Three examples: Harlow, Thamesmead and Milton / p. 67 BORDIN, Micaela – Towns-villages-hamlets: new foundation city in Italy during the fascism period / p.85 CAPRESI, Vittoria – The piazza as the core of the Italian rural settlements in colonial Libya: a theatre for fascist power, the obvious answer to local town planning requirements, or just a place to meet? / p.99 CHEN, Zhen; TAN, Zhu – Colonial archetype and national rebirth. Railway stations and 20th century new cities in China / p. 115 DESPONDS, Didier – The New towns around Paris. What have they become forty years later: new centralities or ordinary suburbs? / p. 130 FERNANDES, Eduardo – Life versus Architecture. Rationalist ideals facing popular taste, from Pessac to Malagueira / p. 146 FERNANDES, Eduardo; SILVA, Ana Carina – From Moore to Calvino. The invisible cities of 20th Century planning / p. 161 JOLLEY, Victoria – Lan-Plan: Central Lancashire New Town 1965-1986 / p. 178 MAIA, Maria Helena; CARDOSO, Alexandra – Portugueses in CIAM X / p.193 MARCOLIN, Paolo; FLORES, Joaquim Moura – 20th Century New Towns – From Archetypes to Uncertainties / p. 241 MOCCI, Silvia – Modern habitat in Casablanca. Appropriation and re-use / p. 230 MOREIRA, Bruno – Uncertainty in contemporary urban planning concepts and methods. What we (still) can learn from garden cities and new towns / p. 245 MOREIRA, César Machado – Hydroelectric Towns in Portugal / p. 263 MUÑOZ SANZ, Victor – Between global turbulences and local manners: the multiple lives of the Bata Shoe Company satellite towns / p. 277 OLIVEIRA, Maria Manuel – (in) The invention of the City of Brasília Modeling the Ground / p. 298 PETERS, Walter – Sasolburg, a South African New Town, 1951. The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ at a crossroads / p. 318 RINCON BORREGO, Ivan – Mat buildings – Gated cities. Critical, change and paradoxical phenomenon in last 20th century new towns / p. 334 ROLAND, Lee Christopher – When archetypes produce uncertainty: the case of the scattered metropolis / p. 350 SILVA, Filipe – The landscape in Le Corbusier plans for Chandigarh. Nature and symbol / p. 367 SULTSON, Siim – Stalinization of Estonian city space: development, typology and perspectives / p.368 TAN, Zhu; CHEN, Zhen – The experience of the communist settlement. The Danwei dayuan and the evolution of urban fabric of Chinese cities / p. 385 TERLINDEN, Bertrand – Prospective approach. A topographical linear town in Wallonia. Learning from an in-depth analysis of the initial Louvain-la-Neuve planning experience / p. 402 TREVISAN, Ricardo – An overview of Brazilian New Cities in the 20th century / p. 411 VIANA, David Leite – Cities’s Structural Matrix From 1950’s Till Today – Between Superlative and Palliative / p. 426 VIKSTRAND, Ana Micro – Vällingby. Sweden’s first satellite town / p. 441 VIMAL, Sunita – Chandigarh. The city beautiful. One of the greatest examples for modern planning / p. 456 WALKER, Paul; NICHOLS, David; GRANT, Jane – Monarto: learning from the past / p. 470 Conference organization Scientific Committee Organizing Committee Executive Committee KEYNOTE ADRESSES 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 14 Hypothetically, both assumptions –the one referring to the Ensache and the Garden-city onewould appear as trials and references which pave the way to new urban conceptions, foreseeing the Twentieth-century “New Town” projects. In theory, New Towns are set out from the project that pretends to be innovative, like the drafts of Le Corbusier, or from the reality planned. In this later case, we would meet several cases: twentieth-century new political and administrative capitals, urban decentralized alternatives with regards to existing urban agglomerations; new towns in the context of a revolutionary, socialproductive alternative; or just current territorial colonization aiming to underline new territories in which most conflictive social groups are being segregated, or to create exclusive class settlements. Our hypothesis is that both proposals would allow the development of other theories regarding the creation of new towns. Among these theories, which have emerged from the extension of the proposals’ original principles and also by dialectical confrontation, the project of Linear City 9 designed by the engineer Arturo Soria y Mata stands out. It consists on a new urban design, although, as it is intensely connected with the city of Madrid, it oscillates between its status as a new kind of urban settlement and its final expression as a peripheral area with certain autonomy. This project was issued some years earlier than the first text of Howard, what turns Soria y Mata into a pioneer in its field. It should be noted that, as Howard’s idea was expressed in the context of a proposal-project which was totally issued –the Garden-city-, Linear City appeared fragmented, diversified in time. Indeed, although Linear City is previous to Garden-city, Arturo Soria’s theories prove that he perfectly knew Howard’s thinking. In fact, following Arturo Soria’s disciplinary path, we could argue that it was its head-on opposition to Garden-city what paved the way to the definition of Linear City basis. Thus, it is well-known his statement regarding his vision of the Gardencity: “The monkey is to man as the Garden-city is to Linear City”. 9 See Soria y Mata, Arturo,“La Cité Linéaire . Nouvelle architecture des Villes”. Rapport presented by “Compañía Madrileña de Urbanización” in “Premier Congrès International de l’Art de construire villes et organisation de la vie municipale”, Gand. Translated by M. Georges Benoit-Levy. París, Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Architecturales, 1979. Alfonso Alvarez Mora, New Towns As Fragmentary Urban Projects… 15 A lot of facets of Ensanches and Garden-city come together in the Linear City project. Nevertheless in the case of Garden-city, which is contemporary to Linear City, the matters which do not achieve the objectives established by Arturo Soria are dismissed. It is the case, for example, of the effects of both “models” on land prices, above all on those with “centrality” values. According to Arturo Soria, Garden-city keeps its plan as a centralized urban model, what does not miss high values of central property, decreasing when we approach to periphery. As a consequence, this hierarchy of values promotes and determines social segregation. The reasoning exposed is to some extent unappealable, as land value depends not only on its location but also on its use, and we all remember that Howard dedicated the centre of the Garden-city to a Great Central Park. “In the Linear City, on the contrary –Arturo Soria explainsthe highest price of land will not be just in one point, but in a line of indefinite extension, which decreases as far as it separates from the lanes alongside crossing streets. Prices are distributed along roads parallels to railway, and not by concentric circles. As land prices decrease quickly, we can locate various social contents in a same block” 10 . Nevertheless, land value should not be interpreted depending on its location, without taking into account the property interests, without appealing the social added value of those interests. Apart from those anecdotes, the really interesting thing regarding this question is the fixed attitude present in all the proposals exposed. Neither of them questions about the land role as “product”. That is, its “rent’s land” status to the detriment of that other which would consider land like “area for social development” one. Therefore, the Capitalist City born under industrialization is not put into question. Only the defects derived from the process of urban development are disputed, in order to correct them. Land speculation stands out among these faults, forgetting that this one is the consequence of the “urban model” which is not put into question or abandoned. 10 See Soria y Mata, Arturo, “Tratados de Urbanismo y Sociedad”. Selection of some of his writings, the basis of its Linear City Project and several articles that form its philosophical and ideological thinking. Edited in Madrid, by Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, in 2004. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 16 What does Linear City collects from previous experiences, accepting or refusing them, that lead us to consider it a New Town proposal that could be referenced as a “model” to imitate, or interpreted critically? Does it include the overall casuistry or does it represent a concrete case? In a different way, does it allow to think about an assumption of the principles of capital, as any other urban expression, either projected or spatially redirected? Could we really take the Linear City as an exemplar town which, although devised as a spatial alternative in opposition to the existing, it is not identified as an alternative to the town of capital, like in previous models? Linear City was devised as a New Town project, regarding, as a methodological proposal, some questions which, in those days, were being reconsidered as a new way of thinking about “urban corpus” elaboration. Its status of New Town project precisely lied in this aspect. That is, this status lied in its new urban proposal, devised as a spatial alternative, which project basis defined, in turn, a conceptual corpus on urbanism. On the other hand, talking methodologically, that “corpus” was being built in a strong connection with economic, social and political demands which correspond to the reproduction of capital. Indeed, the city of capital, from which Linear City was another outline, was being thought, projected and built. Linear City’s conception started towards 1882. Since that year Arturo Soria closely collaborated with the newspaper “El Progreso”. It is by the press that his ideas would be issued. Among that ideas, the one about which Arturo Soria was most concerned was traffic. Thus, he devised new urban entities as agglomerations whose future scenery and final form were determined by the requirements of urban mobility: “… a town’s form, he said, is, or should be, a form derived from the needs of locomotion…the first thing we should do is to draw a railway” 11 . 11 See Terán Troyano, F. “La Ciudad Lineal. Antecedente de un Urbanismo actual”. Madrid, Ciencia Nueva, 1968. Alfonso Alvarez Mora, New Towns As Fragmentary Urban Projects… 17 In this way, Linear City was organized as a “rail corridor”, with a large central street, about 500 metres wide, traversed in both directions by a tramway. Services-equipments were situated in this axis’ edges, making this one into the central model par excellence, beyond which a diverse residential area was extended. He gathered from Ensanches its Residential-Bourgeois City condition, differentiating it from that one which welcomed the proletariat. He also took up a new approach to the project, in which the Plan-Design represented the first phase, getting autonomy in front of its real process of construction. That implied, therefore, the end of the discipline’s route that had subordinated the city to its architectonic side until that moment. The Plan-Design identified the new urban project in the context of a new Theory of City. This theory bet on the Hygienic City and turned the means of transportation into the tools that enabled mobility and land production. However, even if Linear City is conceived as “new town”, it can’t ignore the City of Madrid, what would pave the way to its final conception as a peripheral area dependent on its coexistence with the existing city. “Workers and pensioners, workshop foremen and other people, Arturo Soria explained, could come to Madrid centre -to the offices, workshops and studiosin the morning, and they would be back to their homes in the evening…This project, from which I am licensed, consists on planning Linear City along the ring railway-tramway. I pretend to set up a neighbourhood similar to the Paseo de la Castellana’s one, affordable for everyone because of cheap land, simplicity of payment in instalments and because each plot’s buyer would have the land once the first instalment has been paid” 12 . In effect, Linear City, conceived like town, is carried out as periphery. We find a more direct relationship between “new town” and “peripheral areas” in the Linear City project than in the Garden-city one. Thus, we can consider that like an urban proposal consisting on the construction of a “peripheral area” as an 12 Soria y Mata, Arturo, “Tratados de Urbanismo y Sociedad”, op. cit. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 18 alternative, as a “new town”, and also as a “fragment”. Meanwhile, Garden-city is shown as a total alternative, even if the following interpretation of this one would result into its own perversion, considering the initial “decentralization” a simple “residential decentralization”. Nevertheless, Arturo Soria’s project has gone further. We think that there are obvious similarities between this proposal and Le Corbusier’s one in relation to “The Three Human Establishments” 13 . Indeed, both of them devise the New Town project as a diverse structure of “linear routes” which rely on existing cities, considering these ones the heads, central reference nodes, of the suggested “territorial structure”. For both Le Corbusier and Arturo Soria, town expands like an “urbanized territory”. In this territory’s frame existing cities act as the “centres” in which big ideas are originated, while in “linear space”, strictly speaking, is where the principles of modern urbanism, the industrial age’s new towns, are executed. They both talk about the need to “urbanise country-to “ruralise” town”, idea inherited from Cerdà’s and Howard’s thinking. In effect, Le Corbusier lays out, in the context of “The Three Human Establishments”, the “total urbanization of territory”. To do that, Industrial Linear City, suggested as one establishment more, between others, together with Radio-Concentric Cities, existing cities and units of agricultural development, which take up the centre of the triangulation formed by those establishments, all of those define a structure which gets the value of a CityTerritory. This is the New Town, directly inherited from Arturo Soria’s thinking. The only difference in favour of Le Corbusier is that Linear Industrial City is provided with the three classical modes of mobility of goods and people, that is, motorway, railway and water. “The exam of working conditions on industrial societies, said Le Corbusier, leads to recognise the utility and need of the three basic human establishments for the activity. That is, unit of agricultural 13 See “La Cité Lineare Industrielle”, in “Le Corbusier. Oeuvre Complete. 1938-46”, les Editions d’Architecture Zurich, published by W. Boesiger, Edition Girsberger. 1966. Alfonso Alvarez Mora, New Towns As Fragmentary Urban Projects… 19 development, Industrial Linear City and Radio Concentric and exchange’s (government, art, ideas, commerce) City” 14 . In the same way as Arturo Soria, Le Corbusier does not ignore the existing town, the Radio-Concentric City. He considers it to be essential for the New Town project, taking that city as a territorial presence unavoidable to sign on new urban adventures. Although he is usually so critic to history that he refuses to recognise it as a reality to get back, on this occasion he considers that it is indispensable. Thus, he gives that existing city none other than the role of space for creation and thought, the art city. Is this the first step to define the new town in which the existing-constructed, the historical town, has a privileged place? In this case, the modern urbanism basis would spread out beyond the city itself, where there is enough “void-space” and the “country urbanization” makes into reality. All the urban projects designed by Le Corbusier are paradigm of the new city, which is being thought as an alternative to its first industrial expression, inherited from Nineteenth-century town. After reviewing these projects, we observe a theorist position in which the existing city occupies a prominent place on the new town project. Far from its anti-historical stance, Le Corbusier does not disregard historical city. Indeed, he assigns to this one a prominent role as the new city “centre”, although indiscriminate renewal is needed. Like this, we could understand that reproduction of “centrality” on new towns is not possible, in such a way that we should necessarily add “historical centrality”, or existing city, to the new town project. This means the recreation of the projected beyond the constructed, that is, in peripheral areas. In effect, we notice this permanent feature in Le Corbusier’s urban projects: The use of the existing city as a spatial category which assumes “centrality” conditions is appreciated in most of them, with the exception of Chandigarh project. This latter is more like a theorist recreation, an attempt that history is redirecting to its town condition. With this reservation, we state that, as argued 14 See “La Cité Lineare Industrielle”, op. cit. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 20 by Le Corbusier, “Urbanizing is to value. Urbanizing is not to spend money, but to earn money, to make money … The centre of towns represents a great property value which can double, multiply, as modern techniques allow to build sixty floors and any more six…The centre of Paris, currently threatened to death, threatened to abandon, is actually a diamonds mine…it must rebuild on itself…”. Therefore, in Modern City project there is a close link between what to do with the existing city and how to reproduce the newest –what spreads the most refined essences of modernityin peripheral areas. Modern City is a creation which has its raison d’être beyond the existing constructed, where the new can be recreated, where new theories have creative freedom. We identify again the model assumptions made for Ensanches, Linear City or Garden-city in the New Town project. In this one, we notice that it is beyond the existing constructed were the ideals rooted on its own thought can be accomplished; that is, the construction of a new land intended to be a projected reality in all its scope. Now then, and to conclude, experimenting new forms of Modern Towns apart from existing city, is not the New Town condition being reduced to a simple peripheral setting? Conceived as a complete town, does it abandon this condition to take the form of a neighborhood of the existing town? This is, at least, Hans Blumenfeld argument, appearing in its work on new towns of the U.S.A., like Chatham Village, in Pittsburgh, Baldwin Hills, in Los Ángeles, Green Belt Towns and Reston, Columbia and Irvin New Towns. In relation to that, he states that “…they are not self-sufficient towns, but parts of a larger metropolis on which they completely depend. Actually, they are considered honest suburbs for medium and upper classes. Their inhabitants usually work outside this area and many times they mix together with industrial properties which draw workforce from outside” 15 . Therefore, the project of Modern Town is presented more as a fragment than as a complete urban fact, helping, in its new town condition, to renew the existing 15 Blumenfeld, H. “El Papel del Diseño”, published in the book “El crecimiento de las ciudades”, coordinated by D. Lewis. Barcelona, Gustavo Gili, 1972. Alfonso Alvarez Mora, New Towns As Fragmentary Urban Projects… 21 town. To achieve that, it is indispensable to think, to project, to program and to build a peripheral area which welcomes, by the decentralization process, the concrete functions of traditional urban centres. These “new fragments” are refined as the other side for the renewal process of that “centres”. This is, at least, Morton Hoppenfeld’s opinion, a planner who participated in the project of Columbia’s New Town, located between Baltimore and Washington. “Columbia, he states, was never devised as self-sufficient. In all ways, it is integrated into the socio-economic life of Howard`s County and large metropolis of Washington D.C and Baltimore. It is expected to become the third urban centre, between the two big cities.” Seeing this experience, on the other hand he argues that “… we will not be able to raise our central towns again unless we form, at the same time, new communities going with urban renewal…Any reasonable politic intended for reconstructing our cities should necessarily contain a politic for the develop of new towns as a complement” 16 . 16 Hoppenfeld, Morton “El Proceso de Columbia: El potencial de nuevas ciudades”. In D. Lewis, “El Crecimiento de las Ciudades”. Barcelona, Gustavo Gili, 1972. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 22 Alfonso Álvarez Mora, Architect, 1972, by the School of Architecture of Madrid. Ph.D. in Architecture from the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, 1976. University Professor since 1984, with arrival at the University of Valladolid. Fellow of the Ministry of Education, with stays at MIT in Cambridge, USA; Research in Paris, the University "La Sapienza" of Rome, Researcher of the National Plan for Scientific Research, Development and Technological Innovation. Director of the School of Architecture, Valladolid from 1993 to 1996. Director of the Graduate Institute of Urban Studies at the University of Valladolid. Director of the magazine "Ciudades” (Cities) published by the Urban Institute. The three recent books deal with the "Geography of Don Quixote. Landscapes and Places in Cervantes's Narrative”, "The Historical Construction of Valladolid. City Project and Logic of Class", and "The Myth of the Historical Center. The Prestige Space and Inequality". Currently I am doing a research, I + D + I, concerning the residential impact in recent years has occurred in the historic centers that are spread over the territory of the State, as well as evaluating the Urbanísticas policies that have been implemented. 23 TRANSFERABLE LESSONS FROM THE BRITISH NEW TOWNS Georgia Butina Watson Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, United Kingdom Abstract Great Britain has a long tradition of building New Towns. Some of the early developments, such as Letchworth and Welwyn Garden city were a direct outcome of Ebenezer Howard’s ideas presented in his seminal work Tomorrow: a peaceful Path to Real reform (1898) later published as Garden Cities of Tomorrow (1902). These early developments were initiated to remedy some of the worst slum conditions of London and they became models for the next generation of new settlements. The post-war reconstruction was underpinned by the 1946 Act on building New Towns in order to accommodate the overspill from London and to generate urban growth. Thirty two New Towns were designated in two phases: Phase One, from 1946-1950 and Phase Two, between 1961-1970. Phase Three took place between 1970 and 1996. In 2004 the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister commissioned a research project on the transferable lessons from the New Towns, to establish guidance for the building of new or expanded communities in four growth areas: LondonStansted-Cambridge-Peterborough corridor; Ashford in Kent; the Thames Gateway; and the expansion of Milton Keynes. This paper presents the key findings of the research, by focussing on the context of building New Towns in the UK; by identifying key transferable lessons grouped under eight themes of delivery, finance, creating communities, governance, economic achievement and competitiveness, physical environment and design, long-term sustainability and end user experience. The last part of the paper makes final recommendations for building new communities in the 21st century. Keywords: British New Towns; transferable lessons. Background In order to solve some of the problems of the 19th C Great Britain a number of ideas were put forward by the philanthropist thinkers such as Ebenezer Howard and later on by Raymond Unwin, Barry Parker and a whole host of other key players. The most radical and influential early ideas came from Ebenezer Howard and his seminal book Garden Cities of Tomorrow, published in 1902 as a less provocative title of the earlier version titled Tomorrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform (1898). 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 30 Growth Areas need to display similar qualities in championing the infrastructure needs of their own areas. The scale of growth in designated four growth areas is comparable to earlier built New Towns but there is, to date, a limited attempt to create entirely freestanding new settlements in the Growth Areas, except, in line with local planning policies established around Cambridge and a newly proposed Garden City of Ebbsfleet in the Thames Gateway. In several cases (Basildon, Milton Keynes, Northampton, Corby, Harlow, Peterborough) former New Towns are actually affected as they are designated for further growth. There is a recognition that ordinary local planning agencies are in most cases inadequate to deliver major growth on their own, and therefore some form of a Development Corporation would be desirable. Though today’s language differs, the emphasis on creating sustainable communities and accommodating social mix has strong echoes of the New Town ideals of self-containment and social balance. There are likely to be comparable problems of major infrastructure provision which will be critical before large scale development can proceed. It seems likely that some degree of master planning will be required, which in the New Towns played a key role in establishing image and place identity. Place marketing is also likely to be an important consideration in Growth Areas as it was in the New Towns. This is already used in the Thames Gateway area. There are though some important contrasts which will limit the possibilities of lesson transferability. The New Towns Development Corporations (NTDCs) were unelected nationalized corporations charged with developing a town. They were Georgia Butina Watson, Transferable Lessons from the British New Towns 31 directly appointed and had strong land acquisition powers. The Urban Development Corporations (UDCs) generally share some of these characteristics but will not be operating in areas otherwise most comparable to the New Towns. The NTDCs largely operated in a climate of high state spending at a time when there was a stronger belief in public sector enterprise and investment. They were themselves major developers. Today, there is greater emphasis on public/private partnerships, and a much greater involvement of the private sector. In particular the NTDCs were landlords of large amounts of housing. This had major advantages in ensuring housing affordability and this obviously played a role in getting major development underway relatively quickly. Today, social and affordable housing is delivered through Social Registered Landlords or the private sector. It seems likely that the Growth Areas will involve a higher ratio of brownfield: greenfield development, compared to the New Town developments. Generally NTDCs, at least before the election of the Thatcher government in 1979, had a very different relationship to private developers and especially house builders to that which prevail in the Growth Areas today. Lengthy negotiations of planning agreements were virtually unknown but today they can be key issues in the Growth Areas. The New Towns, especially in the south, were very successful in attracting employment that closely matched the skills of their local workforces. Although the wider regional economies clearly have great growth potential, it is less clear how far the Growth Areas will be able to match this record at a more localised level. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 32 Georgia Butina Watson, Transferable Lessons from the British New Towns 33 Key thematic findings Delivery In order to deliver New Towns programmes, New Towns Development Corporations (NTDC) were set up to deliver a complex set of planning and other development procedures. NTDCs were powerful delivery bodies that could acquire land, quite often at very favourable prices, and also had all other powers to build new communities. They acted as ‘lead’ developers as well as landlords. They could also borrow funds from the government at very favourable prices for periods of up to 60 years (Cullingworth, 1968; Osborne & Whitick, 1977). Transferable lessons to the new growth areas are that NTDCs are still being set up to deal with large-scale urban developments; London Docklands Development Corporation is a good example, and more recently similar structures were set up for the development of London Thames Gateway (Butina Watson, et al, 2006). In today’s climate, there could be more public/private partnerships charged with the responsibility to deliver growth, and also pull the financial resources together. Involving private house builders to deliver both private and affordable housing, is also desirable to delivery diversity of tenure and housing provision. Such partnerships can also deliver faster, but co-ordination is needed via master planning. This also applies to Local Authority partners where joint efforts are desirable particularly when it comes to building infrastructure or the provision of schools and other social facilities. Partnerships with voluntary agencies to deliver community clubs and other social facilities are also desirable early on in the planning of large new settlements. Delivery Partnerships should also engage with the existing local residents as well as the newcomers, to establish social cohesion early on in the process. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 34 Although there is an element of competition building in different growth areas, partnership working should be encouraged to overcome delays and complex negotiations, particularly in building roads and other infrastructure projects. The research also established that an organization could be formed at the national level to facilitate mutual learning. Some of this exchange of knowledge is currently being provided through the Town and Country Planning Association (TCPA). Finance Both the Central Government and private finance need to be co-ordinated and clear responsibilities established. Early acquisition of land is particularly critical, in order to avoid complex purchase negotiations at the last minute and also to avoid high costs. Additional value created through development should be used to provide social amenities and facilities, and the current mechanism of Section 106 agreement can facilitate this benefit. It is also important to prepare long-term financial scenarios as any fast return on investment may not be viable. Detailed implementation strategies ought to be in place in order to avoid unnecessary delays. Careful attention should also be given to marketing new growth and new community developments to attract companies as well as residents into the new growth areas. Growth area teams should also consider sustainability issues, encouraging modern technology and renewables to be employed in the construction of houses as well as other facilities. In costing and preparing financial plans care should be taken to secure adequate funding early on in the process in order to avoid delays in the building and construction processes but also to provide confidence, reduce risk and give credibility to the development. If the growth areas are to be part-financed by loans, these should be on flexible terms, and if possible at low interest rates. It is also important to take into consideration recession and other economic downturns, therefore early finance from the Georgia Butina Watson, Transferable Lessons from the British New Towns 35 Government sources is needed in order to launch such large-scale building initiatives (Butina Watson et al, 2006; Lock, 1989). Creating Communities Key lessons relating to “creating communities” need to be considered in the context of 21stC community initiatives. Some of the differences and changes highlight that the New Towns were planned before car ownership was as extensive as it is today. As a result the layout and parking provisions were different from today’s requirements. Individuals are more geographically mobile today than ever before. Potentially, people identify less with their local community or neighbourhood as a result, and therefore the challenge of creating integrated communities is all the greater. Related to this is the commuter lifestyle that affects many people today. Housing in the New Towns was initially largely rented from a social landlord. This enabled much more centralised planning for communities to be put in place. Today’s housing provision is dominated by the private sector, but with a requirement for the provision of social and affordable housing. It is important to have a mix of housing types, tenure and other requirements such as housing for elderly and disabled to encourage mixed community structures as this inevitably influences the type of communities that come to live in the new settlements. It is also worth noting that the New Towns built after the war were very different in character and context. Nevertheless, some of the lessons to come out of the literature would appear to have relevance to today’s context. It is important to put in place participatory structures whereby both existing and new communities can engage in early decision making processes, linked to planning and design issues. This was already 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 36 identified in the planning for growth of the Thames Gateway (Butina Watson et al, 2006). A ‘Community Chest’ or Community Trust Fund could be set up early in the process of planning new communities so that social aspects, voluntary and community projects could be supported. It is also useful to engage with Local Councils, the church, neighbourhood associations and youth organizations. It is important to incorporate ‘walkable neighbourhood’ principles, to encourage walking and cycling. Locations of Schools and other facilities are therefore important to consider in the design process as well as support mixed use developments. It is also desirable to have social, educational, health and other facilities established in the new settlements areas, before the population moves in. Governance It should also be recognised that the New Towns were initiated and substantially developed in a period of much greater social deference than today, when most of the population did not readily question the judgements of those in positions of authority. Concerning the pre-existing communities in designated areas, central government and NTDCs learnt from the public relations disaster that marked the early days of the first New Town at Stevenage (Orlans, 1952). NTDCs soon recognised the need to maintain a regular flow of local public information about their New Towns for both pre-existing and incoming populations. This involved initiatives such as specific NTDC newsletters and strong encouragement to existing local newspapers. The social development departments of NTDCs were very important in these efforts to encourage community development and cohesion. Social development and housing departments often became channels of communication between community concerns and the development corporation. Georgia Butina Watson, Transferable Lessons from the British New Towns 37 Amongst the ‘New Towners’ themselves, tenants associations were often the first expression of autonomous community action. Other community organisations were created with the encouragement of social development officers and sometimes also the active involvement of voluntary agencies such as the churches. Effective arrangements to organise and involve communities in governance often helped NTDCs in their negotiations with other agencies to secure better facilities for the New Towns. Local authorities were another vehicle for articulating community concerns with the advantage of providing a formal elective element to allow representation of the new communities. As noted, however, relations with the NTDCs were often strained. Research identified (Butina Watson et al, 2006) that clarity of responsibility for delivery and related governance in the Growth Areas is essential and that they should be absorbed into the normal governance systems as quickly as possible. Development Corporations should also encourage autonomous community activity and leadership. Economic achievement and competitiveness The initial success of the New Towns was based on the change of land values from those of agricultural values to those associated with urban uses. This is a key "hidden" tool that has been used elsewhere to encourage the establishment of private sector economic activity. Another element in their success was the national macro-economic conditions of the period in which the first generation of New Towns were developed. Low interest rates and low inflation combined with economic growth and an urban-rural shift, especially in manufacturing industry, meant that they were essentially working with the grain of their contemporary economic environment. