Mehta Parth Pareshumar

UR3001

The Contemporary Touchdown

The cities of today can only increase in density at the expense of their open spaces. But these are also the lungs of the city. We want to increase density without urban sprawl, in order to diminish distance between places we need to go Vertical’. 
The Idea here is to construct a resilient formula to arrive at the fundamental principles of site development, and to introduce a variable typology that reflects the surrounding, which can adapt to change. The Design questions the idea of underutilized space, and space pressurized as a balance enforced by the urban fabric. ‘The contemporary touchdown’ – occurring on the site ; tries to bring a new, dynamic skyline in the city,which is always under construction addressing the site and its changes in real time. The development strategy of such typologies uses parameters that derive the potential location for the built fabric, which will always be in the harmony with open spaces; currently these are perceived as just VACANT plots. 


Report Content

In eastern Ahmedabad, industrial Rakhial houses extremely dense residential fabrics alongside large vacant plots left over from closed mills.

The monogram Mill land has been mapped since 2000, to demonstrate haphazard and limited development on a site that is now mostly overgrown with trees. Walled edges have encouraged an informal cloth market to grow at the south east side, and increasing density in the surrounding context puts pressure on the vacant plots to be developed. How can the current underutilized space be used. in a way that both preserves the site's history, and creates a relationship between the open and built that addr

The site development strategy focuses on preserving potential and history of the site. Using trees as the anchor points, a reverse voronoi diagram delineates possible future development locations.

Resultant plots are further reduced to a minimum plot area for development: 400SM. These plots are analysed with Delaunay Proximity theory to achieve the shortest possible access (desire path). Together, these organisations create a developed site that may stay in harmony with existing landscape, but also creates potential for the future.

The intent here is to bridge the gap between density and vacancy, and create a stable environment with respect to the need for instability. The idea is to bridge the gap. The vacuum is catalyzed by the deployed structure walled element. To decentralize the density pressure and create the bridge between existing archipelagos of density. Different typologies can be added to engage the city, based on the particular surrounding.

A structure deployed in this site strategy seeks to connect tangible and intangible qualities of the divergent conditions. In order to celebrate its responsive nature,it is developed in the language of “under construction” - the most beautiful state,half-finished. Over time the inhibition of the design becomes more and more about the magic of the structure and its emergent qualities.

The under construction intervention is pitched as a deployable structure, which can be redeployed on sites throughout the city. The design concept is developed according to 5 principles: [1] Rational scale of the structure and module [2] method of deployment [3] vertical lift [4] column and cantilever system. [5] replicability

For implementation, the design uses an existing Tower Crane assembly as the base to which modules are attached. The form’s coherence is not dependent on function, which is flexible enough to allow variant activities. See video in link for detailed construction process.

The denser cities are there are less distance to be covered by people. This system generates density within open space, but allows flexibility through its modular mechanism and deployability. It may be considered a flexible update to the Radiant City that takes on the challenge of a constantly changing context.