Before writing a cohesive thesis statement, I thought it would be relevant to brainstorm and cultivate relevant information that pertains to my topic. Much of it is statistics, but this data will help support my thesis topic.
Topic and Argument – Supporting Statistics
As it stands now, the US population is projected to reach extreme levels by 2050. As of the year 2000, the total population in the US was 282 million. By the year 2050, the US Census Bureau predicts a population of 439 million1. That is roughly an increase of 55%. According to the United Nations, based on 2000 data in urban areas within the US populations are expected to increase by 62%2. In some already overcrowded cities, those numbers are quite staggering.
That led me to which may be an obvious question, how do we feed this population increase? Growing up in a rural Midwest setting, across the street from a farm, and having family that do smaller scale farming, this issue resonates with me personally. According to the FAO we currently are using 80% of our arable land for farming3. Will the available farmland be enough to provide for the extreme population increases?
This led me to my next issue/argument. Even if there is enough farmland, and crops are genetically engineered to produce more, coupled with our current agriculture practices, is this good for the nation/world? Here are some more statistics showing how poorly our current agriculture model functions and treats the planet (worldwide statistics)4:
Forest Degradation – 5,800,000 km2 by 1990. Mostly Tropical Rainforests
Overgrazing – 6,800,000 km2. Rougly 20% of the world’s pasture’s and ranges have been damaged by overgrazing.
General Erosion and Soil Nutrient Loss – 5,500,000 km2
Architectural Intervention
Given the issue at hand, how can an architectural response provide a solution? I will be exploring possibilities throughout the term, but have arrived at a few ideas. The idea of urban farming and vertical agriculture holds a lot of attraction as a different model for food gathering. I’ve provided a few images of precedents to show what is meant by vertical farming. A more in depth look at these will be done in the future.
The “Living Tower” by SOA
VF – Type O by Oliver Foster
Vertical Agriculture will benefit urban centers greatly:
– Organic food, no need of pesticides
– No concerns of droughts or floods
– Job source for a heavily unemployed city (MKE)
– Reduced fossil fuels need, no transportation of crops over long distances.
– Opportunities to create a sustainable environment
– Be a catalyst for surrounding urban growth
– They will also free up the space in our country side and allow that to be restored to it’s natural beauty.
Moving Forward
In the next week or so I’ll be putting together a cohesive thesis statement using this supporting data. Related to that, I will see how this framework works with the site I chose, and if anything is being overlooked. Some questions I’m still pondering:
– Should the building be a centralized construct, or be made up of smaller urban farms, more accessible to the whole city?
– Is the building a manufacturer or can it hold other programing elements?
– What other programmatic elements would work well?
Sources and References
1 US Census Bureau 2000 Population Data
2 United Nations 2009 World Urbanization Projections
3 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
4 Our Land, Our Future – FAO
Just a reminder that China ( might be a little hard to image) with extremely high density survive today still, although it produces a lot , but it imports a lot as well. To my experience, New York city might be comparable for density and consumption issues and worthy to look into.
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