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CAPACITY: DTLA_ Cal Poly SLO + Gensler LA

derekmc825

Hello fellow archinects,

I recently had the opportunity to work at Gensler in Los Angeles through an academic studio in coordination with Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. I wanted to share with you the project and start a conversation on the future of the downtown Los Angeles built environment.

CAPACITY:
The intent of this Gensler Los Angeles led academic studio was to survey, understand and visualize the dynamic set of infrastructure constraints impacting and contributing to Downtown Los Angeles’ CAPACITY to evolve. The findings uncovered that meeting Downtown Los Angeles' current FAR "constraint" could increase the population of downtown 10-fold from 450,000 people to 4.5 million. Is this physically possible? Can the resources supporting Los Angeles serve a larger population? If so, how large?

As with any city, Los Angeles’ infrastructure exists as both physical and operational systems. Many of these systems remain an enigma, unimaginable and seldom envisioned at their maximum capacity, while others, such as Los Angeles notorious automotive thoroughfares are easily imagined, if not an everyday reality for many Angelenos.

 

This project has received an enormous amount of praise and critique. The video was recently played at the Downtown Los Angeles Film Festival and blogged on both Curbed and Archdaily.

http://la.curbed.com/archives/2013/08/what_would_happen_if_45_million_people_were_crammed_in_dtla.php

http://www.archdaily.com/350991/capacity-gensler-los-angeles-academic-studio/

 

I hope you enjoy,

Derek McFarland

 
Capacity: Downtown Los Angeles

Aug 8, 13 12:12 pm
Janosh

Nice graphic package, but I am still trying to figure out where the conclusions diverge from conventional wisdom: Potential additional density is limited by available resources, the subject of which has driven the DWP to explore water recycling, MRFs and disposal alternatives to the Puente Hills landfill which nears capacity, DOT and Metro to add transportation capacity via transit and modifications to the 10, 405 and 110 corridors; AB 32 to mandate a sustainable energy portfolio and so on.  

I also am left wondering why a super-dense future might be desirable.  So maybe I can ask this: is ultimate goal role of an architect just the realization of a property's highest real estate potential?

Aug 9, 13 12:11 am  · 
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