Fishermen landscape-From water to land

Fishermen landscape-From water to land: Develop resilient principles to rebuild gradient-landscape in PRD

Zhang, Huiyuan (TU Delft Architecture and the Built Environment; TU Delft Landscape Architecture)

Nijhuis, S. (mentor)
Qu, L. (mentor)
Kuitenbrouwer, P.A.M. (graduation committee)

Delft University of Technology

Architecture, Urbanism and Building Sciences | Landscape Architecture

2024-06-17

The Pearl River Delta (PRD) has always been one of the centers of gravity for China's economic development. Over the past few decades, the PRD has been undergoing urban development at an astonishing rate, but this development momentum has begun to wane in recent years. The development dividend initially gained from the manufacturing industry is gradually diminishing, and the whole region is facing a transformation. To meet the needs of the manufacturing industry, many rural villages have rented out their land to factories, and the living space for farmers and fishermen has been continuously reduced. Pollution brought about by the establishment of factories has also seriously affected the water system of the Pearl River, bringing about the extinction of aquatic organisms.

Not all groups of people have enjoyed the dividends of economic development in the Pearl River Delta. Especially the fishermen among the marginalized people, their living space and production sources are threatened by urban expansion. However, fishermen, as the first to settle in the Pearl River Delta and have lived on the land for thousands of years, have their unique wisdom about the land and the water system. Therefore, the project hopes to help the region achieve sustainable development from the perspective of the fishermen while ensuring their livelihoods.

The project has developed a core fishermen's habitat framework through theoretical research. Firstly, based on this framework, the project collected data and information on typical fishing villages classified the fishing villages in the Pearl River Delta (PRD), and summarized their specific elements. Secondly, the project selected one of the fishing villages for design exploration, exploring specific habitat modifications and area-specific planning strategies. Finally, the design logic implemented in the design exploration was utilized to examine the principles of the other two types of fishing villages, and a relatively feasible way of application was proposed.

Landscape has always embodied the mutual compromise between man and nature. In the past, humans have forced nature to make compromises, leading to the increasingly severe ecological degradation problems today. It is time to think differently about the relationship between man and nature, so the project hopes to help the residents of the Pearl River Delta, and nature reach a new coexistence through the means of landscape modification, which will no longer be a relationship of forcing one party to compromise, but rather a relationship of balanced development.

Landscape Urbanism
Landscape design principles
Social ecological thinking
urban planning and designing
Fish habitat
Ecological Restoration

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:b3ab295e-5e38-4cf8-8f0a-95b5c33c61f5

Student theses

master thesis

© 2024 Huiyuan Zhang