By Demonstration: Catalyzing Change

BY DEMONSTRATION reflectively and projectively explores the work of a Design-Build Studio in suggesting a re-emergent urban environment. It is an alternative form of urban environment; one that originates at the edge – in the marginalized and underutilized sectors of the city. It is predicated on immediate action through the implementation of built interventions developed through participatory design processes with community stakeholders and residents. The programs for these interventions are tangibly relevant to needs of local residents and are entirely representative of their empowerment in achieving implementation. The re-emergent urban environment established through these interventions is not characterized by a singular plan, image, or vision; but by aggregation over time – an agglomeration of catalytic projects. The agglomeration is not subversive or dystopic – it is predicated on the reorientation of once viable landscapes and structures; emerging from collaborative, transparent process – demonstrative of public interest. The work of the design build studio utilized to illustrate the potential of public interest design is firmly tied to its own context – the social and economic conditions of western Pennsylvania (USA). While explicitly specific to regional context, design and implementation processes are strategy based, suggesting broader relevance. This paper utilizes an interactive installation that was built by the design-build entity to communicate the potency that catalytic projects can have over time. Sequential projections and film utilized to communicate with audiences are utilized to illustrate how design-build processes, modest design-build projects, and participatory design can be of great significance. The paper covers eight completed projects in brief and objectively illustrates their successes and failures in suggesting a re-emergent urban environment. Data collected from the projects is utilized to suggest what impact a similar form of work, generated over the next fifty years might have in catalyzing a more positive urban future. In each case, the location and scale of a catalytic demonstration project is presented. Second, the immediate spheres of influence that the project has had are identified. Data regarding challenges addressed and constituencies engaged, both public and private, through participatory process to facilitate the implementation of the projects is provided as a mechanism for demonstrating the practical underpinnings of this theoretical projection – a projection which threads the links between: 1) URBAN ANALYSIS, 2) Analytical Research, 3) Urban Design Framework Development, 4) Opportunity Identification, 5) Objective Identification, 6) Stakeholder Identification, 7) Program Development, 8) Constituent Engagement, 9) Project Funding, 10) Project Design, 11) Multi-Scale Systems Development, 12) Construction, 13) Monitoring and Post Occupancy Evaluation, 14) Replication, and 15) policy change.

Volume Editors
Sergio Palleroni, Ted Cavanagh & Ursula Hartig

ISBN
978-0-935502-94-7