“Spirit of Improvement” explores the social, economic, and architectural consequences of waterfront improvement initiatives undertaken in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston from the waning years of the colonial period through the passage of the first federally-sponsored warehousing act in 1846. City-dwellers replaced a haphazardly-constructed warren of crooked streets, wooden storehouses and buildings, and dilapidated wharves of the colonial period, with orderly streetscapes, brick and stone buildings, and expanded infrastructure dedicated to local and international commerce. Though in each city, construction differed in scale and regional form, improvements everywhere were a daunting physical, financial, and political task. This dissertation seeks to present the stories of men and women throughout American cities to uncover the social and economic complexities that lay at the heart of improvement initiatives in the colonial and early national periods. Merchants and speculators sought new forms of government authorization and the consent of property holders to reorder the landscape. Architects and engineers drafted cutting-edge designs for warehouses and harbors that looked to European examples and embraced the aesthetics of neoclassicism, industrial technology, and emerging theories of public health and disease prevention. White and black laborers dredged harbors, extended docks, and erected brick and stone warehouses. Female boardinghouse and shopkeepers established businesses adjacent to the wharves. Not only did residents confront the persistence of improvement projects in their midst, they also confronted their personal relationships to the abundance of interests jostling for prominence in the early-national marketplace. As a result, these initiatives proved highly contentious both for the elites who could afford to fund competing projects, as well as for the artisans, free and enslaved laborers, small business and property holders, and families living and working on the margins of society. As the cities’ poor and middling sorts witnessed the transformations occurring around them, many were left to grapple with the question, “Improvement, but for whom?” Today, inhabitants of America’s port cities will find many of these themes all-too familiar: the presence of corporate development along shorelines; the role of celebrated architects and planners in the design and construction of expensive waterfront buildings; the ousting of long-term residents and businesses in the face of high rents or shifting clientele; and the emergence of a socially invisible, but economically essential, service-sector workforce who provide the necessary labor to keep these ventures afloat. “Spirit of Improvement” seeks to uncover the complex historical roots of America’s fascination with waterfront development—a phenomenon that stretches back to the improvement initiatives of the early republic, when merchant-entrepreneurs began to truly exploit infrastructure’s economic potential. In the early nineteenth century, capitalist development served the interests of merchants and businessmen involved international trade and commerce. Today, we look to the future of our urban waterfronts and confront the historical foundations on which these physical and social structures stand.

O presente trabalho sistematiza as principais questões relacionadas ao processo de urbanização das cidades portuárias durante as décadas finais do século XX, de modo a compreender as transformações sócio-espaciais, face às determinações econômicas e tecnológicas surgidas ou enfatizadas no período, considerando as especificidades locais. Procura também explicitar a maneira como estas questões vêm sendo apreendidas pelas ações de planejamento desenvolvidas para tais cidades. A análise de projetos urbanos realizados em algumas cidades portuárias, embasa- dos pelas teorias de planejamento vigentes, evidencia uma tendência a estabelecer-se como concentradora da relação porto-cidade a questão da reincorporação ao tecido urbano de áreas correspondentes a etapas tecnológicas anteriores e, conseqüentemente, considerar estas áreas o foco único das intervenções. Partindo da convicção de que a questão destas áreas, chamadas obsoletas, não é a única a ser enfrentada por estas cidades, nem tampouco está desvinculada das demais que se materializam no espaço do porto, busca-se a partir da presente pesquisa, expor quais outras influenciam na dinâmica atual entre cidade e porto, focando especialmente naquelas ligadas ao espaço operacional, de modo a criar uma base multidisciplinar de conhecimento que possa oferecer ao planejamento intra-urbano uma visão de conjunto, assim como destacar o papel da teoria e do método nas etapas de planejamento precedentes à elaboração das propostas. / The present work systematizes the main questions related to the port city\'s urbanization process throughout the last decades of the 20th century, in order to com- prehend the socio-spatial transformations regarding the economic and technological determinations of the period, both new and the emphasized, and considering their local specificities. It also aims to explicit how these questions have been taken into consideration by urban planning actions carried out in these cities. The analysis of recent urban plans for port cities, and based upon current planning theories, shows the tendency of reducing the port-city\'s relation issue to the reincor- poration of obsolete structures to the cíty\'s urban fabric, and, consequently, considering it the only focus of interventions. Supported by the conviction that this is not the only issue to be faced by these cities, nor is detached from the many others materialized on the space of the port, we intend, through the present research, to establish what questions influence today\'s port-city dynamic, aiming particularly those related to the operational space, in order to create a multidisciplinary base that can offer intra-urban planning a broader view. lt\'s our goal, as well, to highlight the role of theory and method on the planning process precedent to the proposal phase.