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 38 The early post-war period is often seen as the era of nationalisation and central control, and the creation of the NTDCs could well be interpreted as an act of public ownership. But the programme was very decentralised in that initially the Development Corporations enjoyed a high degree of autonomy from central government control. Whilst the post war New Towns were linked to the decentralization of industry and population current growth patterns are more globally connected and therefore attract a greater diversity of employers and other organizations. This is particularly evident in the Thames Gateway as well as in Cambridge and Milton Keynes. Physical environment and design/master-planning This section presents findings from a review of the literature on the topic of physical environment and design, including master-planning. These include issues of process as well as urban design – layout, transport infrastructure/road and path configuration and architectural style. It is well recognised that there were major changes in the design thinking and ideology between the early and later New Towns. In particular, the influence of modernism, both in relation to style and to the notion of an efficient disaggregation of land uses has been replaced by a greater concern with local identity, the mixing of uses and issues of sustainability. Attitudes towards mobility have also shifted from car dominated to people dominated design philosophy. Therefore, changing attitudes to the relationship between roads and built form is an additional major factor in design thinking. On the more general theme of master-planning as a process, the dominant process of design was top-down, based on the creation of an overall plan at the outset, at different scales of morphological level of resolution. In addition to master planning the more recent models of Georgia Butina Watson, Transferable Lessons from the British New Towns 39 coding or design frameworks are also able to provide more flexible and dynamic solutions to local circumstances. A population of 32,000 as intuitively advocated by Howard (1902) is also argued to be a reasonable base-line figure for new settlements, particularly with respect to transport sustainability. Size is related to location, and more remote sites require a larger size for any degree of self-containment; sites closer to existing large cities can be smaller to provide day-to-day needs (Miller, 1997). New Town neighbourhoods in the 1950s were of a size to support at least one primary school, located at the centre, with its open spaces to give a green core. This neighbourhood principle underpinned policy on size: commonly based on provision of a catchment to support a primary school, as part of a larger district with a secondary school, and larger neighbourhoods of 15,000 (Miller, 1997). The largest of the New Towns is Milton Keynes, with a target population of 250,000 and is again undergoing expansion to accommodate new employment and population growth. Towns with a target population of 150,000 to 300,000 appear to offer ‘adequate’ choice to employers and employees, and a full range of social, cultural, educational, health and other facilities (Cervero, 1995). For shops, an average of 5,000-10,000 catchment area is needed. New expansion of the four growth areas today should also benefit from the existing services, but any new increase in population should be accompanied by adequate strategic planning of educational, health and other social facilities (Cervero, 1995). Equally important is to mix housing and employment to avoid unnecessary car journeys. The same applies to the integration of retail and other uses. Mixed-use, compact city model is also supporting higher levels of sustainability; attention should also be given to the green and wildlife corridors as an integral component of the overall spatial structure. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 44 role of the architect as an interpreter of the living conditions within the postmodern urban environment. Guido Morpurgo PhD Arch. Adjunct Professor of Architecture and Urban Design Scuola di Architettura e Società – Politecnico di Milano. Born in Milan in 1964, he graduated in architecture from Milan Polytechnic in 1989, where gained a PhD in Architecture and Urban Planning in 1998. In 1999 he gained as well a scholarship for a post-doctoral research at Milan Polytechnic, teaching urban design between 1998 and 2000 and architectural composition from 2011 at the School of Architecture and Society. He worked with Gregotti Associati International between 2000 and 2008. Associate from 2002, he worked on national and international architecture and urban planning projects. From 2001 to 2004 he worked as a project leader on several urban scale projects in Shanghai: among the others, the new towns Pujiang and Jiangwan (100.000 residents, in progress) and the architectural and urban renovation of the former british Concession of Wai Tan Yuan. He has been an editor of “ARC-Architettura Ricerca Composizione” and “Mégalopole. Art, Architecture, Urbanisme” magazines 45 THE 20TH CENTURY NEW TOWNS. THE SEARCHING FOR AN IDEAL CITY Ana Tostões DOCOMOMO; Instituto Superior Técnico, Portugal Abstract The search for the ideal city on the 20th Century has to do with the creation of New Towns. The New Towns concept is rooted in UK under the scope of the London City Council reconstruction actions after the WWII. The movement had a tremendous impact from Helsinky's Tapiola's or Lisbon's Olivais Neighbourhood. These developments must quote Howard's Garden City Movement raising and inspiring the Modern Movement Urbanism: from the Neue sachlichkeit Bruno Taut's Siedlungen or the May's Neues Frankfurt enterprise to the Tessenow Hellerau Neighboorhood, from Tel-Aviv new city to Brasília or Chandigarh new capitals which revealed specific political and cultural targets. The paper intends to provide a reading on the New Towns European influence and the non-Europeans New Capitals iconic reference as a 20th Century specific urban approach. The analysis aims at discussing this Modern Urban legacy as a strategy for the Unesco' urban landscape heritage concept implementation. Ana Tostões, Ph.D. is chair of DOCOMOMO International, DOCOMOMO Journal Editor, associate professor with habilitation at Técnico Lisbon University, where she is the director of the PhD Program in Architecture. Her research field is the history of architecture and the city of the twentieth century, in which she develops an operative view, oriented towards the conservation of modern architecture, focusing especially on post-war architectural culture and relations between European, African and American. On these topics she has published books and scientific articles and curate exhibitions. She has been coordinating the research project (PTDC/AUR-AQI/103229/2008) EWV: Exchanging World Visions, focused on SubSahara African architecture and planning mostly built in Angola and Mozambique during the modern movement period (Tostões, A. (ed.), Modern Architecture in Africa, 2013.) She has published widely, curate exhibitions, and taken part in juries and scientific committees. PAPERS 49 AN INVESTIGATION ON LANDSCAPE STRUCTURES IN IRANIAN NEW TOWN DEVELOPMENT The case of Fuladshahr New Town (1963-2013) Azadeh Badiee KU Leuven / Leuven, Belgium Abstract This paper intends to explore the changes made to the urban landscape of Fuladshahr New Town in Iran by focusing on (mainly public) strategies and initiatives elaborated with regard to two particular urban development momentums. Firstly, the experiences of the pre-Islamic revolution of 1979 under the shah's regime and secondly, developments occurring after the Iran-Iraq war period. The exploration draws on two different levels of analysis, namely the large-scale of the metropolitan region, the medium-scale of the New Town in each stage of time. Rapid urbanization and the rural-urban migration during Iran's modernization forced the government and urban decision makers to offer an array of different solutions for housing and infrastructure provision at each paradigm shift. From construction based on political security and industrial growth to regional decentralization in order to control the overflow of population in large cities, these strategies have all been considered in Iran's New Town development. Most recently, the government provided affordable housing (known as Mehr housing) is the main agenda under which New Town development is implemented throughout Iran and around Tehran. This contribution offers an alternative reading of the above-mentioned development strategies by focusing on the landscape characteristics that acted as a support for past urban developments and are no longer relied upon when developing Iranian New Towns. Methodologically the paper applies inductive and descriptive approaches in which will not only analyze Fuladshahr's degrees of flexibility over a period of time, but will also investigate the role of landscape in the New Town's evolution. Using mapping methods, the landscape will be highlighted in the role it has (or not) covered in Fuladshahr's urbanization, and the type of urbanity that has consequently been generated. Keywords: New Town, Urban Landscape, Iran, Fuladshahr, Urban change 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 50 Introduction Pre-revolutionary Iran's economic development was rapid. A traditional agricultural society, had achieved significant industrialization and economic modernization by the 1970s, largely aided by the growing worldwide demand for oil.1 Isfahan as the Iran third largest city has a noticeable history in interrelation with landscape in every aspect of development. Since the 17th century Isfahan spatial and social configuration has changed a lot and this evolving in each stage of time is a consequence of political and social changes that were appearing in that time frame. The development of the region since the modernization period was concentrated in new town development, but in each stage of time concerning different agendas. The Isfahan urban growth process followed certain changes in the spatial and social configuration of the region in which cannot be read without its interrelation with landscape as a platform where all these transformations and evolving are happening. By a look at the urbanization process and the booming in the population growth the city sizes and extensive rural to urban migration all ended with the growth in the major cities and resulting an increase in the number of cities in these years. The growth in the number of cities were not the same as the growth in the population of the major cities such as Tehran, Mashahd, Isfahan and Tabriz. These cities continued to be the main attraction for the migrates and the size of the cities were also passed its desirable limits. The modernization movement with regard to the industrialization of the cities ended up by expanding the city territory toward consuming the nature and the landscape around the city, where the productivity of the people and therefore the culture were starting from. By an investigation in the history of historical cities in Iran, the dominant of landscape characteristic is noticeable and illustrates the various impacts of landscape as a structuring element in the different scale of spatial development and therefore in the cultural and social dimensions. Fuladshahr New Town as the first New Town which was designed in Isfahan region has faced different development strategies with regard to two particular 1 CIA World Factbook (February 2012) Azadeh Badiee, An investigation on landscape structures in Iranian new town development 51 urban development momentums. The complex interplay of socio-economic and ecological process, has shaped landscape as a medium of exchange in which it formatted a complex network of political, social and cultural identities. 'The challenges to the region are immense and need to be understood in all their complexity in order to then propose feasible alternative and strategic projects.' (Shannon, 2010, p.94) In addition to Shannon argue about understanding the process of urban development, testing the thesis of landscape urbanism as a means by which the fundamental questions about the contemporary city and new ways of intersection of physical and social processes of territorial formation will be investigated in order to generate new forms of urban typologies and knowledge. Shannon also brings out the importance of understanding the region's history in order to learn lessons from the interdependent relationship to landscape. 'Recognition and abstraction of the idea of synergy between urban and rural, the consumptive and productive landscapes, can become a guiding principle for new urbanization.' (Shannon, 2010 p. 148) The first part of this research is a short exploration of historical studies on Isfahan development in order to highlight the framing elements of the early stage of Urbanism in the region. Later it will explore the development motivator in the contemporary Urbanism during the pre-revolution and post-war period in the New Town of Fouladshahr in order to reveal the role of landscape in the urbanization process of Iranian New Town development spatially Fouladshahr case. This research investigates the role of landscape in the New Town's evolution that acted as a support for past urban development and are no longer relied upon. Maktab Isfahan, reframing a territory After selection of Isfahan2 2 Isfahan City located about 340 km south of Tehran and is the capital of Isfahan Province and Iran’s third largest city. The city has a population of almost 1.600.000 people. It is Situated in the central part of Iranian Plateau at the eastern foothills of Zagros mountains and lush plain of the Zayandeh(Birth giving river) River. Heading north with a slight deviation to the west it goes towards foothills of the Alborz mountain range and Tehran. The eastern boundary of the city by Safavid dynasty as the capital of Iran by the end of the 16th century, major urban design strategies were applied in order to give a 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 52 framework to the previous and future urbanization of the region. The integration of the new development with the organic historical city, created an organization that has been an example for Iranian Urbanism since then. The formation of Safavid dynasty followed by ‘Maktab Isfahan’ in urbanism can be compared with the reinforcement of central Europe after the Renaissance and the creation of Baroque in the 18th century. When intellectuals and innovators are still struggling to structure their medieval towns and building their ‘Ideal-City’,’Maktabe Isfahan’ has built its ideal model and depicts a sharp and clear portrait of what exists and what is appropriate. (Habibi, 1996) Maktab Isfahan (Isfahan School) was a combined design of new and old city with the following characteristics: the new garden city of Isfahan got connected to the old city centre via a new structuring spine. This urban corridor (Chahar Bagh) works as a north south link between river as an ecological gate for the city throughout a sequence of gardens and public spaces toward the old urban fabric of the city. The designation of three neighbourhoods for the development of the city was also part of the new plan in which for the first time in the history of urbanism in Iran river has become a natural east west corridor in which the urbanizations are located in the northern and southern part of it. A closer look at this integration of old and new reveals the relation of historical irrigation technology to the new urban structure. 'These irrigation channels named ‘Madi3 almost touches the Great Kavir and Gav khooni marshlands several minor basins with infrequent desert stretches. ’ had major impacts in water management and transfer to agricultural fields and to the gardens of Isfahan. ‘Madis’ were a dendritic irrigation system that branched from the river and supported the production of cultivated lands and royal gardens'. (Tabrizian, 2010) 3 “Madi”s were dendritic irigations systems branched from the river to agricultural plots and royal gardens. MADIs are essential in agricultural, Industrial and urban development in Isfahan. (Isfahan Water Administration 1993), the MADIs provide 91% of agricultural, 4% of industrial and 5% of urban water requirements .there are seventy seven MADIs branched from left side (north) of Zayanderood river while there are only seventy one MADIs branched from right side (sough).( Sattari et al.. 2003). Azadeh Badiee, An investigation on landscape structures in Iranian new town development 53 The intertwined design of the historical natural system with the perpendicular connection between the river as a natural resource and new urban development and the old city resulted a new urbanization which embraces the landscape characteristics into cultural and spatial perspective. Figure 1. Isfahan and main structuring elements during Safavid dynasty. (Habibi, S., Ahari, Z., 2012). The integration of river to the old urban fabric and the royal gardens in Isfahan. New Town a feature of modernity A new approach of New Towns derived from the utopians and the ideas of Howard. 'New Towns are successors to Howard's social city as a regional planning model and address the urban form and economy, as well as the social structure and municipal organization.' (De Klerk, 2006, p.7) New Towns had different purposes in the developing countries such as instruments for restructuring and de-concentrating the population of rapidly growing metropolitan regions (Atash, 2000, p. 68). The New Town development in Iran can be divided into two periods, the pre-revolution and post war period. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 60 'The 1986 census counted the population of Fuladshahr at 28,728, with the majority working primarily in the Esfahan Steel Mill Complex and its nearby industries.'(Atash, 2000) The Isfahan Region's 25 year master plan, designated Fuladshahr as the second largest urban centre in the region in 1986, and recommended that the New Town has no longer work as a dormitory New Town and has to be a self contain and dynamic New Town with a future population of 500,000 inhabitants by 2010 in an area of 7,000 ha.5 'The end of the war with Iraq coincided with the implementation of the first FiveYear development plan for the period of 1989–1993.'(Ziari, 2006) 'The plan identified economic growth and efficiency as its most important objectives; others included controlling population growth, optimizing resource exploitation and the completion of unfinished projects.' (Amirahmadi, 1996, p. 123) 'The government decided to prepare the second development plan for the period of 1995–1999. It placed top priority on economic growth and did not address its spatial dimension and performance. The second plan emphasized industrial growth in areas with an adequate infrastructural base.'(Ziari, 2006) therefore the establishment of the New Towns located near the large cities in 1986 in order to address New Towns to absorb the surplus population of these cities. In this regard, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development announced construction of 18 New Towns which they are located in the areas owned by the state. Although Fuladshahr was established as a company Town, but according In order to fulfil this goal, two important changes were implemented in Fuladshahr, one was according to spatial configuration in relation to the problems with high-rise apartment, they decided to limit the building typology to four-story apartments and one-two story single family units and in this way they re-designed a major part of the original master plan of Fuladshahr. Since the second phase of development was parallel with the new government and strategy in the country by president Rafsanjani, the New Town followed the governmental slogan of 'Construction' therefore the City Land Organization allowed the investors (private and public) participate in the development of Fuladshahr and for the first time the housings provided in the New Town could be purchased. 5 Fuladshahr New Town Development Company, 1992 Azadeh Badiee, An investigation on landscape structures in Iranian new town development 61 to its location and access to main industrial hubs of the region was selected as one of this New Towns beside two other New Towns of Baharestan and Majlesi with 15 and 65 km distance from the city of Isfahan. The revised master plan targeted the middle and upper middle class population to live in the New Town and it was mainly focused on households working in the nearby industries. An adaptation of the plan to the new economic changes, which was the result of the war related national problems, seemed necessary at that time in order to attract a new population with different social background to Fuladshahr. The fast growing rate of population in this period and the high-price of land in the city of Isfahan attracted the house seeking families to the New Towns around Isfahan region. By a close look at the location of the three New Towns of Isfahan and their succession in absorbing the population, the parameters of the distance from the major city and their accessibility to the means of production were the key points in that stage of time. Figure 4. Productive Landscape. (Source: the author.). The location of New Towns and their relation to the means of production in comparison with the other Cities in the region shows the intense relation of productive landscape and urban growth. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 62 The Justice Era - The Time for The Low Income The population of Fuladshahr New Town according to the Company of Iranian New Towns in 2002 was 45,000 people, which shows the growth rate of 18% and the number of migration from other part of Iran specially Isfahan region to the city, but on the other hand, according to the second master plan of the city the target population by the year 2010 should reach the 500,000 that means a major part of the New Town was still waiting for further developments. The age pyramid of Iran demonstrates the widest category in the age between 25-35 which are the generation were born during the war and after the 1979 revolution. These huge numbers of the population who are in the age of marriage and independence have a massive need for housing and job. This is in parallel with the declining family size of the Iranian family, therefore more housing units are needed.6 Mehr Housing Project targeted the free lands in the northern part of Fuladshahr in the district D, where in the first and second master plan was placed as the last phase of development and therefore had the least infrastructure ready (almost empty land). The number of 32,000 housing units Considering the economic crisis and the inflation due to the western sanctions against Iran, finding housing in the major cities for young families and low income households became impossible. At 2006 by the beginning of the Ahmadinejad government, his major propaganda for satisfying his followers (as a populist president) was the introduction of affordable housing projects known as Mehr Housing which is the 99 years leasing housing on the governmental lands outside of the major city limit. New Towns, due to their unfulfillment in attracting the population could provide a number of available lands for developing the Mehr Housing project. 7 6 Journal of Housing Economics, (2011). No 47-48 which were designated to be built in Fuladshahr are mostly following repeating pattern of eight to ten storey high apartment arranged along a relatively wide infrastructure grid create a uniform environment in District D consisting of 10 neighbourhoods. The main north-south access of the city which works as the main spine for connecting the 7 Fuladshahr New Town Company 2013 Azadeh Badiee, An investigation on landscape structures in Iranian new town development 63 open spaces and public facilities is connecting the core of the Mehr District to the old city centre of Fuladshahr. The introduction of new housing typology of the new District of Fuladshahr and its distance from the main activities and recreational centers, and the most important one, means of production, brings out the question of spatial integration of the new development of the city. Although the New Town showed a high level of flexibility during the last four decades of development through different political and social configuration, access to a productive landscape of agriculture and later industries were the key for the calibration of the city and following in the social formation of it. But now the new pattern of homogenous living style with their concentration on the same needs requires a new means of production in order to be able to compose new spatial and social characteristics of the city after passing various changes. Interpretation Toward Construction Maps can do more than depict the interrelationships of urban landscapes; through the ways and means by which these relationships are depicted they can influence the way such space is conceived. In this, maps are never a neutral presentation of a given reality but rather present a particular concept of space and thus also construct it. (Löw, 2007, p.68) With a focus on landscape characteristics of urban development, it comes to observation and comprehension that the spatial conditions of landscape has an exchange with the urban development of the city. As Cosgrove argues, ' Landscape as symbolic systems and as ways of seeing needed to be seen in relation to 'social formation'(Cresswell, 2003) hence the sequence of the social and cultural circumstances that had occurred during the practical uses of the spatial spaces of the city has shaped the landscape of Fuladshahr. This process of evolving and adaptation has formulated a complex network of political social and cultural identities where can be seen as a landscape of inter-relations. ’ Landscape ... as a mosaic of the “total spatial and visual entity of human living 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 64 space” that integrates the environment, living systems, and the man-made'. (Corner, 2006, p. 61) The spatial formation of Maktab Isfahan had followed the cultural characteristic of productive landscape of the River and agriculture following the social and cultural activities in the city during the 17th century, while the landscape of Fuladshahr New Town in the 20th century, followed the new industry as the new mode of production and consequently the social and spatial production which came as the result. In the territorial scale, the Isfahan regional growth during the last 6 decades shows a continuing correlation of the urban expansion of Isfahan and the small and large size cities around it in relation to the means of production and centrality and accessibility of this landscape. The spatial feature of the region (the topography, river-shape and the agriculture) has structured the settlements in the region and although the master plan had tried to put a limit for the city growth, the consumption of agriculture fields and an excessive growth of the major cities such as Najafabad and Khomeinishahr are clear (Fig 3). In the scale of Fuladshahr New Town, the influence of the social configuration of citizens, to some degree, has shaped the spatial structure of the city. Different political and cultural ideologies brought different typologies and spatial characteristics for Fuladshahr. The level of ownership and access to common uses has shaped a new landscape which gives the possibility of an alternative understanding of the New Town. The way landscape circulates as a medium of exchange, a site of visual appropriation, a focus for the formation of identity. (Mitchell, 2002) Azadeh Badiee, An investigation on landscape structures in Iranian new town development 65 Figure 5. Fuladshahr Evolution. (Source: the author). The typology of residential buildings and their access to open spaces and their share of nature is shown during the three phases of development in the New Town. References Allen, S., (2001). Mat Urbanism: the thick 2-D, in Hashim Sarkis, Ed., CASE: Le Corbusier's Venice Hospital, Munich: Prestel, 124. Amirahmadi, H., (1996). Iran's development: evaluation and challenges, Third World Quarterly, 17(1), p. 123. Art and Architecture (ed.), (1975)., No. 39-40, pp. 52-72, Tehran. Atash, F. (1998), New Towns and their practical challenges, Habitat Intl, 22(1), 1-13. Cross, N., (2006). Designerly ways of knowing, Springer, London. Corner, J., (2003), Landscape Urbanism, in M. Mostafavi (Ed.) Landscape Urbanism. A Manual for the Machinistic Landscape., London: Architectural Association. Cosgrove, D. (1998). Social Formation and Symbolic Landscape, University of Wisconsin. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 66 Corner, J. (2002). Landscape urbanism reader, Princeton Architectural Press, New York. Cresswell, T., (2003). Landscape and the Obliteration of practice, Handbook of Cultural Geography, Sage Publication, London. D'auria, V., De Meulder, B., Shannon, K., (2010). Human settlement in development, formation and (re)calibrations, Sun publishers, Amsterdam. De Klerk, L. (2007). New Town in Development Policy, First international seminar, INTI, Almere. Galantay, E., (1979). New Towns in National Development, Milton Keynes. Gibberd, F. (1980), Harlow: the story of a new town, Harlow publication, London. Golany, G. (1976), New Town planning: principles and practices, John Wiley & sons, Inc. Habibi, S., Ahari, Z., (2012). The Language of urban design in historic cities, Isfahan School, Culture and Architecture Center, Tehran. Habibi, M. (2005). New Towns Identity, New Ton development institute, Tehran. Jackson, J.B., (1984). Discovering the Vernacular Landscape, Yale university Press. Journal of Housing Economics, (2011). Ministry of Housing and Urbanism, No 47-48. Tehran. Karimi, K. (1997). The spatial logic of organic cities in Iran and in the United Kingdom in Proc. 1st International Space Syntax Symposium, M. Major, L. Amorim, F. Dufaux (eds), University College London, London, 1, 05.1-05.17. Löw, M., (2001). Sociology of space, Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt. Madanipour, A. (1990). A study of urban form, PHD dissertation, Newcastle University. Faculty of Humanities and Science, School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape. Mitchell, W., (2002). Landscape and power, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Shannon, K., (2004). Rheorics and realities. Addressing Landscape Urbanism, Three cities in Vietnam. Doctorate desertation. Waldheim, C. (2002). Landscape urbanism reader, Princeton Architectural Press, New York. Ziari, K. GHARAKHLOU, M., (2009). A study of Iranian New Towns during preand post revolution, International Journal of Environment Research, 3(1), 143-154. Azadeh Badiee. Qualified as an architect at the department of Architecture and Urban Planning, Art University of Tehran, Iran and holds an advanced master of Urbanism and Strategic Planning from KU Leuven, where she is currently a PhD student. 67 BRITISH NEW TOWNS THROUGH COMPARED EXAMPLES Three examples: Harlow, Thamesmead and Milton Keynes. Carmen Blasco Sánchez, Francisco Martínez Pérez, Julia Deltoro Soto Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura, Universitat Politècnica de València, Valencia, Spain Abstract Great Britain has always been a pioneer in the field of urban planning during key stages in its history, the Garden City (in the early twentieth century) and the New Towns (once the WW2 was finished) are two models that have been decisive in our urban culture, besides having been used with a great profusion internationally. The influence that throughout the twentieth century the development of the Modern Movement had, is another determining factor of the course of the mentioned models and their commitment with these new resources in the architectural and urban settings. The experiences of Harlow, Milton Keynes and Thamesmead shed light on these and other topics of interest for future developments. By deepening into aspects as their instrumental and compositional definition, their own urban development and programmatic aims, the shapes of each settlement and its relationship with the territory, their urban structure, their compositional units, the paper and settings of the civic centres, their architectural typologies and the landscape treatments, allows us to make a compared diagnosis of these experiences and of some data which demonstrates the compliance of their aims and how they have evolved, their current situation and their future expectations. It is about making a current reading of them in terms of the greater or lesser implications of their ideologies and their possible influence on the challenges that the urban planning and design is facing nowadays. The New Towns are an alternative to the sprawl of large cities and avoid a dispersed growth on the territory, a problem still to be resolved and inherited from the last decades in Europe. The recommendations for a sustainable development advocates not to occupy the greenfield, but also defends the compact city in a precise location with a certain territorial autonomy. Keywords: new towns, urban design, planning, Britain, urban morphology 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 68 1. Topicality of the new towns The new towns have been revised in the United Kingdom as a base for the development of the Growth Areas. The latest publications on the subject such as the study Transferable Lessons from the New Towns of the Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University (2006), specific conferences as the New New Town held in London in February 2008 or this International Conference emphasize the importance of its revision from the current perspective. The focus of this paper1 is made from a particular aspect, the urban practice. Congestion and informal growth of the city, with other nuances, remain as problems of the 21st century as they were in the period from the 50ies to the 70ies2 The new towns have more common denominators in their framing than in their physical materialization, in part, by considering the geography and landscape as elements of identity and prevalence over planning and by assuming them as project resources. They tested new urban morphologies incorporating the alternatives offered by the architecture and urbanism of the time to resolve the inherited conflicts. . The vision that sustainability gives us now overlaps with the concerns at that time which were looking for a new environmental balance and respect for the pre-existing conditions that impacted positively, not only on the quality of life of citizens but also in the world quality. Having minor commitments in terms of the prevalence of consolidated urban morphologies on which to grow, allowed them to respond more freely to: the greater rationalization of mobility and transport systems, the priority of public spaces, the equitable and egalitarian distribution of services and facilities, the concern to establish healthier environments, to live in better equipped and 1 Libraries and institutions consulted for this work have been among others, the library of the Polytechnic University of Valencia, the RIBA Library in London (Royal Institute of British Architects), the library of the City Discovery Centre of Milton Keynes, the Central Library of Milton Keynes, several publications of English Partnerships, the national archive of the BFI Southbank library, where many explanatory and advertising videos of the time can be found, and the library of the TCPA (Town and Country Planning Association). 