Solarpunk Urbanism

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A community to discuss solarpunk and other new and alternative urbanisms that seek to break away from our currently ecologically destructive urbanisms.

Henri Lefebvre, The Right to the City — In brief, the right to the city is the right to the production of a city. The labor of a worker is the source of most of the value of a commodity that is expropriated by the owner. The worker, therefore, has a right to benefit from that value denied to them. In the same way, the urban citizen produces and reproduces the city through their own daily actions. However, the the city is expropriated from the urbanite by the rich and the state. The right to the city is therefore the right to appropriate the city by and for those who make and remake it.

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What am I getting wrong? Please point out my bad ideas for art of a solarpunk swamp city (slrpnk.net)

submitted 2 months ago by JacobCoffinWrites to c/urbanism

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I've been thinking about trying to depict some of the ideas from this conversation: https://slrpnk.net/post/12735795, using a sort of flat, diagram-like style similar to this old photobash:

Though a bit more complex. The obvious answer is 'don't build cities in swamps' but we already have a bunch of them, and though I don't live there I recognize that they have a lot of unique cultural and historical value and are peoples' homes, so I'm interested in what a solarpunk-adapted version of these would look like.

At the same time, I know basically nothing about New Orleans or similar areas, have no background in civil engineering, and no qualifications to make this except for the capability to do so using an old version of GIMP. So I'd absolutely love to identify issues, places to make improvements, and things that are missing now rather than once I've spent days chopping up images and finessing them into something coherent.

So what'd I get wrong? What's unworkable, out of scale, or dangerous? What style of buildings or cultural touchstones would you like to see? What kind of plants are missing?

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[–] fruitycoder@sh.itjust.works 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Something to consider water doesn't stop at the shore in a lot of soils. There is actually a lot of water moving underground, moving the foundation and such. You also have to contend with rising water levels.

What makes the most sense then would be a city built to transition between the types of houses shown here as the conditions change and grow.

[–] JacobCoffinWrites 4 points 2 months ago

That's something I've been wondering about - I live in a place with lots of ledge to anchor foundations to (or to get in the way of basements, depending on your situation and budget). I know skyscrapers drive in huge piles for support which I think aims for that supportive material underground? I know from researching bunkers that in other places the ground is kinda moving steadily, which can roll or twist unprepared or poorly designed structures. I've seen that New Orleans for example has some skyscrapers but just having them doesn't necessarily mean building them is a good long term plan and that the ground will support those kind of structures.