Some ideologues argue against accessibility because it "beaks the esthetic." The truth is, an esthetic that permits inaccessiblity is already irrecoverably broken.
Launching into study of Christopher Alexander's Pattern Language has been an engaging intellectual exercise. By no means can I claim to have mastered his thought but some initial thoughts occur to me. Resonant with Chomskian sensibilities the search for gramaticality in Alexander's work seems to substitute for the proscriptive esthetics of more precious constructs like New Urbanism. That is a hopeful sign.
Alexander's essay "Methods" which discusses the role of " generative sequence" and its essential feature as being "backtrack-free" strikes me as the Pattern Language argument against retrofitting ("backtracking") - and, by extension, as argument for Universal Design.
This is because Universal Design incorporates the lifespan-aware definition of disability outlined in the International Categorization of Functionality (ICF). Good design, even for those who remain in the temporary state identified and reinforced by the built environment as "able bodied," must take into account the functionalities associated with a complete lifespan -- childhood, temporary injury, tiredness, lapses of attention, the posssibility of permanent disability, and aging. To achieve the goal of livability each action undertaken must not eliminate the possibility a future one made necessary, for example, by disability:
There is one essential ingredient to the sequences, which is perhaps their most salient feature, and which is also the feature that makes them work, and which forms the foundation of the described methodology.A sequence works, or does not work, according to the order of the steps in the sequence. Some sequences allow unfolding, others do not allow it.
This property of being backtrack-free is the essence of what makes a successful sequence.
This approach and business method is fundamentally different from previous attempts to plan, design and construct buildings. The present methodology provides for user participation in the planning design and construction of the built environment in a manner which allows the organic growth of a design through a sequence of generative steps...
It is a major feature of this proposal that urban space is not only made better, not only made coherent and beautiful, and connected, but that it also contains the desires and will and thought of many, many individual people.
Some of Alexander's thoughts on Urban Redevelopment, laid out in his 2000 article on Thessaloniki, seem even more feasible in light of functionalities for collaboration eveolving as "Web 2.0."
The radical democratization of the unfolding of design he envisions can only work, however, if the anthropometrics accepted as "normal" by the dominant culture take into account the full range of human functionality -- childhood, disability, aging. There exists a class of people made invisible and voiceless by all examples of urban space up to this point in history - even the best, most organic, most esthetically pleasing - people with disabilities. They will not automatically be heard simply through access to digital amplification of their peripheral voices.
The recent Paralympic Games did much to raise awareness of difference in Greece but not enough to give the seven principles of Universal Design or the practice of Visitability the ubiquity necessary for this methodology to generate a Livable Community.
Still, the deep insight of Pattern Language remains congruent with a core, pan-disability cultural value -- interdependency. Alexander seems to return often to that theme under the term "belonging", or in the Thessaloniki speech, "deep pleasantness."
I am struck that in biological systems growth ocurs at the periphery. That is the space -- both metaphoric and physical -- to which those with disabilties are relegated. To be true to its fascination with biomimicry, Pattern Language ought to engage itself in sustained, interpreted observation of the patterns produced by disability cultures.
Universal Design arose from within disability culture. It is an actively nurtured and evolving production that authentically expresses, and simultaneously progresses, the vitality of that community.
What would a fully developed dialogue between Universal Design and Pattern Language produce?
Maybe it's time to find out.
The city of the future should not be, as some may think, a fabric to be modernized by stripping out and enlargement of structure, and by destruction. Instead, careful observation, street by street, wall by wall, of the very subtle things which work now, and which make people deeply comfortable, can provide a new kind of solution more in keeping with the humanity of our new century, more in keeping with the promise of the 21st century as the century of biology -- that is, a century which may now be dominated by small scale intimacy, by complexity arrived at by working complexity created by sometimes tiny human structures cooperating to form more complex streets, and spaces, and foci, and opportunities for human life.
Who will "Bring New Orleans Back Home?" Could it be the very people disproportionately left behind to bear the brunt of Katrina's destruction because the very inaccessibility of the city eliminated any chance of retreat from reality? Could it be that the view from the sidelines, disabled and meticulously attentive, holds the secret to renewal and rebirth?
Posted by rollingrains at November 5, 2005 11:19 PM