s u s t a i n i n g
ou r
u r b a n
i c o n s
Copyright. Tommy Ong, Fifth Year Student, School of Architecture, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. 2000.
The city is a record of a vital, dense and ever changing series of relationships, all of which involve bridging between humanity and its surroundings. It also acts as the centre in supporting the cultural production, social innovation and the economic activity. Ever since the dawning of the ages, humanity has attempted to identify their land with means of icons designed to physically embody their civilization and aesthetic culture. Many political agenda in the past were orientated towards achieving a more integrated society based on a strong establishment with its citizens. Urban icons are often employed to collect people -- connecting between the people and city that result in a better understanding of their history and culture. At the functional level, urban icons are essentially concerned with memory and recording memory. As a key component in our collective memory, our urban icons enable us to go on with life, marking a point of change, connecting the past and establish our vision for the future. The monumentality of urban icon in turns identified its presence to its citizen as well as the people globally. Large urban projects include the civic and religious buildings, meeting places and market characterized town or city. But our contemporary cities are lacking the element sense of providing the sense of pride with our city. Good urban space makes use of city icons, it relates to them and they relate to it and this mutual interaction happens at both conscious and sub-conscious levels. Urban icons give people the opportunity to gather and builds upon the energy - giving the city a hierarchy order. One a global terms, when a tourist wants to learn about a new city, one is automatically turned into the beautifully photographed books on the architecture of the city. These architectures are the icons that define the city presence. Thus, quality of urban design is not just about monetary and functional intent, but also about providing urban icons that can lift the spirit of the city emotionally and reveal that spirit to the rest of the people on the earth. Memory of the city resides in its urban icons, and that without them the city is no longer special. Our problem today is that we no longer build mega urban developments.
One may question: If there are so many advantages of having city icons, why is there a notion of government not likely to contribute to the development of city icons? We might perhaps no longer able to see mega-project like Eiffel tower, Louvre or L'Arc de Triomphe ever again. What are the fundamental causes? What do one need to do to ensure that our city icon will not end in our time?
Ultimately, the answer should starts with the governmental constraints. Our modern city is no longer the same as the historical city, and evidently our government's agenda has changed in accordance to our modern situation. Perhaps it is inevitable that the planners in local government, admittedly daily dealing with urban design issues, is going to concentrate on procedure and policy rather than the academic and design notions behind urban design. With the enormous load of legislation, policy, educational and promotional activity around urban design, little work is actually being done in terms of designing our city. The inherited meaning behind city icons no longer appear as the priority in the political agenda. Instead, the local government placed more emphasis on ensuring that the proposal for their urban design is not going to lead them into any tribulations. This is the fear of failure. Government does not want to get any negative response from the citizen. After all, they do wish to get re-elect again. Planning and urban design are extremely carefully plans out which leads to nowhere at the end. This type of masterminding of our city is often set out in words or in a two dimensionally on a piece of paper. Planning is not very pro-active and urban design is not part of the usual vocabulary. Sometimes, there is a need for risk taking and accept that some mistakes will be made. The success will depend on having the right ideas and experiences. This maybe over ambitious, this type of design conception is often not in the government's planning book. Toronto HarbourFront Commissioner has been planning for the revitalization of Toronto waterfront area ever since the early 1900's. The planners finally agree upon a new image for Toronto waterfront after more than half a century later. What matters to them was not the people or the city; their concern is the negative pressures from the citizen. This may also be one fundamental reason why urban and architectural designs are not advancing as efficient as other industries, such as computers or automobiles. Second major constraint in knitting together the mega urban development is the funding. Since mega urban development is no longer a priority, obviously the grants and funding for the urban projects will slowly shift its way down to the bottom of the agenda. Instead, the funding is shifted towards more immediate public interest, such as health care. The government no longer wants to play the major role in managing our urban growth. There are just too much risks involved.
