Beyond Industry

01 X INFO

02 X DESCRIPTION

Globalization and capitalism are resulting in the emergence of more and more urbanized landscapes.  As the world becomes increasingly globalized, ports become ideal places for investment and development.  Because of its strategic coastal location, Prince Rupert has one of the fastest growing port terminals in North America and is the epicentre for the exploitation of natural resources in Northern British Columbia.  As Prince Rupert evolves, peak oil is reached, and non-renewable resources decline, we can imagine a transition toward a renewable resource economy, an influx of renewable resource industries, and an influx of diverse groups of people.

Fumihiko Maki’s 1964 Investigations in Collective Form is adapted to act as the guiding framework for this project.  Maki’s writing suggests, “Our concern here is not, then, a “master plan,” but a “master program,” since the latter term includes a time dimension.  As a physical correlate of the master program, there are “master forms” which differ from buildings in that they, too, respond to the dictates of time.

Collective form represents groups of buildings and quasi-buildings—the segment of our cities.  Collective form is, however, not a collection of unrelated, separate buildings, but of buildings that have reasons to be together.”  Maki’s three major approaches to collective form—compositional form, mega form, and group form—are used as the fundamental base layer for this project.

Our relationship with natural resources, industry, the economy, and the environment are complex and constantly in a state of contradiction.  This relationship is explored through an understanding of the city as a collective form.  Positioning industry as a generator, a systems-based approach to collective form imagines an urbanism through the lens of a form, a strategy, and a program.

This project forecasts the future generative potential of industries stimulating the Canadian resource economy, while allowing these industries to productively shape the built environment and the exchanges that occur within it.

Urban society is “a dynamic field of interrelated forces,” and as such, this proposal positions the architect as a mediator.  It proposes approaches not as fixed solutions, but as possibilities for how a place can evolve in response to shifting geopolitical and socioeconomic values.

This project suggests ways in which an urbanism can develop and adapt to support these shifts, highlighting the need for the designer to consider cycles and transformations.  Post-war carbon economies can transition towards renewable resource economies as a catalyst for diversification and the growth of the collective city.

Our relationship with natural resources, industry, the economy, and the environment are complex and constantly in a state of contradiction.  This relationship is explored through an understanding of the city as a collective form.  This project forecasts the future generative potential of industries stimulating the Canadian resource economy, while allowing these industries to productively shape the built environment and the exchanges that occur within it.

03 X ABOUT

Jesse received his Master of Architecture from the University of British Columbia in 2020.  He completed previous undergraduate degrees in Toronto, ON, and Halifax, NS.  Jesse was born and raised in the suburbs of southern Ontario and has taken an interest in vernacular architecture and its relationship to the urban – rural divide.  His work has focussed on the role of form and how it can take shape not just through physical manifestations, but by intervening in larger systems that engage with socioeconomic and geopolitical values from the human exchange to the territory.