A Regenerative Brownfield development
Architecture towards a Third Generation London
S. van Klooster (TU Delft - Architecture and the Built Environment)
R Cavallo – Mentor (TU Delft - Theory, Territories & Transitions)
F.J. Speksnijder – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Teachers of Practice / AE+T)
J.P.M. van Lierop – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Theory, Territories & Transitions)
D. Piccinini – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Landscape Architecture)
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Abstract
Over the years, the Anthropocentric societies are to blame for the problematic urban environments they have created. Within the current paradigm, our destructive behavior towards the natural environment has caused a major decline in biodiversity. To restore the ecology in our contemporary urban environment, we require a turning strategy. This is where the Third Generation city framework emerges: a city aiming to learn from the mistakes made in the urban environment, followed by restoring them. Within the spectrum of restoration, it aims to restore the natural environment & creating ecocentric mindsets.
Due to their post-anthropocentric characteristics, brownfields can be seen as the seeds for the Third generation city, as wildlife often returns to these sites due to the absence of human activity. Therefore this thesis introduces architecture as a regenerative act toward the socio-environmental context of these brownfields. In one of London's most socio-environmental deprived areas, the representative brownfield development aims to actively regenerate the deprived neighborhood, becoming a statement in the city as a learning center. Here, visitors & local communities can learn how to support London Ecosystem with the effect of stimulating Ecocentric mindsets, while the design & material conditions of the architecture simultaneously stimulate the ecological development of the brownfield site.
Multiple of these ecological brownfield developments can influence the larger urban organism and become the driver toward an Ecocentric, Third generation London, restoring the balance with the Anthropocentric urban environment.