Secondly, this issue leads back to the citizen and the society itself. Unfortunately, western culture has developed from the idea of Cartesian Paradigm -- a world view in which Man is totally independent of his environment, where his Reason and his Feeling are totally separate, and body and soul have nothing in common. Our society is exactly driven towards this path. Our culture denies history and culture. Our culture wants to eliminate the past so our society is constantly developing. In short, one always in the process of creating something new to change the world. The inherited meanings, including the use of urban icons, no longer becomes important. The most celebrated example is the invention of computers and automobiles; these two inventions alone have changed the way we shop, live, communicate and create art form. Looking back at the historical development of city form, along that of scientific and philosophical thought, a consistent observation is shown that our modern culture continue to produce urban form that is not congruent to the view of a unified universe and its main objective is built upon immediate experiences. One is not in the position to say this is a bad thing, but it is a fact that this is what our culture is built upon. Today, this type of notion influenced the relationship between the citizens with our urban components. The inherited meaning behind urban icons is no longer the same as in the past. People no longer treat it as an iconic architecture as the civic marker in which our hierarchy is built upon. It even slowly becomes less important in attracting the national and international travelers. People certainly have no intention of living around it. What has become increasingly apparent is the citizens' main objective is to look for ways of getting immediate experiences from its surroundings.
An urban design framework is a dynamic structure and as such it brings into questioning our changing urban components - how do one prevent our urban icons from coming to an end? Should one just strip away all the modern inventions to bring our inherited culture back? Let's not be naïve about this. One cannot totally recreate a past environment; this is not urban design as an integrative process. Our city needs to perform in different ways in relations to our time. If the heart of the urban icons is where people like to collect, then there must participation from all parties --an urge for people to congregate with the essence of urbanity and exchange for the expression of national significance. In short, there must be a clear physical expression from the community's hopes and intentions, and it is essential for the communication of a consensus image for the future city.
First task in the list is to establish a common goal and ambition for the city. This will set up the parameters for the character the city wants to achieve and understand the idea of areas of significance where care and attention is needed. The goals will then inform the process that will lead to a vision. The entire process of this urban agenda will have to call for the government to work together with the private sectors and community in order to produce a sound vision for the city. A strong participation from the private sectors is inevitable in our time; government today no longer has the same enthusiasm to take the full responsibility in designing our urban space. A new strategy must evolved to attain our vision of urban icons -- a business plan that sets out how and when the funds become available, and a set of mechanisms that enable implementation to take place
Urban icon serves as the major element that connects all the urban nodes in our city fabrics. Hence meticulous studies must be initiated to ensure that development responds appropriately to its context as well as defining the urban context broadly in visual, social, functional and environmental terms. Our city often erects buildings without considering the full spectrums of its urban conditions. Control must be exercised to ensure that meaningless buildings will no longer appear in our urban fabrics. Part of this urban design auditing can also be seen as identifying the development its potential and implications. The government can help to set up the agenda and the developer can respond in accordance to it. This vision is made out of team players - a common vision formed by professionals, public and private sectors, and communities. Another important element lies in the in the planning guidance framework -- that is to recognize the idea for interdependence and the need to break down barriers between the sectors in order to reach a common goal. A vision is neither architecture nor government writ large. It is an indicative three-dimensional framework that the team players can use to give a clear indication of the quality of development it wishes to attain. One should not employ this large urban development as an opportunity to create their self-character.
One needs to remember that the quality of a place is defined as much by what people do there as by the physical attributes of the area. On that account, public participation is crucial. A clear understanding vistas and views is needed to accompany how the market sees the area and establishing the range of uses needs to be juxtaposed with. The public interest has changed over time; we no longer gather in a piazza surrounded by religious buildings. The interest is shifted towards attaining more immediate benefits and the improvement on the quality of our built environment. The design of urban icons must fully accommodate this notion. Urban icon no longer survive alone by itself, it must be juxtaposed with a highly desirable entertainment, cultural and commercial destinations. One should recognize that urban icon is not just frills, but a serious urban component. There should also be a need to educate the public interest. Competitions or non-statutory design briefs, such as end-of-year exhibitions of urban design school, are good tool to illustrate the possible variety, ingenuity, skills and art within a well layered national framework. Understanding the connections between culture and innovation is a key success to urban design. Putting people in the centre of urban regeneration affects the city life. The key is to involve people in planning and designing of their place. If urban icon is about anything, it is about creating a beacon in city to attract public participation. Urban icons and buildings are precious. Our city tells us what we are or wish to be - not only as individuals, but also as a community. It is in these roles that we know each other; it is in these roles that we know ourselves. Hence it is clear that the investment on urban icons is not strictly based on monetary value, but also on uplifting the spirit of our urban identity.