Open House International

Wilkinson, Nicholas

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0001

Nabeel Hamdi's new book The Placemakers' Guide to Building Community (ISBN 978-1-84407-803-5) published by Earthscan is a very useful book which should be on the shelves of every person involved in building communities and the art of development practices. The outside back cover has a number of short statements which reveal that Nabeel has made a place for himself at the pinnacle of participatory planning and “.….has masterfully woven together notions of place making that have evolved since John Turmer's book, Housing by People, into a new paradigm for professional practice” says Bish Sanyal, Ford International Professor of Urban Development and Planning at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.”

Sandström, Greger; Keijer, Ulf

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0002

This article explores the residents' attitudes to and acceptance of Smart Homes. The results are based on surveys of two residential units fit with advanced smart home systems. The systems offered functionalities of different kinds as alarms, energy measurement, booking of common facilities, broadband connections and electronic keys. The buildings were first occupied in mid 2001 and early 2002, respectively. The original smart home systems were in operation until end of 2005, when they ultimately were replaced by simpler ones, based on the web, a change not foreseen from the beginning. The extended period of time offered the possibility to study the residents' long term attitudes, expectations and demands on smart homes with their installed and perceived functionality.The questionnaire surveys focused on the residents experiences and included questions of their actual use of the smart home systems and opinions regarding accessibility and easy of use. Albeit functionality related to current demand is a basic requirement, two other concepts, viz. accessibility and trust, have appeared to be fundamental for a positive attitude and acceptance of various functions that constitute a smart home. Related issues are developed and further discussed in the article.

Idham, Noor Cholis; Numan, Ibrahim; Mohd, Munther

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0003

One of the most important issues arising from the 2006 Java earthquake is that many of the Javanese houses were easily collapsed or badly damaged due to the quake. The failure of the vernacular houses was also believed to be a principle factor in causing the casualties. As a replacement, the government built reconstruction houses which differ in form, size and structure to the earlier houses. Intensive campaigns were conducted to encourage and support the construction of compacted dwellings with brick walls and concrete frame systems. In view of the fact that the collapsed houses were comprised of many of the various types of Javanese vernacular structures in the area, including the recent well known reinforced concrete frame type, uncertainty in deciding which house is really fulfill the need of the people has emerged. Even though the new houses are thought to be more stable in respect of earthquake safety, the other values in housing should be examined and reassured.The comparative study presented in this paper, is based on a housing quality assessment method, which employs using an adaptation of Maslow's theory. Here, an interpretation related to the housing aspects in respect of the specific grading method is proposed. Following the earthquake, all Javanese house types were examined from the old traditional housing to the newly built houses. Aspects of evaluating the quality are considered according to local requirements and needs in respect of how the houses had been built according to the climate, needs, customs, safety, security, utility and comfort. This was done in order to compare the developments and changes in quality of the various types of housing. The result of the assessment applied to the houses shows that the Javanese housing quality is constantly changing over time for particular reasons. Unfortunately, according to this study, the overall quality of Javanese houses is currently, for some reason, in a downward trend.

Oktay, Derya; Marans, Robert W.

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0004

This study aims to identify key indicators affecting the residents' perception of overall quality of urban life in the Walled City of Famagusta, the historic core of the city, which reflects a decaying socio-spatial quality. The paper first presents a brief overview of the research methodology and then analyses the results from a household survey carried out in the Walled City, in order to provide a sheer understanding of people's feelings about their neighbourhood environment and the overall urban quality of life in case of implementation of a possible regeneration scheme for the area. The research contributes some empirical evidence to verify the claimed benefits and shortcomings in terms of effects of neighbourhood satisfaction, sense of community, sense of belonging, neighbourhood attributes, use/evaluation of cultural and recreational opportunities and safety on the overall quality of urban life of the residents, as well as to identify the predictors of the neighbourhood satisfaction.

Zlatanova, Sisi; Itard, Laure; Kibria, Mahmud Shahrear; Dorst, Machiel van

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0005

Urban renewal is a multifaceted activity that involves numerous actors, software, and types of data. Design communication tools play an important role in this process. Visual information helps to outline, understand, and choose sustainable solutions for problems in the design, while visual tools should be able to diminish professional differences and establish a common language. Recent 3D geo-technologies offer a great variety of new tools that significantly enrich visualisation possibilities and allow for flexible switching between different 3D representations. However, studies have indicated that particular representations create different perceptions in professional compared to non-professional individuals. This paper discusses the specifics of urban renewal processes in the Netherlands and investigates recently developed 3D geo-information technology, and more specifically multiple 3D representations, that can support this task. The concept of LOD, which uses five levels of information, was evaluated as a very promising approach to agree on abstractions and representations in the different renewal phases. The study did not reveal a lack of digital possibilities for visualisation, but instead showed that the simultaneous visualisation of the proposed alternatives should be a priority. This investigation did reveal that different levels of interactivity could be used for the presentation and communication of project alternatives.