2 Lewis Mumford, (1961), alerts us about the disfigurement and degradation process that occurs in the urban and rural landscape not being able to find the way to restore the ecological balance that originally prevailed between the city and the territory. Carmen Blasco Sánchez, Francisco Martínez Pérez, Julia Deltoro Soto, British New Towns through compared examples. 69 modern dwellings as well as providing more democratic participation and job opportunities. Today, urban problems have worsened and the greater instability of our territories caused by the indiscriminate urbanization calls for measures, solutions using our best resources. Strategies are needed for a balanced regional planning, consideration of ecological and heritage value of our landscapes, ensuring access to information and equal opportunity for all citizens, sustainable mobility, higher levels of public participation, etc. Resources that can not ignore the relationship between historical processes and spatial, deliberate and delimeted forms (Perla Zusman, 2008). In the Greek culture only the limited, with a known beginning and end had a form, and nothing else but that which was shaped could be considered good (Rubert de Ventos, 1998). The diffuse city would be the counterpoint to this principle and the new towns their best correlate. This is not defending an immutable and frozen image of the urban, but an evolution in patterns of relationship in the formal definition that qualifies it as an urban addition. All urban characteristics of the new towns can serve as a prior baggage to think and plan forms of urban development. In addition to the political efforts that allowed the planning process to start up, the legal provisions which revalidated it and the work brought by the public institutions, its own physiognomy or the way it got materialised can enlighten us about their major or minor achievements as a key of practical understanding. 2. Harlow, Thamesmead and Milton Keynes The morphological characteristics of the different generations of new towns3 3 Several authors classify the new towns in three generations, others distinguish only two. The classification chosen is based on: Mark I-first generation, Mark II and Mark III, second generation. The new towns of the first generation or Mark I as Harlow, had a population between 20,000 and 60,000 inhabitants. The second generation had a maximum population of 250,000 inhabitants and were designated since 1960. This second generation is divided into Mark II and Mark III. Mark II (Thamesmead) has a population between 70,000 and 100,000 inhabitants. The new towns of the Mark III (Milton Keynes) meet the requirements marked in the study of South East England, 1964. in this paper are exemplified in three of them, each representative of one of the 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 76 which acted as a screen to protect those areas from the Thames winds and the traffic noise. Phases I and II adopted a clear composition by closely linking the various parts together. A green north-south axis articulated all the elements of the composition from Lesnes Abbey to the lake, two perpendicular axes to it sorted out the rest of the project with the alignment of their towers and the rhythms created between open spaces and buildings. Everything is organized by repetitions, series and modules, setting precise three-dimensional relationships between geometries and full and void spaces, all of them characteristics of modernity. Figure 3. Thamesmead Phase I. Lake view from one of the elevated footpaths. The three neighbourhood units with its associated schools. Diagram analysing the compositional axes and units, created by repeated modules which together give order and form the project. Source: Photograph and diagrams, the authors. Landscape development Being a project that concentrates its density it leaves large areas without buildings which are designated for parks and outdoor spaces, some of them with natural vegetation. The river front sets a major façade, and together with the artificial lakes strategically located on the edge of the area, allow for a recreational use of them and enhance the landscape. These lakes, interconnected by canals, solve the drainage of surface water, retaining it and giving a solution to the environmental aspects of the project. Carmen Blasco Sánchez, Francisco Martínez Pérez, Julia Deltoro Soto, British New Towns through compared examples. 77 MILTON KEYNES Location The new town is situated equidistant between London and Birmingham, and between Oxford and Cambridge, occupying 8,900 hectares. The A5 crossed diagonally the area and together with the railway and the Grand Union Canal were the main transport infrastructures. The existing towns9 Characterization were integrated in its structure keeping their own identity. The valleys of Loughton Brook and Ouze were also part of the designated area. The area had a plain on the north and it rose its altitude to the west and between the valleys. Its design was conceived as a very flexible strategic framework to meet the future needs. It assumed low densities in a green environment with a maximum of three floors, except for the buildings in the civic centre which reached up to six floors. It incorporates industrial land that is distributed in a segmented way throughout the city, either occupying one of the super blocks or sharing it with housing. It also includes other uses of a regional scope. The sub-centres of activity are shared between adjoining neighbourhood units. Road system The use of the vehicle determined the master plan approach with a road grid of 1km by 1km axes which was adapted to the territory in a respectful way allowing to incorporate residential areas of similar sizes. The proposed grid incorporates one or two accesses to each of the superblocks connecting them to the roads that provide access to housing and local centres. A continuous system of bicycle paths and pedestrian areas completes the network. 9 Bletchley, Stoney Stratford, Wolverton and New Bradwell, and thirteen smaller towns or villages that had a total population of about 40,000 inhabitants. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 78 Compositional structure The neighbourhood units10 were designed independently by different architects so a wide variety of types and composition structures were created. From units with compositions made of series, axes and repetitions which ordered all its parts to the typical Garden City clusters. However, they all share some principles set in the master plan: similar areas for green spaces11, accesses to them from the main road or common facilities12 . Figure 4. Fullers Slade neighbourhood unit. View from the north-south axis. Land use. Diagram of the units and axes used in the composition. Source: Photograph and diagrams, the authors. Landscape development The quality and quantity of the green spaces in Milton Keynes is one of its main achievements. About 1,800 hectares of green space and 600 hectares of parks are distributed around the city. The green and the buildings are considered as complementary elements. The landscape incorporates a wide variety of elements and its green areas constitute a continuous urban, agricultural and forest system that transcends 10 The size of the neighbourhood units was based on previous experiences, 560x560m superblocks of Brasilia, or the residential sector of Chandigarh of 800x1200m. 11 In each of the quadrants of about 100 hectares, one to two hectares are occupied by local parks and one of them is located near the facilities. 12 Some of the relevant examples are Netherfield, Coffee Hall and Fullers Slade. Carmen Blasco Sánchez, Francisco Martínez Pérez, Julia Deltoro Soto, British New Towns through compared examples. 79 beyond the city limits13 . The lakes and ponds, interconnected by canals were integrated in the proposal as part of the solution to control the waters and as recreational areas. The vegetation next to the road grid system not only serves to protect and as a transition element between uses, it also plays a prominent environmental and landscape role. Figure 5. Comparative analysis of different aspects of the selected new towns. Source: the authors. 3. Conclusions Territorial and local planning scales The new towns tried to promote the rational distribution of population flows and activities to implement new territorial equilibriums to avoid the characteristic dysfunctions of large agglomerations. The current guidelines of sustainability claim the development of a balanced and polycentric system of cities. The territory may be the support of concentrated 13 Three types of parks can be distinguished according to their area of influence: the city and the region ones, the areas that serve a district and the low density areas. At a smaller scale, there are the local open spaces in the residential areas, where playgrounds for children are located. All of them are connected together and with the territorial parks. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 80 urban units of a controlled size and hierarchical within a regional system, but not a continuum of urbanized fragments14 It is the underlying problem since the late twentieth century. Resources for mobility which provide a comprehensive network of services and transport infrastructure, and the ubiquitous forms of communication and information allow the random choice of places for all uses, assuming that the territory is a large isotropic and malleable area. . Town and country relationships The new towns were cities linked to a territory and often participated in the rural world to the extent in which they recognized the existing heritage values15 It is curious how the new towns, heirs of the Garden City movement which promoted the move from the traditional city to the countryside, are a reflection of a much stronger idea of the urban than the postmodern urban rhetoric of the disseminated areas. Today, this phenomenon threatens the gradual isolation of rural life and the disregard of the cultural and natural values of the area with which it is identified and the environmental qualities. 16 Urbs & Civitas . The new towns intended to cover the basic needs of citizens under their capacity of being both a resident, a consumer of spaces, and a citizen, a member of a self-organizing participatory democracies17 14 For years, the urban dispersion policy has been translated into pure consumption of images and the city generated as a result is nothing but the assembly of thousands of different individual responses who face problems difficult to evaluate from a generalist perspective. . The inseparable relationship 15 Their treatment and planning is liable to also to the principles of Howard, which refers twice to the rurality or to the incorporation of the qualities that the countryside could offer the city. 16 Among the Guiding Principles for Sustainable Spatial Development of the European Continent (CEMAT, 2000) should be emphasized the one of "improving rural-urban relations", to try to prevent progressive division of the relations traditionally held by that pairing and that guaranteed a mutual reinforcement of the qualities of the other and certain balance in the development of the territory. 17 L. Mumford support initiatives of the new towns and the community legacy of the principles of the Garden City as it understands that participation in the life of the city is the real heart of the existence of the city. Carmen Blasco Sánchez, Francisco Martínez Pérez, Julia Deltoro Soto, British New Towns through compared examples. 81 between the two terms, physical and social, allows to defend certain compromises in the shaping of their projects which tilted the form and the functional and citizen coordination of their districts and neighbourhood units. Today, it is all about doing or remaking the city so as to facilitate cohesion and social relationships but also its readability and functionality. The desolation and neutrality that prevails in globalized landscapes is hiding the territorial identities and the history of their social organizations, reaching a point where we can see how the urbanization process is distorted and becomes a mere mechanism of graphic design18 Nature and city . Therefore, an Urbs that does not add a sense of place under which a community may feel reflected, does not provide a participatory and collaborative Civitas in the defence of their environment. The three selected models maintain very close relationships between the created landscape and their territory. The valleys and the incorporation of green in the urban fabric of Harlow and Milton Keynes19 It is necessary to set out an urban planning that respects nature and preserves the natural structures that sustain the planet's biodiversity and the vital and cultural framework of our towns. For this reason, the new towns again serve us as a reference as they have respected and enhanced the previous territorial conditions, bonded the built and green areas and have treated the landscape as a factor of environmental balance and collective identity. , or the river, the lakes and green areas in Thamesmead. In all of them the artificialisation of the developed land was compensated with the incorporation of natural elements and green areas. The treatment of the landscape and the environmental work was a starting and important point in the master plans. 18 Because urban and architectural discourses are trivialized, or because the appropriate answers to some social programs and to the different conditions of each case are avoided. 19 Even in this case, the nature is perceived much more than the buildings that rise behind the green corridors running along the road. As the Green Paper of the urban environment points out, the occupation of greenfield is not a part of the current discourse of sustainability, but it is the conservation of structures of natural areas and the incorporation of a coherent system of green spaces. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 82 Density and mix of uses In the three examples we find different densities. Thamesmead presents denser groups of buildings and blocks than the others, in which terraced houses and clusters prevail. The Garden City and Modernity endorsed different densities and two ways of conceiving the required distances between buildings: one, to protect the privacy and continuity of landscape and another to restore the natural elevation of the land and to ensure an optimal and natural air acclimatization. As for the mix of uses, they incorporate areas of centrality hosting the spaces for the community and the productive zones in well connected locations. Sustainability demands the distribution of uses to be continuous and to pervade throughout the urban fabric. The inconvenience to housing because of its proximity to areas where the population gather for group activities should also be avoided. Density, concentration, compactness today are concepts that take us back to a partial image of modernity20 or the traditional city. We have historically suffered from an excessive accumulation of population, historic centres hardly ever have been an example of a healthy city. And that has resulted, in part in the mass exodus of the population to suburban areas. Today, sustainability is more determinative as to the mix of uses within the urban space21 Urban structures and public spaces and to densities rather than forms of action to ensure the compactness, something to be set against the spread of the dispersed, a city model which expresses itself unequivocally. In the three projects studied underlie a control of the shape and the distribution of uses faithful to the principles of the urban culture from which they evolve. Balanced and unitary layouts that maintain relations and recognizable hierarchies. The relationship systems between the structure elements: road, green, facilities, plots, buildings and open spaces ensured the overall readability of the project and the achievement of general interest of the objectives. Their 20 The works of Bruno Taut for the German Siedlungen serve us as a positive reference. 21 Currently and in many cases, industrial production is compatible when linked to innovation and technological development with other urban uses. Carmen Blasco Sánchez, Francisco Martínez Pérez, Julia Deltoro Soto, British New Towns through compared examples. 83 planning was materialized through the urban project and the landscape thus avoiding the disaggregation of the urban space and the aggression on the territory. Today, the opposite trend arises from an imprecise regulation and arbitrary spatial relationships that generate dysfunctions in the territory and a lack of coordination in the forms. Planning has not been able to provide a structure to a large part of the new forms of urban growth. The lack of clear references in its configuration has generated a disciplinary crisis before which only the sustainability appears as a framework from which to succeed. Its principles, ecology, public participation, conservation of nature, or more specifically the aforementioned urban compactness among others, shed light on new ways of thinking and to address the current problems but do not resolve how to project urban systems. References Alexander, A. (2009). Britain´s New Towns: Garden cities to Sustainable communities. Abingdon, Routledge. Deltoro, J. (2008). La experiencia urbanística de las New Towns Btritánicas. Tres ejemplos, Harlow, Thamesmead y Milton Keynes. Trabajo de investigación para la obtención del DEA. ETSA Valencia, España. Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University. Department for Communities and Local Government: London. July 2006. Transferable Lessons from the New Towns. Gabborit, P. (2010). European New Towns: Image, Identities, Future Perspectives. Brussels. Peter Lang. Gibberd, F. (1952). Harlow New Town: A plan prepared for the Harlow development corporation. Harlow Development Corporation. GLC. (1974). Thamesmead. Housing a balanced community. Libro verde del medio ambiente urbano. http://www.upv.es/contenidos/CAMUNISO/info/770431normalc.html 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 84 Milton Keynes Development Corporation. (1992) The Milton Keynes Planning Manual. Milton Keynes Development Corporation. (1970) The plan for Milton Keynes. Mumford, L. (1961). The City in History. Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc Principios Directores para el Desarrollo Territorial Sostenible del Continente Europeo (CEMAT, 2000) http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/cultureheritage/heritage/cemat/versionprincipes/Espagnol.pdf Rubert de Ventós, X. (1998). La urbanització contra la urbanitat? Ciutat real, ciutat ideal. Significat i funció a l'espai urbà modern. Barcelona: Centre de Cultura Contemporánea de Barcelona (Urbanitats; 7). Secchi, B. (2008). La città del ventesimo secolo, Editori Laterza, Bari. Zusman, P. (2008). Perspectiva crítica del paisaje en la cultura contemporánea. En El paisaje en la cultura contemporánea, Nogué, J. (ed.) (pp. 275-296), Biblioteca Nueva, Madrid. Carmen Blasco Sánchez. Architect. PhD in Architecture – ETSA València, Spain1989.Professor at the ETSA of several urban and landscape related subjects both in the Architecture School and in Masters of the UPV. Editorial secretary of the magazine Historia Urbana (1990-97). Research: Participation in four research projects with public funds. Participation in several research contracts with companies and administrations. Publications: Author of several books, book chapters and articles focused in the urban projects and planning, history, landscape and the configuration of the shape of the city. Francisco Martínez Pérez. Architect. PhD in Architecture - ETSA València, Spain 2004. Professor at the ETSA of several urban and landscape related subjects both in the Architecture School and in Masters of the UPV. Research: Participation in four research projects with public funds. Participation in several research contracts with companies and administrations. Coordinator of the working group Universitary Urbanism and Sustainability of the CADEP, permanent commission of the CRUE Publications: Author of several books, book chapters and articles focused in the urban projects and planning, landscape and the configuration of the shape of the city. Julia Deltoro Soto. Architect - ETSA València, Spain 2005. PhD Candidate in Architecture. Research: Contributor in research projects. Research project to obtain the DEA (diploma of advanced studies) following the PhD studies (2008): La experiencia urbanística de las New Towns Británicas. Tres ejemplos, Harlow, Thamesmead y Milton Keynes. Publications: BLASCO, C., MARTÍNEZ, F.J., DELTORO, J. The urban validity of modern experiences. Proceedings of the 10th International Docomomo Conference. Ed. Dirk van den Heuvel. Delft, 2008. 85 TOWNS-VILLAGES-HAMLETS: NEW FOUNDATION CITY IN ITALY DURING THE FASCISM PERIOD Design Paradigms for a New Development Micaela Bordin Politecnico di Milano / Polytechnic of Milan, Dpt. Of Architecture, Built Environment and Construction Engineering (ABC), School of Civil Architecture, Milan, Italy. Abstract This paper aims to study the "foundation cities" of the fascist regime in Italy with the particular attention in the Pontine Plain, in the regions of Sardinia and Apulia. These new kind of city-villages appear united by ambitious proposals of land transformation and characterized by a peremptory and constant remodelling of the natural and agrarian landscape, promoting with their foundation a settlement compound of other towns, farms, farm houses, new villages, through a long-distance political coordination extended on the territory. To these city-villages a shared settlement role is recognized, due to a "design" that tends to narrow down in the "redeemed" plains a centre or a system of multiple centres, on which converges and from which branches or on which "is sustained" a network of streets, roads, canals. On the territory, all punctuated by the orthogonal grid lines of the canals, finds place the settlement and production unit, that is the farmhouse and the farm. To a defined number of farms correspond a village, to a number of villages, a city. The city, a privileged point of the territory, is intended to receive the most public functions without ever losing his contacts with the campaign, and represents the image and the urban reference for settlers scattered in the countryside. A total intervention therefore able to invest in a wide range of sizes, from the structure of the territory to the urban model for a new lifestyle, a new man. The "foundation city" so analyzed, intended as the representation and creation of a new reality, becomes an element of acceleration as part of a new development, capable of triggering new models, of creating new links with the production and of regaining a functional reorganization through the urbanization of the countryside. Keywords: Foundation City, New Town, Urbanization of the Countryside, Alternative market, New Development. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 92 the construction of new rural towns, villages and agro-cities, such as Segezia, Borgo Incoronata and Borgo la Serpe (fig. 4). Figure 3. Sardinia, Cortoghiana, view of the buildings on the square. Figure 4. Tavoliere delle Puglie, Borgo la Serpe (Mezzanone) view of the square with the Church. Micaela Bordin, Towns-villages-hamlets: new foundation city in Italy during the fascism period. 93 Figure 5. Tavoliere delle Puglie, Segezia, view of the square with the Church. The reclamation plan promised a significant reduction of unemployment in these areas through new forms of land interventions, such as construction of residential townships and service centres. According to this plan, the villages would have supplied large numbers of workers to the local farms. The Consortium's first attempt at colonisation was the village of La Serpe, near Mezzanone, on the Foggia-Trinitapoli road (D'Antone, 1990). Later, were implemented three other large land division areas, placed as a semi-crown around Foggia: Daunilia in the north; Incoronata to the south-east, with a rural township of Masseria Nuova; and Segezia to the south-west, with the villages of Stazione Cervaro and Stazione di Troia-Giardinetto. Segezia (fig. 5) was designed (1939-42) by Concezio Petrucci, using the form of a Greek cross, with a large rectangular square in the centre accommodating the official buildings (the City Hall, the church, government offices, etc.), and other buildings laid out on the orthogonal grid. In the part of the grand square and its buildings, this plan was only partially realised. The project of the Incoronata village was entrusted to Giorgio Calza Bini (1939). Its system, again, was structured around a central square on which stands, rather isolated, the Village Hall. In the late 1939, Dagoberto Ortensi finally designed the plan for Daunilia, whose centre 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 94 consisted of a system of open squares along the Foggia-Manfredonia connecting line, with the most representative buildings on each side. Of these planned settlements, only Segezia, Incoronata, Giardinetto di Troia and Cervaro have been eventually realised. Located in the strategic positions on the plain and designed with regard to the communication roads, the villages were supposed to become administrative, social and even religious centres of the entire territory. But despite the initial ambitions of the project, it was destined never to achieve the entire scope of the desired result, remaining a mere superficial interference and a land colonisation attempt, especially on the scale of the actual territorial dimensions of the Tavoliere Plains. In the end, these efforts turned out to be insufficient to resolve substantially the economic and social problems of the Capitanata. The cities, towns and villages covered here are but a few of those built throughout Italy in this historical period. They number, large and small, more than one hundred and fifty, scattered throughout the nation. Today, some of those “new settlements” have become large and busy local centres, almost unrecognisable. While others were destined to turn into desolate places, even ghost towns. Some have become towns and even cities, others remained as villages deep in the countryside. However, all of them share the common history of "new settlements " and "new foundations". These "new foundations" are united by the pronounced geometry of their layouts and shapes, that were supposed to reflect the hierarchical order that prevailed in the politics, economy and society of the time and thus was also translated into the contemporary urban models. These towns were portrayals of the regional strategy that has created them and represent the "recultivated" and "redeemed" lands that house them. These towns, villages were the urban images and points of reference for the new settlements scattered in the countryside. In this area "built-up" and cultivated by man, an "artificial" homeland where people have ‘constructed their fileds just as they did their towns’ (Cattaneo, 1846-47, p. 267)6 6 These considerations are borrowed from the text by C. Cattaneo. In this case, Cattaneo refers to the territories of Milan, Pavia and Lodi. , we see the architecture that in its traditional and monumental character queries the reasoning of territorial dimensions. Micaela Bordin, Towns-villages-hamlets: new foundation city in Italy during the fascism period. 95 Each of these towns-boroughs had a recognised and shared role in the settlement project, based on the plan to "harness" the recultivated plains by creating a centre or a system of centres in which converges, from which branches out and on which relies a network of streets, roads and canals. From the beautiful Sabaudia to the smallest Segezia, these town-boroughs became the protagonists of further, more general regional planning, by their very existence promoting the foundation of a series of other settlements, farms, farm houses and villages ordered by the "remote-control" political coordination extending over the territory. This was a comprehensive intervention, able to affect a wide range of sizes and scopes, from a territorial structure to an urban model, for a new lifestyle and for a new man. These cities relied on the model of a medieval town. From medieval squares they took the formal reference points of the bell tower, the church, the town hall, but not only that. From medieval towns they took the territorial dimension of architecture, the spatial dimension that in the political and institutional context of medieval society was conceived as a distinctive element of power and endowed architecture with extraordinary significant power. The events and situations in the three geographical areas: the Pontine Marshes and the Plains of Puglia and Sardinia, briefly analysed here, despite their inevitable differences share in common an attempt to consider the territory as a resource for further development. The efforts to reclaim the lands and to repopulate the plains that mark these various Italian experiences are based on the rejection of the concept of metropolis, ‘with its weight of physical and moral evils brought about by lack of space, air, sun, with its general misery imposed by the imbalance of values, with its false economy, illogical and unnatural’, as Piccinato wrote in 1934, in "Urbanistica" (Urban Planning) (Piccinato, 1934, p. 3). Instead, they were guided by a desire to ‘overturn the way cities function, doing so by means of urban decentralisation that interprets the use of techniques and models able to balance the urban reality, and to erase the city /country relationship’ (Cefaly, 1984, p. 18). Now, perhaps, the case studies analysed here may help us outline a way of development and urbanisation that is alternative to what we see today; to imagine a different relationship between the city and the country. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 96 Today, the prevailing trend is a progressive devastation of land through urban development: in the centre are the cities on the Italian plains, along with their undefined surroundings of widespread urbanisation and relocated production, the surrounding landscape constantly subjected to the uncontrolled waves of new construction, construction for the sake of construction, exclusively profitand rent-driven. Whereas in the outskirts, in the hilly or mountainous areas, we see little but gradual abandonment of settlements and their inevitable decay and collapse. The new towns continue to grow at the expense of productive agricultural areas, while in the times past the criteria for the choice of construction lands depended on quite different reasoning: protection, water supply, health, and so on. And even the mountain areas used to be put to use, as far as the inherent limitations of these territories permitted7 We must promote an alternative way of development (Canesi, 2012), launching on our territory a radical reversal of the viral settling of today, forming dedicated metropolitan areas, where the inhabitants of each territory, be it the plains, the hills or the mountains, can have a usable city, or may rely on rewarding work activities, adequate services and attractive leisure opportunities, with movements and activities of the urban type (max. 60 minutes long). . We believe that in the current situation of economic crisis the government could promote a new measure of "integral reclamation", that we see as complete control of the humanised landscape, ensuring safety of the territory and recovering the habitations that are abandoned or subject to seismic risks, while also implementing large-scale infrastructural, profitability and accessibility projects. However, as is well known, these interventions (hydro-geological reorganisation, recovery of uncultivated land – mostly hills and mountains – management of seismic risk, major infrastructure projects, etc.) by their nature require considerable investments and, in addition, do not carry any concomitant profit, apart from for a brief list of sectors, and at that only in the long term. That's why we consider it necessary to create an alternative market that will be 7 Every year, Italy looses 500 km2 of natural, rural or agricultural land in favour of new buildings, new infrastructure and similar. The data of the last ISTAT census on agriculture show that in ten years we have lost 300 thousand hectares of usable agricultural land. Micaela Bordin, Towns-villages-hamlets: new foundation city in Italy during the fascism period. 97 able to provide financing for projects design and realisation, in part through a more productive use of the unproductive social spending, partially with a deferred compensation for work (social securities) and with private capital (lowcost banks loans, European funds, etc.), and in part from the tax payments auto-generated by these very new projects. This is essential to secure the areas at risk and to facilitate the economic and social recovery. A similar funding mechanism also would have an immediate and effective on mass unemployment that the global recession has thrust upon us, while also giving the essential momentum to a qualified revitalisation of productive structure. The government could promote alternative market, starting from some pilot areas. It is important that this work is carried out on the basis of comprehensive projects that consider the safety measures and the environmental issues in close relation with the structural aspects, income and affordability, in the light of the growing imbalance (conflict) between the cities and the countryside, the industry and the agriculture, the Italian plains and its mountains. References Canesi, M. (2012), Le macchine utensili e il made in Italy, Milano: Franco Angeli Cattaneo, C. (1846-47), Industria e morale, in Alcuni scritti, 3 voll., Milano: Borroni e Scotti. Cefaly, P. (1984), Littoria 1932-1942. Gli architetti e la città, Roma: Clear D’Antone, L. (1990), Scienze e governo del territorio. Medici, ingegneri, agronomi e urbanisti nel Tavoliere di Puglia, Milano: Franco Angeli. Febvre, L. (1922, 1980), La terre et l’evolution humaine, Torino: Einaudi Piccinato, L. (1934), Il significato urbanistico di Sabaudia, in «Urbanistica», n.1, gennaio-febbraio 1934. Serpeiri, A. (1973), La bonifica integrale, Padova: CEDAM 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 98 Micaela Bordin got a degree in architecture at the Polytechnic of Milan-School of Civic Architecture (2003) and received her PhD in Architectural Composition (2009) at the same university. She has focused her scientific interest on the analysis of the historical development of settlements, of the land resources, of the evaluation of the transformation demand and of the safety status of the territory, hypothesizing new reliable and desirable scenarios. Since 2010 she has been teaching Economics influence and city planning, Regional planning and Laboratory of Architectural Design at the Polytechnic of Milan-Campus Bovisa and Campus Lecco. 