Aqua-sprawl ~ will Federation Island also have 11 time zones?
Shame on Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat for proving, once again, that many architects aren’t afraid to stoop to doing jobs that (most) landscape architects and planners know better not to do. He’s designing an 865-acre (350-hectare) project for a major Russian development on the Black Sea. It’s a Russia-shaped infill island of pure sailboat paradise called “Federation Island.” Barf.
Is architecture training today more bereft of ethics training than business schools? I thought Dutch architecture was the last bastion of hope for the profession. If it is, they need to rein in this stray.
If you don’t like gross over-generalizations or you love all architects, you can skip this paragraph. However, if you’ve attended any architecture conferences recently, you know that the buzz is all about green building. But instead of asking whether or not a building should even be built in a site, or how it relates to the environmental and social systems around it, they are trying to figure out how best to incorporate the building-buzz into their sites. I assume that the goal is that they might attain some level of celebrity. But they’re talking about environmental concepts, which landscape architecture has been using and exploring for a hundred years, AS IF THEY’RE NOVEL.
This island SHOULD NEVER BE BUILT. It is going to alter ecological systems forever. It is a disaster for the Black Sea. Why has island paradise become so ingrained in all of our hearts and minds that we think we need to replicate it everywhere? Remember the paradise tent in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, which is located fairly close to the geographic point farthest away from any ocean?
What’s funny is that everyone is attributing this “Federation Island” idea to Dubai’s “Palm Island” and “The World” developments. Weren’t the Russians the original land-fillers with St. Petersburg? Konechno! Oh well, I see what they’re doing, and they’ll probably make a ton of money as the Black Sea still holds a place in the former Soviets’ paradisiacal hearts from better days gone by.
All of these projects are aqua-sprawl, and they need someone to stop and say, “maybe we shouldn’t be building these.” I wish the major international hotel chains would also take a stance against owning and/or operating hotels in places like these.
I can’t wait until I get to travel there in 40 years with my dilapidated Russian skills to take pictures of the distopia that this island will become. Glory to Soviet sciences…and algal blooms to new-Russian islands (hyphen intended).
The best part will be when they decide that they’re going to have 11 time zones for the place. I think I’ll buy Astrakhan.
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Posted on September 25, 2007
Filed Under Architecture, Islands, Real Estate, Utopia |
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