O presente trabalho sistematiza as principais questões relacionadas ao processo de urbanização das cidades portuárias durante as décadas finais do século XX, de modo a compreender as transformações sócio-espaciais, face às determinações econômicas e tecnológicas surgidas ou enfatizadas no período, considerando as especificidades locais. Procura também explicitar a maneira como estas questões vêm sendo apreendidas pelas ações de planejamento desenvolvidas para tais cidades. A análise de projetos urbanos realizados em algumas cidades portuárias, embasa- dos pelas teorias de planejamento vigentes, evidencia uma tendência a estabelecer-se como concentradora da relação porto-cidade a questão da reincorporação ao tecido urbano de áreas correspondentes a etapas tecnológicas anteriores e, conseqüentemente, considerar estas áreas o foco único das intervenções. Partindo da convicção de que a questão destas áreas, chamadas obsoletas, não é a única a ser enfrentada por estas cidades, nem tampouco está desvinculada das demais que se materializam no espaço do porto, busca-se a partir da presente pesquisa, expor quais outras influenciam na dinâmica atual entre cidade e porto, focando especialmente naquelas ligadas ao espaço operacional, de modo a criar uma base multidisciplinar de conhecimento que possa oferecer ao planejamento intra-urbano uma visão de conjunto, assim como destacar o papel da teoria e do método nas etapas de planejamento precedentes à elaboração das propostas. / The present work systematizes the main questions related to the port city\'s urbanization process throughout the last decades of the 20th century, in order to com- prehend the socio-spatial transformations regarding the economic and technological determinations of the period, both new and the emphasized, and considering their local specificities. It also aims to explicit how these questions have been taken into consideration by urban planning actions carried out in these cities. The analysis of recent urban plans for port cities, and based upon current planning theories, shows the tendency of reducing the port-city\'s relation issue to the reincor- poration of obsolete structures to the cíty\'s urban fabric, and, consequently, considering it the only focus of interventions. Supported by the conviction that this is not the only issue to be faced by these cities, nor is detached from the many others materialized on the space of the port, we intend, through the present research, to establish what questions influence today\'s port-city dynamic, aiming particularly those related to the operational space, in order to create a multidisciplinary base that can offer intra-urban planning a broader view. lt\'s our goal, as well, to highlight the role of theory and method on the planning process precedent to the proposal phase.

O presente trabalho busca traçar um panorama urbano atual das políticas públicas implantadas no município de Santos, em especial nas áreas de interface porto/cidade com foco nas propostas realizadas nas duas últimas décadas. Trata do conflito da gestão da cidade com a gestão do porto, enfatizando a análise comparativa dos planos desenvolvidos para a cidade e para o porto, com recorte temporal do último século. Compara: o caso da área central de Santos com os projetos de requalificação urbana de outras áreas portuárias (Boston, Baltimore, Londres, Barcelona, Argentina, Plano Estratégico do Rio de Janeiro e projeto da Estação das Docas em Belém). Pretende responder as seguintes questões: As estratégias destas requalificações urbanas resolveriam os conflitos santistas entre a cidade e o porto? Estas estratégias viabilizariam a requalificação da área central santista? / This essay aims to outline an up-to-date urban panorama of the public policies implemented in the municipality of Santos, focusing the areas of interface between port and city and emphasizing the proposals which were realized within the last two decades. It deals with the conflict between the city and port managements, with emphasis on the comparative analysis of the plans developed for the city and port, with a temporal cut of the last century. It compares: Santos central area case with other port areas regeneration projects (Boston, Baltimore, London, Barcelona, Argentina, Rio de Janeiro Strategic Plan and Docks Station Project in Belém). It intends to answer the following questions: Would the strategies of these urban regenerations solve the conflicts between the city of Santos and its port? Would these strategies enable the regeneration of Santos central area?

