This document is submitted in partial ful" lment for the degree: Master of Architecture [Professional] at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa, in the year 2014. / “" at environment and those structures invest the vast di# erences of nature with meaning intelligible to, indeed imagined by, a mankind and they involve in the end all those complex relationships of human buildings with each other that shape within nature a man-made topography.” (Scully 1991: 1) Humankind has forever been placed outside the realm of nature, peering in as a spectator through a frame. ! at which is organic is ‘natural’ and that which we create is ‘man- made’. A beaver’s nest would not exist if the beaver had not built it, yet it is ‘natural’. If humans are of earth then surely that which we build is ‘natural’ as well? Let us translate the ‘man-made’ back into the natural world. Lake Malawi makes up one-third of its country. Local Malawians are dependent on this resource for livelihood, food, water and sanitation but over" shing threatens it. Cichlid " sh native to the lake are a rapidly evolving species, they are also a rapidly depleting food source. ! e lake with its local " shing villages is nature with us in it. I propose an underwater observatory on the shoreline of the lake, to address a species and a food source. Local Malawians inhabit the shoreline within a nature that has been adapted to meet the needs of human activity. Fishermen prepare their nets at sunset, go out at night with # ickering para$ n lamps, and return at sunrise with a diminishing catch of Chambo while women make their way to the water’s edge to wash and collect water. ! e chosen site is situated in Cape Maclear at the entrance to Lake Malawi National Park which is protected aquatic sanctuary. An established tourist industry supports the local community of Chembe village. ! e observatory is a threshold to the park and a liminal boundary between land and water, in and out, above and below. ! e programme is categorized within Science and Community. Communal facilities address alternative food sources, sanitation and education while science facilities document and record the rapid evolution of Cichlids. If architecture can be viewed as a hybrid, a construct of both human culture and nature, then let an amphibious structure rest upon the water’s edge, partially submerged and partially elevated over water and land. Acting as a bathometer, climatic changes mark its surface as it modi" es nature while nature modi" es it. Designed to adapt to # uctuating water levels, the facility evolves as rapidly as its native Cichlid " sh. By reframing the mindset of locals and visitors, we become part of an evolving ecosystem and may begin to truly acknowledge the part we play in it. We attempt to preserve a species and a livelihood, yet preservation may be viewed as the pursuit of stagnation. Our livelihoods, our food and our buildings are of this earth. Like nature, they must continuously adapt, modify and evolve.

Thesis (M. Arch.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1980. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND ROTCH. / Supervised by Jan Wampler. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 151-155). / Perhaps the easiest way to comprehend the complexity of our built and natural landscape is to draw an example from common experience. As ambulatory beings we must all move from one place to another. Architects, too, must travel a distance, but in a more abstract manner; from the idea to the design to its execution. Yet a journey is not just getting there; for the space which surrounds and fills our experience both defines and acts as the log of that movement. A journey, therefore, seems a fitting metaphor for an exploration of the wider implications of how built form might help us get from here to there. and understand the quality of in-betweens as well. From a cross-country journey , to the path we travel between rooms, there lie many clues to inform the way we design. The journeys in this thesis are both figurative and literal. Viewed as life-giving connections for all arrivals and departures, they take on a more positive definition than the void between objects. Within their contextual field they become a kind of built cytoplasm, or the living substance which helps structure the whole of our perceptive universe. "Journeying" is my way to study a larger issue, that of the in-between regions of built landscape. The concept of articulated in-betweens acts as a vehicle to make positive association with space, in a culture that puts a premium on objects and equates the in-between with emptiness. In this study I have momentarily turned the tables on a casual view of in-betweens, as if I were held throughly accountable for all "left-over" space. The articulation of in-betweens is the primary objective. While the written expression of the journey process and ideology of in-betweens has been building with my experience and plays an important role, the mos t substantial effort in the thesis has gone into the actual design study. My investigation graphically documents the processes of designing the path of one journey and several of its sub-journeys. Each sub-journey is contained within the limits of the larger path yet focuses on the in-betweens with the same intensity. As a context for the investigation I have used a small section of an urban residential and commercial area in Boston. / by Steven Imrich. / M.Arch.