99 THE PIAZZA AS THE CORE OF THE ITALIAN RURAL SETTLEMENTS IN COLONIAL LIBYA: A THEATRE FOR FASCIST POWER, THE OBVIOUS ANSWER TO LOCAL TOWN PLANNING REQUIREMENTS, OR JUST A PLACE TO MEET? Vittoria Capresi German University in Cairo – GUC, Cairo, Egypt Abstract The paper aims at analysing the newly-founded Italian settlements in colonial Libya, proposing a critical interpretation of their urban planning and the related architectural solutions adopted. First, the settlements will be considered as the basic element for the physical organisation of the territory, and secondly, as places for the social identification of the Italian rural community newly settled in the colony. The role of the piazza, the central space of every new settlement, will be studied: was it really the theatre where Fascism staged its power, as the material expression of the political control over the territory? Through oral history methods, the first collected narratives will be related to the architecture and town planning of the settlement, to point out the multi-layered functions of the square. Keywords: Fascist architecture, colonialism, Libya, rural settlements. Why did the piazza, that particularly defined urban space, serve as the main planning device in the newly-founded Italian colonial settlements in Libya? What was its practical and symbolic function? And what about the settlers: were they influenced by the architectural propaganda? Was the square really used by the inhabitants in the way the fascist regime planned it? Scholarly research focussing on the architecture in the Italian colonies, in particular Libya, have predominantly dealt with questions related to the dependence or independence of colonial architecture from the contemporary theoretical debate about modernity and its relation to fascism in Italy (Fuller, 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 100 McLaren). In other publications, the built projects in the colonies are presented in form of a catalogue, important as reference work because of the large amount of new data presented, but often not offering further analysis (Gresleri, Massaretti). My own research on the new rural settlements in Libya started with my doctoral research in 2004. For the first time, through archival research and field survey, the projects as-built were compared with the designs on paper. The studies allowed to identify differences in the execution, as adaptation to the conditions on the ground, and added information on the forms of the settlements and style of the architecture of what really exists. Still, even after fieldand archival research has been done, very little is known about how the new settlements were really working at that time1 The essay proposes some of the results achieved by the analysis of the town planning and architecture of the newly-founded settlements and aims at exploring the methods adopted by the Italian Government in the Libyan colony for the mass colonisation of the territory. The role of the piazza, considered the core element of colonial urban design, will be investigated in detail, pointing out its urban and metaphorical role. This research also attempts to look behind the propaganda, questioning for the first time the image that fascism translated into the towns in Libya. By using oral history methods with the original inhabitants of the new settlements, I will explore, compare, and analyse the actual urban relations, daily use of space and domestic routines in the settlements during fascist rule. The memories and narratives of the settlers will be commented on and re-connected to the architecture in order to investigate the relationships between the architecture and its users. The aim is to shed new light on the function of the piazza, the core of every rural settlement, first in discussing its role as the theatre of fascist propaganda, then looking beyond the image the regime was imposing, making an attempt to explain the actual use people made . Nothing is known about how the inhabitants responded to the created spaces and how they made use of them. 1 A major problem is the access to the Libyan archives, and often research – including mine – is based mainly on the Italian perspective, omitting the Libyan counterpart. The works of Francesca Di Pasquale and Francois Dumasy with their extensive use of Libyan sources are exceptions, but do not deal with the town planning and architecture of the rural settlements. Vittoria Capresi, The piazza as the core of the Italian rural settlements in colonial Libya: a theatre for fascist power, the obvious answer to local town planning requirements, or just a place to meet? 101 of this space2 Italian colonial urban interventions in Libya can be divided in three groups. First are the urban developments of the already existing capitals, Tripoli and Benghazi, where Italian city planning mainly focused on the reorganisation of the existing city for their new administrative role and in anticipation of urban growth. Second are the extensions planned for minor cities, such as Derna and Homs, which despite being less important on a political level remained fundamental for the colonial regime as a means of showcasing its power. The third group of interventions comprises the newly-founded rural settlements built along the coasts of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica, unique not only in the scale and dimensions of the urban works, but especially because of their purpose. . These rural settlements were built ex novo in Tripolitania and Cyrenaica starting from 1934 to receive rural Italian families transferred from Italy for the agrarian colonisation of the land3. They offer extraordinary insight into the urban solutions adopted by the Italian Government in Libya, and accordingly a better understanding of the fascist idea of colonisation. In the timeframe of 6 years (and if we leave out the first 4 attempts in 1934, the bigger part of the settlements was built only in two years between 1938 and 1939), 28 new settlements were planned and built, with completely different forms, but with the same purpose. The engineers and architects involved were asked to design the settlements on land considered empty,4 2 My research into the oral history of the Italian settlements is still in a very early stage. I will present here the very first few preliminary ideas of this newly started research, which undoubtedly require further development and in depth examination. with the resultant absence of design constraints engendering a complete creative freedom – one of the most original elements of the Libyan interventions. A critical study of the urban forms and architectural leitmotivs can offer many clues to better understand the main devices used by the fascist regime to create a familiar setting for the Italian settlers, and on the other hand, to occupy, administrate and transform the space. 3 The first settlement built in Libya was Tigrinna, Tripolitania, in 1931. See the following paragraph in the text. 4 The pastoral use of the land, as well as any other temporal use by the local population, was completely ignored by the Italians. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 108 enclosed it hosted the necessary functions for the settlers, such as the church, the municipal building for civic functions, the market, the shop, and the offices of the ECL or INFPS to advise on matters of cultivation. But the square was more than just a crossing point between functional buildings; looking at its symbolic function, it was a place to gather as a community, to feel to be part of a town, reinforcing the feeling of belonging. With the emptiness of the square, the architects envisioned it as a space for the common activities of the settlers, giving them a new identity in the new unknown land. It is for this reason that the church, rather than the Casa del Fascio, took on the dominant position in the square; the settlers needed to be reassured and to feel protected by the building that most represented their cultural and deep religious identity. At the same time, however, as the square was the only major gathering place in town, it was also the place where the regime could address the mass of settlers and display its power. The tower, symbols, and balcony of the Casa del Fascio were thus situated overlooking the space and psychologically engaging with the settlers. Figure 2. The church of Gioda, Tripolitania. Umberto di Segni was the architect of the settlement, built for the first mass migration in 1938. Picture by the author, 2009. Vittoria Capresi, The piazza as the core of the Italian rural settlements in colonial Libya: a theatre for fascist power, the obvious answer to local town planning requirements, or just a place to meet? 109 But how present was fascism in the square, besides the architecture? The pictures published by the magazines and press of that time largely show the squares as empty spaces, likely having been taken before the arrival of the settlers. Still, this emptiness, the portrayed “pure” architecture, was able to powerfully publicise what the regime had done. In the pictures of that time, the piazza became a sort of symbol of the ability, efficiency, and “modernity” of fascism, advertising in the motherland and abroad the success of the colonisation in Libya. Beyond the physical appearance of the squares’ architecture and the associated ideological discourse promoted by the regime, I would like to introduce here the very first steps of a research based on interviews, to explore the daily use by the inhabitants and their response to the architecture and urban planning. This testattempt investigates, behind the propaganda images and architectural appearances, how the built spaces, and in particular the square, were used by the people at that time. These accounts provided in oral history interviews are undoubtedly subjective, partial, partly nostalgic, partly traumatic, and in some cases informed by political orientations and echoes of political propaganda associated with the settlements. However, they offer an invaluable opportunity to provide crucial counter-narratives to the official discourse to enrich and complicate our understanding of these settlements. The first sample of interviewees spent their childhood in the settlements of Tigrinna, Giordani and Bianchi (Tripolitania)21 21 It is necessary here to remember that the settlements for the mass migration were built in 1938 and 1939 and the families were transferred in 1938 and 1939, spending maximum one and half year in the settlements before the beginning of the War and the end of fascism. This is a very short time, also because at the beginning of their Libyan life, the families had to mainly focus on the agrarian exploitation of the land. Nevertheless, the data can show a general tendency in the relation between everyday life and politics. . Tigrinna was established in 1931 by the Azienda Tabacchi Italiani (Italian Tobacco Company) and included 500 families, each on a plot of 2 hectares, mainly dedicated to the cultivation of tobacco, regularly bought by the company. In the square there was a church, a school, the office of the company, a clinic and houses for the teachers. The main idea of the colonisation and the town’s overall design were very similar to the 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 110 mass colonisation in 1938 and 1939, with the most notable difference being the exclusively tobacco based farming and the dimensions of the land-plot, only 2 hectares, compared with an average of 25 hectares of the plots assigned in the colonisation of 1934 and 1938-3922 Giordani was a borgo, in which the municipal building and Casa del Fascio were missing, for which settlers referred to Bianchi, the biggest settlement in Tripolitania. . In the memories of the interviewees, the square was not the place for political meetings. In Tigrinna and Giordani, the Sabato Fascista, or fascist Saturday, was the only institutionalised political moment in the week, during which men were required to dress the black shirts and attend military training. Before and after this (in Tigrinna) came a slot of time when settlers were invited to present complaints to the head of the Casa del Fascio. The complaints mainly regarded the obligatory physical and military exercises, which many felt were excessive after a week spent in the fields. Usually the training happened in the athletic field (as was the case in Tigrinna) or in the streets; not necessarily in the square. None of the interviewees could remember any gathering for the visit of any high-ranking political guest. By lunchtime, everybody was back at home. In Tigrinna, likely due to the higher concentration of settlers on a smaller district and the consequent shorter distances, after lunch men could spend some time at the bar playing cards and drinking wine. Sundays were a different matter. At 11am, the entire settlement attended Catholic Mass in the church (Tigrinna, Giordani, Bianchi). The time before and directly after Mass was used to walk in the square and talk with the other families. In Giordani there were two bars (Locanda Fiesoli and the Ragno d´Oro) with outdoor space. Here people would sit for a coffee or a water ice before going back home for lunch. In Tigrinna the bar was not on the main square, so 22 One of the settlers in Tigrinna reported: “We had a house, which was on a plot of 2 hectares: but in 2 hectares there was the house, the stall, the plants and it was even impossible to keep animals. Animals eat, it was necessary [to have] more space, and there was no space: we needed the land to cultivate the tobacco. And the more we grew, and got married, we had to stay all in one house. There were no houses to rent like today; where could we go?” See also: Capresi 2009, pp.140-145; Schmieder-Wilhelmy, Die fascistische Kolonisation in Nordafrica, Quelle&Meyer, Leipzig 1939, pp.177-179. Vittoria Capresi, The piazza as the core of the Italian rural settlements in colonial Libya: a theatre for fascist power, the obvious answer to local town planning requirements, or just a place to meet? 111 that it did not offer a place to stay on Sunday morning. Because of its position on the street in the direction of the seat of the Tobacco Company, the bar offered an unplanned stopover on the way home during the week. One common thread independently cited among those interviewed, however, was a general shortage of free time to dedicate to such meetings and chats. If the square was the setting for the informal gathering, the bars were the formal meeting area – to play cards, to listen to the radio, and to converse. Figure 3. Sunday after the Mass in the settlement Gioda, Tripolitania. Libia, October 1939, p.1. There is no mention of gender segregation regarding the activities at the bar on Sunday morning, but pictures of the time would suggest the contrary. Tigrinna’s bar had a special role during the Second World War. It hosted the only available radio in town, but all of its stations were blocked. After secretly 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 112 connecting with Radio Londra (the BBC special programme in Italian), settlers would gather in the bar to listen to the coded-messages. Concerning other propaganda actions, such as the projection of films or documentaries, information remains unclear and sparse. In Bianchi and Garian (close to Tigrinna), there was a cinema, which played a new film each week, always opened by a LUCE newscast23 The square was also the setting for a range of religious festivities. Patron saint days were celebrated, with a parade for the saint (Tigrinna), or the celebration of all baptisms and confirmations (Giordani and Bianchi). The interviewees made no mention of bigger holidays with music, but spoke instead of smaller parties at home by those who owned a gramophone. During the year there were two further occasions for celebration: the wine festival and the threshing festival. On the occasion of the wine festival, chariots and carts were decorated and driven around the settlement. Apparently, there was a competition for the most beautifully decorated cart, but this information is unconfirmed. The threshing festival, on the other hand, was a more private affair: after threshing with a machine the plot of one family, all the people involved would have lunch or dinner together at that place. . There is no mention of public projections in the square (this happened only afterwards during the British occupation). During the Second World War, however, the situation was completely different. All children under 14 were forcibly transferred to Italy, leaving only women, infants, and the elderly in the settlements. As explained by a former inhabitant of Giordani, there was no need and no time for propaganda. In general, what emerges from these first collected narratives is that people only visited the core of the settlements during the week if they had urgent needs (purchases at the shop, finalising of documents), as distances were generally too great for frequent visits. Otherwise, the actual use of the square was limited to casual meetings around the time of the religious functions or festivities. The balconies of the Casa del Fascio were not really used for what they were 23 L´Unione Cinematografica Educativa – LUCE was established in 1924 to show films with didactic purposes. It soon became the main instrument of propaganda for the regime. Vittoria Capresi, The piazza as the core of the Italian rural settlements in colonial Libya: a theatre for fascist power, the obvious answer to local town planning requirements, or just a place to meet? 113 planned, and the flag-hoisting was not conceived as a common ceremony. It seems, then, that the fascist elements on the façade of the buildings were speaking less to the settlers themselves and more to everybody else back in Italy and elsewhere, via the many pictures published in all Italian magazines and abroad to publicise the achievements of the fascist colonisation. References (only recent literature, historic references not included) For further readings, please refer to the bibliography in Gresleri, G., Massaretti, P.G., 2008. Capresi, V. (2009). The built Utopia. The Italian rural centres built in colonial Libya (1934-1940) / L’utopia costruita. I centri rurali di fondazione in Libia (1934-1940). Bologna: Bonomia University Press. Capresi, V. (2012). Architectural transfer, Italian Colonial architecture in Libya: ‘Libyan Rationalism’ and the concept of ‘Mediterraneity’”, 1926-1942. In Demissie, F. (Ed.), Colonial Architecture and Urbanism in Africa. Intertwined and Contested Histories (pp. 33-66). London: Ashgate. Culotta, P., Gresleri, Gi., Gresleri, Gl. (Ed.) (2007). Città di Fondazione e plantatio ecclesiae. Bologna: Compositori. Del Boca, A. (1986). Gli italiani in Libia (2 voll.):Tripoli bel suol d’amore, 1860-1922; Dal Fascismo a Gheddafi. Roma-Bari: Laterza. Fuller, M. (2006). Moderns Abroad: Architecture, Cities and Italian Imperialism. London: Routledge. Godoli, E. (Ed.) (2008). Proceedings of the first international conference “The Presence of Italian Architects in Mediterranean Countries”, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Alexandria, Novembre 2007. Firenze: M&M. Gresleri, G., Massaretti, PG, Zagnoni, S. (1993). Architettura Italiana d’oltremare 18701940, catalogue of the exibition. Venice: Marsilio. Gresleri, G., Massaretti, P.G. (2008). Architettura italiana d’oltremare. Atlante iconografico. Bologna: BUP. Labanca, N. (2002). Oltremare. Storia dell’espansione coloniale italiana. Bologna: il Mulino. Mc Laren, B. (2006). Architecture and Tourism in Italian Colonial Libya: An Ambivalent Modernism, Seattle: Univ. Of Washington Press. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 114 Nicoloso, P. (2008). Mussolini architetto. Propaganda e paesaggio urbano nell´Italia fascista. Torino: Piccola Biblioteca Einaudi. Prestopino, F. (Ed.) (1993).Uno dei Ventimila. Diario del colono Giacomo Cason (Libia, 1938-1959). Roma: Off. Grafica di G. Barghigiani ed. Segrè, C. (1978). L’Italia in Libia. Dall’età giolittiana a Gheddafi. Milano: Feltrinelli. [Original title: Segrè, C. (1974). Fourth Shore. The Italian Colonisation of Libya. Chicago: University of Chicago] Vittoria Capresi. Studied architecture in Florence and Berlin. From 2002 until 2011 she works at the Technical University of Vienna, department of History of Architecture and Building Archaeology, where she achieved her PhD with a research on the Italian settlements built in colonial Libya, published in Italian and English in 2009. In 2011 she moves to Egypt, as Associate Professor of History of Architecture at the German University in Cairo. As cofounder of baladilab in 2011, a spin-off project associated to the GUC, she currently works on projects with students to discover and activate the hidden potentials of Cairo and raise awareness for the architectural heritage of the city www.baladilab.com. 115 COLONIAL ARCHETYPE AND NATIONAL REBIRTH Railway stations and 20th century new cities in China Zhen Chen, Zhu Tan Politecnico di Milano/ Polytechnic of Milan, Milan, Italy Abstract Railway stations played a vital role in the creation and transition of 20thcentury new cities in China. The early railways development in China at the beginning of 20th century was promoted by foreign companies; it radically changed the pre-existing territorial hierarchy in the regions concerned, implying the construction of new planned cities, or the addition of new cities siding existing Chinese old cities. In both cases this kind of settlement had all the typical feathers of the company town, indeed railway company town. In this way the Russian CER (Chinese Eastern Railway) built the cities of Harbin and Dalian in the form of “ideal city” of that time, i.e. the garden city, and the Japanese SMR (South Manchuria Railway) added a completely new urban body, the so called “the business city”, to the old Manchuria capital of Shenyang. Later the urban archetype of the business city of Shenyang was also adopted in the new Manchukuo capital of Changchun, and in some others Manchurian cities like Fushu and Jiamusi. In 1920s the Nationalist Government made the Capital Plan of Nanjing, which could be considered as the Chinese version of the plan of Washington, D.C. (L'Enfant) and New Delhi (Lutyens). Indeed the plan reflected Chinese imperial planning and architecture. In this project the three Chinese style Pavilions of the railway station building were positioned at the end of the central axis, in the focal position of the new Administrative District of the capital. Later in Beijing, during the post colonialism period the communist regime introduced a new urban display in which the railway station, was playing the role of the “gate” of the new monumental axis celebrating with museums and governmental buildings China’s new identity. The sample of Chang’an Avenue with the new Beijing Central Station became an archetype replicated in many other provincial capital cities. This idea of integrated urban complex whose focus is the railway station is even used nowadays in some cities with their new stations for the high speed railway. The cases here listed and illustrated in the following paper show the metamorphosis and the continuity of an urban archetype of Chinese contemporary city with its roots in the colonial and post-colonial past. Keywords: Railway station in china; Colonial archetype; National rebirth; 20th century new cities in china 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 116 1. Railway Station and Colonial Archetype The German historian Jurgen Osterhammel in his book <Colonialism: A Theoretical Overview>discusses the different way in which colonialism expressed his power and influence in colonized territories. One of this is the “informal colonialism” of the railways companies through which the colonial power subjugated colonised countries without the use of military force. China offers in this sense a very rich sample, considering that until the foundation of Peoples Republic of China almost all the railway network (nearly 22.000 km.) was built and controlled by colonial powers: Great Britain, France, Belgium, Germany, Russia, Japan. Indeed these colonial powers “carved up” China and formed their own territory of influence inside China through the geography of railway network: for instance, Russia and Japan competed for the northeast (Manchuria), France penetrated in China in southwest via Vietnam, Germany controlled Shandong province, British occupied the Yangtze River basin, in order to further consolidate their colonial rule and transport of mineral resources (mainly coal), grain, cotton and other resources. The “treaty ports” of these areas were then connected each other by railways lines constructed through joint ventures among the major colonial powers. During the Self-Strengthening Movement the reformers of the weak Chinese Qing government advocated to learn advanced Western technology, and continued to propagandize the benefits of constructing railways. Although the conservative Court reluctantly agreed to their suggestions, due to the long war with the Western colonizers and Taiping Rebellion, the weak Qing government was unable to afford enough funds to develop their own railways. Thus, the reformers had to borrow capital from the Westerners, and repaid the loan by the income obtained from railway operating. Therefore, China’s early railway network was in fact financially controlled by the Western colonialists. The vast territory of northeast China was coveted by the close and aggressive neighbours Russia and Japan who quickly constructed new city or district as soon as they got the concessions: Russia obtained the concessions at the Zhen Chen, Zhu Tan, Colonial archetype and national rebirth 117 beginning of the XX century, while Japan military occupied the Russian concession after the Japanese-Russian war in 1905. Notwithstanding the different position both Russians and Japanese made massive investment in urban construction, attempting to maintain their occupation for long time. The two important new cities that Russia founded because of the strategic geopolitical position, Harbin and Dalian, took over the form of the ideal city of that time, i.e. the garden City. Japanese colonists in Shenyang, Changchun, Fushun, and Jiamusi, constructed the railway station out of the old Chinese city, and also adopted a common archetype, that is, by using the station as a bridgehead to lead the development of new urban district in opposite position to the Chinese city, thus forming a sort of second city and this forming a “double city”. Railway Station and Planned City: Russian Archetype Harbin, the emerging super star, one of the most important financial centres of north-east Asia at the first half of the 20th century, was just a ferry on the Sungari River near to some scattered villages by the end of the 19thcentury. In 1897 the Russian company CER (Chinese Eastern Railway) started to construct the railway in Harbin, as a junction of the Trans-Manchurian line (“Chita -Vladivostok” shortcut of Trans-Siberian Railway) and the South Manchurian Railway to connect the ice-free port cites of Dalian and Lushun in Bohai gulf. CER, as later the Japanese SMR, immediately played also the role of "a enterprise of city development" and became indeed the body that administrate the city. The new city of Harbin was divided by the railways into a series of geographically, functionally and "ethnically" distinct neighbourhoods: “Pristan”, the district between the river port and the central station was set up as railway factories, in front of which were residential area predominantly inhabited by Westerners, with dwelling houses and commercial building, characterized by 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 124 Figure 3. Nanjing Central stationa (Project, 1930) and the Central Administrative District in Capital Plan, with the Beijing west station (1996). (Source of painting of Nanjing station: Technical office of Capital plan(2006).Capital plan: 1929.Nanjing: Nanjing Publishing House.) 3.Railway Station and National Rebirth. The Beijing Celebration After the foundation of the People’s Republic of China, the new Communist government which claimed to be independent from foreign influences promoted the construction of the new central station of the Capital of People’s Republic. The area of the old railway hub made of two separate station facing each other on the two side of the Zhengyangmen (the South gate of the inner city wall) and directly connected with the area of the legation of the colonial powers was almost demolished to thoroughly eliminate the memory of the humiliating experiences occurred during the colonial times. Indeed the two stations of 1912 Beijing hub, built by the French and British companies, were set like a pair of pliers to hold the Zhengyangmen city gate and its barbican, as a symbol and metaphor of the control on Chinese feudal court by the foreign forces. Only one of the buildings of the old railway hub survived (the British station to Shanghai) and was converted in a market (later a railway museum) and the city walls were Zhen Chen, Zhu Tan, Colonial archetype and national rebirth 125 also destroyed. Thus the siege of “imperialism” and “feudalism” was removed. The former central station and the station square were enclosed in the great urban ensemble of Tiananmen Square, symbol of the rebirth of the nation. In the meantime, after some debate on how to build new administrative facilities, the government decided to create the new Chang’an Avenue as the west-east axis to break and dilute deliberately the imperial symbol of the ancient north-south axis. Along this avenue were built the most important state facilities: government palaces, conference halls, museum, cultural buildings and its official status has been reinforced many times by the parades of anniversary national day. The Avenue immediately became the political and cultural centre in Beijing, and strengthened the new urban image of the new regime. Figure 4. Beijing Central station (1959) and Chang’an Avenue. Taiyuan station (1975) and Yingze Avenue. (Source of facades of stations: Starndard department of the third railway survey and design institute. (1977). Tielu lükezhan jianzhu sheji = Architectural Design of Railway Passenger Station (ed.). Beijing: China Architecture & Building Press.) The new central station was linked to Chang’an avenue through a short but large perpendicular avenue, at its east end. The building was designed by the Chinese architects Yang Tingbao and Chen Dengao, and belongs to the Top 10 buildings 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 126 for the 10 years anniversary ceremony (1959) of the foundation of People’s Republic of China. The station consisted a central concourse with the facade formed by three large arched windows and porch, with two clock towers and two small towers in each wing. The project, as for some other buildings realized in 1950s, followed the influence of the soviet experience of the redesign of station like a national palace. This image of the station as “people’s palace” was to celebrate the people’s country, and display the new power of “People”. Soon Beijing station and Chang’an avenue became a sort of prototype, a model of “official socialistic architecture” and his layout as many his architectural motives and features were repeated in many other provincial capitals. In some cities like Taiyuan (Shanxi province) and Changsha (Hunan province), the reference to Beijing involves both the architectural as the planning archetype. In the case of these provincial capitals the replicas of the Beijing archetype the new urban axis and the Station give place to the “civic center” of the city. Getting out of station, passengers could immediately notice the most spectacular avenue of the city and the shape of the Station building, for its position and scale, accompanies them throughout all the journey on the axis. Such solution manifested the national rebirth by creating in every provincial capital an unified and impressive urban image based on a common archetype. 4. Conclusion The archetype of the Central station as a Gate to a monumental urban axis had been repeated again in 1996 in the well-known Beijing West station. Here the station building is a sort of high wall in red brick with an arch in the middle supporting a series of pavilion in “adaptive style” with big Chinese roofs on the top; from the arch is originated an urban axis with similar proportions and whose architecture shares the same features of Chang’an avenue in a postmodernist taste. In more recent cases the new majestic buildings of the station of the high speed railway, since they are almost located in new development area of wide Zhen Chen, Zhu Tan, Colonial archetype and national rebirth 127 metropolitan region reproduce urban images that remind the “Japanese business city” or the “Russian planned cities”. These contemporary cases (as for instance in Shenzhen central station and in Guangzhou south station) demonstrate in a certain sense how the colonial and postcolonial archetypes of the urban complex station/monumental axis has been reproduced by metamorphosis and adaptation to new gigantic scales and to traditional tasks as the one to be the core of the new city, as it happened in Harbin at the beginning of the railway architecture history in China. Figure 5. Shenzhen Central station (2014) and Guangzhou south station (2010), with their urban complexes. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 128 References Osterhammel, J. (1997). Colonialism: a theoretical overview. Princeton: M. Wiener. Wu,G.(2007). Jianzhu yishu changlang. Zhongdong tielu laojianzhu xunzong = Architecture gallery. Tracing the old buildings of the Chinese Eastern Railways.Harbin: Heilongijang People’s Publishing House. Kradin, N. P. (2001). Charbin - russkaja Atlantida. Chabarovsk: Chvorov. Koshizawa, A.(1982), translated by Huang Shyh-Meng (1986). History of urban planning in Manchuria, Taipei: Dajia Publishing House. Chen, B. (2010).Shenyang dushi zhong de lishi jianzhu huilu = Collectionof Historical architecture of Shenyang (ed.).Nanjing: Northeast University Press. Technical office of Capital plan(2006).Capital plan: 1929.Nanjing: Nanjing Publishing House. Cody, J. W. (2001). Building in China: Henry K. Murphy's "adaptive architecture," 19141935. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Wang, J. (2002). Guo min zheng fu shi qi Nanjing shou du ji hua zhi yan jiu = On the capital plan of Nanking in the nationalist era of China, 1928-1937. (Ph.D Thesis).Taipei: National Cheng Kung University. Zheng, G. (2004). Chang'an jie: guo qu, xian zai, wei lai = Chang'an Boulevard : yesterday, today, tomorrow (ed.). Beijing: China Machine Press. Urban Planning and Designing Administration Bureau of Taiyuan. (1985).Taiyuan yingze dajie=Taiyuan Yingze Avenue (ed. & pub.). Starndard department of the third railway survey and design institute. (1977).Tielu lükezhan jianzhu sheji = Architectural Design of Railway Passenger Station (ed.). Beijing: China Architecture & Building Press. Rowe, P. G., & Kuan, S. (2002). Architectural encounters with essence and form in modern China. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Zhen Chen, was born in 1979, national certified urban planner of China. After getting PhD degree in architectural composition in Politecnico di Milan, currently work in the School of Civil Architecture of Politecnico di Milan as contract professor, teaching optional course “The Project of Architecture and City in China”. He published several articles in European and Chinese Journals and proceedings. He had more than 10 years professional experiences in China and Italy, since 2009 he has been the co-founder of RECS Architects studio. Zhen Chen, Zhu Tan, Colonial archetype and national rebirth 129 Zhu Tan, was born in 1981, PhD, architect and urban planner. She received architecture education in Beijing University of Technology and earned bachelor’s degree in 2004 and Master’s degree in 2007. Afterward she moved to Italy and got the PhD in Politecnico di Milano in 2013.She started her professional experience since 2003, and has worked in both China and Italy. Now she is the Collaborator in Architectural Design Studio of Department ABC of Politecnico di Milano and the architect of RECS Architects studio. 130 THE NEW TOWNS AROUND PARIS. WHAT HAVE THEY BECOME FORTY YEARS LATER: NEW CENTRALITIES OR ORDINARY SUBURBS? Didier Desponds Université de Cergy-Pontoise / University of Cergy-Pontoise, France Abstract Launched in the middle of the sixties, the urban plan (SDAU de la région Parisienne) has deeply changed the face of the first agglomeration of France: five New towns have been progressively created in order to resolve some of the main problems in terms of urban amenities or economic efficiency,. Located in the urban fringes, they should reorganize the whole agglomeration following a polycentric model. At first, the success of the project was directly depending on State’s support. Then, the New towns have become more autonomous, generating their own attractiveness. Forty years later, even if the project is not yet totally finished, it may be possible to evaluate the various consequences of this vast scheme. To begin with, the demographic weight of the new towns is not so important than initially expected: less than 8% of the whole population of the agglomeration of Paris in 2006. Their economic weight is about the same: less than 7% of the agglomeration. Nevertheless, the New towns concentrate an important quantity of diversified jobs and they succeed attracting firms in different activity sectors, even if each one of them does not possess the same advantages. Because of this you may conclude that the New towns have partially reached their initial goals: to create new centralities in the suburbs and to break with their lack of jobs and urban amenities. Although the suburbs of Paris are much more diverse than we generally think, the New towns have contributed to a necessary improvement of their socio-spatial organization. However, the recent urban policy in the agglomeration of Paris, called Grand-Paris, is absolutely not based on the New towns. Keywords: New towns, Territorial inequalities, Urban planning, Polycentrality, Territorial attractiveness Introduction In middle of the sixties, the President of the French Republic decided to reorganize the agglomeration of Paris. The basic reason for this new urban policy was the demographic increase of the agglomeration and the lack of urban amenities in the suburbs. Furthermore, the urban planners thought that the urban sprawl could not be stopped, and consequently they preferred to guide it. The projects of this new urban policy should improve the territory’s organization, Didier Desponds, The new towns around Paris. What have they become forty years later: new centralities or ordinary suburbs? 