O presente trabalho busca traçar um panorama urbano atual do planejamento urbano implantado no município de Santos, em especial nas políticas de requalificação urbana e portuária por meio da análise das ações do Programa Alegra Centro, com ênfase temporal na última década. Trata das transformações do espaço urbano da cidade de Santos, do ponto de vista físico e social. Identifica o processo de reprodução do capital no espaço local por meio da análise da política de requalificação urbana em desenvolvimento e sua relação histórica no processo de planejamento urbano municipal. Discute as ações realizadas no processo de requalificação urbana e as compara com da política habitacional. A tese aqui proposta é verificar se o projeto de requalificação santista é uma política urbana que privilegia a alocação de recursos públicos em espaço estratégico da cidade. E ainda, a implantação do modelo de requalificação urbana não seria a adoção das \"ideias fora de lugar\" (SCHWARZ, 1999, 98 apud MARICATO 2000, 121), portanto a importação de modelos sem considerar as especificidades, realidade local e fragilidades sociais? Discute as seguintes hipóteses: A proposta de requalificação é mais uma retórica ideológica, que perpetua a acumulação do capital? Como as propostas de requalificação têm alterado a dinâmica e realidade urbana? Há agravamentos sociais? Que recursos são utilizados? Qual o papel das parcerias público-privadas? Qual é o plano ou esquema global de cidade que está sendo implantado em Santos. / The present work aims at outlining a current urban scenario of the urban planning implemented in the city of Santos, especially the policies of urban and port requalification through the analysis of the actions of Alegra Centro Program, with emphasis on the last decade. It also deals with the transformations of the urban space of the city of Santos, from the physical and social point of view. It identifies the process of capital reproduction in the local space through the analysis of the developing urban requalification policy and its historical relationship in the process of the city urban planning. It discusses the realized actions in the process of urban requalification and compares them with the ones taken towards housing policy. The proposal of this thesis is to verify whether the project of requalification of Santos is indeed one that privileges the allocation of public resources in a strategic site of the city. Furthermore, would not the implementation of the urban requalification model be the adoption of \"displaced ideas\" (SCHWARZ, 1999, 98 apud MARICATO 2000, 121), therefore the importation of models without considering the specificities, local reality and social fragilities? It discusses the following hypotheses: Is the proposal of requalification more of an ideological rhetoric, which perpetuates the accumulation of capital? In which ways have the requalification proposals changed the urban dynamics and reality? Have there been social issues? Which resources have been used? What is the role of the public/private partnerships? What is the city plan or scheme that is being implemented in Santos?

O presente trabalho busca traçar um panorama urbano atual do planejamento urbano implantado no município de Santos, em especial nas políticas de requalificação urbana e portuária por meio da análise das ações do Programa Alegra Centro, com ênfase temporal na última década. Trata das transformações do espaço urbano da cidade de Santos, do ponto de vista físico e social. Identifica o processo de reprodução do capital no espaço local por meio da análise da política de requalificação urbana em desenvolvimento e sua relação histórica no processo de planejamento urbano municipal. Discute as ações realizadas no processo de requalificação urbana e as compara com da política habitacional. A tese aqui proposta é verificar se o projeto de requalificação santista é uma política urbana que privilegia a alocação de recursos públicos em espaço estratégico da cidade. E ainda, a implantação do modelo de requalificação urbana não seria a adoção das \"ideias fora de lugar\" (SCHWARZ, 1999, 98 apud MARICATO 2000, 121), portanto a importação de modelos sem considerar as especificidades, realidade local e fragilidades sociais? Discute as seguintes hipóteses: A proposta de requalificação é mais uma retórica ideológica, que perpetua a acumulação do capital? Como as propostas de requalificação têm alterado a dinâmica e realidade urbana? Há agravamentos sociais? Que recursos são utilizados? Qual o papel das parcerias público-privadas? Qual é o plano ou esquema global de cidade que está sendo implantado em Santos. / The present work aims at outlining a current urban scenario of the urban planning implemented in the city of Santos, especially the policies of urban and port requalification through the analysis of the actions of Alegra Centro Program, with emphasis on the last decade. It also deals with the transformations of the urban space of the city of Santos, from the physical and social point of view. It identifies the process of capital reproduction in the local space through the analysis of the developing urban requalification policy and its historical relationship in the process of the city urban planning. It discusses the realized actions in the process of urban requalification and compares them with the ones taken towards housing policy. The proposal of this thesis is to verify whether the project of requalification of Santos is indeed one that privileges the allocation of public resources in a strategic site of the city. Furthermore, would not the implementation of the urban requalification model be the adoption of \"displaced ideas\" (SCHWARZ, 1999, 98 apud MARICATO 2000, 121), therefore the importation of models without considering the specificities, local reality and social fragilities? It discusses the following hypotheses: Is the proposal of requalification more of an ideological rhetoric, which perpetuates the accumulation of capital? In which ways have the requalification proposals changed the urban dynamics and reality? Have there been social issues? Which resources have been used? What is the role of the public/private partnerships? What is the city plan or scheme that is being implemented in Santos?

