What is at stake in this thesis are the ways in which we approach policing and controlling the cityscape, and, more importantly, architecture's role in this authoritative and institutional apparatuses. Looking at the Watts neighborhood of South Central Los Angeles as both example and test site, this project analyzes how and why the policing apparatus of a city fails to operate effectively, especially in contested urban environments. Existing architectural precedents here, and in other dense cities, have been reduced to emblematic fortresses, where the station and the police are rendered inactive and inaccessible. Responding to this crisis, this thesis re-imagines the police station as a piece of city infrastructure that situates itself as an interface between police and populus. Borrowing from vernacular models of spatial organization and local public phenomenon, the traditionally invisible policing processes get invaded by the surrounding neighborhood, rendering those processes visible and accessible.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:RICE/oai:scholarship.rice.edu:1911/61763 |
| Date | January 2009 |
| Source Sets | Rice University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis, Text |
| Format | application/pdf |
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