Alfredo Jaar

Check out also this cool artist, especially the playground piece and art museum piece.

http://www.alfredojaar.net/

A City Made of Waste

Hi group,

Here is a project that relates to the ideas about flexibility that we have been talking about in class:

A City Made of Waste

Katie

Amphibious Architecture

I went to see this exhibit, Toward the Sentient City, for one of my other classes, City Studio last week. One of the projects was something that was placed at our waterfront! Please check out the website:

Amphibious Architecture

Response from LES Ecology Center

I got an email back from the Lower East Side Ecology Center just now. They answered a bunch of questions pertaining to our project:

Hi Tara and Carey,

I know you guys are the experts on all things having to do with the East River, so I thought I'd ask you for some help in some research. I am taking a class at the New School where we are making a design project for the East River waterfront between piers 35 and 17. My group was thinking about doing something with wetland habitat restoration and I was wondering if you knew the answers to a couple questions, or if you could guide me to some useful resources.

• Would the water's edge at this area be an apt place to put a wetland habitat?

Yes, anywhere would be good. There is a good example of the beach under the brooklyn bridge on the manhattan side where there is a soft edge. It would be great for us to be able to develop, within our infrastructure, more soft edges and access points to the water for people.

• What would be the necessary elements to include in a wetland habitat (on the East River) in order to encourage animal life?

Soft edge, hearty plants, enforcement of boat traffic speed limits and periodic "no wake zones". Local plants.

• What kinds of effects would erosion have on the structure of the waterfront? (For example, if the concrete barrier was taken away, what would happen?)

Beaches adn soft edges always shift with time. So, they either have to shift or be refilled, which happens with many beaches. The same thing happens to hard edges (built environment), however, the time scale is much different. In other words, nature wears away at everything. You can certainly help prevent erosion in with plant coverage, decrease in wakes, etc. The east river doesn't have waves, except for from boats, so this helps reduce erosion.

• How would one go about building a wetland in a sustainable and effective way?

I'm not sure. I have never built one, but it is inherently what happens to an area that has some sort of soft edge. Plants begin to grow, etc. I don't think it's realistic to rip away the wharf all along this area, so some sort of access points, built-up areas that have soft edges and stairways down to the river would be great. Additionally, keeping it local in terms of native species of marsh/wetland plants and helping to develop some of the structures that help reduce erosion (oyster beds, etc can help). It would be great, particularly in areas that are being redeveloped, that they include access to the water and promote estuary ecosystems.

• What kinds of plants and animals would belong in a wetland on the East River?

Some of the native plants are in the guide attached.

sunday sequence

I went back to the site on Sunday, I needed to check the sand situation for our installation.

The place was very lively so here are some shots of the sequence. It is peculiar that we thought about the sand box, please look at the girl playing on the beach!

Gabriel

sequences

Here are the original traces of my observations as a preview.

Gabriel

sequences

Here are two sequences observed in September and October.

The static behavior observations will come soon...

Sorry I will show this in class, although I saved the sequences as compressed PDF they are still to beg for blogger.

Gabriel

Useful Maps

Here are some maps buried within the Mannahatta site on ecological communities and the original shoreline as part of research we will need for our informal ecological education.

Katie and Fishermen Pt 2

My friend Bless and I went to talk to the fishermen again this morning, at 11am. It was sunny and beautiful and people were more receptive than the last time we were there. We spoke to three different fishermen this time:

Guy #1:

• Lives near here, Chinese, finds his spot at Catherine Slip to be a good spot to fish, comes about every day
• Throws away small fishes and brings the big ones back and cooks them for his family
• When asked what he would do if there were private developments that made it so he could not fish there anymore, he said he would just leave
• Feels like he has freedom to fish there and "anywhere in Manhattan" and hasn't had problems with feeling watched by the police

Guy #2:

• Lives nearby, younger, Asian, speaks English, 2nd time fishing there
• Used to fish at 23rd, but came here because it is closer to where he lives
• Said that the best place to fish is probably near where the seagulls are
• Spends most of his time playing video games and paintball
• Is disappointed because he hasn't caught anything yet
• Wants to try freshwater instead of salt water fishing

Guy #3:

• Lives nearby, Chinese, comes here everyday
• Says everywhere along the waterfront is good for fishing
• Doesn't catch much, but what he does he throws back
• Feels like he has a lot of freedom at the waterfront
• If police came and told him not to fish anymore, he said he would show them his green card
  

I think I might write my next paper more about these fishermen observations and try doing more mapping for the paper after that.

Group meeting summary

Tonight we finally met as a group! We decided:

That our strategy is to increase resident's awareness of how the ecology of the East River directly influences their well being through the use of interactive installations and informal environmental education.

Our tactics include using chalk, string, tape, sound, and other media to demarcate the paths of water flow into the East River, guiding residents walking paths to converge with the water flow paths. We also propose a wetland habitat that will break up the concrete wall that separates people from the water and re-connect people to the ecology of the site.