In recent decades, the role of port cities has changed dramatically. In many cases, the port function has been removed from the urban waterfront altogether. For this practicum, the subject is not the post-industrial, but rather an investigation into the role of landscape architecture in a place where industry persists on the shoreline. Halifax, Nova Scotia is the principle location for this exploration wherein the existing port-city interface is re-evaluated. This study includes an examination of the course of worldwide port development and the resulting impacts on port-city interrelationships and a historical comparison of the Port of Halifax to the general evolution. Mapping is the core of the analysis and is the primary means of assessing current conditions and future considerations. The work concludes with a final design proposal. Design drawings demonstrate the conceivability of the working port environment as a place to reconnect citizens with their harbour and the activities that occur within.

In recent decades, the role of port cities has changed dramatically. In many cases, the port function has been removed from the urban waterfront altogether. For this practicum, the subject is not the post-industrial, but rather an investigation into the role of landscape architecture in a place where industry persists on the shoreline. Halifax, Nova Scotia is the principle location for this exploration wherein the existing port-city interface is re-evaluated. This study includes an examination of the course of worldwide port development and the resulting impacts on port-city interrelationships and a historical comparison of the Port of Halifax to the general evolution. Mapping is the core of the analysis and is the primary means of assessing current conditions and future considerations. The work concludes with a final design proposal. Design drawings demonstrate the conceivability of the working port environment as a place to reconnect citizens with their harbour and the activities that occur within.

O presente trabalho busca traçar um panorama urbano atual das políticas públicas implantadas no município de Santos, em especial nas áreas de interface porto/cidade com foco nas propostas realizadas nas duas últimas décadas. Trata do conflito da gestão da cidade com a gestão do porto, enfatizando a análise comparativa dos planos desenvolvidos para a cidade e para o porto, com recorte temporal do último século. Compara: o caso da área central de Santos com os projetos de requalificação urbana de outras áreas portuárias (Boston, Baltimore, Londres, Barcelona, Argentina, Plano Estratégico do Rio de Janeiro e projeto da Estação das Docas em Belém). Pretende responder as seguintes questões: As estratégias destas requalificações urbanas resolveriam os conflitos santistas entre a cidade e o porto? Estas estratégias viabilizariam a requalificação da área central santista? / This essay aims to outline an up-to-date urban panorama of the public policies implemented in the municipality of Santos, focusing the areas of interface between port and city and emphasizing the proposals which were realized within the last two decades. It deals with the conflict between the city and port managements, with emphasis on the comparative analysis of the plans developed for the city and port, with a temporal cut of the last century. It compares: Santos central area case with other port areas regeneration projects (Boston, Baltimore, London, Barcelona, Argentina, Rio de Janeiro Strategic Plan and Docks Station Project in Belém). It intends to answer the following questions: Would the strategies of these urban regenerations solve the conflicts between the city of Santos and its port? Would these strategies enable the regeneration of Santos central area?

