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?

SANTA MONICA

DOWN

WESTWOOD

HOLLYWOOD

URBAN FABRICComparisons o urban abrics around the world expose the

inherent problem o scale as perhaps one o the most signicant

actors in determining whether a city is characteristically

suburban and auto-oriented or more pedestrian-oriented. The

traditional response in suburbia has been to internalize

pedestrian areas, in the orm o the mall. Square One (home tothe largest Walmart in the world) as illustrated in the gure/

ground o Mississagua, is a classic example o the surbu rban

pedestrian public space (http://www.bricoleurbanism.org).

Copenhagen, on the other hand, is perhaps what many would

consider the ultimate pedestrian city. Though the two cities

could arguably have the same total areao pedestrian public

space, it is ultimately the degree o integration into the urban

abric that denes the temporal character o the city. Various

cities around the world all have dierent orms o the urban

grid,and thus there is no perect orm o street abric. However,as Los Angeles emerges rom a quilt work o distinctive

neighborhood abrics stitched together by the Wilshire corridor,

the morphological characteristics o each can perhaps begin to

expose the possibilities o a more interconnected city abric.

image source: http://www.bricoleurbanism.org

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WILSHIRE

A City within a City

As undamental as the element o the city block, are the

constructs that orm upon the delineation o these grids. While

the shiny towers o the centralizedcity nucei are indeed

present along the stretches o Wilshire Boulevard, what then liesin the interstitiary spaces within the urban abric? Not quite city,

yet not exactly surburban, Grey Goo,is the massive territory

between city centers and the exburbs.Endless and without

clear structure, this goois quite literally the grey concrete and

asphalt that has seeped into the inrastructure o transportation

throughways and city blocks.

As Wilshire transcends the shiting geometry o b

proportion and distance, it also illustrates the gra

prolieration o grey gooin the in-betweenso

neighborhood abrics. With the quaint proportioWestwood Village morphing into the corporate sc

City, the signicant increase in buildable oor-area

gives an indication o Grey Goo as the actual ma

apparatus necessary to sustain the shiny aade o

center.

Wilshire Boulevard was the rst trafc corridor to the ocean ater

the automobile became primary means o transportation.

Though initially the street was residential, the amount o trafc

using Wilshire gradually became more attractive or commerceand business. As Los Angeles developed, Wilshire became a city

within a city on a linear trajectory. Le Corbusiers Linear City

would come as no surprise to anyone living in this city(Barden

160).

As his concept idealized the city along viaducts, parallel open

spaces, and straight boulevards or corridors, to live in it requires

believing that having a true geographical center is not really t hat

important (Barden 160). With Wilshire Boulevard stringingtogether the dialogue between the citys many distinct

neighborhoods, it is perhaps these variable iterations o scale and

proportion undamental to the city block, which can ultimately

enable the dissection o LAs diverse spatial DNA.

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2.41 miles/ 11,303 ft2.45 miles/ 12,945 ft 2.72 miles/ 14,308 ft2.9 miles/ 15, 325 ft 2.71 miles/ 14, 306 ft 2.58 miles/ 13,622 ft 2.64 miles/ 13,982 ft

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METRIC: city block le

190,230 sf

617 ft

338 ft

GREY GOO

if 0.2 miles ~ 3 min walk

2.5 min

1 min

GREY GOOThe material apparatus o this greysupport system is

monotonous- asphalt, preab homes, back ofces, and old strip

malls. As city blocks along Wilshire morph and uctuate, it is the

interstitiary spaces that suer rom the inevitable need o

automobile and other support inrastructure. Scale becomes

orgotten and as the walkable city block transorms to meet a

more metropolitanabric, the residual blocks in-between are let

at the cost o their urban efciency and pedestrian viability.

While Grey Goois generally associated with the d

o the mid 20th century, a ormal and spatial dete

city into the boundaries o suburbia, the linear o

Wilshire Boulevard creates a contrastingly cyclic p

one not necessarily deteriorating but rather uct

ambiguity o abric shits. As distinct neighborh

together, the lost identity o those spaces caught

reected in the urban architecture o the goo.