The landscape we propose will be productive in that it will educate and raise awareness around environmental justice issues. It will also generate discussion about the state of the East River ecologically and people's uses of the waterfront. Lastly, the wetlands habitat will provide water filtration, which will lead to healthier fish and fishermen.

We decided not to limit our audience to only the public housing residents, but to open it up to anyone that lives near the site.

In terms of presentation, we were thinking about constructing digital models of water flow (CSOs and runoff) into the East River and combining that with a video of those things in action. We also discussed the importance of documentation, using both photo and video, of the temporary installations on site.

We need to research a number of things, including:

• Types of wetland plants that would work in our site area
• Specific scientific research pertaining to implementing a wetland at our site

and a couple more...

Some pictures of "test-bed"

"test-bed"

Here is a little diagram of where the "test -bed" is:

What is most important to me (Gabriel)

Following up on your meeting, what is most important to me is a site that is in tone with the neighbors.

A site that would be of importance to them because is flexible, dynamic and and because the memory and social significance is respected.

The particular site that I am interested, is under the Manhattan Bridge. I like it because it is a "test-bed" on itself. So it is very delicate to come up with a design that allows what already goes on, as well of a design that is dynamic and flexible enough to allow for what the future may bring.

Ultimately I will like to link this site to the water-front, respecting it's privacy and idiosyncracy.

I would like to explore the possibility of allowing water runoff catchment trough "phyto-remediation". This would endure the quality of the East river waters as well as the fish the fisherman catch on the sore, as well as tying in with your (Katie) wetland project, and Dan's educational interest.

Please see the following examples:

http://www.toddecological.com/files/case-studies/Baima_Case_Study.pdf

http://www.toddecological.com/files/case-studies/Darrow_School_Case_Study.pdf

http://www.toddecological.com/files/case-studies/Tyson_Case_Study.pdf

Gabriel

Dan and Katie's meeting

This post is to catch Gabriel up on our group meeting tonight.

I posed the question of what was most important to both of us in terms of intervening on the site.

Dan said he would like to reorient the site to the neighborhood and away from tourists, in a way that residents would be invested in the site.

I am most interested in increasing the ability of site users to physically interact with the water, in order to deepen the connection between users and the ecology of the East River.

What is most important to you, Gabriel?

We then established what we thought was common ground amongst the three of us: an interest in ecology, the residential community, and waterfront access.

Then we started to narrow down our interests to try to come up with our strategy. We thought of focusing our audience of the design on the people who live in the public housing projects near the site. We came up with a number of specific points that we need help turning into a strategy:

• Connecting the everyday walking paths/trajectories of public housing residents with the water flows to and around the East River (including urban run off, CSOs, and tides)
• Having people explore the boundaries of the natural environment versus the built environment
• Increasing social interaction and informal ecological education on the site
• As a tactic: leading people to these convergences and shaping the way people navigate through and around the site

We talked about various tactics involving chalk, tape, and string signage and path defining.

Let's think about how we can pull this all together for our meeting on Tuesday at 6:30pm.

Fishermen, part 1

On Thursday I went with my friend Bless, who speaks Mandarin and Cantonese, to talk to the Chinese fishermen at our site.

It was 45 degrees and raining, so there were only four men out fishing. The first three were standing at the water at Market Slip. They all spoke Mandarin and did not want to speak to us.

The fourth guy was standing further south and did answer some of our questions. He spoke Cantonese, and was humorous in his responses. When asked if this was the best place to go fishing, he said "No! Of Course not! It's down by the pier (maybe pier 11?)... This is the old mens' fishing strip, only old people fish here. You can ride your bike down there, if you walk it'll take 30 minutes, for me if would take an hour."

He said this pier is where the younger people come to fish, and they catch a lot more fish there than he does.

He said he comes to fish only when he has time, which is about 3 times a week. He doesn't catch much, but sometimes he will eat what he catches. The other times, he'll just throw back the fish.

Bless and I are trying again next Thursday-- hopefully the weather will be a bit sunnier!

Ideas

Research google doc

Hello group,

Here is a google doc I started with research about urban wetlands. I've highlighted the important points that could also serve as starting points for future research.

http://docs.google.com/View?docID=dgwtht37_55g5q5x4ff&revision=_latest

Some observations from the site

I went to the site yesterday to observe exactly what was going on at the water's edge. Here are my observations!

First, I noticed that there were a lot more people out fishing than I had seen previously, probably because it was a gorgeous weekend day. I also saw that there were puddles of water under the FDR near where people had set up their fishing poles. I don't know if this observation might help us when thinking about what part of the site might be suitable for reintroducing wetland habitat, if that is a direction we want to go in.

The next thing I noticed was an area that might be interesting to intervene in on the site. There is a part where the fence juts out a little bit and water splashes up quite vigorously. I found this little spot to be a great example of what happens at the waters edge in an estuary.

I also took some photos of what once was a pier and made a montage of the beachy area under the Brooklyn Bridge. I still need to do some research to find out why that little spot is beachy. It did seem like it was at a higher elevation than the surrounding water, which might have something to do with it.