This dissertation examines the cross-cultural circulation of the cruciform design for hospitals as the early modern architectural response to charitable and urban crises, considering the emergence of the plan in Italy and its rapid dissemination during the Age of Exploration (1400-1700). Despite recent media attention on makeshift hospitals, refugee camps, and reconstruction efforts worldwide following natural disasters, wars, and pandemics, the urgency of devising architectural and urban responses to human crises associated with poverty, disease, and migration is not a new phenomenon. While today these issues are often addressed in isolation, during the early modern period, they factored into a broader, ‘ecological’ understanding of health that drove the construction of hospitals and shelters for the sick poor, enmeshing these institutions into larger social, public health, and environmental strategies.</DISS_para> <DISS_para>Using the cruciform design as a connecting thread, I investigate links among port cities in Italy, Iberia, and the New World as they struggled with unprecedented challenges in sanitation, poverty, and medical assistance. As a result of intensified contact and circulation, ports are ideal sites for a study of architectural and urban innovations targeting urban crises. My project employs sociologist Immanuel Wallerstein’s model of ‘world cities’ to construe early modern ports as globally-networked cities that actively imported the latest advancements to achieve cultural and political centrality. Moving away from a formalist analysis, I integrate the building fabric with the contexts that inflected its adaptations, considering the role of the cruciform design in hospitals whose architecture and infrastructure promoted medical and sanitary innovations in the building itself and surrounding urban area, including developments to facilitate the disposal of human waste and the removal of dead bodies. My study combines archival evidence, archaeological data, and architectural and urban plans with contemporary knowledge of public and environmental health. This interdisciplinary approach highlights why political authorities sought and re-interpreted the cruciform design, isolating the innovative aspects responsible for the fast spread of this typology across Europe and Latin America. </DISS_para> <DISS_para>My Introduction (Chapter 1) examines the development of the cruciform typology as a result of charitable reforms occurring in northern Italy in the mid-fifteenth century. Building on early modern medical knowledge, I introduce the innovations associated with the design and consider the role of Filarete’s Treatise on Architecture (ca. 1460-64) in the circulation of architectural concepts during the period. Chapter 2 addresses the Ospedale di Messer Gesù Cristo (1474) in Venice in a longer history of Venetian reform. More specifically, I investigate the change in the mission of the Ospedale, as well as its architecture, from the perspective of military and urban crises faced by the Republic in the late fifteenth century. My discussion expands to Iberia in Chapter 3, with a study of the Hospital Real de Todos-os-Santos (1492) in Lisbon, an institution commissioned by the Portuguese monarchy to solve Lisbon’s crises of social welfare and public health. In particular, this chapter analyzes the Portuguese adoption of foreign and local strategies in charitable reform and the architecture of the hospital in view of larger public health strategies. Chapter 4 centers on the Hospital de las Cinco Llagas (1503) in Seville, especially considering the upsurge of at-risk women in Seville due to Spain’s male-driven colonization endeavors in the New World. Investigating the move and expansion of the hospital in 1549, I demonstrate how the architecture of the institution balanced innovations with the necessity to guarantee the invisibility and isolation of the institution’s female patients. Finally, Chapter 5, which also serves as a conclusion, addresses the translation of the cruciform typology to the New World. I compare the adoption of the plan in the Hospital San Nicolás de Bari (1503), located in the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo, with the different strategies of the Portuguese monarchy in colonial Salvador as evidenced by the Hospital da Cidade (1549).</DISS_para> <DISS_para>This dissertation contributes to the field in three ways. First, I demonstrate the actual reasons for the cruciform plan’s success rather than assuming the ‘natural’ replication of an Italian design as has been traditional in scholarship centered on this topic. Second, my case studies show the mobility and circulation of scientific and technological knowledge across southern Europe and between the Old and New Worlds, innovatively recognizing the impact of this flux on the built and urban fabrics of early modern cities. Finally, by shifting the scholarly discourse from Italy to the agency of Iberian and New World patrons, my dissertation opens the field for contributions from the so-called historical periphery, promoting a global understanding of early modern architecture and urbanism. / Art History