Landscape Architecture, Planning and Architecture; sidewalks, curbs, streets and parking.

Oscar's, Couture
Originally uploaded by With Any Luck

walk01b45
Originally uploaded by franklinavenue2008

Which sidewalk would you rather walk on?
Everytime I drive by a new development I think to myself "why?" Why are they building it like that? Oh, and especially when they are advertising an "urban" lifestyle. Why do they constantly screw it up? Let's think about our cities for a while. Let's discuss first our streets.
What makes someone want to walk on the sidewalk? Accessibility.

Let's perform an autopsy on un-walkable city streets.
1.Streets that are 2-4 lanes going each way. That makes 8 lanes to cross (I've seen 10 in Irvine, CA! Main&MacArthur
2a. No parking curbside.
2b. Sidewalk. sometimes with some trees as a buffer to the street
3. A buffer typically of turf or some shrubs probably rhaphiolepis
4. A parking lot
5. and THEN the building

Now let's dissect a walkable city street
1. Usually 2 lanes going each way making a 4 lane street
2. Parking on the street which creates a buffer between the pedestrians and traffic.
3. Sidewalk again sometimes with trees.
4. Building

Now think about it. Do you want to cross 6-10 lanes? 100 ft? or 4 lanes 40 ft?
When you walk on the sidewalk, would you rather walk along moving cars or parked cars?
Do you want to walk across a parking lot to get to a building or do you want the building's entrance to be a few steps away?
By putting the building entrance along the sidewalk you are forcing people to walk along the sidewalk. Putting the building in the right spot but moving the entrance around does NOT help. Why would I even want to use the sidewalk if the entrance isn't there?
Wouldn't a street front store increase business? There would be heavy foot traffic causing more exposure as opposed to cars whizzing by your store on the other side of the parking lot.
Removing parking lots is a GOOD idea. Increasing street parking is a GOOD idea, and having fewer lanes is a GOOD idea.

Final food for thought, Think of the most famous streets in Los Angeles County, one of the least walkable metropolitan areas in the country.(remember that song "Nobody walks in LA"?)
Melrose, Sunset, Hollywood, and sometimes Rodeo, Think about it, now go there. You'll see what I'm talking about.
edit* (those streets I mentioned are very walkable hence the mentioning of such, they did it right in those areas)

DO Talk to Strangers

A Conversation About Talking to Strangers
Originally uploaded by Ric James

This past weekend my Girlfriend and I went to a bonfire. we arrived before the sun went down and there were only 3 or 4 others that we were meeting.
A stranger approached us and asked if we would be sharing our fire pit with them. There seemed to be some apprehension by the person he was talking to but she eventually agreed to share the pit with his group.
Well as it turns out. These people were a lot of fun and we all got along. there were about Seven of us and at least 10 of them. We shared our food and drink with each other and we shared our conversations and jokes. It ended up making the night so much more fun. When I party I party harder than the people we met up with. But the other group partied like I do. We mingled and by the end of the night you never would have thought we were all strangers. My GF and I left a little early because we had a long commute and the parking lot had one exit. But the others that stayed ended up going to The Stranger's house to finish up his birthday party (his name was Jay and the person that approached us was named Niner *sp).

Two days later. I spoke to more strangers. On Monday I saw some graffiti artists in Pomona doing some interesting work on Holt near Hamilton. I asked if I could see their work close up and they allowed me to. I began speaking with a fellow named "Redoe" and someone named "worm" we began talking about art and school and it was a fulfilling conversation, They were very friendly and had some insight about what they considered art, "Redo" handed me a flyer to a party in a couple of weeks and we decided to meet and share some artwork, It'll be interesting to compare some traditional art to some urban art.

Moral of the story? Talk to strangers. You could make some new friends. I made a few this just this past week. when I could have easily and just like everyone else ignored them.

Landscape Architecture needs fixing. (Amenities)

Unwind
Originally uploaded by aurastra

Park benches. Trellises. gazebos. hand rails. These are all things that are wrong with Landscape Architecture.

Why does this profession continue to order benches out of catalogs? who actually believes that they look good? Do designers really want the stamp of another company on all of their designs, the same stamp that is on hundreds if not thousands of other designers landscapes?

We are taught to design, why is it so hard to design a simple park bench that has a designers stamp? I visited an award winning dog park in the fall of 2007. It was recently featured in Landscape Architecture Magazine. When I saw the park the first thing that stuck out was the shade structure. The cataloged gazebo. It looked exactly like every other parks shade structure. nothing unique about it. some pillars and a blue metal roof.

If the park could win awards for its uniqueness why couldn't the designers design a shade structure instead of ordering it from a catalog? Are Landscape Architects lazy? A common response is "budget" let's face it, "budget" is a POOR excuse for a lack of creativity and creativity INCLUDES finding solutions on a low budget. not just ordering it from a catalog. I've SEEN these catalogs and I KNOW the costs. I also know how to build them and I know that with some creative thinking it can be done CHEAPER than what can be ordered in a catalog.

It's frustrating to see the laziness of designers in the profession I am going into.

I vow to not order amenities from a catalog. I hope others take this same vow and really push our profession to the respect it should deserve.

Earthquake in Pomona

shakin' it in so. california
Originally uploaded by NicaMom

Here's a photo from the earthquake we just had. the Epicenter was somewhere in or near Pomona at 5.8, no make that a 5.4

I was driving in a cart while it was happening and I thought i hit something hard. I looked around and realized everything else was shaking as well. luckily i wasn't near anything that could have fallen on me. For a split second i thought.
"is this the big one everyone's been talking about?"

thankfully it wasn't.

so for everyone let's remember our earthquake safety from elementary school.