131 including the economic development and offering a better quality of life to the citizens. These New Towns should be a good working and living place for different kinds of people. As a result, five New Towns were built around Paris. Located at thirty kilometers from Paris’ city-center, they were supposed to create new centralities within the suburbs. Their success was depending on economic and demographic attractiveness. Forty years later, it may be possible to observe the main results of this policy. This paper aims to analyze the influence of the New Towns on the urban system of Paris. Accordingly, official data (old and recent) have been used. Moreover, it should be interesting to examine what kind of cities they have become. Have they become new suburbs integrated into the old ones or do they create new centralities located closely to the urban fringes? As a matter of fact, this paper will depict that the initial goals have been partially reached. In addition, it will describe the possible futures of these “old New towns”. How can they continue alone, without State’s support? What are the good factors framing their territorial identity? The origins of the New towns project: to build new centralities in the suburbs When the territorial scheme, called SDAU RP (Schéma Directeur d’Aménagement et d’Urbanisme), was launched in 1965, it was totally different from the previous one (Vadelorge, 2004; Cottour, 2008): First, Paul Delouvrier1 and his team accepted the demographic increase of the agglomeration of Paris. They thought that it should reach 16 million of inhabitants at the end of the XXe century. A large part of this new population would have to live in one of the eight New towns. Later on, they should be reduced to five (Cergy-Pontoise, Evry, Marne-laVallée, Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, Sénart2) based on the real growth of population. Nevertheless, the actual part of the population living in these New towns has increased from 1.9% in 1968 to 6.9% in 20063 1 He was main manager having to think up the new organization of the area of Paris (Murard & Fourquet, 2004). The term of “New town” had been considered as the more appropriate (Béhar, Estèbe & Gonnard, 2002). (Fig. 1). At the same 2 The names of some New towns will be changed in the eighties. Thus Melun-Sénart will become Sénart. We are using in this paper the present names of each territory. 3 In order to calculate these rates, the official limits of the agglomeration of Paris in 2010 have been used (cf. Insee). This one is defined as UU (Urban Unity). 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 132 time, old suburbs have stayed at the same level, more than 62% – Secondly, the New towns had to plan different kinds of housing, not only public housing but also private housing and housing for property buyers. The urban planners should not build up the new “grands ensembles” (Hirsch, 1990), which were criticized already for the monotone pattern and the lack of urban amenities (Peillon, 2001). In the future, New towns should not make the same mistakes. Hence it was strategic to create many jobs, the most diverse as possible. The settlement of public or private companies on these territories demanded a high quality of the activities’ area and the transport facilities. Even if there was no exact quantitative goal fixed in the SDAU RP report, the target was close one to one: one workplace located in each New town for one employed worker living there. This did not mean that workers had to work and live in the same place. Finally, the creation of New towns should reorganize the metropolitan area of Paris throughout new centralities in the periphery. This may be seen as a paradox. However, it is not considering the spatial organization of the agglomeration of Paris at the beginning of the sixties. The city-center of Paris concentrated population and activities. The lack of urban amenities in the suburbs was an important problem. The main challenge was to do urban planning on the agglomeration’s scale. Even if the SDAU RP of 1965 cannot be reduced to the New towns, it is obvious that they have produced a new way to organize Paris and his suburbs. New towns have broken with the mono-centrality of this agglomeration and they made it possible to realize a polycentric plan (Fouchier, 1998). In comparison with the UK, they were, closer to the center of Paris (about thirty kilometers) than the New towns of London. Didier Desponds, The new towns around Paris. What have they become forty years later: new centralities or ordinary suburbs? 133 0 2000000 4000000 6000000 8000000 10000000 12000000 1968 1975 1982 1990 1999 2006 Population without double counting Census from 1968 to 1999, new census of 2006 Outskirts New towns Suburbs without New towns Paris 11,5 % 6,9 % 62,6 % 18,9 % 7,6 % 1,9 % 62,5 % 28,0 % Figure 1: Demographic evolution of the New towns around Paris in the region of Îlede-France, from 1968 to 2006. Source: Insee, census from 1968 to 1999 and new census of 2006. For a long time, the success of this project was depending on State’s support. This factor was identified as a possible failure by the DATAR (Direction à l’Aménagement du Territoire et à l’Action du Territoire, created in 1963). In fact, it was difficult to imagine that such an urban policy could be executed during forty years. What kind of people have chosen to live in one of the five New towns? In the middle of the sixties, populations living in these areas4 4 The areas of New towns have changed after the 1983’s law. Community councils were offered the possibility to integrate a New town or to stay out. Some of them have chosen to leave the New towns. In this paper, we are using areas resulting of these local decisions. were very small: 41,912 inhabitants in 1968 in the case of Cergy-Pontoise, 24,866 in SaintQuentin-en-Yvelines, 8,558 in Evry, 17,195 in Sénart and 85,353 in Marne-laVallée. Besides some towns as Pontoise, these spaces were yet rural and unconnected to the agglomeration of Paris. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 140 mutation (Fig. 4). – 4) In terms of job’s increase, Roissy and La Défense have been clearly the most dynamic places for the period 1990-2010 (Fig. 4). Comparing the quantity of jobs is necessary, it is also important to know what kind of jobs are located in these New towns. Are New towns different from the other part of the suburbs? Is a New town really different from the other ones? Among all the jobs, the share of executives and professionals increased in all the suburbs (New towns included): 12.1% in 1975, 20.2% in 1990 and 28.7% in 2010. In the same time, job of blue collars decrease: 34% in 1975, 23.1% in 1990 and 14.5% in 2010. New towns follow this trend for the executives and professionals like for the blue collars11 . However, situations are very various from a New town to another one. Proportion of executives and professionals become the highest in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (12.1% in 1975, 27.9% in 1990 and 41.4% in 2010) and stay the lowest in Sénart (13.2% in 1975, 14.6% in 1990 and 17.2% in 2010). The New towns: are they truly different from the ordinary suburbs? When we are using the word “ordinary suburbs”, what does it mean exactly? Such a concept is partially an absurdity because no suburb is “ordinary”. Indeed, 7.22 millions of inhabitants live in this part of the agglomeration of Paris in 2006 and urban morphology of these territories is very different from one place to another. Nevertheless, “ordinary suburbs” can be put in relation with following ideas: weak quantity of jobs, lack of activities’ diversity, lack of urban amenities, weak rate of executive and professionals among all the jobs, great dependence on other places of activity, small size of the area of economic attractiveness, difficulties to draw in qualified workers, lack of social diversity among living population. For some of these points, previous analyses have detailed that New towns hold many advantages in term of economical dynamics. They have contributed to reduce the traditional gap between Paris and its suburbs. This evolution results highly from the links between knowledge institutes and companies. However, 11 For executives and professionals, the rates are: 11.3% in 1975, 22.8% in 1990 and 28.7% in 2010. For blue collars, the rates are: 33.8% in 1975, 19.2% in 1990 and 14.2% in 2010. Didier Desponds, The new towns around Paris. What have they become forty years later: new centralities or ordinary suburbs? 141 Sénart cannot be associated to this description. Its level of economic activity is yet too low and the quantity of companies still insufficient. Figure 5: Polarized areas by the New towns in 1990 and 2006. Source: Insee, census of 1990 and new census of 2006: files of commuting mobilities. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 142 In the whole metropolitan area of Paris, the separation between living and working places has increased from 1990 to 200612. The rate of stability13 We also need to know the areas of attractiveness of the New towns in order to evaluate their importance. Are they depending on Paris or have they contributed to build a polycentric agglomeration (Fouchier, 1998; Berroir, Cattan & SaintJulien, 2005; Desponds, 2005, 2012)? The New towns predominate not only on their own territory but also on the agglomeration’s fringes (Fig. 5). These rural territories are more polarized by the economic power of the New towns. This does not mean that these New towns strengthen the urban sprawl, but rather that they offer job opportunities and quality of urban services to the population living in these territories with low density. depends on the living place (Beaufils & Courel, 2012): it is decreasing from the center to the periphery. Located in the urban fringes, New towns are characterized by inferior levels than Paris. However, these rates change from one New town to another. Thus, the rates in Cergy-Pontoise were: 53.1% in 1990, 47.8% in 1999 and 45.9% in 2006, and respectively, 37.8%, 40.2%, 42.2% in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, 41.3%, 38.2%, 37.1% in Evry, 38.4%, 36.9%, 39.8% in Marne-la-Vallée and 28.3%, 27%, 29.1% in Sénart. The probability to work where you live increases when the jobs’ quantity grows more quickly than the employed inhabitants (Fig. 3). Considering this argument, the situation of New towns can be considered relatively good. In conclusion: New towns: are they the forgotten territories of the Grand Paris urban plan? At the beginning of the sixties, jobs were concentrated in Paris or its close suburbs which had not enough urban amenities for an increasing population. The initial project of the New towns aimed to reorganize the whole agglomeration of 12 For this study, files of commuting mobilities have been used, in 1990, 1999 and 2006. In 2006, 25.9% among the workers of Île-de-France live in the same place. They were 25.5% in 1999 and 28.8% in 1990. Except for the twenty boroughs of Paris, rate of stability has decreased of 2 points from 1999 to 2006 in the region of Île-de-France. 13 The rate of stability is defined as share of employed workers of an area having a job where they live. In this case, it is calculated at the New town’s scale, by consequence it cannot be directly compared with the previous rate calculated at a more local scale (town or borough for Paris). Didier Desponds, The new towns around Paris. What have they become forty years later: new centralities or ordinary suburbs? 143 Paris highly centralized among the big cities (Beaucire, 2000; Pachaud, 2006). Forty years later, it is not easy to conclude definitively about the success of this story. On the one hand, the main goals have been reached: economic activity has increased, jobs are diversified, quantity of jobs is generally higher than employed workers, rate of stability for working population is important in the context of Île-de-France, and lastly the population living in the New towns is socially mixed. On the other hand, the economic and demographic factors of the New towns remain static compared to the other suburbs and don’t increase since a decade. However, this trend must to be tempered according to the specific situation of each New town. If New towns are not totally different from the other parts of the suburbs, they cannot be qualified as ordinary. Indeed, they contribute to polarize the urban fringes of the agglomeration. The situation of these New towns in the urban system of Paris cannot be considered as definitively guaranteed. The recent urban dynamics point to a reconcentration of the activities near Paris. Moreover, the second belt of suburbs and in particularly to the “old New towns” just play a marginal role in the Big project of Grand Paris (Subra, 2012), launched by the government of Nicolas Sarkozy in 2008. For example the New towns, except for Marne-la-Vallée, should be badly connected to the future transport networks. This represents a risk for the development of these territories and can be analyzed as a major factor of uncertainty. References: Beaucire, F. (2000). Paris : les limites d’un aménagement spatial contrôle. In Dureau, F., Dupont, V., Lelièvre, E, Lévy J.-P., & Lulle T. (Ed.), Métropoles en mouvement. Une comparaison internationale, (pp. 393-399). Paris: Coll. Villes, Economica. Beaufils, S. & Courel, J. (2012). Un actif sur deux travaille à proximité de chez lui, Note rapide n°600. Paris : IAU (Institut d’Aménagement et d’Urbanisme). Béhar, D., Estèbe, P. & Gonnard, S. (2002). Les Villes nouvelles d’Île-de-France ou la fortune d’un malentendu. Revue de la littérature. Paris: Acadie. Berger, M. (2004). Les périurbains de Paris. Paris : Editions du CNRS. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 144 Berroir S., Cattan, N. & Saint-Julien, T. (2005) : La contribution des Villes nouvelles au polycentrisme francilien : l’exemple de la polarisation liée à l’emploi », Espaces et sociétés n°119, Les Villes nouvelles, 30 ans après, 113-133. Cottour, C. (2008). Une brève histoire de l’aménagement de Paris et de sa région. Paris : DREIF. Davezies, L. (2004). Evolution des fonctions des Villes Nouvelles depuis 20 ans. Accueillir, produire, servir-desservir. Créteil : ŒIL – Institut d’Urbanisme de Paris. Desponds, D. (2012). Les villes nouvelles de l’agglomération parisienne et les enjeux de la polycentralité. In Mei, D & Tertrais, H. (Ed.), Espaces croisés, (pp. 281-296). Paris: Editions de la Maison des sciences de l'homme. Desponds, D. (2008). Cergy-Pontoise et les Villes Nouvelles de la Région Île-de-France : de la ‘greffe urbaine’ aux pôles périphériques ». In B. Lestrade (Ed.), Cultures croisées Japon-France, un regard sur les défis actuels de notre société, (pp. 125-147). Paris: L’Harmattan. Desponds, D. (2005). Stratégies résidentielles et logiques ségrégatives. Investigations dans l’aire d’influence de Cergy-Pontoise. Paris: Editions Connaissances et savoirs. Estèbe, P. (Ed.) (2005) : Vers l’intercommunalité de projet. De l’expérience des villes nouvelles aux communautés d’agglomération. Paris : Ministère des transports, de l’équipement, du tourisme et de la mer, Coll. de la DGUHC. Fouchier, V. (1998). Le polycentrisme : du concept au concret ». Urbanisme n°301, 5359. Hirsch, B. (1990). Oublier Cergy… L’invention d’une Ville Nouvelle : Cergy-Pontoise, 1965-1975 : récit d’un témoin. Paris : Presses de l’Ecole nationale des ponts et chaussées. Léger, J.-M. (1997). Les villes nouvelles d’Île-de-France. Images sociales et identités. Paris : DAU-DREIF-SGVN. Merlin, P. (1982). L’aménagement de la région parisienne et les villes nouvelles. Paris : La documentation française. Murard, L. & Fourquet F. (2004). La naissance des villes nouvelles. Anatomie d’une décision (1961-1969). Paris : Presses de l’école nationale des Ponts et chaussées. Roullier, J.-E. (Ed.) (1989) : Vingt-cinq ans de Villes nouvelles en France. Paris : DAEI, Economica. Pachaud, E. (2006). Villes nouvelles : du concept à la réalité, EspacesTemps.net, http://espacestemps.net/document1880.html (consulté le 08 juin 2009). Didier Desponds, The new towns around Paris. What have they become forty years later: new centralities or ordinary suburbs? 145 Pedretty-Ndiaye, M. & Tréhin-Lalanne, R. (2009). Ville nouvelle, quarante ans après. Les pionniers vieillissants de Maurepas, in Articulo n°5, Splendeur et misère du périurbain. Le périurbain : territoire de relégation ou d’ascension sociale. Peillon, P. (2001). Utopie et désordre urbains. Essais sur les grands ensembles d’habitation. La Tour d’Aigues : éditions de l’Aube. Subra, P. (2012). Le Grand Paris. Géopolitique d’une ville mondiale. Paris : IEP université. Vadelorge, L. (Ed.), (2004) : Eléments pour une histoire des villes nouvelles. Paris : Le manuscrit.com, collection « Manuscrit-université ». For have more informations about the subject, go to Internet site of the Ministère de l’Equipement et du logement: Urbamet : http://www.urbamet.com/ or the one of Institut d’aménagement et d’urbanisme de la région Île-de-France (l’Iaurif): http://www.iaurif.org/ Didier Desponds is professor of geography at the university of Cergy-Pontoise and director of the laboratory MRTE. His researches are about the residential strategies of the households and the dynamics of the housing market. These ones also aim at evaluating the social consequences of urban policies, as urban renewal and at understanding the new ways of life in the outskirts of the big agglomerations. He has recently published : Desponds, D. et alii (Ed.) (2014). Les habitants : acteurs de la renovation urbaine ? Rennes : PUR. 146 LIFE VERSUS ARCHITECTURE. Rationalist ideals facing popular taste, from Pessac to Malagueira. Eduardo Fernandes Escola de Arquitectura da Universidade do Minho / School of Architecture of the University of Minho - Landscape, Heritage and Territory Laboratory (Lab2TP), Guimarães, Portugal Abstract The clash between the aesthetics produced by rationalist ideals of the modern movement and the taste of the dwellers is always present, in urban extensions designed in the XX century. In plans based on single-family housing, this clash led to interesting phenomena of physical transformation of the proposals of the architect, creating hybrid constructions in which it is difficult to recognise the original design. The “Quartiers Modernes Frugès” (1924-27), design by Corbusier in Pessac (near Bordeaux, in France), is a famous case study of this phenomenon. Commissioned by the French industrial entrepreneur Henry Frugès, it began as a very ambitious plan that aimed to build one hundred and thirty-five houses disposed around a commercial square, but was not completed according to the original plan. Furthermore, some of the houses were altered by the dwellers in a way that was completely unexpected to Corbusier, which commented on the fact with the famous ironic statement: ‘It is life that is always right and the architect who’s wrong.’ In Portuguese architecture, mainly in the SAAL Program, we can find interesting examples of this confrontation between life and architecture. However, between the experience of the interventions in Porto and the later construction of the urban extension in Malagueira, designed by Álvaro Siza nearby Évora, we can find a very important change: in the second case, the posture of the architect is different, aiming to work with the uncertainty of the final image of the dwellings and leaving to the future owner the possibility to adapt it to his own taste. This different posture makes a great difference in the final results of the intervention as a whole, allowing it to become diversified and alive. Keywords: Pessac, SAAL, Malagueira, Participation, Uncertainty. Eduardo Fernandes, Life versus Architecture. 147 1. Pessac: Life is always right… The “Quartiers Modernes Frugès” (1924-27) was commissioned to Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret by Henry Frugès, a Bordeaux industrialist.1 In 1924, the Tonkin house was completed and the Lège construction was in progress, but the problems that would mark its construction had not yet appeared; It was in 1921 that the client and the architects first made contact (Ferrand, 1998, p. 63); two years later, fascinated by his discourse on standardization presented in “Vers une architecture”, Frugès commissioned the Swiss architect a small housing estate in Lège and a little house (‘Maison du Tonkin’) in Bordeaux, where Corbusier ‘first tried out his Dom-ino System’ (Frampton, 2001, p. 22). 2 In contrast to the Lège experience, Pessac was an ambitious enterprise: the initial plan aimed to build one hundred and thirty-five houses and a commercial square, in a site of 38,882 m2 purchased by Frugès in the outskirts of Bordeaux, eight kilometers away from the city (Ferrand, 1998, p. 76). For Corbusier, this was the first opportunity to apply his ideas, both on urban planning and on low cost housing. He designed his first ‘cité jardin horizontale’ (Frampton, 2001, p. 22), experimenting with his ideas on standardized construction, with the aim of providing affordable houses for the working class: the houses were destined to the workers of Frugès industries and should provide ‘domestic and social hygiene (…), air, light and water (…) trees and gardens (…) and hence become the catalyst for happiness and pleasure’ (Ferrand, 1998, p. 72-3). encouraged by the apparent success of these first experiments, Frugès presented Corbusier with an irresistible invitation: ‘I am going to enable you to put your theories fully into practice (…) to reach really conclusive results as regards the reform of low-cost housing’; more than a housing project, ‘Pessac should be a laboratory’, breaking ‘all conventions’ and abandoning ‘all traditional methods’ (Ferrand, 1998, p. 120). 1 Henry Frugés was not a common industrialist, he was also a man of culture; he described himself as a ‘researcher, polyvalent artist, architect’ (without a diploma), ‘painter, sculptor, pianist and composer, writer, art critic, historician, etc.’ (Ferrand, 1998, p. 64). 2 In January 1925, ‘the southern foundations of the canteen collapsed’ marking the beginning of various structural problems caused by ‘the incompetence of Monsieur Poncet’, the first foreman of the construction, both in Lège and Pessac (Ferrand, 1998, p. 60). 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 148 Corbusier managed to build four types of dwellings (Isolée, Quinconce, Arcade and Gratte-Ciel), conceived as different associations of the same pre-fabricated elements, composed in a five-meter grid. The layout of the buildings was studied to achieve a collective quality in the site: ‘External spaces are fused into one whole (…) minimising physical boundaries between the gardens’ (Ferrand, 1998, p. 86). But the initial good intentions were challenged by reality. The construction process previewed the use of advanced technologies that presented several problems to the first constructor, Mr. Poncet: ‘the concrete spray gun was hard to use’ and the pre-fabricated windows ‘did not always fit the voids left in the structure’ (Curtis, 1986, p. 66). Even after the hiring of a new foreman, Mr. Summer, who was constructing the ‘Pavillon de L’Esprit Nouveau’ in Paris (Ferrand, 1998, p. 108), the difficulties did not stop: ‘neither architects nor engineers had proper provision for drainage and this cost Frugés more money and headaches’ (Curtis, 1986, p. 66). Due to all these construction problems and various administrative complications, the construction lasted longer and cost much more than planned. It was only with the intervention of Anatole de Monzie (the new Minister for Public Works)3 Meanwhile, the cost of the houses increased substantially and it became difficult to sell them; the first dwellings that were ‘purchased in 1929-30 were already in a deteriorated state’. In 1929, Henry Frugès went bankrupt and emigrated to Algeria, leaving the sales under the coordination of Vrinat (an engineer from that the bureaucratic problems presented by the prefecture were surpassed (Gans, 1987, p. 108). Pessac was officially inaugurated in 1926 (June 13), but from the one hundred and thirty-five houses planned only fifty five were completed (two of which were destroyed during the Second World War), in the sectors C and D. Sectors A and B, where a commercial square (and the other dwellings) should be, were never initiated (Ferrand, 1998, p. 108-10). 3 Corbusier was introduced to Anatole de Monzie (Minister for Public Works since 29 octobre 1925) by Gertrude Stein; two years later, this acquaintance would allow the Swiss architect the commission of villa Stein, by Gabrielle de Monzie (the first wife of Anatole), Michael Stein (brother of Gertude) and his wife, Sarah, painter and art collector (Gans, 1987, p. 62). Eduardo Fernandes, Life versus Architecture. 149 Frugés factories); thus, ‘the plots of land were sold off slowly, one by one, without a coherent development pan’ (Ferrand, 1998, p. 110). Figure 1. ‘Quartiers Modernes Frugès’, Pessac, Corbusier, (1924-27). Image of two ‘type Quinconce’ houses: the one on the left was recently recovered according to the initial project; the one on the right still presents dwellers alterations (photo by the author, June 2007). But as soon as the first dwellers began to inhabit the houses, they began to transform the purist architecture of Pessac ‘in all sorts of individual ways, walling up ribbon windows, filling out terraces, dividing up the open-plan rooms, and so on’ (Jencks, 2000, P. 144). On June 1931, Corbusier writes an alarmed letter to Vrinat, expressing his indignation on the way Pessac ‘has been allowed to go to the dogs in such a disgracefully insane way’. Corbusier complains specifically about the state of house n.º 14 (‘It now resembles some gaudy piece of architecture, the likes of which are found in pseudo-modern spa towns’) and refers that he ‘simply cannot 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 252 and communication and by the inability of the Modern Movement ideal to resist to contemporary societies’ needs. The dispersion is now recognized as an urban fact, together with concentration, revealing new forms of living and economic and social organization of a discontinuous and fragmented society. When reading the contemporary territory, especially certain regions of southern Europe such as Ave valley (Portugal) and Veneto (Italy), one finds out that the dichotomy concentration / dispersion is not an option but a reality (Borja et al., 2003, p. 96; Soares 2005, p. 12): the compact city is just one piece of the urban puzzle (Domingues & Silva, 2004, p. 8) and is not, by itself, sign of urbanity11 or of centre. Diffuse and compact city co-exist and complement themselves, and this tendency grows stronger12 We can also see this dichotomy fading in Howard’s experience since, on the one hand, he proposed the development of several contained and concentrated networks of Garden Cities dispersed throughout open country, connected with railways, keeping in this way the formal integrity of each Garden City and the green belt surrounding them (Howard 1898/1902, pp. 130-131). Several Garden Cities arranged in networks and articulated with a Central City would become part of a wider territorial arrangement where even London, forced to rebuild itself, would ultimately find its place. as more effective means of transport and communication are being developed as they favour, on the one hand, concentration in regional and national metropolises while, on the other hand, they promote punctual or linear forms of dispersion (Choay 1994/1999, p. 83). This model of a network of cities would eventually become reality as a set of formal, organized and planned actions13 11 The diffused urbanization does not necessarily imply the concentration of people, and they can still be called “urban” or “citizens” despite living in a dispersed territory where housing, agriculture and work are mixed together (Ferreira & Salgueiro, 2000, p. 181). , as Howard intended, but also as informal responses of a society too complex in its interests, aspirations and 12 Although at different rhythms, with “old towns” becoming dense at a higher pace than diffuse territories (Portas 2007, p. 91). 13 Such as the New Towns program or the more recent Growth Areas program. Bruno Moreira, Uncertainty in contemporary urban planning concepts and methods. 253 goals, and sufficiently provided with transport and communication means to carry them out. In contemporary urban planning it is argued the need to structure these dispersed centres in networks (Portas 2007, p. 90; Soares 2005, p. 14) to be able to balance territorial differences – not eliminate them – promoting functional complementarity rather than intending to turn dispersion into concentration, because dispersed territories are also signs of urbanity, but of a different kind distinct from the one present in the city’s archetype. Diversity in the New Towns post-war program The theoretical model of Garden City14 The New Towns did not translate into an unique response to an unique problem, but rather into variable responses adapted to the specific objectives and uncertainties of each place and time – although they had several features in common with Howard’s proposal, namely the willingness to break up with a problematic reality and to plan from the start the whole future of a community. would (and keeps) inspiring the development of New Towns in different contexts and countries and with different purposes. The success of this model might as well have less to do with formal aspects than it had with the overall project of social reorganization it contained inside its complete town (Choay 1994/1999, p. 80). The relevance of the themes and issues raised by the New Town experiences have transcended their time and remain contemporary, like the aforementioned relationship between city and country, concentration and dispersion, and others such as the notion of centre and concentric growth, functional self-sufficiency and complementary, autonomy and dependence, planning from scratch versus developing existing settlements, and public and private roles in urban development. 14 Let us remind that Howard did not specify a design or specific place, but only thoughts and diagrams to be adjusted to specific sites and locations. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 254 We can draw some conclusions on the effective implementation of Howard’s model in the New Towns program. The relocation of urban population away from the major urban centres, namely London, turned out to be motivated by the need to solve the housing shortage caused by war bombings in 1940 and 1941 (Osborn 1947, p. 4) which gave rise to the first stage of the New Towns program and their designation around London, following the 1944 Greater London Plan of Sir Patrick Abercrombie. Another stage would come out later on the sixties and seventies, this time concerning more provincial New Towns. The relationship between city and country in the New Towns is a topic where we can draw some conclusions. Currently the classification of English land between urban15 Most of these New Towns are classified today as city-urban-compact. The New Towns around London as well as the nearest ones to the north are all classified in this way, except for Hemel Hempstead which is part of large urban conurbation of London. The same happens for the New Towns along Birmingham and along the large urban conurbation Manchester-Liverpool, with the exception of Skelmersdale. In the North of England, Newton Aycliffe and Peterlee follow this trend, while Washington is also caught in the context of an urban conurbation. The New Towns are therefore eminently urban and compact, while the city dispersed context (New Town or not) is practically non-existent and rural is not limited to these two global containers, but rather it extends towards four types of urban and six types of rural land – overcoming the simplistic dichotomy and taking into account other variables such as type of settlement and its location in more or less dispersed contexts (Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs 2013). 16 15 The quality of urban is given to continuous built-up areas of more than 10000 inhabitants. . Surrounding these New Towns we find a complex area of multiple layers of urbanity and rurality way more complex than the countryside as it was thought by Howard. 16 This type of city corresponds only to 0.2% of the whole English territory (Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs 2013). Bruno Moreira, Uncertainty in contemporary urban planning concepts and methods. 255 The New Towns experience demonstrated clearly the impossibility of keeping with the numbers proposed by Howard – 32000 inhabitants for a 1000 acres city. The reality surpassed in large scale Howard’s intentions, and even the smallest New Towns exceeded those values (Office for National Statistics 2012). Finally, the urban structure of the New Towns was multiple and varied depending on the particular time, location and dynamics of the program: from a linear expression with a grid more (as in Basildon) or less (as in Hatfield) evident, to a radial expression as in Crawley, Bracknell or Welwyn, to more complex and hybrid states such as Stevenage or Milton Keynes; from punctual green spaces and parks (as in Hatfield and Basildon) to more extensive green areas, such as Milton Keynes and Stevenage; from dispersed industries and warehouses in the city limits (as in Hatfield) to linear concentrations in the city limits as well (as in Basildon) or in the city centre (as in Welwyn). This diversity is noticeable not only in the New Towns by themselves, but also when we look at the regional level: the New Towns are sometimes surrounded by rural areas, as in most of the New Towns of the first generation around London (which successfully contained it’s excessive growth), and are sometimes limited or in the vicinity of a large conurbation, as in Skelmersdale, Warrington and Runcorn, near the extensive built area polarized by Liverpool and Manchester. Conclusion: the uncertainty of an archetype Although the planning associated with the New Towns program has managed to pass a clear and emblematic quality of urbanity, central in promoting the image and identity of these places (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 14), 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 256 the New Towns program has proved to be multiple in terms of its objectives and applications17 It is recognized a greater homogeneity in the planning of the New Towns of the first generation when compared with the latest experiments (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 12), a situation explained by several factors that, throughout time, changed or became more complex, bringing uncertainty (and diversity) to the developments. and uncertain about its results. The power struggle between public and private sectors came to a clear transformation. If, in the first experiments of the New Towns, the influence of the public sector and power granted to the New Towns Development Corporations was evident, the trend has been towards the dispersion of this power between various entities – local authorities, central government and private companies – making it harder to manage and maintain the newer New Towns (Town and Country Planning Association 2011, p. 29) and yielding an increased dependence on private companies as a way to generate growth (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 13). As the New Towns program evolved, people were already claiming the right for the purchase and possession of their homes, instead of having to rent them (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 11). The impossibility to do this in the early stages of the program has, according to some authors, limited the profile of the New Towns residents (Bennett 2005, p. 8). The power balance between the public sector multiple organisms was also transformed, especially the relationship between central and local powers. The Garden Cities and New Towns taught us the importance of letting the local 17 Stevenage, for example, is a completely different experience if compared to Peterborough: a self-sufficient city on the one hand versus an extension of an existing one, on the other (Town and Country Planning Association 2011, p. 8). Bruno Moreira, Uncertainty in contemporary urban planning concepts and methods. 