Review: Architecture Australia, July 1996

Is New Urbanism the Answer to the City of the Future?

Debate hosted by the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects (AILA) on a trend in urban design: speakers Christopher Degenhardt (USA), Philip Thalis, Rohan Dickson, Philip Grails, Vladimir Sitta, Darlene van der Breggen and Chris Stapleton. At Chifley Tower, Sydney, 26 March, 1996.
Review by Lewis Knight

Following recent visits to this country by Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk (DPZ), Miami-based purveyors of ‘new urbanism’, the NSW AILA arranged a well-attended forum to debate this theory and its ramifications.

The introductory address, delivered by Christopher Degenhardt, founding member of EDAW in the United States, outlined personal views of ecological sustainability and broad trends that he saw developing in the US which may find their way to Australia. He mentioned Australia’s advanced global standing on environmental matters, yet urged practitioners and students not to be complacent but to continue “pushing the envelope” on longterm ecologically sustainable design (ESD) issues.

A loose for-and-against discussion followed-chaired by AILA national president Leonard Lynch with his usual alacrity-in which speakers from various urban design disciplines (landscape, architecture, planning, transport) defended and denigrated the misnomer “new urbanism”. The forum organiser, Tempe Macgowan, is to be commended for reaching beyond landscape architecture for participants such as transport engineer Chris Stapleton, who made an impassioned plea for improved connectivity of public transport. Later, landscape architect Vladimir (Tom) Sitta closed the debate with a stand-up routine which reaffirmed the need to understand ‘new’ urbanism’s neo-traditional principles as more than a form-based stylistic expression. Questions and comments from the floor concluded a full, yet slightly disjunctive evening.

Unfortunately, given the limitation of the debate format, links between the increasingly embraced new urbanism and ESD ideals were not fully explored. Also, DPZ’s ‘charette’ process- oriented chiefly towards upper-middle class suburbanism-is only one of many strands of new urbanism theory. More ecologically aware initiatives, such as Morrish and Brown’s work at the University of Minnesota, deserve wider dissemination and may offer the intellectual bridge between commercial interests and ESD that the AILA seemed to seek with this discussion. Of course, someone this side of the Pacific may have a better idea.

Lewis Knight is an urban designer and landscape architect with Context in Sydney.

Neighbourhood green concept by Duany Plater-Zyberk for St Mary’s a Lend Lease suburb in Sydney’s west.

Bridging the Gap

International Construction Information Technology (INCIT) conference in Sydney, 18-19 April 1996.
Report by Bruce Duyshart

As the title of this conference implied, the aim of INCIT ‘96 was to bridge the gaps between research, development and practice in the use of information technology in the construction industry.

Over two intense days, 34 papers were presented by architects, engineers and researchers from eleven countries. The topics varied widely, including discussions on the use of IT in the planning of Olympic venues, visualisation techniques, quality assurance, process re-engineering, building knowledge bases, assessing risk management, cost planning, collaborative design systems and integrated data, document and CAD environments.

If there was a major highlight, it would have to be the evidence of important advancements with integrated CAD environments. For many years CAD researchers have advocated the need for a common product model that enables the representation and seamless exchange of information between a wide range of project participants. At this conference, a number of papers were presented which demonstrated that CAD standards such as STEP (and the recently emerged IFC), are now a lot closer to being used for delivering tools that will meet these aims.

The eventual introduction of these technologies will mean that the incompatibilities that currently exist between data from different CAD systems will dissipate. When this occurs, it will enable a range of disciplines to concurrently and/or collaboratively work on a common 3D CAD model that represents an entire project. In practice this will enable architects and engineers to improve many aspects of the design and documentation process.

The only disappointment of the conference was the inability of many presenters to use computer-based presentation technologies. The use of traditional acetates and well worn slides does little to build an audience’s confidence in the practical use of technology in the real world.

Readers wishing to find out more about the conference and the papers presented, can go to the INCIT Web page at

Bruce Duyshart, a Melbourne architectural computing consultant and specialist in digital documents, is a project manager of information technology with Lend Lease Design Group.