"duck and cover" - duck under a table (preferably not a glass one or one made by ikea) and cover your head.
If no table is nearby stand in a doorway. Bathrooms are also structurally stronger than other rooms.

emergency kit - get some canned food and bottled water to last a few days at least 3 preferably a week.

emergency contact- keep your emergency contact information handy and noted on your phone put an asterisk next to it on your cel. phone so people will know it.

stop drop and roll- no wait... that's for fires.

Architecture: Building or Landscape? (Semantics)

Two months have past. I know but I got too ambitious and found I was too busy to maintain a blog. But not too busy to look at others.


arkhi, chief + tekton, builder

So, I recently filled out a form that asked what my industry was. I looked for Landscape Architecture but it wasn't there and I looked under Architecture and it had two subheadings: Building or Landscape.

Now I find this interesting and I think that this language should be used more often. The next time someone says they are an Architect I will ask "Building or Landscape?" When i refer to what most people call Architects I will call them Building Architects. I plan to make this a normalcy in my vocabulary. After all Both Building Architects and Landscape Architects are Chief builders of their respective fields of the "Built Environment" A landscapes are often built just as buildings are.

My GF who is getting her masters in linguistics always calls me on the use of terms and reminds that words are ever-changing. For example "orientate" was not a word until recently(Got a dictionary over a year old? Look it up.), the correct term is orient but because there is a growing misunderstanding that the root words for ALL words with the suffix -ation usually have the suffix -ate. Hence Orientation causes Orient to become Orientate. Don't buy it? More examples... Conversation makes Converse become Conversate. Registration makes Register become Registrate. ( I actually expected orientate to have a red underline when i typed this but it didn't causing me to change some terms on my post. conversate and registrate still have red underlines)

The use of terms also change the way we think. In the past under forms Hispanics were considered white when marking "white or colored" Asians were also grouped under one heading and even STILL we are often told to "mark only one". The differentiation of races is also a linguistic battle. Because Hispanics were no longer considered white a new minority was developed and it also helped to perpetuate prejudices because they are now "different". On the other hand this helped with the Asian Cause because instead of grouping all Asians and assuming that their cultures languages and customs are all the same by using language on forms to differentiate Asians it is helping people understand that there are major differences (No, I don't speak Asian)

Architect is to Landscape Architect and Building Architect
as
Asian is to Korean and Chinese

So what I am trying to do is change the way we speak which will thus hopefully change the way we think. Architect and Architecture are the Suffixes, Building and Landscape are the Prefixes. Building Architects can't (or at least shouldn't) do landscapes and Landscape Architects can't (or at least shouldn't) do buildings.

Elections!

So this month has been very busy for me. Those that know me know that I ran for ENV Senator for ASI. That means that I'll be the Senator for the College of Environmental Design to the rest of the University with Associate Students Incorporated. I ran unopposed, That is typical for the ENV Senator. My friend who is the current Senator Ran unopposed and also endorsed me. Because our College is somewhat tightly knit and most people know each other through probably 3 degrees of separation rather than the typical 6 it was easy to find out if I'd be unopposed or not. This made campaigning fairly easy.

On top of that. I am also the President of Two campus clubs. The Student Chapter of American Society of Landscape Architects and Emerging Green Builders Club. I've admittedly let EGBC slightly fall through the cracks because of the rest of my duties, but i hope to next year put some more energy into them.

Since it is the end of the school year I've got to hold elections for all these clubs for next year. It was tough to get people to Sign up ASLA let alone EGBC. I really had to recruit a lot of people and a lot of hopefuls ended up not following through and becoming an officer. What DID make my job easier was that all positions were unopposed. again. most people know eachother so that makes things a bit easier in terms of elections. EGBC will have trouble developing officers though. We'll have to see what happens.

So as you can see, I've been extremely busy with the school year coming to an end. I've got a lot of wrapping up to do and some starting up of my new position on campus. I've not put as much energy into this blog as I'd like partly because I have a weekly journal for my Design course and a weekly blog for my Regenerative Studies course which will remain anonymous.

But i have things to share about my trip to Duroville, Driving a tractor, and some more farming i've been doing. I've got some projects i've set for myself over the summer so we'll see how those go.

I'm glad to see the Goddess's Blog stay strong. She's a great voice for the Pomona community. when i feel down and out about Pomona I just take a trip to her site.

Farming is tough

Today i learned how to use one of these. it's GENIUS I've never used one but it's so simple. Apparently it's a common agricultural tool. A little bit about how it works.
With freshly tilled loose soil, the front wheel helps separate the soil. The metal piece on the bottom in the middle has adjustable lengths to create a hole for the seeds. A gear on the inside of the red bucket intermittently allows seeds to drop through the metal piece in the middle. A chain follows that piece which pulls dirt over the seeds and following that is a flat wheel in back to help compact the soil. One just needs to be aware of jams in the gear. This is my first time using this and I am now fascinated with agricultural tools.
I've also got a new found appreciation of farm workers, after four hours of weeding my back begins to hurt immensely, it is NOT easy work.

I also learned how to braid garlic at the Center. It's very similar to french braiding, I guess it is french braiding just done upside down. I braided a set of 15 heads for my girlfriend and when I brought it home just she asked if we had a vampire problem. So for kicks I placed the braid on the door. The smell is much stronger but also sweeter than store bought garlic. Organic, locally grown and freshly picked is always the best.
So for all you garlic fans, come by the center QUICK and pick up your braids of garlic for free, they'll run out fast, i guarantee it, They were just picked today (technically yesterday, Saturday) and you just might get one braided by either myself, or the Goddess of Garey Ave.