257 community benefit from the management of their own assets in order to reinvest on them for their benefit; the absence of this ability, as advocated by Howard (Howard 1898/1902, pp. 21) has brought fund-raising problems in several New Towns needed for urgent infrastructural renovations (Town and Country Planning Association 2014, pp. 16-17). Thus, the willing to bring planning closer to the communities18 The intent of “forging” self-sufficient and balanced communities, as proposed by the New Towns program, was also questioned. Relocating poor urbanized people from London was proven to have cut their strong emotional and social ties (Bennett 2005, p. 7), while the New Towns, with their policy of linking housing to working, excluded everyone who was not suitable to work (Bennett 2005, p. 8). , financial constraints and the difficulty in articulating a centrally-driven New Town designation with local consent (Town and Country Planning Association 2014, p. 11) is leading the Central government to avoid taking the lead role as it once had (Town and Country Planning Association 2011, p. 23). The partnerships between local authorities and privates will therefore assume greater relevance in the next generation of New Towns (Town and Country Planning Association 2011, p. 7), although it’s argued to be the responsibility of both local and central powers to gather the conditions for private investment, especially in the beginning of the developments, when the uncertainty is higher (Town and Country Planning Association 2011, p. 25). The belief that a change of environment was enough to solve the problems of the most disadvantaged social classes of the Industrial Revolution also proved to be mistaken (Madge 1962, p. 208): the dispersive nature, low density, functional segregation and spatial monotony of the spaces and buildings in most New Towns ultimately hindered the possibility of creating a community19 18 As implied in the “Localism Act 2011” and in the “General Power of Competence” introduced in its context (Local Government Association 2013). and generated a feeling of alienation (Department for Communities and Local 19 Low density and functional segregation led to higher commuting, contrary to what the New Towns program advocated. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 258 Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 78; Madge 1962, p. 211). It was being realized the impossibility of moving entire neighbourhoods and maintaining their social relations (Madge 1962, p. 211) and that one’s response to a place was dependent more on social, economic and community factors that on physical ones (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 78). This explains why contemporary urban planning is increasingly multidisciplinary. The sense of isolation and self-sufficiency of the New Towns was also losing its reason to be. This kind of understanding was already present after the first generation of New Towns was completed: although still being required a clear definition of the city and of its limits, it was recognized that from a social and economic point of view this definition made no sense (Madge 1962, pp. 218219). Today the regional level is gaining special relevance in connecting communities (Bennett 2005, p. 11). Finally, contemporary urban planning is revealing that a rigid planning model based on inflexible master plans is not adequate to today’s territories’ needs, and a greater flexibility is necessary (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 14) for planning to accommodate uncertainty and change, adapt to the communities’ needs and promote the resilience of places (Town and Country Planning Association 2011, p. 32). The master plan is now understood as part of a process and not as the end product itself (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University, 2006, p. 79). Partnerships remain today more dispersed, resulting from the diffusion of responsibilities between public and private entities, but are necessary to ensure local democracy and participation (Department for Communities and Local Government & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University 2006, p. 58). We are moving towards as increasingly limited planning, questioned by uncertainty to an extent where one can ask if it’s still worth it. Our idealistic visions of city and country are changing. More than persistent and timeless, Bruno Moreira, Uncertainty in contemporary urban planning concepts and methods. 259 archetypes are undergoing profound changes and no longer match the reality; and uncertainty appears to be anything but transitory. If we expect to efficiently manage our complex contemporary territories we must find a way to inscribe flexibility into the formal planning system while allowing some extent of responsible informality. Acknowledgments This paper is part of the PhD research project “From informality to formal variability – planning and urban management strategies under uncertainty contexts: the municipality of Santo Tirso between the Provisional Regulations and the review of the Municipal Plan” (original title: “Da informalidade à variabilidade formal – estratégias de planeamento e gestão urbana em contextos de incerteza: o município de Santo Tirso entre as Normas Provisórias e a revisão do PDM”) which is being financially supported by FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia – under the QREN-POPH program and the PhD Grant SFRH/BD/86675/2012, and developed in CEAU – Centro de Estudos de Arquitectura e Urbanismo – at the School of Architecture of Porto University. References Bennett, J. (2005). From new towns to growth areas. Learning from the past. London: Institute for Public Policy Research. Borja, J., Drnda, M., Iglesias, M., Fiori, M., & Muxí, Z. (2003). La ciudad conquistada. Madrid: Alianza. Busquets, J. (1995, September). Planeamiento: Pasado reciente y futuro próximo. Sociedade e Território, (22), 10-21. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 260 Carvalho, J. (2012). Dos planos à execução urbanística. Coimbra: Almedina. Choay, F. (1999). O reino do urbano e a morte da cidade. Projeto História. Revista do Programa de Estudos Pós-Graduados de História, (18), 67-89. Department for Communities and Local Government, & Department of Planning Oxford Brookes University. (2006). Transferable lessons from the new towns. West Yorkshire: DCLG Publications. Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs. (2013). Rural urban classification leaflet. Domingues, Á. (2013, September). Face-a-face. Álvaro Domingues entrevistado por Ricardo Miguel Gomes. UPorto Alumni, (18 - 2º Série), 32-38. Domingues, Á., & Silva, L. P. (2004, June). Formas recentes de urbanização no norte litoral. Sociedade e Território, (37/38), 8-22. Ferreira, A. F. (2004, June). Paradoxos do planeamento urbanístico em Portugal. Sociedade e Território, (37/38), 23-26. Ferreira, A. F., & Salgueiro, T. B. (2000, December). As cidades, hoje e amanhã. Sociedade e Território, (31/32), 180-187. Gil, F. (2000). Inventar. In Enciclopédia Einaudi, Volume 41, Conhecimento (pp. 174252). Lisboa: INCM. Gonçalves, F. (2007, February). O PNPOT, o défice democrático e a descentralização territorial. Sociedade e Território, (40), 93-100. Guerra, I. (1993, June). Viver na periferia. Sociedade e Território, (18), 106-108. Howard, E. (1902). Garden cities of to-morrow (being the second edition of "to-morrow: A peaceful path to real reform"). London: S. Sonnenschein & co., Ltd. (Original work published 1898). Jung, C. G. (2002). Os arquétipos e o inconsciente coletivo. Rio de Janeiro: Editora Vozes. (Original work published 1976). Bruno Moreira, Uncertainty in contemporary urban planning concepts and methods. 261 Koolhaas, R., Mau, B., Sigler, J., & Werlemann, H. (1998). The Generic City. In Small, medium, large, extra-large: Office for metropolitan architecture, Rem Koolhaas, and Bruce Mau (pp. 1248-1264). New York: Monacelli Press. (Original work published 1995). Lefebvre, H. (1991). O direito à cidade. São Paulo: Editora Moraes. (Original work published 1968). Local Government Association. (2013). The general power of competence. Empowering councils to make a difference. London: Local Government Association. Madge, J. (1962). The new towns program in britain. Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 28(4), 208-219. Moreira, G. (2004, June). Da cidade industrial à pós-industrial. Contributo para uma análise da transformação urbana em Portugal. Sociedade e Território, (37/38), 27-37. Mumford, L. (1966). The city in history: Its origins, its transformations, and its prospects. Great Britain: Penguin Books. (Original work published 1961). Office for National Statistics. (2012). Usual resident population and population density, local authorities in the united kingdom. 2011 census: Table 2. Retrieved from http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/census/2011-census/population-and-householdestimates-for-the-united-kingdom/rft-table-2-census-2011.xls Osborn, F. J. (1947). New towns in Britain. Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 13(1), 4-10. Portas, N. (1995, September). Os planos directores como instrumentos de regulação. Sociedade e Território, (22), 22-32. Portas, N. (2007, February). As oportunidades do PNPOT. Sociedade e Território, (40), 88-92. Rémy, J., & Voyé, L. (1994). A cidade: Rumo a uma nova definição? Porto: Afrontamento. (Original work published 1992). Silva, P. R. d., & Cruz, R. V. d. (1995, September). Os territórios planeados, os que não são, e os planos directores supostamente para todo o território. Sociedade e Território, (22), 38-46. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Porto, May 22-24, 2014 268 to João Castelo Branco.8 To house the personnel who would be in charge of running the Vila Nova power station, HICA built, next to the power station, a small group of houses, a Pousada - hostel and some supporting buildings. The Pousada of Pisões, the only building of the group designed by Januário Godinho, was the last building that this architect designed for HICA. The settlement was placed on a hillside on the left side of the Cávado river, around 800m from the power station building, facing the future reservoir of the Salamonde dam, the second to be created by HICA. In January, Januário Godinho presented “... detailed plans for the houses to be built in the settlement attached to the power station, with the Board having definitively chosen the types of houses for managers and workers... “9 In Salamonde, with the experience gained from work on Venda Nova, HICA was already aware of the need for creating accommodation at the site of the next dam for technicians and workers to live in while construction work was taking place on the dam and related projects. By planning for these to be definitive structures, HICA could later use them to house the employees who would be running the power station. Once the locations of the dam and power station were finalized, HICA engineers decided on the siting of the dwellings, choosing the south bank of the Cávado river, upstream from the dam on a south-west facing hillside, which would be reached by the new access road built for the dam. In contrast to what had happened relative to the settlement of Venda Nova, which had involved a lot of indecision and a variety of locations discussed for the building work, in Salamonde, “...the need to locate the installations close to the work and to provide the appropriate exposure, dictated the choice of location and the boundaries of the area to be occupied.”10 The proposal highlighted three main objectives: the location of the buildings at higher elevations, non-interference with the sparse vegetation that existed, and the choice of views to the south and west rather than towards the future 8 In Paradela however, there was no need to build a settlement, given that the water of the dam at that level went to the power station at Venda Nova where it then entered the turbine. 9 Minutes no. 182, of 19 January 1949, AHME, ARCAHICA. p.2 10 Project brief, installations for the dam at Salamonde, signed by the chief engineer of the civil engineering department, 20 June 1950, ATEDP, PRT-1944-00004. p.1 César Machado Moreira, Hydroelectric towns in Portugal 269 reservoir which would mean that the houses would have to be turned to face north. In the plans that Godinho drew up, the houses - 10 in total - were split into two groups adapted to the slope of the terrain. The detached buildings rise out of the terrain in order to make best use of the landscape, their main façades facing south/west, to take in views of the valley. Lower down, the other façades nestle into the hillside or rest on granite walls, a solution identical to the one found for the houses in the settlement of the Venda Nova power station. The main road, which goes around the settlement, terminates at the hostel building, and from it radiate a number of short paths providing access to the houses. Clearly separate from the main road, the houses have a special positioning in relation to the new topography and exposure to the sun. The process of building the Caniçada dam turned out to be very similar to that of Salamonde. The type of dam that was chosen, the subterranean nature of the power station and the proximity between the different sections were all points that were adopted in the same way for Caniçada. The engineers decided that the site should be very close to the dam and that it should occupy as small an area as possible11 Following similar lines to the work already carried out, the general building plans envisioned for the same site not only the definitive buildings, but also those that were temporary and could be taken down. , indicating as a suitable location the land next to the EN 308 road, downstream from the reservoir, on the southfacing hillside. The proximity of the buildings destined for accommodation to the towns of Gerês and Amares meant that in this case fewer houses were planned when compared to previous levels of the hydroelectric system, and that there would also be no need for a Pousada.12 11 The high value of the land next to the dam at Caniçada made for difficult negotiations with the locals who lived in the villages that would be affected by the construction of that section of the hydroelectric system. The expropriation of land needed for the section at Caniçada was, due to the size and the quality of the land to be purchased, a problem that would force HICA to spend a much greater sum of money for the same purpose than had been previously spent at the other sites. As these nearby locations were served by schools and chapels, these were not included in the plans made by HICA for the settlement 12 Minutes no. 333, 20 November 1951, AHME, ARCAHICA, G 1.1.1-2. p.1 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Porto, May 22-24, 2014 270 at Caniçada, which was thereby reduced to a small collection of houses that was spread along the main road. Figure 1. Terraced houses belonging to the 1st phase constructed at the Vila Nova settlement, 1951 – Photography Alvão, Archive da EDP, Porto The types of house chosen for permanent housing in the settlement were versions of type B and C houses designed 2 years previously for the settlement at Vila Nova. The solutions found for their interior areas are practically identical to those of the houses at Vila Nova, with differences being visible only in the relationships that the houses established with the landscape. In line with the times, the houses were positioned in accordance with a social hierarchy defined by HICA, with the first group of houses, located in the quietest area and having the best road access, aimed at those of a managerial level. The materials and the language used were the same as those used in the workers housing settlements at Salamonde and Vila Nova: tiled, gabled roofs, plastered walls, visible granite basements, and window frames and blinds in wood. Construction work on the 5th level of the hydroelectric system was the largest project that HICA carried out. At one point during construction, the site at Alto Rabagão had over 4,000 people at work, who together with their families led to a total resident population of over 12,000.13 13 Report, Balance Sheet and Opinion of the Supervisory Board. HICA S.A.R.L. Financial year nineteen, 1964. AHME. p.15 César Machado Moreira, Hydroelectric towns in Portugal 271 In 1958, the first general plans were made for the installations that were to become part of the large construction site, which took the name of the nearest location, Pisões. With the experience obtained on previous levels of the hydroelectric system, and the large number of workers expected for the construction site, the installations were divided into two types. Some were temporary, for use during construction, and others, more permanent, would be used during construction and would then make up the definitive settlement for the workers who would be operating the hydroelectric power station. The general plans for the two groups of buildings were finished between May and July 1958. The temporary buildings were decided on first, to be located on a hillside on the right-hand-side of the river next to the dam and the power station, close to Km 117 of national road E.N.103, between Braga and Chaves, near Pisões.14 As well as planning for different types of dwelling and dormitories, a host of provisional supporting services were also included, such as schools, a hospital, a social centre, a cinema, a chapel and a shopping area. Permanent buildings were decided on during a second stage, to be located on the same hillside, in an area that was higher and flatter. 15 The plans for the settlement at Pisões followed a similar pattern to the previous ones. Located on a hillside sloping downwards N-S towards the reservoir and the dam, it included a series of detached and terraced houses as well as a group of facilities, in an area of over 8 hectares. As had already happened previously on construction sites at previous levels, several of those installations, which were prefabricated, were transferred from the site at Paradela once construction work at that location had come to an end. At the end of 1958, as well as the settlement built for the future permanent staff of the power station, containing 40 detached houses, there were also 349 14 The parish of Vila da Ponte in the municipality of Montalegre. 15 The general plans for accommodation and installations of 09/05/1958 stated: 1 Dormitory for higher-level personnel, 1 Dormitory for managers, 1 B1 House, 3 B Houses, 1 Bc House, 10 C Houses, 3 Cc Houses, 1 I House, 6 E Houses, 6 Ec Houses, 4 Rows of 4 D Houses, 8 Rows of of 2 L houses, 1 Row of 2 Lc houses, 1 L’ house, 1 School with two adjoining rooms, 1 Porch – Garage, 1 Dormitory for auxiliary staff, 2 Dormitories for specialist staff, 2 Shower blocks, 75 Rows of 4 houses for workers, 1 Public washing tank, 1 School with 2 rooms and a canteen, 1 Dormitory for 40 workers, 1 Dormitory for 80 workers, 1 Kitchen with oven – refectory, 1 General kitchen – refectory, 1 Cooperative, 1 Covered porch area, for commerce, 1 National Guard post, 1 Social Centre for workers, 1 Hospital, 1 General Office, 1 Laboratory, 1 Warehouse. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Porto, May 22-24, 2014 272 houses and 29 dormitories being built, with a total capacity to deal with around 1400 workers and salaried staff.16 They also built a chapel, schools, recreation centres, refectories, canteens, a market, shower blocks and a permanent medical centre. The construction of dams and infrastructure for the transportation of energy, firmly founded within a modern culture, determined the large-scale transformation of place in a process of appropriation of the existing landscape. The terrain taken over by HICA led to the transformation of nature by the collective (COSGROVE'S, 1984), establishing places in which the vision was guided by the new representations of space, as well as by new practice and local usage. The settlements created by HICA were notable for their social programmes, developed in accordance with hierarchical levels. When the design of the settlements was being developed, no thought at all was given to the relationship between the new inhabitants and the existing populations. Those villages next to the dams which had not been submerged by the reservoirs rarely received any sort of benefit as a result of their proximity to these constructions. Ancestral habits, skills and lifestyles had nothing whatsoever to do with the modern settlements that HICA built for its workers. A dichotomy that was also reflected in the architecture itself. In all the settlements, the groups of houses were laid out so as to adapt themselves to the terrain, with optimum conditions relative to sun exposure and direction which the houses faced being taken into consideration. An integration into the landscape that was often the result of the movement of large quantities of earth in order to transform the very steep hillsides into terraces against which the houses could lean. The types of houses built, closely linked to the type of settlement, were not very varied, being designed to meet the specific needs of their inhabitants. Each settlement consisted of two or three types of house, with one or two floors, with variations mostly in relation to number of bedrooms and in the relationship 16 Report, Balance Sheet and Opinion of the Supervisory Board. HICA S.A.R.L. Financial year thirteen, 1958. AHME. p.15 César Machado Moreira, Hydroelectric towns in Portugal 273 between the social areas of the house: individual for houses aimed at managers, and shared for the remaining employees. The centre of the settlements were generally devoted to supporting infrastructure: The 'Centre for happiness at work', the chapel, the market and the Pousada. In all the settlements “...there was a series of buildings that demonstrated a relationship of analogous form and function...” (ARGAN, 2008 [1963]: 269) The houses designed by Januário Godinho followed rules that defined a model which, with few alterations, was used for all the different inhabitants and different settlements. The types of houses chosen for Vila Nova were, with only minor alterations, used in Salamonde and in Caniçada. In Pisões, despite the fact that plans were drawn up by a different architect, the adoption of those same solutions can be clearly seen. Receptive to the idea of uniformity in the built environment, Januário Godinho worked with the materials he had, taking as a foundation the relationship between financial constraints and natural possibilities. The buildings that were constructed do not bear any resemblance to the rudimentary buildings that existed in the surrounding villages. Stonework, in granite or schist depending on the locations, and thatched roofs, common in that area, are very distant from the systems of construction used in the new settlements, which were motivated by economics and the need for dwellings that could be easily reproduced. Concrete posts and beams, voided concrete slabs, walls in brick or granite - when it was necessary to raise the basements of the buildings - and tiled roofs resting on wooden structures. The technology and construction processes used to build the power stations and dams were used purposefully, though on a more subtle level, in the building of the settlements. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Porto, May 22-24, 2014 274 Figure 2. Interior of a house in the settlement of Vila Nova, April 1952 – Photography Alvão, Archive da EDP, Porto. The architecture of the HICA settlements is not “...merely a question relative to the use of the materials most available locally, or of copying any simple form of construction used, for want of anything better, by our ancestors of the last one or two centuries. Its regional forms are those that are best suited to real-life conditions and which reveal themselves to be the most successful at allowing people to feel at home and in their own environment: not limiting itself to merely using the resources of the soil, it reflects, more than anything, cultural conditions...” (MUNFORD, 1941: p.23) The settlements of Venda Nova, Salamonde and Caniçada, designed by Godinho display “...his feeling for place and access to a healthy belief in the value of experience which is seen in the choice of materials, the inflections and outlines of the spaces, in the relationships of spaces to landscape” (PORTAS, 1987:136). Where before there was wasteland, hills and mountains, came houses, facilities and roads, all to accommodate the new communities who had come from so far to be there. It was in this context that Januário Godinho worked. His architecture did not seek to mimic pre-existing construction, instead, everything was new. There was no intention of placing the new settlements within the framework of the other villages, their locations were chosen for reasons of function and operability, and this also had to apply to the different dwellings and facilities which made up the settlements. The quality of the architecture that Januário Godinho provided for HICA can be found in the way in which he etched César Machado Moreira, Hydroelectric towns in Portugal 275 the images of an architecture, which he wrote into the existing landscape and which is not rural and was never intended to be so, onto the collective imagination. Acknowledgements This work was carried out at CEAA | Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo at ESAP, and was financed by the Portuguese government via the FCT – the Portuguese national funding agency for science, research and technology, as part of the PEst-OE/EAT/UI4041/2014 strategic project. References ARGAN, Giuliu Carlo, Sobre a tipologia em arquitectura in Uma nova agenda para a arquitectura, org. Kate Nisbett, Cosac naify, 2008 [On the tipology of arcjitecture, publicado em Architectural Design n.33, Dez.1963, pp.564-565.] BRITO, Raquel Soeiro de, Dir. “Portugal perfil geográfico”, Editorial Estampa, Lisboa, 1994, P.49 BISSON, Marie-France, Vernaculaire Moderne? Vers une comprehension de la notion d’architecture vernaculaire et de ses liens avec la modernité archtectural. Montreal, Université du Québec à Montreal, 2007 COSGROVE'S, Denis E., Social Formation and Symbolic landscape, New Jersey, Barnes and Noble Books, 1984 COSTA, Alexandre Alves, Dissertação para o concurso de habilitação para obtenção do título de professor agregado (1980), Porto, Edições do curso de Arquitectura da ESBAP, 1982, p.23 DOMINGUES, Álvaro, A Paisagem Revisitada, Revista Finisterra, Vol.XXXVI, Nº72, Centro de Estudos Etnográficos, Lisboa, 2001, p.59 FERREIRA, Luís Lucena, "A produção de electricidade na segunda metade do século XX e a engenharia nacional”, in Engenharia em Portugal no Século XX, Coord. J. M. Brandão de Brito, Manuel Heitor e Maria Fernanda Rollo, Publicações Dom Quixote, Lisboa, 2004 JACINTO, Rui Candeias, As barragens em Portugal: de finais de oitocentos ao limiar do século XX in Momentos de inovação e engenharia em Portugal no século XX, Lisboa, Centro de estudos em inovação, tecnologia e políticas de desenvolvimento do Instituo Superior Técnico - Dom Quixote, 2004 KAGAN, Jerome, The Three Cultures: Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, and the Humanities in the 21st Century, Cambridge University Press, New York, 2009 LEAL, João, Etnografias Portuguesas (1870 – 1970): Cultura Popular e Identidade Nacional, Publicações Dom Quixote, Lisboa, 2000 MUNFORD, Lewis, The South in Architecture, New York, Harcout, Brace & Company, 1941, p.32 OLIVEIRA, Ernesto Veiga de, e GALHANO, Fernando, Arquitectura tradicional portuguesa, Publicações D. Quixote, Lisboa, 2003, 5ºedição (1ºedição 1992) 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Porto, May 22-24, 2014 276 PORTAS, Nuno, Januário Godinho – 1910, in Catalogo da exposição, Arquitectura, Pintura, Escultura, Desenho, integrada nas comemorações do 75º aniversário da UP, Porto, Universidade do Porto, 1987 RIBEIRO, Orlando, Portugal, o Mediterrâneo e o Atlântico, Lisboa, Livraria Sá da Costa, 6ºedição, Lisboa,1991 (1ºedição 1947) RIBEIRO, Orlando, Opúsculos Geográficos – VI volume – Estudos Regionais, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisboa, 1995 TOSTÕES, Ana, Em direccção a uma estética industrial: Zeitwill ou vontade de modernidade in DOCOMOMO, A arquitectura da indústria – 1925 – 1965, Barcelona, Actar, 2000 César Machado Moreira. Since 2010, studying on the PhD programme in Architecture at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Porto on an FCT research grant: SFRH/BD/72332/2010. Masters from the Universidade Lusíada de Famalicão - 2009. Masters at the Escuela Superior Técnica d’Arquitectura de Barcelona - 2000. Graduated in 1998 from the Universidade Lusíada do Porto. Lecturer at the Universidade Lusíada since 2001. Senior Researcher at the Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo (CEAA). Has worked as an architect since 2002, with work published and shown at several national and international exhibitions. 277 BETWEEN GLOBAL TURBULENCES AND LOCAL MANNERS The multiple lives of the Bata Shoe Company satellite towns Víctor Muñoz Sanz Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de Madrid / School of Architecture of Madrid, Madrid, Spain Faculteit Bouwkunde, Technische Universiteit Delft / Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands Abstract Following the spectacular growth of the Bata Shoe Company and the transformation of its home town, Zlín (Czech Republic) into a field of spatial and social experimentation, the enterprise began a strategy of decentralization and global expansion which lead to the replication of an urban and community model in a series of modern ideal industrial satellite towns, built between the years 1930 and 1945 around the globe. This network of cities was split up by force after the World War II; in their maturity, the individual towns have been exposed to the multiplicity of realities that resulted in the post-war geopolitical landscape. Remaining on either side of the Iron Curtain, some cities were still part of the Bata Company, whereas the Communists nationalized some others; some struggled in advanced economies, meanwhile some others thrived in developing countries. The comparative and systematic study of the network of Bata satellite towns, built in an unprecedented global scale with a strict design consistency in a relatively short period of time, allows for the construction of a comprehensive evaluation of the different lives of a prototypical urban idea, revealing timeless trends and differentiating features that reveal new directions for the critical reformulation of the idea of a company town, with a renewed relationship between design, labour, and capital. Keywords: Zlín, Bata, company towns, ideal industrial towns, interwar urbanism. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 284 identity applied directly to the ground, with no consideration to topographical features. Le Corbusier’s projects for Bata15 and Soviet planning heavily influenced the next prominent model. Jiří Voženílek developed a distinct version of Gahura’s strip city, based more explicitly on the idea of assembly-line urbanism (Voženílek, 1948; Novák, 2008). A green strip clearly separates the factory from a series of parallel programmatic bands accommodating civic infrastructure, dormitories, apartments, schools, family housing, and recreational facilities (figure 2). In contrast to Gahura’s plans, here the belt city is understood as a self-contained unit16 With the advent of the War, Voženílek ideas radicalized leaning towards socialist planning, proposing a precise articulation of relationships among industry, transportation networks, high and low-density settlement units, agriculture, and the regional landscape (Voženílek, 1948; Novák, 2008). Voženílek’s ideal town served just as an inspirational diagram, and the finished plan grew and adapted to the actual landscape conditions, forcing a dissolution of the urban figure in nature. These units . 17 were self sufficient and after reaching their maximum population it was better to create a new, parallel town, creating regional patterns that bring to mind some of Hilberseimer’s explorations in suburban decentralization18 France), Batapur (Pakistan, 1941), and Batatuba (1947, Brazil) are all prototypes based on this model. . 15 Albeit relatively unknown, the phenomenal role of Baťa as patron of modernity attracted the interest of some of the most talented, and ambitious, architects of the century. Cohen (1980) thoroughly described the complicated relationship between Le Corbusier and Bata, which included several unrealized commissions including the master plan for Greater Zlín, a plan for a satellite town in France (Bataville), the design of the Bata Boutiques in France, and the pavilion of Bata in the Universal Exposition of 1937. Less mentioned has been the case of Adolf Loos, who considered the Czech entrepreneur one of the ‘most important men of the present time’ and tried repeatedly, and unsuccessfully, to meet him (Rukschcio, 1982, p. 362). 16 A new plan for Baťovany (1945), and the cities of Svit (1935, Slovak Republic) and Martfű (1941, Hungary) were designed according to this spatial organization. 17 A plan for Bataville (1939), Batawa (1939, Canada) and the extension of Svit (1948) were the result of the influence of this new, wartime, direction in the planning of industrial cities. 18 See ‘The New Regional Pattern’ (Hilberseimer, 1949) Víctor Muñoz Sanz, Between Global Turbulences and Local Manners 285 Figure 2. On the left, ideal industrial town with organic leaf structure designed by Robert Podzemný in 1937; on the right, ideal industrial town designed by Jiří Voženílek following the idea of assembly-line urbanism (Muñoz Sanz, 2013c). Over the course of the 1930’s and 1940’s, the different architectural trends, new social needs, changes in the management, ideological positions, and the outbreak of the World War II would inform the continuous search for the ideal industrial town. The different types overlapped and sometimes there was a succession of alternative plans for the same town, even when construction had already begun. At the same time that the satellites were fulfilling the pressing and practical needs of the company, for their designers the fast pace of their construction and immediate tangible results became an unusual opportunity to experiment and test in real time with urban and architectural prototypes. Bata towns after the War The events in the Second World War would change the course of Bata’s business, including the lives of its urban offspring. With the threat of the war, the planning of foreign units continued, to both secure surplus capital, and to anticipate an eventual transfer of control of the entire concern to a new Zlín in the case of its occupation, as it actually happened. Both J.A. Baťa and Tomáš Baťa’s son, Thomas J. Baťa, went into exile in 1939 (Pokluda, 2009), and both started efforts to reconstruct the empire, from Batatuba and Batawa respectively. With an unclear leadership in Zlín, the work of the architects, and the planning and construction of new settlements continued at a slower pace, while some of the existing ones were trapped amidst warfare and violent 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 286 occupation. The liberation of the occupied towns by the Red Army was an ephemeral relief for the directors in exile, as the ascension to power of Communist governments in the east would bring the nationalization and loss of ownership and control of many of its factories and towns, including Zlín, in 1948. Several decades have passed since that critical moment. Twenty towns19 As one could expect, the biggest obstacle for a successful self-sustained continuity in time laid at the core of what defines a company town: the dependency of jobs and economic activity on a single industry. In most the towns that remained in the western block, post-war development was hampered by the restructuring of the company. The consolidation of the welfare states made accessible public social infrastructure that relieved the company of such responsibilities. Instead of that, wages raised and workers incorporated into the consumer market. The subsequent access to car and home ownership changed also the mentality of the company regarding housing provision, and it got rid of it real estate stock by selling land or homes to workers or other entities. When manufacturing shifted to cheaper countries, competitiveness was lost, and factories ended up closing. With no other economic engine and in a relative isolation, the settlements became dormitory towns or suburban enclaves that never reached their full potential. In private hands, heritage protection policies , different iterations and successive versions of a perfected Zlín, have continued their lives on different paths. These pieces of urbanism have been exposed to a multiplicity of realities and challenges in radically different contexts, even out of the sphere of influence of the company that created them. Therefore we can consider them as samples, products of a consistent project, on which it is possible to interpret the effects of economic and societal changes, to ask questions about urban resilience and sustainability, and to discern some trends, some of them general, some others more specific, that could facilitate the critical reformulation of a renewed relationship between design, labour, and capital. 