Recently I have made a number of posts regarding green buildings and the paradigm shift which will be necessary if we are even going to have a truly green architecture (see posts here and here). I bring this up again because i recently read two different articles online from two different architectural professionals from two different cultures, Martha Schwartz – a Boston & London based landscape architect and Harald Bodenschatz – a professor of Sociology and Planning in at the Technical University of Berlin and they both discuss similar goals for a more environmentally friendly development. Schwartz focuses on the urban landscape and its development (or lack thereof) currently as opposed to in a truly green environment, and Bodenscahtz focuses on the development of inner cities and suburbia as sustainable growth tactics and in such a way to help the European city thrive.
While neither of these articles explicitly states my previously argued hypothesis (that in order to be a truly sustainably designed society we need to increase our population densities and thus maximize our transportation schemes), both provide intellectual support to my arguments. Without a new 21st century version of urban renewal – one which is culturally, environmentally and economically sensitive – we will never be able to sustain our growth and development. This collapse in infrastructure is one of the issues facing us today, and it is potentially more threatening than global warming, rising oceans, and food shortages. With more people in the suburbs there are more cars on the road, the more cars the more wear on the roads. The more cars, the higher the demand for and thus the higher the price of gasoline, and the higher the demand for gas the less money available for other “necessities.” Greatly improved mass transit systems could alleviate the strain on our fuel supply and roads, while slightly increased mass transit systems but planned suburban clumping and urban densification could easily have the same impact.
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