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This research involved an examination of landscape art, the nexus of art and landscape architecture, within a rural Australian context. Four completed landscape art projects from different regions of the country were selected as case studies, and through a methodology of layering data to create a matrix of physical, social and cultural, and design factors, the case studies were analysed and compared to identify commonalities and differences. The influence on the design outcome by diverse factors such as climate, landform, community profile, local history, and the methodologies employed during project planning and implementation was examined. The process of community consultation and participation was seen as particularly important in this context, so was examined in depth. The Design Practice Methodology developed by Fifth Creek Studio, who specialise in landscape architecture, public art and urban design, was combined with Action Research, Heuristics and other methodologies to form the basis of the thesis methodology. This was supported by oral histories, interviews and a questionnaire with case study participants. The analysis and synthesis of complex and interwoven aspects of landscape art projects in rural communities provides the basis from which to formulate a design framework for future landscape art projects. / thesis (MArchitecture(Research))--University of South Australia, 2005.

University of Technology, Sydney. Institute of Sustainable Futures. / This thesis investigates the implications that urban motorway development has for the sustainability of cities. It does this by focusing on the sudden increase in road traffic that follows after the opening of additional motorway capacity, known as induced traffic growth, and asking whether induced traffic growth affects the ability of an urban system to sustain its essential economic functions. The investigation also addresses how urban systems impact on the biosphere. Induced traffic growth, and the urban motorway development responsible for it, are often cited as a threat to sustainability because they are seen to increase fuel consumption and air pollution without necessarily improving accessibility within a city. Opponents to urban motorway construction claim that it merely represents a reshuffling of system elements, such that the spatial relationships between transport and land-use are changed, but the amount of time spent travelling, and the number of economic exchanges made by people, remain much the same. Motorway development advocates refute these claims, arguing that motorway construction reduces travel times, cuts emissions and fuel consumption and increases economic activity, thereby enhancing sustainability. While it should be possible to resolve these issues through a program of empirical analysis, the phenomenon remains contested, raising questions about why and how its contested status affects transport decision-making and transport science. These questions are answered in this thesis by first investigating the social and political context in which debate over induced traffic growth has taken place. To do this, Soft Systems Methodology is used to investigate the way in which conflicts over urban motorway development have been resolved in London, Sydney and Zürich. The comparative analysis highlights differences between the rules of the political decision-making systems in each of the cities, and how these distribute power to different groups within society. While the history of conflicts is similar in each of the cities, more power is given to special interest groups from industry in London and Sydney. By contrast, the system in Zürich gives more power to resident populations through its system of direct democracy. Consequently, urban motorway development, the induced traffic growth it gives rise to and the impacts they have on city operations are acted upon in Zürich to the extent that transport policy has focused more on the development of comprehensive public transport systems. This leads to the conclusion that the contested status of induced traffic growth is more a product of the socio-economic goals of particular interest groups within society than it is of shortcomings in the empirical record or essentially unresolved theoretical issues. With the political context as background, the thesis then reviews the empirical analyses and theoretical explanations for the phenomenon. First, a review of past empirical analyses is undertaken to identify the grounds that have been cited to refute the induced traffic growth hypothesis. Two key areas are identified. The first involves difficulties with distinguishing the sources of induced traffic growth from traffic reassignment. The second concerns the absence of traffic data for routes that are potential alternatives to a new motorway from which traffic reassignment may have taken place. A case study of the M4 Motorway in Sydney is presented with data for all arterial through-routes that cross relevant screenlines, thereby overcoming several of the shortcomings identified in the review. This case study adds to the general literature of case studies that corroborate the induced traffic growth hypothesis, but provides the first substantial documented case for an Australian city. A review of the theoretical explanations for the phenomenon finds that while both microeconomic evaluation and standard modelling procedures provide accounts for the phenomenon that meet institutional expectations of technical veracity, neither constitutes a substantial description of the causal mechanism for the phenomenon, leaving unanswered questions about some findings in the empirical record. This conclusion prompts the development of a systems-based explanation for induced traffic growth that defines it as a form of multiple system feedback processes controlled by a travel budget time constant. By accounting for the phenomenon and its effects in this way, an explanation is provided for changes to travel behaviour and patterns of land-use development that reveals how urban motorway development affects urban systems in an holistic way. The final section of the thesis combines the insights gained by examination of the politics of the transport decision-making system with empirical analyses and theoretical explanations for induced traffic growth, to produce a general systems view of cities and their place within the earth’s biosphere. This treatment considers the problems of oil depletion and global climate change, and the effects that urban motorway development has on the ability of urban systems to adapt to changes in the system environment brought about by these problems. The thesis concludes that urban motorway development and the processes that it triggers, which are embodied in the phenomenon of induced traffic growth, can undermine a city’s comparative ability to sustain the accessibility needs of its residents.

Bibliography: leaves 166-175

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Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

Thesis (Ph.D.)-- Université de Montréal (Canada), 1999. / Adviser: Claude Comtois. Includes bibliographical references.