19 I am considering as ‘towns’ those industrial settlements planned and built by the Bata Shoe Company based on a functional zoning that included factories, housing for workers, social infrastructure, and recreation. The company build dozens of other factories, some of which included a small housing compound. Víctor Muñoz Sanz, Between Global Turbulences and Local Manners 287 turned up as one of the only mechanisms to preserve the formal integrity of these urban ensembles20 In the Communist block, the centralized control on production carried out by the governments as well as the existence of safe markets for their products, mainly the USSR, made the towns thrive. The existing housing stock became state property, and that prolonged the original look of their architecture. Socialist programs put into service the existing Bata social infrastructure, and promoted the construction of new buildings. The need for more housing caused the introduction of new typologies, mainly prefabricated housing blocks. Progress and population growth—beyond the numbers they had been planned for— affected greatly the urban landscape and suburban feeling of the towns. After the fall of the iron curtain, the companies specialized on the manufacturing of shoes barely managed to survive a couple of years to the fierce competition in the capitalist global markets, bringing rampant unemployment to the towns. This has forced the municipal and regional governments to employ active policies to bring back economic development by finding alternative economies, or attracting new employers. . In spite of such—at times devastating yet revealing—panorama, the study of the specifics of some cases makes it possible to find some productive lessons in ways in which the effects of the neoliberal economy on these communities have been buffered. The cases of Batanagar, Batawa, and Otrokovice widen the scope of action and legacy of future designs, bringing them closer to discussions on infrastructure, landscape, and community participation. Batanagar: infrastructure and contingency. In contrast to, and at the expense of, the European cases, shoe manufacturing still takes place in Batanagar, India. In 1999, the need of the company to get rid of the high operating expenses of a 20 East Tilbury in the UK was designed a Conservation Area and contains listed buildings (Thurrock Council, 2007); the factories and part of the housing at Batadorp / Best in the Netherlands were declared Rijksmonumenten (Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed, 2014); the urban ensemble in Möhlin in Switzerland is an Industrial Monument of National Importance (Gemeinde Möhlin, 2006); new construction in Batatuba, Brazil, was prevented in the latest masterplan for the city (Prefeitura Municipal de Piracaia, 2006); Belcamp, USA, was listed in the National Registry of Historic Places in 1996, but in spite of that the complex was demolished in 2002 (Maryland Historical Trust, 2002). 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 288 large company town, a large tract of virtually open land in a dense city, coalesced with the interests of real estate developers eager to make profit with the money from raising upper classes and investment funds, and Batanagar became a construction site of a future new town (figure 3). The new form is organised along the structuring lines of the old town, to make use of the existing service infrastructure and access roads. The overall design is also determined by the existing nature (environmental laws in Kolkata enforce the conservation or transplantation of trees on site, and the preservation of the current water bodies) when in fact it was totally altered during the construction of the town. Contestation with the existing and neighbouring population is prevented with the relocation of workers in new apartments, the provision and access to public space for community use and festivals, and the preservation of the social infrastructure, schools and temples, once set by Bata and now used by a wider community. Whereas the old housing stock is being slowly demolished, part of the social and environmental legacy of the modern town will be preserved (Muñoz Sanz, 2013). Víctor Muñoz Sanz, Between Global Turbulences and Local Manners 289 Figure 3. Villas in the Officers' colony of Batanagar, with high-rise buildings for the new development under construction (Muñoz Sanz, 2013a, p. 102). Batawa: building with community. After the closure of the shoe factory in Batawa, Canada, unemployment and isolation put in severe risk the continuity of the existing community. The Batawa Development Corporation, chaired by Sonja Baťa21 21 Born Sonja Wettstain, she married Tomáš Baťa’s son, Thomas J. Baťa, in 1946. , is currently developing a sustainable community redevelopment plan, with 500 new homes and a forty-hectare business park. The project aims to bring new life to Batawa and make of it a model village which breaths from ideas from New Urbanism and smart growth, keeping a ski hill—founded by workers of the factory independently from the company management—as a regional recreational magnet and community centre. Excellence in design, community participation in decision-making, as well as environmentally and economically sustainability and social responsibility are the basis of the town’s transformation (Batawa Development Corporation, 2007). The symbol of the development is the 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 290 former factory building, which is being transformed into condominiums (figure 4) (Muñoz Sanz, 2012b). At the same time that it will come back to its original estate after the renovation, the project will eliminate any logo or symbol on it that might objectify the idea of a company owning a town. Figure 4. Residents preparing a skate ring for a community event in Batawa next to the old factory (Muñoz Sanz, 2012a). Otrokovice: logistical hub. Contrary to shoe manufacturing towns, those that because of Bata’s vertical integration depended on other, more specialized production (chemicals, synthetic products, and machinery) keep industry as the economic foundation to date, as the inheriting companies took advantage of their particular expertise, location, and industrial infrastructure, to maintain operations successfully. Otrokovice, the first Bata satellite town, was home of a variety of auxiliary industries that supported production in Zlín. It was established there because of its potential of becoming a nodal logistics centre: it is located adjacent to a main railway and highway corridor, and a canal for water Víctor Muñoz Sanz, Between Global Turbulences and Local Manners 291 transportation and an airport were constructed with the town. This logistical and industrial congestion resulted beneficial; as the city grew and has kept its diverse production facilities in use manufacturing the same products (tires, tanneries, airplanes) that Bata used to produce there, while the original urban form and architectures are reasonably well preserved (figure 5). Otrokovice is home of the largest tire manufacturer in Europe (Continental AG, 2013), and the inclusion of the city as a node in a pan-European infrastructural corridor (European Commission, 2013) anticipates further economic development. Figure 5. Former worker’s housing in Otrokovice. The old shoe tannery building is on the background (Muñoz Sanz, 2013b). From Zlín to Silicon Valley, and Dhaka: lessons from Bata The continuous search for an ideal industrial town undertook by the architects of Bata was inspired by a critical learning from past experiences and the feedback received from their own urban prototypes; truncated by the war, one wonders how the successive iterations would have looked like. The reality now is that the 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 292 engagement of corporations with the landscape of labour in the contemporary world can just be seen with dismay: from the non-urban clustering of company islands in Silicon Valley or the isolation of corporate headquarters in idyllic ‘pastoral’ landscapes22, to the growing divide between the environments in which products are designed and where they are manufactured—think of the fashion industry headquarters or Norman Forster’s building for Apple versus the manufacturing cities in China or the collapsed factory in Dhaka23 The turbulent history of the XX century makes it difficult to evaluate the success of this undertaking and the building of satellite cities, since these events prevented from full implementation or the planned course of their lives. In Spite of that, the Bata case is still extraordinary for it was able to build a decentralized system of satellites that proved to be successful as business strategy for survival in a critical moment, being the biggest evidence that the company is still a family business in operation today. For the company, building towns was not really a matter of charity or paternalism —all end up sharing similar challenges in housing, transportation or social justice. These conditions make more crucial than ever to re-imagine the role of design in achieving an integral and sustainable relationship between economy, urbanism, and the communities of labour. 24 22 Both Louize Mozingo in ‘Pastoral Capitalism’ (2011) and Alexandra Lange in ‘The Dot-Com City’ (2012) offer interesting views on the development and characteristics of corporate campuses and headquarters in America. but a social experiment which purpose was to placed people at the centre of the sustained growth of the company. For that, Tomáš Baťa thought it was instrumental to produce a new urban and social environment that would produce a new kind people, putting into practice the transformative agenda of modernism. Nevertheless, what makes it really unique is that in its effort for reproducing the same efficient environment everywhere by 23 A collapse of a factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh, killed more than 1,000 workers, raising criticism about the responsibility of fashion brands in the health and safety conditions of labour employed in the manufacturing of garments (New York Times, 2013); the conditions of workers manufacturing and assembling high tech gadgets in China were revealed in the Pulitzer-awarded series ‘The iEconomy’ published in the New York Times (2012). 24 In one of his speeches in 1924, Tomáš Baťa stated: ‘Our reason for giving you a share in the profits is not that we think we ought to distribute charity to mankind. Our aim is a different one. We want to raise the level of production…” (As quoted in Devinat, 1930a, p. 59) Víctor Muñoz Sanz, Between Global Turbulences and Local Manners 293 the exportation of a global and standardized, yet adaptable, social and urban system, it brought higher standards of urban landscape, housing and social infrastructure to both a town in Switzerland that to one in Kolkata. As a paradigmatic case that encompasses many others—from different times and geographies—learning from Bata urbanism, from its mistakes and achievements, brings about lots of issues to the renewed discussion on corporate urbanism, company towns, and international development. The most fruitful of those research and design questions that come up for consideration have to do with imagining ways of bridging the gap between the heroic and future-oriented visions of modernism, and its grounding on issues of social justice25 Planning for contingency. Can we plan in advance for uncertainty, exploding bubbles, and shrinkage instead of sticking to the illusion of unlimited sustained growth? Is the design of landforms, ecologies, and infrastructure—physical, social, and intangible—an alternative to immutable architectural forms as the only legacy of capital? , risk, ecology, and global economy. The following four provocations try to summarize those, and they are aimed not just at corporations, but also, and in particular, at designers, planners, and policy-makers: Interactive polycultures. Can we show the benefits of clustering, diversity, interdependencies, and exchange as opposed to monocultures in isolation? Responsive philanthropy. Would it be worth the effort of replacing enforced26 Corporate design responsibility. Could corporate social responsibility be measured in tangible and global design standards and not just on statistics and commitments on paper? , unregulated, philanthropy with negotiating an integrated vision for the future of working communities? 25 Susan Feinstein (2011) proposes diversity, equality, and democracy as the central concepts to incorporate social justice in planning. 26 The Indian New Companies Act of 2013 imposes under certain criteria a mandatory series of rules for companies in relation with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The bill estimates the amount to be spent according to the profit, but gives freedom to the companies to choose the field of action of their CSR (Indian Ministry of Corporate Affairs, 2014). 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 300 But, in fact, surrounded by hills that give it a horizon whose ridgeline is continuous and clearly perceptible from its interior,6 Brasília emerges as situated atop of an elevation at the heart of a ‘crater’. Figure 1. ‘Distrito Federal – Altimetria’ (Embrapa, s/d). Brasília|Plano-Piloto is situated at the centre of the ‘crater’. This ridgeline forms the basin of Lake Paranoá exhibiting altimetry variations of about 250m.7 In an unexpected way, this vision of a ‘valley’– a valley that has at its centre an elevation of approximately 200m in height – as a lowland was paradoxically reinforced by the realisation of its graphic registration. The construction of the new capital was officially approved in the mid 1940s, and at the start of the It is not difficult to imagine that the newcomers from Rio de Janeiro, first during the Cruls expedition, and then, in the various approaches taken to the construction of the city, coming from rugged topographies and densely occupied urban areas, saw this area as a vast flat space and fully available to welcome the new city. 6 The maps ‘Visibilidade do Horizonte de Brasília’ – which is incorporated in the ‘Mapa de Visibilidade do Horizonte do Plano Piloto de Brasília’ (2010) – and ‘Distrito Federal – Altimetria’ (Embrapa, s/d) gives us this evident perception. 7 This is an approximate value, obtained by cross-checking the information contained in the cartography ‘Distrito Federal – Altimetria’ (Embrapa, 2005) and ‘Mapa de Visibilidade do Horizonte do Plano Piloto de Brasília’ (2010). Maria Manuel Oliveira, (in) The invention of Brasília: modelling the Ground 301 following decade drafting began on the necessary cartography8 for the studies that would lead to the identification of its precise location. Performed using the most sophisticated technical means available at the time, initiated through flights and aerial photography, this physical recognition abstracted the interpretation of the territory by inferring a distant vertical view:9 Apparently, this flat figure defined the perception of space where the city would be located, even overlapping the cartography that confirmed a diverse morphology. Reinforcing this settlement, politicians, journalists and technicians – who all contributed to the construction of its collective imaginary – also arrived in Brasília by air. ‘from the distance, the landscape transforms into a figure’ (Labastida, 2013:I-62). And, in this instance, the ground flattens. This image has continued to build up to this day given that travelling within the city is done by car; and since it is not a city covered on foot, closely and at slow speed, the topographic variations of the land are not directly and susceptibly grasped. Thus, the representation of Brasília was built as if it were a flatland, a perception accentuated by its subsequent form of use. In the contemporary mental map, Brasília was, and is, a nazca figure.10 8 The survey was commissioned by the Comissão de Localização da Nova Capital Federal to a Brazilian company, Cruzeiro do Sul. The photographic mosaics prepared through these flights began a complex process of cartographic restitution executed by Geofoto, which resulted in a complete collection of extraordinary quality and accuracy, belonging to the ArPDF collection. 9 About the cartography as a ‘demiurgic instrument’, see Corboz, 2010. 10 Discovered in the 1830s, the nazca lines, executed between 200bC and 400aC in the Peruvian desert, are only readable by aerial view. In the same sense, to travel through Brasília is an experience powerfully amplified from the exercise of abstraction only possible to the connoisseur of its design, to those who can read the city at a bird’s flight. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 302 Figure 2. Brasília under construction, aerial view (source: Fundo Novacap, ArPDF). 2. The territory: its graphic representation The first aerial photogrammetric survey of the region was executed in 1954, at a scale of 1:250.000: covering an area of 52.000km2, it was defined from that which had been determined by the Cruls expedition. This survey was the basis for the study commissioned to the American company Donald Belcher, which selected five zones as the most favourable for the location of the new capital. Also, in 1954, surveys at a scale of 1:25.000 were executed in these zones, as a result the ‘brown site’ was chosen – and an area of 5.789,16 km2 was defined – for the city’s location. This approach led to a series of cartographic campaigns, now at a scale of 1:2000 (which reached an impressive 700 plan sheets) and of 1:1.000, drawn with great accuracy. Novacap, the entity responsible for managing the design process and construction of Brasília, was created in 1956, after Kubitschek election. In that same year, the competition for the design of Plano Piloto da Nova Capital do Brasil11 11 Prior to this competition many projects for the new capital had already been carried out (see Tavares, 2004), the most recent in 1955, the Plano Vera Cruz, commissioned by the Comissão de Localização da Nova Capital Federal. Featuring a Beaux-Arts design (Ficher, Leitão, 2011), it was launched. Quite open in its terms, it demanded that the participants Maria Manuel Oliveira, (in) The invention of Brasília: modelling the Ground 303 create a city model, specifically requesting the ‘basic outline’ at a scale of 1:25.000 and a ‘justificatory report’. Chartering the immense preparatory work of recognition and territorial registration carried out until then, the competition provided,12 among other elements, topographic surveys at various scales; later on, the participants were asked to consider: the water level of an artificial lake, to be created, at elevation 997,13 The territory that was delimited for the establishment of the city had an area of 150km2. Framed by the ridgelines of the surrounding mounts, its highest point is Cruzeiro, at 1.172 meters and its lowest point would be determined by the surface of the future lake. In a straight line between Cruzeiro and the water level a spur can be observed, dividing the basins of the rivers Gama and Torto, both profusely marked by streams. This hill is the morphological accident that, in reality, prevents the reading of the territory as a flat ground. the hotel and the presidential palace, the airport, a ‘railroad’ and a ‘motorway’ connecting Anápolis to Brasília (in Braga, 2010:43). 3. 1957. The Plano Piloto of Lucio Costa Selected from among 26 candidates, Lucio Costa’s proposal translates into a beautifully hand-drawn plan. The design does not expose its morphological support and, of the physical reality where the city will be located, it only already contemplated Lake Paranoá with the water level at a height very similar to that which later came to be adopted. 12 Launched in Rio de Janeiro in September 1956 by the Comissão de Planejamento, da Construção e da Mudança da Capital Federal, the National Competition for the Plano Piloto da Nova Capital do Brasil provided the participants with, namely: covering all of the Federal District, an aerial photogrammetric mosaic at a scale 1:50.000 (with contour lines at 20 in 20m), drainage and soil maps; ‘covering the site of the Capital (approximately 1.000km2)’, a topographic map executed by aerial photography, at a scale of 1:25.000, with contour lines at 5 in 5m, ‘photographic amplification of the maps of the site of the Capital (200km2), with contour lines at 5 in 5m’ and ‘regular topographic maps, at a scale of 1:2.000, with contour lines at one in one metre and two in two metres, of the area (150km2) indicated as ideal for the localisation of the urban area of the Federal Capital’ (‘Edital do Concurso...’ in Braga, 2010:39-41). 13 Lake Paranoá is approximately 45km, has a depth of 30m and a volume of water of 600 million cubic metres (Jeferson, 2004:158). It results from the damming of the river with the same name, formed by the junction of the rivers Torto and Gama, initiated in 1959; the water level came to be at elevation 1000. The formation of an artificial lake has already been contemplated by Glaziou (in Cruls, 1896:13), by closing a ‘loophole’, known as the waterfall of Paranoá. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 304 indicates Lake Paranoá, taking into consideration the limits defined for it in the competition.14 Although not explained, however, the ‘partido’ that was adopted was indelibly impressed by the topography, which can be verified by the overlapping of the Plano Piloto submitted for competition (PPB|1957) with one of the topographic surveys existent at the time. The ‘local topography’ is only referred to in point 2 of the Report that integrates the proposal when justifying the curvature of one of the axis. Figure 3. Brasília - Plano Piloto. Overlapping plan: ‘P.P.B. (Lúcio Costa, Competition 1957)’ and 'Mapa Indice... Sítio da Nova Capital do Brasil' | esc.1:100 000 (the author) 14 When compared to other proposals that were distinguished by the jury, it is evident that, although all contemplate the topographic information provided by Novacap in their designs, they do not give it particular importance (with the exception of the design submitted by Mindlin and Palanti, who featured the implementation of the two main roads in much the same way as Lucio Costa; and also, although to a much lesser degree, the plan of the Roberto Brothers). In fact, it is Lucio Costa’s design that gives more attention to the land’s morphology. Maria Manuel Oliveira, (in) The invention of Brasília: modelling the Ground 305 The design is tied, quite intentionally, to the morphology of the land: apart from the Eixo Residencial that, in an arch, accompanies the contours, the Eixo Monumental (the spatial structure that hosts the ‘monumental scale’ and integrates the connecting nodes with the territory outside the city) is exactly implanted at the top of the spur that moulds the local orography. 4. ‘put the city on the ground’ The Plan submitted for competition by Lucio Costa was, according to his own words, a ‘brief presentation of the partido’ that was adopted. As the winning plan, it was necessary to transform the idea into a project, giving it technical specifications, harmonising architecture and infrastructures, adapting the design to the land, in short, giving due measure to all parts. Apparently, however, the circumstance of Brasília being perceived as sitting on level ground and the naturalness with which the buildings appear to articulate with it, coupled with the fact that there are no known designs relating to a systematised topographic project, propagated the idea that no such project had existed and that the definition of the elevations for the setting out were decided as construction was being developed.15 Perhaps, for these reasons, the disciplinary literature we know systematically features the city in plan and shows no sections at urban-scale that relate to the design of the settlement with the corresponding manipulation of the land. However, the accentuated intervention on the original topography16 15 Given the speed at which construction was being developed, this situation occurred in particular in the setting out of the super-quadras. Moreover, this corresponds to the statement made by Nauro Esteves (Head of the Architecture Division / Oscar Niemeyer’s team, located in Brasília), who speaks of ‘doing directly on the ground’, in his testimony (1989). However, in the same series of ArPDF interviews, Sérgio Porto (1989), bothered by the results of ‘that business of Nauro, of not waiting’, states that it would not be necessary to do so. evident in the photographic records made during the construction of the city (Acervo Fotográfico ArPdf; Kim, 2010), suggests that this apparent naturalness is 16 The Revista Brasília nº 13/1958 (apud ‘Do imaginário ao concreto’, 2004, p.37), in the article ‘Estatísticas do primeiro ano de construção’, states that 7 million cubic metres of soil were moved, ‘gathering 428 heavy bulldozers’. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 306 carefully controlled. Proving this, Guimarães Filho (1998) mentions that the work of ‘materialising the city’ began by recognising the topography: ‘...we filled the plans with sections of the land... Here is 3%, here is 5, this here is zero... And we knew that the lake would be at elevation 1.000)’ and speaks of plans designed ‘contour line with contour line’. The plans were precise, no pretty designs, none of that… we would draw the final plan on altimetry paper that already had the natural contours and we would place over the natural contours the coordinate points and arrangement of the contours that result from the projected movement of soil (Guimarães Filho,1998). Jayme Zettel (2013) also attests to the existence of an accurate topographic control, stating, for example, cross-sections designed at 20 in 20m along the Eixo Monumental.17 And, although the respective plans have not yet been found, the statements made in the scope of the Programa de História Oral (ArPDF,1989) and the interviews carried out with Jayme Zettel and Jethro Bello Torres (2013) corroborate their existence. Also, the ‘Memórias de Cálculo da Urbanização de Brasília’ by Jethro Bello Torres, a document of great importance to the history of the construction of Brasília, confirms the existence of very precise elements orienting the topographic marking on the ground. Therefore, the development of the Plano Piloto implied the preparation of a detailed topographic plan,18 17 Among the various archives researched, it was not possible to find the plans that were drawn by Lucio Costa’s team in the scope of the topographic definition of Brasília. There is, however, a lot of documentation relating to the construction of the city that has not yet been catalogued, and it is expected that this material be found and identified. which was executed in Rio de Janeiro by Lucio Costa’s team. Under the technical management of Augusto Guimarães Filho, who ‘taught how to do it and who was instrumental to the development of the plan’ (Leal, Porto, 1989; Zettel, 2013), the task of ‘taking the city, materialising it, putting her to the ground’ began: 18 Moreover, the apparent non-existence of artificial hills and depressions resulting from large embankments or excavations in the vicinity of the city – traces usually left by the erection of new metropolises – seems to corroborate the idea that the calculations for the earthworks had in consideration, namely, the balance between excavation and embankment. Maria Manuel Oliveira, (in) The invention of Brasília: modelling the Ground 307 Thus... we begin to follow the supervision of Guimarães. Sectioning the ground, trying to place that arch... in truth, we had to work the ground a lot until placing it in the best position, for the purpose of sections, embankments, the position of the plan, the risk of Lucio Costa... Then began the calculation of the coordinates... we began to effectively carryout Lucio Costa’s plan (Zettel, 1989). The team worked at a scale of 1:2.000, adjusting the project over the montage of cartographic plans, spread out on a large table (Leal, Guimarães, Porto, 1989; Zettel, 2013) and calculating the coordinates,19 systematically checked with Joffre Mozart Parada, Head of Topography in Brasília, responsible in the field for the foundation of the city.20 The group from Rio was in permanent contact with Brasília by radio that operated 24 hours a day, by which coordinates, distances, surveys were confirmed: ‘Thus, we left the line open all the time... I would pass information via radio to Mozart... I continued to do all the points, because that time period was exactly that of the city’s outline’. Given the shortage of time, the coordinates for the foundation of the city were frequently provided under great pressure: ‘on site, the surveyor waiting with the machine... you giving, calculating, giving it him’. During that phase, contact via radio was complemented by the presence of the Architects from Rio in Brasília, who ‘rotated’ for that purpose. In 1961, part of the planning team set-up there, where Niemeyer’s group, responsible for the architecture, was already settled. Subject to multiple adjustments21 19 Jayme Zettel (2013) and Guimarães Filho (1989) mention ‘the old Facit machine, manual’, where they calculated the coordinates; they also mentioned that there was only one machine in the office and that many times it was necessary to line up to use it. as a result of comments by the jury and the inevitable confrontation between the idea presented for the competition and its 20 The testimonials are unanimous in defining Engineer Mozart Parada as one of the most competent technicians, always present, when and where necessary. José Silveira Filho, a cartographer that came to work with him at Novacap, in 1957, says that practically all of the Plano Piloto was implemented by Mozart (in Bello Torres, 2009). 21 Regarding the adaptation of the PPB submitted for competition and the erected city, see Leitão, 2003, and Braga, 2010:227-258. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 308 effective implementation, the Plano Piloto by Lucio Costa, however, maintained its integrity and spatial clarity due to this intensive monitoring.22 From those adaptations, the one that deserves to be focused on in the scope of the present article refers to the adjustment of the Eixo Monumental (EM): 23 Through the overlapping of the plan submitted for competition and of the current survey the jury’s criticism, that considered the implementation of the Plan too far away from the lake, imposed the shifting of the ‘point of intersection of both axis by about 800m, and thus, the whole urban area’ (Carpintero apud Leitão, 2003, p.98). The EM as a whole was also subject to important growth, which significantly amplified the dislocation of soil that Lucio Costa had already expressed in 1957. ‘The Eixo Monumental and the Rodoviária, that which was a real “Africa”, a very serious business in terms of earthmoving works’ (Zettel, 1998). 24 it is apparent that the extension of about 5.450m predicted in the initial plan (measurement between the axis of the path foreseen to the top west, that links the city to the outside and supports the railway station) grew almost by 2/3, reaching 8.716m in the executed plan.25 This expansion, which results in an overall extension of the length of the EM in about 3.260m, was not distributed equally through the various notable moments that accentuate and organise it, altering the geometric and topographic relationship the plan initially presupposed. 22 The testimonies of the architects involved in the construction of Brasília (Programa de História Oral, ArPDF, 1989), lead us to believe that, despite the existing group spirit, the relationship between the Urban Planning and Architecture Divisions was, at times, tense. 23 Whereas the project attempted to adjust the Eixo Rodoviário to the topography, it did not do so in relation to the Eixo Monumental; to the contrary, it attempted to assert it by making it ‘come off the ground’, a choice that implicated substantial earthworks (Guimarães Filho, 1989). On the urban history of the Eixo Monumental, consult Marquez, 2007. 24 This comparison was carried out by overlapping two common moments between both plans: contour line 1000, which defines the water level of Lake Paranoá, and elevation 1172, which corresponds to the highest point of the whole area of the Plano Piloto. This overlapping enables the procurement of approximate values for the distances and altimetries that were intended in the initial plan and these that were built. Given the nature of the cartographic manipulations that were executed, these values cannot be considered exact, but as references susceptible to comparison between each other. 