Benko, Melinda

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0006

One of the innumerable ways to systemise contemporary European urban projects is to analyse the urban form originates from the master-plan concept. The duality of closed and open urban situations is an excellent conceptual tool for classification. This classification helps us to recognise, understand and represent the diversity of the city, as it is present on each level of a settlement and architecture.In the case of “Solid-oriented” projects construction and emplacement of buildings are the main goals. The principle of “Solid-oriented” projects are based on two very different, still existing traditions One is the classical European closed block structure, while the other one is the Modernist open urban system. Today we can identify two new approaches combining those two traditions in different ways. Urban transparency preserves streets, the effect of enclosure, and the dominance of buildings. At the same time density is coupled with spaciousness, blocks are fractured and the environment becomes more complex even within one block. The in-between method, based on the idea of structuralism, attempts to balance the importance of mass and space and creates permeable blocks in a new open urban structure. Besides creating urban volumes or buildings in the city, there is a new type of challenge in contemporary urban design. Since the 1990's attention has shifted to cityscape, i.e. to re-interpreting and reforming open spaces. The international literature calls this un-volumetric architecture. The duality of openness and closedness also appears here. While openness seems to dominate urban situations in contemporary cities, buildings are predominantly used in a closed manner.

Ahmed, Iftekhar; Sager, Jalel; Cuong, Le Vu

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0007

This paper presents concepts important for understanding the potential of sustainable low-income housing in Vietnam, with a focus on key environmental, socio-economic, and cultural dimensions that bear on its housing sector. It examines challenges for sustainable urban development in Hanoi and HCMC, Vietnam's two main cities. Recognising the current challenges in balancing affordability and sustainability, the study explores Vietnam's lack of adequate and affordable housing and the problem of its urban slums. Synergistic strategies suitable for the Vietnamese context are then suggested for sustainable low-income housing in these two cities.

Turkkan, Elif E.; Basa, Inci; Gurel, Meltem O.

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0008

A major aim of the design studio is to educate students to be well-equipped designers. To do so, a student should be able to grasp the divergent information of various courses and integrate that knowledge into their design problems. But are students aware of the emphasis placed on incorporating different curriculum courses into the design studio? Do they find it beneficial while developing a design project? To what extent do they think this integration has an impact on their success in the design studio and in their adaptation to professional practice? This paper seeks to find out whether the integration between the design studio and other curriculum courses is productive from students' perspectives and determine if there is a consensus between students and instructors on the significance of transferring knowledge from curriculum courses to design projects. In addition, the paper examines the position of the design studio as an integrative medium between education and practice in the Turkish context.

Jusan, Mahmud Bin Mohd

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0009

Meeting human needs is considered as fundamental to sustainable human settlement. However, in micro level developments particularly in respect of a housing unit, for example, an operational definition of sustainability which will be useful in its practical implementation, has yet to be developed. To address this, the author posits that theories on the relationship between the environment and the person can be taken as a conceptual frame of reference. One of them is the theory of Person-Environment Congruence (PEC). This theory conceptualizes “congruence” as the favourable outcome of the person-environment relationship. Achieving PEC is considered as the most important criteria that supports the concept of housing sustainability. In the context of housing, the author considers that PEC is achieved when the dwelling place can offer its inhabitants a place which meets their basic needs. In order to operationalize this concept in terms of housing unit design, the author propagates the use of the Means-End Chain (MEC) research model to explore the relationship between a person and his or her environment. The combination of the two concepts facilitates the identification of those housing attributes emphasized in the home-making process, together with the users' perceptual orientation towards those attributes. To experiment with the application of the MEC research model in respect of exploring the concept of PEC, a case study was conducted on 15 renovated and personalized houses in a mass housing scheme in Malaysia. The traditional MEC methods were maintained with some modifications to accommodate the various housing characteristics. The results suggest that the MEC research model is able to link the relevant housing unit attributes to user values, and it is potentially applicable in the design of a housing unit. The results also indicated that user participation is essential in home making process, in order to achieve and maintain sustainability.

Shetty, Sujata; Luescher, Andreas

2010 Open House International

doi: 10.1108/OHI-03-2010-B0010

Urban design has historically occupied the gap between architecture and planning. Although there have long been calls for the discipline to bridge this gap, urban design has continued to lean more heavily on design than planning. The efforts to revitalize downtown Toledo, a mid-western U.S. town experiencing steep economic decline, present a classic example of the potentially unfortunate results of this approach. Over the past three decades, there have been many attempts to revitalize the city, especially its downtown, by constructing several large public buildings, all within a few blocks of each other, all designed with little attention to each other or to the surrounding public spaces, and with a remarkable lack of civic engagement.Responding to calls in the literature for inter-disciplinarity in urban design, and to the city's experience with urban design, the authors created a collaborative studio for architects and planners from two neighboring universities with two purposes: first, to establish a collaborative work environment where any design interventions would be firmly rooted in the planning context (i.e., to erase boundaries between architects and planners); second, to draw lessons from this experience for the practice and teaching of urban design.Despite the difficulties of collaborating, architects and planners benefited from exposure to each other, learning about each other's work, as well as learning to collaborate. The interdisciplinary teams developed richer proposals than the architect-only teams. Finally, critical engagement with the community is essential to shaping downtown development.