London's Olympics are just the most recent example of the growing trend in building temporary architecture and urbanism in response to financial and practical considerations. Christopher Hawthorne asks whether this trend is too short sighted.
With cities from Los Angeles to London embracing lighter, quicker, cheaper ways to implement improvements to their environments in a wobbly world economy, "individual
clients and institutions will continue to turn to expedient architecture
as the only way to get their buildings or parks financed," writes Hawthorne. In the rush to embrace expediency, however, are officials and designers ignoring the larger implication of such projects on planning, preservation, and urban design?
Hawthorne looks at several temporary projects in Los Angeles to poke at the question. Ultimately, he seems to believe that building something is better than nothing, and in a city like Los Angeles, which over time has been reluctant to significantly invest in its purely public spaces, "even
on-the-cheap solutions like Sunset Triangle Plaza represent a sea change."
In the end, Hawthorne is merely starting the conversation over the long-term value of expediency, rather than providing an answer to his probing questions.
Read the full story: From London Olympics to Pasadena, temporary architecture takes hold
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City of Rosemead
Rutgers University, Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
One Hundred Miles
University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability (SEAS)
Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY)
The Architects Foundation
City of Cambridge
Montrose County
The Pocatello Development Authority