25 This dimension – 8.761m – is according to that which is indicated in the plan ‘EMO I/I, Eixo Monumental, Locação Estradas - NOVACAP, 1959’. The marking points from which the topography of the EM was created are indicated at 100 in 100m, and the legend’s plan indicates that the coordinates are determined in relation to level 0. Maria Manuel Oliveira, (in) The invention of Brasília: modelling the Ground 309 Figure 4. Brasília - Plano Piloto | Eixo Monumental. Overlapping plan P.P.B. (Lúcio Costa, Competition 1957); Companhia Urbanizadora da Nova Capital, Planta aerofotogramétrica do Novo Distrito Federal, fls 15/16, esc. 1:25.000, 1958 (ArPDF); SICAD, esc.1:10000, 1997. Longitudinal sections, esc.1:50.000 (the author). The content of these changes and its impact on the overall perception of space were verified through the comparative reading of both plans and longitudinal sections, following the EM in the direction of Lake Paranoá. A. Estação Ferroviária (PPB|1957), current Estação Rodoferroviária Just like in the competition, it is the point that closes the urban area, connecting it, by land, to the rest of the country. However, whereas in the PPB|1957 it was back to back to the EM, directly included in its design, in its definitive setting out the Estação was relocated west approximately 2.020m, which removed it from the composition. Marking one of the instances in which pre-existence was decisive in its final localisation, this change is due to the attempt of the Estação to find support in the old route (the current EPIA) ‘that connected the settlement of Santa Luzia 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 316 GUIMARÃES FILHO, A. (1989). Depoimento - Programa de História Oral. Brasília: Arquivo Público do Distrito Federal. KIM L., WESELEY, M. (2010). Arquivo Brasília. China: Cosac Naify. LABASTIDA, M. (2013). El Paisaje Próximo. Fragmentos del Vale do Ave. Dissertação (Doutoramento em Arquitectura). Guimarães: EAUM. LEAL, J.A. (1989). Depoimento - Programa de História Oral. Brasília: Arquivo Público do Distrito Federal. LEITÃO, F. (2003). Do Risco à Cidade: as plantas urbanísticas de Brasília, 1957-1964. Dissertação (Mestrado em Arquitetura e Urbanismo). Brasília: FAU-UnB. MACEDO, D., SILVA, E. (2012). Brasília, the Palace of Congress and their urban changes. Finland: 12th International Docomomo Conference. MARQUEZ, M. (2007). A escala monumental do plano piloto de Brasília. Dissertação (Mestrado em Arquitetura e Urbanismo). Brasília: FAU-UnB. MORAES, V., JOBIM A. C. (1960). Brasília, Sinfonia da Alvorada. PORTO, S. (1989). Depoimento - Programa de História Oral. Brasília: Arquivo Público do Distrito Federal. ROSSETTI, E. (2010). Lucio Costa e a Plataforma Rodoviária de Brasília. Vitruvius, arquitextos. TAVARES, J. (2004). Projectos para Brasília e a cultura urbanística nacional. Dissertação (Mestrado em Arquitectura e Urbanismo). São Paulo: EESC-USP. TORRES, J. B. (1957-1962). Memórias de Cálculo da Urbanização de Brasília. Resumo, Formulário Técnico. Brasília: ArPDF, Fundo Jethro Bello Torres. VIEIRA JUNIOR, W. (2010). Vestígios no Parque Nacional de Brasília e na Reserva Biológica da Contagem: do campo da invisibilidade aos lugares de memória. Dissertação (Mestrado em Arquitectura e Urbanismo). Brasília: FAU-UnB. ZETTEL, J. (1989). Depoimento - Programa de História Oral. Brasília: Arquivo Público do Distrito Federal. Interviews Jayme Zettel (Junho de 2013). Entrevista. Rio de Janeiro. Jethro Bello Torres (Julho de 2013). Entrevista. Brasília: ArPDF. Jethro Bello Torres (Maio de 2009). Entrevista. Brasília: ArPDF. Maria Manuel Oliveira, (in) The invention of Brasília: modelling the Ground 317 Maria Manuel Oliveira, architect (Higher Institute of Fine Arts of Porto, 1985), is Associate Professor at the School of Architecture at the University of Minho. She she conducts work on architectural and urban design at the School’s Studies Centre. Her latest research has concentrated on the study of Modern Architecture in Lusophone countries, with a particular focus on Mozambique and Brasília. 318 SASOLBURG, A SOUTH AFRICAN NEW TOWN, 1951. The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ at a crossroads. Walter Peters University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa Abstract Despite its minerals and wealth of raw materials, natural oil is a resource South Africa does not possess. But, it has vast deposits of low grade coal which can be converted for the production of synthetic oil and petrol. Conceived in 1951 as the company town of the South African ‘oil-and petrol-from-coal’ corporation, Sasolburg is strategically located adjacent to vast deposits of coal, the Vaal River for supplying the large quantities of water required in the conversion process, and the principal consuming area of Johannesburg, some 100km northward. The design was entrusted to Swiss immigrant architect-planner, Max Kirchhofer (19102011) to whom the “aim of making towns safer places to live in” was paramount. However, conditioned by the apartheid paradigm, in fact, two towns with similar concepts were built, Sasolburg for whites and Zamdela for blacks. In both, main streets radiate from an inner ring road defining the central area free from vehicular traffic. While acknowledging its derivation from the Garden City and Radburn (1928), Kirchhofer devised what he termed the ‘Sasolburg pattern’ for the residential precincts. This pattern separates vehicular through-traffic from residential areas and, while the predilection for detached dwellings was accepted and other types of accommodation were correlated, a continuous system of wide, landscaped green strips, traverses residential areas affording pedestrian access to the primary school, shops and recreation club, and from one precinct to the other, keeping intersections with main streets to an absolute minimum. Six decades on, the petrol-from-coal industry still flourishes, but concerns for personal safety have rendered the park strips a liability, exacerbated by the high garden walls now surrounding the houses which limit surveillance. The priorities of the new municipality are different and walkways and park strips are unkempt. An attempt has been made to infill the parks with housing to densify the town, and informal trading has changed the quality of the walkways in the centre of town. In the post-apartheid South Africa, the aim “of making towns safer places to live in” requires more than separating pedestrians from vehicles. Keywords: South African new towns, Max Kirchhofer, Sasolburg pattern. Walter Peters, SASOLBURG, A SOUTH AFRICAN NEW TOWN, 1951. The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ at a crossroads. 319 A town for the South African oil-from-coal industry Despite its minerals and wealth of raw materials, natural oil is one of the few resources South Africa (SA) does not possess. It does, however, have vast deposits of low grade coal, which could be converted for the production of synthetic oil and petrol. For this purpose, initial investigations commenced with a ‘white paper’ published in 1927 and the passing of the Liquid Fuel and Oil act in 1947, before the government founded the SA Coal, Oil & Gas Corporation Ltd in 1951. This corporation selected for its plant and employees a site adjacent to vast deposits of low-grade coal in the northernmost tip of the (Orange) Free State province; the Vaal River to supply the large quantities of water required in the conversion process; and the principal consuming area of the Witwatersrand, Gauteng Province today, some 70-100km northward. The town’s name is derived from the Afrikaans translation, Suid Afrikaanse Steenkool-, Olieen Gaskorporasie (Raper: 2004) but the suffix ‘burg’ appears to have been without particular foundation. The featureless site lies in an elevated position at 1500m altitude, on a gentle gradient on the western flank of a dome-shaped hill, for which 2145ha (5300 acres) of farmland were acquired. The town would fringe a new inter-provincial road across the Vaal River to Vanderbijlpark, another new industrial town established as a duplicate of the Iscor (now Arcellor Mittal) steel plant in Pretoria, planned from 1942 onwards. Like Vanderbijlpark, Sasolburg was to be an ‘open’ town with property rights for its residents (Meintjes: 1975, 47). Water was available from seven boreholes and from 1953 it was pumped from the Vaal (Meintjes: 1975, 48). 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 320 Figure 1. Location of Sasolburg relative to the Vaal River and Johannesburg (Kirchhofer: 1958A,19). Planner, priorities and prescriptions The design of Sasolburg in late 1951 was entrusted Swiss immigrant architectplanner, Max Kirchhofer (1910-2011), a product of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich. As work was scarce and “storm clouds [were] brewing over Europe”, Kirchhofer and his wife, also an architect, had left for South Africa during the 1930s and settled in Johannesburg. During World War II, Kirchhofer graduated from the part-time Planning course offered by Wilfred Mallows at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg (Cooke & Kirchhofer: 2010, 45-46). While a few SA town planners might have been considered, it could not be established why the immigrant was commissioned with the design of such an important innovation as the company town of Sasolburg, save to say his training and skills in Zurich were of cutting edge. To Kirchhofer the “aim of making towns Walter Peters, SASOLBURG, A SOUTH AFRICAN NEW TOWN, 1951. The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ at a crossroads. 321 safer places to live in” was “paramount”, and he later qualified this priority: “By 1951 motor vehicles had become a cause for concern in SA towns. Incidence and use was much greater than in Europe and the trend was following the growth pattern of the United States. Vehicles were free to traverse any street spreading danger and disturbance into those parts, which by their function, had a claim to peace and quiet” (Kirchhofer: 1976, 68). Subservient thereto were three aspects which Kirchhofer labelled as being of “governing importance”: free movement of main roads without interfering the beneficial occupation of the land; residential areas in self-contained units containing all that was necessary for daily living; and the creation of a coherent urban scene, wherever possible in the residential areas and certainly in the town centre (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 20). However, due to the prevailing legislated segregation imposed by apartheid ideology, Kirchhofer actually designed two towns, Sasolburg in the north for a maximum of 20 000 whites and Zamdele in the south for 30 000 blacks. This was in itself an unusual brief as, although the planning of ‘native locations’ or ‘townships’ usually fell to the state or municipality, here it was integral with the planning of the company town. Nevertheless, legislation required that spatial separation and buffers be provided between the two population groups, which purpose was served by the oil refinery, another area of similar extent reserved for future petro-chemical industrial development, and the waste disposal grounds. Due to the constraint in site area, these industries are right opposite the initial residential areas of both town and township, which Kirchhofer mitigated with tree belts and parks. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 322 Figure 2. General layout of Sasolburg (top) and Zamdela (bottom) separated by the Sasol oil-from-coal plant (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 22). Planning concept Main roads radiate from an inner ring road, which partly defines the central area free from vehicular traffic. The five residential areas, which Kirchhofer termed precincts, lie within the meshes of the network of main roads. This pattern separates vehicular through-traffic from residential areas, which are traversed by a continuous ring of wide, landscaped green strips, affording pedestrian access to the primary school, shops and recreation club, and from one precinct to the other and to the central area, while keeping intersections with main streets to an absolute minimum. The green strips would effectively bring parks to the people, form continuous walk-ways away from the main roads where the “pedestrian is out of place” and break the spread of the residential area. Kirchhofer made the analogy: “Like rivers, [the green strips would] meander through the whole residential area and in their sweep unite the different sections” (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 24). The green strips also accommodate the Walter Peters, SASOLBURG, A SOUTH AFRICAN NEW TOWN, 1951. The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ at a crossroads. 323 water and cable mains laid as rings, which principle also facilitates stormwater drainage. Service industries, including the cemetery, gaol and show ground, fringe the south-west of the layout with the hospital on the north-east. While smaller, the plan of Zamdela follows suit. To quote Kirchhofer: “The requirements of the urban Native population are essentially the same as those of the white inhabitants. For this reason the layout is similar. In fact, the green strips in which all parks, sports fields and other recreational facilities are combined are even more essential. Not only is there a larger number of people to use the walkways, but there is urgent need for organising the sprawl of closely spaced cottages into smaller sections of creating a sense of locality. The bands of landscaped open spaces reach up to the homes and so set the stage for the development of community life” (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 27) The initial two residential units of Zamdela were developed in accordance with the official standards of accommodation prepared jointly by the Native Affairs Department, National Housing Office, and the Building Research Institute. This included single-sex compounds for the accommodation of black men. Developing the ‘Sasolburg pattern’ Kirchhofer carefully examined two current examples of residential units, what he called the ‘English pattern’ such as the Welwyn Garden City (1920), and Stein & Wright’s ‘Radburn pattern’ (1928) “created in an enthusiastic attempt to tame the dangerous motor car and put it in its appropriate place in American community life” (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 24). In the ‘English pattern’ the feeder roads traverse the residential units to give access to “development streets” which in the shape of “loops, cul-de-sacs and courts” form the setting for the spatial grouping of buildings in a “restful atmosphere”. Access points to residential units can be kept to a minimum so as not to interfere unnecessarily with the flow of traffic in the circumferential roads. However, shops, school and park are separated by traffic routes from the greater part of the residential area, which until the private car becomes the 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 324 indispensable medium of locomotion as in SA, concluded Kirchhofer, could develop into a serious problem, particularly where local shops attract traffic denser than that on the main roads (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 24). In the Radburn pattern all thru-traffic is excluded; cul-de-sacs provide vehicular traffic access to dwellings which on opposite side face on to a footpath leading into a central park area. No car threatens safety or disturbs peace. However, if applied in SA, surmised Kirchhofer, such footpaths would at once be “decried as sanitary lanes in the condemnation of which householders, policemen and municipal officials [would] speak with one voice”. But, the real problem, argued Kirchhofer, resulted from the “multiplicity of intersections along the main roads where vehicles turning into the residential cul-de-sacs impede and endanger the straight flow of traffic” (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 24). In consequence, Kirchhofer derived the ‘Sasolburg pattern’, conditioned by his aim and the three aspects of “governing importance” stated earlier. Following these, he separated through traffic from “use areas” and limited links with the local street system to an absolute minimum. Hence local streets of each sector of a residential unit are inter-leading. It is unavoidable that children on their way home from school have to cross some of these streets, but the larger part of their walks is in the park strips which are reached through short pedestrian lanes placed at convenient points. Dangers would be considerably reduced, argued Kirchhofer, if residential sectors were ‘kept small’ with drastically reduced permissible speed limit – 64.36km/h (40mph) on main streets and half for the “short last lap of the journey” (32km/h). The latter was not introduced but the general speed limit in SA towns is 60 km/h (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 24). The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ is unique with residential quarter cells bordered by main routes and green strips, with the result that only internal traffic is found within. Interestingly, the aggregate road area covers 22.3% of the residential area, saving 1/10 of the usual 25% (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 25). Access to schools, shops and the CBD was made easier for pedestrians and cyclists as the green strips are free from vehicles and the distance is shorter. One researcher quotes a woman who grew up in Sasolburg and recalled the green strips as spaces where “after 5 Walter Peters, SASOLBURG, A SOUTH AFRICAN NEW TOWN, 1951. The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ at a crossroads. 325 o’clock [in the evening], you found families on bicycles, families walking their dogs, old people walking hand in hand” (Sparks: [2011],7) . These were venues for relaxation. Figure 3. The English garden city concept (top left), Radburn (top right), and the 'Sasolburg pattern' (bottom) (Kirchhofer: 1958A, 22). Establishing Sasolburg It was decided that the initial residential area of Sasolburg should be established for 10-11000 whites, i.e. making up a crescent of the whole. Many residents would be young men and technically skilled immigrants recruited from Europe for the installation of the plant and whose families would follow, hence the need for hostel accommodation for whites with a mess (kitchen and dining facilities) and a recreation club with associated sports fields which were placed up against the provincial road. Couples would be accommodated in apartments and families in terrace housing limited to 2-3 storeys to maintain a close relationship 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 332 The design of Sasolburg was a product of its time still waiting to be dragged into the 21st century. The aim “of making towns safer places to live in” today refers to personal safety, a desire even more elusive to achieve but now paramount. Acknowledgement This work is based upon research supported by the National Research Foundation. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and therefore the NRF does not accept any liability in regard thereto. References Cooke, J & Kirchhofer, N (2010) Stalwarts of the profession. Two centenarians. Architecture SA, Sept/Oct, pp43-47. Floyd, T. (1966). More about town planning in South Africa. Pietermaritzburg: Shuter & Shooter. Greig, D. (1971). A Guide to Architecture in South Africa. Cape Town: Howard Timmins. Harrison, P (2004). South Africa’s top sites: struggle. Kenilworth: Spearhead. Kirchhofer, M. (1958A). Sasolburg O.F.S. Report on the new town by Max Kirchhofer. South African Architectural Record, Vol 43, March, 18-35. Kirchhofer, M. (1958B). Sasolburg. South African Architectural Record, April, 18-35. Kirchhofer, M. (1976). The role of the architect in planning new towns. Planning & Building Developments, December, pp67-72. Meintjes, J. (1991) Sasol 1950-1975. Cape Town: Tafelberg (2nd edition) Sparks, S. [2011]. “Spoiling the neighbourhood, pulling down the town”: Making class and race in apartheid-era Sasolburg. Unpublished paper presented to Critical Studies Group, University of the Free State, August. Walter Peters, SASOLBURG, A SOUTH AFRICAN NEW TOWN, 1951. The ‘Sasolburg pattern’ at a crossroads. 333 Raper, P. (2004). New dictionary of South African place names. Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball. Watson, D; Plattus, A; Shibley, R. (2003). The Radburn Idea. Time-saver standards for urban design. New York: McGraw-Hill, pp2.7-1-2.7-7. Walter Peters is an architect, architectural and urban historian, editor of a professional journal, and Professor of Architecture at the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein, South Africa. 334 MAT BUILDINGS – GATED CITIES. Critical, change and paradoxical phenomenon in last 20th century new towns Iván I. Rincón Borrego Higher School of Architecture, University of Valladolid, Spain Abstract The paper aims to revalue and to compare two urban phenomena of growth and change during the second half of the 20th century: the Mat Building and the Gated City. On the one hand, Mat Building is analysed as a modern strategy of spatial and formal organization in architecture, which is related to the concept of Mat Urbanism. This idea is rooted in the interest of TEAM X in the traditional cities of North Africa, Japan and China, among others, during the late 1950s and 1960s. In 1974 Alison Smithson defined this urban structure using the model of Arab fortresses called Kasbah: “where the functions come to enrich the fabric, and the individual gains new freedoms of action through a new shuffled order, based on interconnection, close knit patterns of association and possibilities for growth, diminution and change.” Alison Smithson formulated an alternative to the functional city described in the CIAM´s Athens Charter. But she also proposed a new urban form, closed and opened at the same time, a kind of urban structure based on the necessity of identity and mobility. On the other hand, the phenomenon of the Gated City is also closely related to the idea of urban identity. The CIDs (Common-Interest-Developments) began to emerge at the end of the 1970s, but actually, that idea was put into practice during the 19th century, as a reaction of utopian socialism to environmental and social consequences of the Industrial Revolution. In the context of the sprawling city, during second half of the 20th century, the New Urbanism also established its criticism to the urban ideology of the Modern Movement, as the TEAM X had done before them. However, unlike the previous one, this current used the paradigm of the walled medieval city, or Gated City, which was indebted to the anti-industrial manifesto of Rob and Leon Krier. They wrote: “function follows form”, and not the opposite, as Louis Sullivan had said. Therefore, a purely picturesque approach to urban form was adopted, against the rationalism of the modern post-war planning. The paper compares both strategies through European and North American urban developments. It analyses their spatial and social structures pointing their own relevance in contemporary urban discourse, and it provides a critical relationship between them, which is full of paradoxes and contradictions for the sustainable urbanism and the landuse planning challenges. Keywords: Mat Building, TEAM 10, New Urbanism, Gated city. Iván I. Rincón Borrego, Mat Buildings – Gated Cities 335 1. During the second half of the 20th century, urban planning has faced one of the periods of major change and growth of cities. Initially, the requirements of European post-war reconstruction caused the application of functionalist guidelines of the Athens Charter during the 50s. Then, as reaction during the 1960s, groups of younger architects, as the Team 10, led to a fertile and intelligent review with alternatives to the doctrine of the CIAM. At the same time, in parallel to these events of urban theory and critique, the reality was conducted by a rapid stretch of large cities. Especially in the United States, this period saw the emergent of a radically horizontal urbanism, driven by the enhancement of motorway and the suburban ideal of private housing. Meanwhile, in Europe, part of the debate focused on the role of the modern city and its relationship to the existing city. From the contemporary point of view, our paper tries to revalue two urban process of growth and change of the late twentieth century: the Mat-Building and the Gated City, in order to analyse their spatial and social structures and to point their own relevance in contemporary urban discourse. 2. In September 1974, coinciding with the 15 years since the founding meeting of the 10 Team in Otterlo, Alison Smithson publishes How to recognise and read to mat-building. Following the death of Shadrach Woods on July 31, 1973, the article makes a first assessment of the achievements of the group and it presents a sort of manifesto of a new emerging urban organization called Matbuilding. This idea comes in the middle of the debate on the role of the modern city and its relationship to the existing city. The urban paradigm during post-war European reconstruction was a blend between the Garden City of Ebenezer Howard and the modern functional city derived from the Charter of Athens led by Le Corbusier. Team 10´s urban tendency considers the importance of the independence between roads and pedestrian walkways, which had already been used by Ludwig Hilberseimer in his Vertical City, (1924) or the analysis of traffic 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 336 flows of Louis Kahn developed for the Mid-Town Plan of Philadelphia (1953). Figure 1. Smithson, A. (1974). How to Recognize and read Mat-Building. Mainstream architecture as it developed towards mat-building. Source: Architectural Design, no. 9. The group Team 10, in general, and the Smithsons, in particular, analyse the city in terms of patterns of association, rather than in terms of functional organization as the CIAM had done. Their proposals bring forward the streets of London’s working class neighbourhoods as inspiration for a new form of architecture and urban design. They understand the street as a stem of public life, an idea that is developed in the competition for a new housing block at Golden Lane (1952). Instead of Le Corbusier’s Unite d’Habitation and its internal street, the Smithsons do emphasis the building as a cluster within a bigger organism, in order to create a network of continuous buildings arranged in a kind of cellular pattern. Their building would be articulated with “streets in the air”, open galleries that provide access to flats, but at the same time also function as places for human encounter and interchange. Iván I. Rincón Borrego, Mat Buildings – Gated Cities 337 Figure 1. Competition for Golden Lane, 1952. Source : Smithson and Smithson, 2005.’ In 1974 Alison Smithson explains this urban structure outright, `mat-building can be said to epitomize the anonymous collective; where the functions come to enrich the fabric, and the individual gains new freedoms of action through a new shuffled order, based on interconnection, close knit patterns of association and possibilities for growth, diminution and change.´ (Smithson, 1974) Her words claim a multi-nuclear urban model that fosters social activity through control of urban density, a model that is able to grow and integrate large areas of public green space, and transform the chaos caused by the growing presence of the automobile into an ordered structure. Stan Allen has also insisted in these principles of mat-building: “Its job is not to articulate or represent specific functions, but rather to create an opened field where the fullest range of possible events might take place”. (Allen, 2001, p. 122). However, the term mat-building has different nuances and annotations by the Smithsons, who did not give a single clear and unambiguous definition of it, as Carles Muro has studied. In one hand, Peter Smithson talks about “networks plans - so called mat buildings” in ILAUD 1980 in Urbino, definition that stresses towards the objectual nature of architecture. When ILAUD´s texts from 1977 to 1990 are reviewed for publication, Peter Smithson corrects the term to “layered 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 338 net plan”. In the other hand, in the original document Alison Smithson proposes an earlier meaning: “Mat-Building: a newly invented connective urban arrangement”, emphasizing the planning aspects and the idea of urban landscape (Muro, 2011, p.45). In fact, the term mat-building may represent the idea of building as mat, in the identification of the substantive character of 'building' or, conversely, if 'building' is understood as a verb, we would be talking about a way of create architecture, a formal system. The ambiguity of the term, together with the guidelines used by Shadrach Woods at the Free University of Berlin, “groundscraper”, reaffirms the mat-building as horizontal extension system that promotes the exchange and the feeling of belonging to a community, a concept between building autonomy and connectivity in the city. The most importance projects of Team 10 as the Frankfurt-Römerberg centre (1963) and the Berlin Free University (1963) by George Candilis, Alexis Josic y Shadrach Woods seem to demonstrate that the ambivalence of the term. Their flexibility makes syncretism between architectural design and city project thoughts easier. This strategy provides potentially enriching exchanges for both architecture and city, linking the genetic identity of growth and change of the built form. In that sense, the ambiguity of the term mat building, has served to stimulate the imagination of many architects since then. Examples such as the Agadir Convention Centre (1990), Rem Koolhaas or the Yokohama International Port Terminal (1995-2002), Foreign Office Architects have used that ambivalence although do not represent themselves a mat-building. The suggestive flexibility of the architectural form together with the patterns of association, have revitalized interest in Alison Smithson´s article. Mat-buildings are strongly influenced by the dense historical tissue of traditional cities. According to Alison Smithson, “The systems will have more than the usual three dimensions. They will include a time dimension". (A. Smithson. 1974). So mat-building conception also recognizes that authentic city culture is the product of many hands over an extended period of time. In particular, the traditional Arabic Kasbah fascinated the Smithsons; its rich texture is “full of starts and stops and shadow… with a high degree of connectedness to allow for change of Iván I. Rincón Borrego, Mat Buildings – Gated Cities 339 mind and the in-roads of time” (Smithson, 1974). A kind of urban structure whose spatial qualities became condensed into continuous structures of interlinked stems. Apart from Kasbah, many other traditional urban tissues are quoted by the Team 10´s interest. Alison Smithson´s text weaves words and images of several historical cities and buildings. She goes back to pictures and descriptions of Villa Katsura, the necropolis of Saqqara, Deir-el-Bahari, Sinan, Honan, Fatehpur Sikri and the vaulted constructions of Greek and Arabic architecture, suggesting that architects should create together with ancient architectures and cities. Her text does not distinguish between chronologies or styles, between small and large scale. But it seems that it tries to build a kind of conscious lineage of matbuildings in which the project for the Berlin Free University (1963), together with their own proposal for the reconstruction of Berlin-Hauptstadt (1957), are the main characters. The project of Berlin-Hauptstadt is one of the best examples to understand the multifaceted character of the notion of mat-building. The project illustrates the Smithsons’ ideas about mobility networks in post-war cities. According to the English authors, “the urban forms of Berlin Hauptstadt have as their basis the idea of mobility, of absolute maximum mobility, achieved by a layered movement pattern that separates the various means of expression and gives to each its own geometry, its own formal expression.” (Smithson and Smithson, 2005). Instead of divisions, which characterize the previous guidelines of CIAM’s functionalistic cities, they suggest that new ways of mobility ask for new physical and architectural patterns of connectivity. 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 340 Figure 3. Competition for Berlin Haupstadt, 1958. Source : Smithson and Smithson, 2005.’ The mat’s indefinite circulation network is the project’s generator. Its spatial organization takes the form of a multi-level grid with pedestrian walkways in upper level, and roads for vehicles in down level, linked by platforms and mechanic stairs. It reinterprets the traditional elements of the nineteenthcentury city (streets, squares, buildings) to subordinate them to a new urban hybrid structure, which is building and city at the same time, resulting an open array type, different from previous historical models proposed by the Modern Movement. The paradox of this project is that far from integrating the new and the existing cities, it puts in crisis the model that in theory should pursue, that is the notion of mat-city. Interestingly, the architects propose a limit of buildings sinuous southward, which act as a border between the new city and the old one, being the only possible direction of free growth towards the Tiergarten. Therefore, in fact it emphasizes the idea of walled city as a model of inspiration. Rather than propose a kind of mat-urbanism able to expand indefinitely, BerlinHauptstadt is not intended to be sewn to the consolidated urban fabric and grow Iván I. Rincón Borrego, Mat Buildings – Gated Cities 341 in all directions. Under certain point of view, it is actually more like the examples of historical cities described by the Smithsons, a defensive city protected by walls, or buildings in our case. Nevertheless, the ideas of Team 10 have a clear integrative intention. BerlinHauptstadt is not based on the traditional continuity with the existing urban fabric, but it is based on a strategy that gives continuity to the landscaped and topographic elements. It produces an artificial urban carpet that adds to the existing layer as a palimpsest. It conceives the city as public free space per se, open space and uncrowded, in which the network of elevated roads and park together form a unitary whole. It does not distinguish between city and green space integrating both of them. Moreover, the value of the proposal for Berlin lies in the design of a strategy of city that will allow the development and growth not in terms of planning, but in terms of adaptation to the changing patterns of human associations. It represents an alternative to the Rationalist and American models of New Towns, unsuccessful attempts of a new urbanism based on responses contrary to the traditional city; centre of low density versus centre of high density built in height; integration of green spaces versus sprawl city; specialized ways versus hegemony of cars over pedestrians; multi-nuclear centres versus unique centre with radial growth. Therefore, the ideology of the 10 Team, in general, and of the Smithsons, in particular, is built as a thought in permanent evolution where the gaze to the past plays a key role. Their ideas conceive the History of Architecture as the history of anonymous shared problems, expanding architecture temporally and geographically, which they qualify endowed with enormous capacity to adapt to change, regardless of use, location or appearance. 3. Alison Smithson´s article is clearly retrospective but is not closed to future. Since it was written in 1974, cities have developed in unpredictable ways. If certain strategies of urban development described by the article have dead- 20th Century New Towns. Archetypes and Uncertainties Conference Proceedings. Oporto, May 22-24, 2014 348 Team 10´s mat-building relocates modern architecture within the tradition of urban form, breaking with the functionalist isolation of the guidelines of the Modern Movement and CIAM. Structural aspects found in the mat-buildings (overlay, continuity, identity, flexibility) are shared with the historical urban fabric. Therefore, they represent a certain return to the old city, after the urban ostracism of the avant-garde. But while those ingenious proposals arise, it would have been plausible to wonder about the critical size that the growth of matbuilding may have. In the one hand, the Smithsons were among the first to recognize the potential of infrastructure to influence the future development of the city -under certain point of view, Le Corbusier also shares that meritnevertheless, in the other hand, they have also unwittingly endorsed the conceptual apparatus of modern sprawl. According to Jaime Ferrer “In theory, the mat typology offers a flexible framework for relating to a site through, an uninterrupted continuation of the urban fabric into its own spatial network”. (Ferrer, J. 2011) But in practise, today, it seems that the notion of urban mat and cluster, understood as a link in a chain of urban spaces, has been replaced by the idea of fortress, in response to the uncontrolled sprawl of the contemporary city without identity. Matbuildings and gated cities demonstrate that architecture´s mediating role becomes increasingly difficult to maintain in a sprawling urban context; so new strategies are required. Acknowledgments This paper is developed at CEAA | Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo da ESAP, with FEDER funds by the Operational Competitiveness Programme – COMPETE and national funds by FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia, within the project PEstOE/EAT/UI4041/2014. References Allen, S. (2001). Mat Urbanism: The Thick 2-D. In Sarkis, S., Allard, P. and Hyde, T. (ed), Case: Le Corbusier’s Venice Hospital and the Mat Building Revival. New York: Prestel. Blakely, E. J. & Snyder, M. G. (1999) Fortress America. Gated Communities in the United States. 1ª edición. Washington, D.C: Brookings Institution Press. [Document text truncated for crawler view.]