RIM: Newsletter of the Pacific Rim Community Design Network

Issue 1 | Issue 2, Autumn 2009 | Issue 3 | Issue 4 | Issue 5 | Issue 6 | Issue 7
Next Pacific Rim Conference: Awaji, Japan!

 
Hosted by Professor Mayumi Hayashi, the 7th Conference of the Pacific Rim Community Design Network will be held on Awaji Island in Hyogo, Japan in September 2010 at the Awaji Landscape Planning & Horticulture Academy and the University of Hyogo. More details will be available soon!

 

2007 Conference Proceedings Available Online

 
The proceedings from the 2007 Pacific Rim Community Design Network conference are now (finally) online! Refresh your memories and reflect on the progress of your scholarship and action by reviewing the papers that were presented two years ago. Papers submitted in Chinese as well as English are available in both languages. Go to http://courses.washington.edu/quanzhou/pacrim/

 

Community-based Earthquake Recovery in Taoping, China

 
Dan Abramson and Jeff Hou recently led a community field studio in the village of Taoping in Sichuan, China. The studio involved a multidisciplinary group of students and faculty from University of Washington and Sichuan University to address the challenges of community recovery from the 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake that include: resilient building reconstruction; ecologically sensitive site design and watershed management; cultural heritage preservation; and sustainable tourism development. The students interviewed local residents and produced proposals based on different conservation and development scenarios. A town hall meeting was held as a part of studio where local residents were consulted for the first time on the recovery of the village, more than a year after the earthquake. A report of the studio is available here.

 

Neighbor Power in Taiwan -- Jim Diers

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks to the Community Empowerment Society, a Taiwanese edition of my book has been published and I was able to tour the major cities and small villages on the west side of Taiwan in September. Jeff Hou’s students, Kuang-ting Huang and Shu-Mei Huang, did a wonderful job of translating Neighbor Power: Building Community the Seattle Way. The tour gave me an opportunity to share Seattle’s programs of community empowerment including community-driven planning and a Neighborhood Matching Fund that has now yielded more than 4000 community self-help projects. In return, I was incredibly inspired by the community activism in Taiwan as evidenced by the graduation ceremony I attended for 80 Young Community Planners in Taipei, the creative community gathering places I saw in the village of Tugo, an elder in Meinong who has led a 20 year successful fight against the building of a dam, a young activist in Kaohsiung wearing a t-shirt that read “Yes we can” in Chinese and English, Hakka elementary students growing organic rice, a senior center in Taoyuan run entirely by volunteers, historic businesses in Daxi that are preserved despite no government requirement to do so, and so much more. Many thanks to everyone who made this visit possible!

Davis Farmer’s Market Won Award – Mark Francis

 

 The Davis Farmer's Market, designed by Mark Francis, FASLA Professor of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design at UC Davis, was voted "America's Favorite Farmer's Market" in a recent national poll conducted by the American Farmland Trust. It is the first permanent farmer's market designed into an urban park in California. The Davis Farmer's Market received 3032 votes, over 10 percent of the total votes. The award was presented at a ceremony in Central Park on September 12, 2009 attended by local and state officials as well as the California Commissioner of Agriculture and the former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture. Francis's design of Davis Central Park and Farmer's Market has received several design awards including a Centennial Medallion from the American Society of Landscape Architects as a "national landmark of outstanding landscape architecture." (Left: photo by Mark Francis) 
Greening Cities, Growing Communities

 

 A new book by Jeff Hou, Julie Johnson and Laura Lawson, titled Greening Cities, Growing Communities: Learning from Seattle’s Urban Community Gardens (University of Washington Press), came out in October. Focusing on six community gardens in Seattle where there has been a strong network of knowledge and resources, the book examines the capacity of community gardens to serve larger community issues, such as food security; urban ecosystem health; demonstration of sustainable gardening and building practices; active living and pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods; and equity concerns. The book also examines how urban community gardens offer opportunities for professionals to have a more prominent role in community activism and urban sustainability.
Chattanooga's Downtown Westside Waterfront Proposals Won Award

 
Perry Yang joined the City and Regional Planning Program and Architecture Program at Georgia Tech. His Urban Design Studio in the Spring 2009, co-teaching with Professor Richard Dagenhart, recently won the 2009 Outstanding Student Project Award from the Tennessee Planning Association for its research and proposals for Chattanooga's Downtown Westside Waterfront. He is also organizing a Shanghai Urban Design Studio starting from December 2009 to investigate issues of new downtown and its social and ecological issues, in collaboration with Tongji University. His new book Ecological Urbanism: Scale, Complexity and Design, is to be published by China Architecture and Building Press in 2010 in Beijing. He is the board member of UPE, the International Urban Planning and Environment Association (UPE). Perry is co-chairing the organizing committee of UPE9 in August 2010 Guangzhou China, with the main theme Sustainable Planning Challenges: Rapid Urbanization, Global Recession and Climate Change.

 

Fringe Neighborhoods and Nanxijiang National Scenic Area

 
Zhang Tianxin, Ph.D, is an associate professor of urban design in Peking University. His teaching focuses on the university fringe neighborhoods, analyzing the spatial structure and impact of universities on their surrounding areas. He also attends practical planning and design projects. In 2009, his project of Nanxijiang National Scenic Area master plan has finally passed the evaluation process.