Synoptic Tactics: Mapping Territorial Transgressions

The paper introduces theoretical paradigms, compu¬tational strategies, and representational techniques to uncover, analyze, and engage cross-boundary, territorial phenomena affecting multi-jurisdictional urban environments. Jurisdictional boundaries (between cities, states, regions, and nations) and urban boundaries (between zones, neighborhoods, land uses and owners) routinely impose artificial limits on the representation and understanding of territorial phenomena. Just as architects often limit site surveys and detailed site investigations near the confines of a given property line, designers and public officials considering transformations of urban neighborhoods, cities, and city regions are often bound to studies that end at the limits of the urban form. These representational limits are not necessarily intentional oversights on the part of the designer; rather, they are practical results of various data regimes, economic constraints, and ownership models which atomize and selectively distribute spatial and environmental information. Simultaneously, there is a growing sensibility toward transboundary conceptions of shared challenges within bio-regions, eco-regions, watersheds, and similar transboundary constructs gaining geopolitical and design currency.1 Designers seeking to assemble cross-boundary geospatial representations to better assess and intervene within these constructs face challenges in the fragmentation of data sources and incongruous or incomplete data across jurisdictional divides. The paper details a series of novel synoptic tactics, computational tools and geospatial data visualization techniques projecting territorial transformations beyond the limits of jurisdictional boundaries.

https://doi.org/10.35483/ACSA.AM.109.26

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ISBN
978-1-944214-37-1