Overrun with tourists during the summer months, Venice has also seen an influx of refugees in the past half-decade — two challenges the city is struggling to handle. With his proposal Ghetto, architect Gregory Henriquez asks if the former phenomenon might be leveraged to mitigate the latter: Tourists bring capital, which could, in theory, support newcomers. Henriquez’s plan comprises four architectural islands in the canal with timeshares for tourists that subsidize refugee housing. Under this scheme, denizens of the two Venices — the vacationers’ paradise and the port-of-call for migrants — would have to share neighbourhoods and acknowledge each other’s humanity.
Team: Gregory Henriquez with Sarah Schlegelmilch, Patricia Tewfik, Peter Wood, Bartosz Palus, Nicolette Williams, Sara Zonouzi, Quinci Cohen, UNHCR and European Cultural Centre
The tributaries of the Upper Los Angeles River have been marred by a racist history of neglect. Today, the hostile concrete landscape offers little in the way of community space, flood protection or nature. Intending to restore all three, the Upper Los Angeles River and Tributaries (ULART) Plan is led by Los Angeles Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, Sarah Rascon of the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority and landscape architecture firm Studio-MLA, led by Mía Lehrer.
This trio was joined by designers, geographic scientists, information technologists, community advocates and local residents to redefine the tributaries as valuable social, ecological and hydrological players in the fight for equity. In contrast to earlier schemes, which tended to address singular issues (from drinking fountains to cycling trails) on a limited geographic scale, their new collaborative vision, spanning 2,070 square kilometres, considers the watershed as a whole.
After compiling a database of 114 planning studies previously conducted throughout the area, ULART organizers synthesized a wealth of individual necessities into a broad framework and prioritized the initiatives that would have the greatest possible impact.