Design Methodology - GSD Cantinho do Céu Studio in São Paulo
Since imperative planning models have failed in the Billings watershed (otherwise the site would be still rainforest), imperative planning will be replaced by tactical design. Tactical design can be found in military operations, economic activities or medical care and are a natural part of our everyday life (sport, career, cooking, etc). Tactical operations can be described as a set of actions unfolding over time to achieve a certain goal. Several tactics can be pursued at once to create substantial change.
Landscape Tactics - Tactical thinking was always part of the landscape architecture profession. Landscape architects had to apply tactical strategies in order to successfully operate with living organism and systems that are subject to constant change and great indeterminacy. In the last decade tactical thinking became quite prominent when society was faced with tasks that could not be solved with one strike. Brownfield remediation, large parks or complicated projects in the urban periphery required strategies that unfold over time and can survive uncertainty. Eventually the term Landscape Urbanism was used to describe the tactical activities of landscape architects in the increasingly complex field of today’s urbanism.
Tactical Design for the Informal - In the context of informal urbanism tactical thinking will come in handy. The client of the project, the inhabitants of Cantinho do Céu, is less than traditional. Cantinho do Céu’s dwellers are used to self-organize their city, independently construct their dwellings and use public space to their discretion. There are many needs inside the city: better education, economy, access, medical care and security. A lot of pressure is exerted from the metropolis to clean up the city and the reservoir. We expect that students will develop tactics that target these problems. The tactics for these problems might originate from a cultural observation or a particularity of the site or a new technology. Several targets might be woven together. To give an example: the cleaning of the reservoir could be coupled with the creation of jobs. This combination could result in a tactic based on the exploration of stormwater treatment wetlands that filter polluted stormwater and whose biomass could serve as the raw material for fabrics. The harvested biomass might give rise to a cottage industry employing workers who in turn maintain the stormwater treatment wetlands. The resulting design is the detailed development of a waterfront based on the maximization of wetlands that can be easily harvested, and the strategic location of a factory with a store. Several tactics like this example could be woven together and form the basis of a design that can be carefully developed within the specifics of the land.
Tactical Site Design - Based on the previous example it has to be stressed, that the studio’s goal is to arrive at site specific designs. Students have to design in great detail how their chosen tactics will physically restructure the city or their chosen sites. Thereby we will use all the latest technologies of representation and design exploration available to us (digital models, animations, GIS, etc).
Successful Tactics - With the availability of local experts, the field trip and the community meetings the studio will have sufficient feedback loops to check the feasibility of the chosen tactics. However certain themes of tactical success are already known. All tactics that involve income generation will have a great chance to succeed. Tactics that involve the long term oversight of an outside organization are frail and bound to fail. Tactics that feed on the desires and culture of the local population are more successful than tactics that import outside values. For example the passion of favela dwellers for sports has led to the design of successful sport plazas. Tactical thinking looks for openings and opportunities. It ties together disconnected strings of information. To facilitate this creative thought process the participants will run through various exercises and will be made intimately familiar with the desires, needs and culture of the inhabitants of Cantinho do Céu.