Category Archives: Richard Register

Robert Stark talks to Richard Register about Resilient Design in the San Francisco Bay

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Richard Register is a theorist in ecology and urban design, the author of several books on the topic of ecologically sustainable cities, and founder and President of Ecocity World.

Topics:

The Bigger Bay Ecotropolis
The degree to which sea level rise is inevitable
Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming
How people in Ancient Mesopotamia adapted to flooding with artificial mounds
How that concept can be incorporated in the San Francisco Bay Area and Mississippi River Delta
How that concept is not adaptable in spread out suburbia
Building on elevated terrain in compact pedestrian developments
The All Bay Collective Proposals
Why damming the Golden Gate is not viable
The long term goal of living car free
Underground highways
Retrofitting suburbs into compact villages surrounded by open space
How that model is more sustainable to natural disasters such as wild fires
Yv 88: An Eco-Fiction of Tomorrow and its depiction of a car free Yosemite Valley

Click Here to download!

This show is brought to you by Robert Stark’s PaintingsStark Truth TV, and his novel Journey to Vapor Island




Alt Urbanism: Retrofitting The Aesthetically Pleasing Suburb

By Robert Stark: Originally Published on Alt of Center

There has been a growing movement within the New Urbanist scene to retrofit car-oriented suburbs. There is even an excellent book on the subject titled Retrofitting Suburbia by Ellen Dunham-Jones. The book focuses primarily on retrofitting aesthetically unappealing, car-oriented suburbs that were built in the 2nd half of the 20th Century.

Despite opposition from suburban NIMBYs this idea makes practical and aesthetic sense. Your typical American suburban commercial thoroughfare is lined with ugly strip malls with massive parking lots that are aesthetically unappealing, ecologically unsustainable, and unfriendly to pedestrians. The safety of pedestrians is rarely secured. It really should come as no surprise that law firms like lamber goodnow are often required to assist pedestrians who have been struck by cars in these areas.
Continue reading Alt Urbanism: Retrofitting The Aesthetically Pleasing Suburb

Robert Stark interviews Richard Register about Ecocities

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Richard Register is a theorist in ecology and urban design, the author of several books on the topic of ecologically sustainable cities, and founder and President of Ecocity World.

Topics:

Richard’s concept of an Ecocity
Paolo Soleri’s concept of an Arcology and his project Arcosanti in Arizona
The Ecosa Institute which is doing what Soleri intended on a smaller scale
Ancient examples of the Arcology go back to Ur in Mesopotamia and Çatalhöyük in Turkey
The city as a complex living organism
Horizontal vs. three dimensional cities
Implementing an ecocity on a large scale as an Ecotropolis
Why density is more ecologically sustainable
Ecocity Zoning
The goal of creating a car free city
The use of bridges between structures
John C. Portman’s Embarcadero Center in San Francisco which has aspects of an Arcology
Exterior glass elevators
Richard’s book Ecocity Berkeley and NIMBY imposed barriers to change in Berkeley
Opening up the creek systems in urban areas
Creating Ecocity village cores in the suburbs and how to retrofit aesthetically pleasing suburbs(ex. Santa Barbara, Marin County, and wealthy East Bay suburbs)
Reducing the foot print of cities and suburbs and opening up new land to agriculture and wilderness
Richard’s illustrations and the importance of aesthetics in urbanism
New Urbanism as a step in the right direction but too rigid in height and density
Richard’s trip to the Galapagos Islands and observations of how architecture coexists with nature
Ecocities in China
Robert’s observation that Las Vegas despite being an ecological catastrophe has many aspects of the Arcology

Click Here to download!

This show is brought to you by Robert Stark’s Paintings and his novel Journey to Vapor Island