ARCOLOGY

CITY OF THE FUTURE

BY:ANKET SUMAN

ORIGIN
The word "Arcology" comes from a fusion of "architecture" and "ecology, A term first coined in Paolo Soleris 1969 book, Arcology: City in the Image of Man. Arcologies have since entered into many serious discussions on the future of cities, as a possible inevitable evolution of todays ever-larger skyscrapers. Some see Arcologies as the remedy for the massive urban and suburban sprawls that are overwhelming the industrialized world.

SHIMIZU MEGA-CITY PYRAMID

Status Type

Vision Office, Residential, Research, Leisure Location Tokyo Bay, Japan Floor area 8 square km. (3.1 sq. mi) Architect Dante Bini, David Dimitric

CHARACTERISTICS
Arcologies are envisioned as : 1. Optimal human urban environments. 2. Large, self-enclosed megaskyscrapers . 3. Contain everything a human being could ever need. 4. They would be miniature cities onto themselves. 5. Engineered for maximum comfort and efficiency.

THE ULTIMA TOWER

Status Architectural style Height Floor count Floor area Architect

Vision Futurism 3,218.7 metres 500 1,500,000,000 sq. ft. Eugene Tsui Company

TYPES OF ARCHOLOGY
Though arcologies today are seen primarily as any urban development, arcologies can be built for nearly any environment. Sea-floating arcologies Cliffside arcologies Farmland arcologies Dam arcologies Deep sea colonies Arcologies are also seen as a necessary precursor to building orbiting space colonies or colonies on other planets such as Mars.
THE LILYPAD

BASICS
A break-down of what an Arcology would be required to provide for its population : 1. Living Space 2. Open Areas 3. Power 4. Water 5. Food 6. Waste Management 7. Employment

NEW ORLEANS ARCOLOGY HABITAT

Status Type Location Architect

Vision Office, Residential, commercial, Leisure New Orleans Ahearn Schopfer Architects

LIVING SPACE
An arcology would require about 2% as much land as a modern city of equivalent population. Actual living space per person would be about the same, but the support structure can be built on a much more efficient three-dimensional scale. The need for road infrastructure (which can consume as much as 60% of the space of modern urban sprawls) would be eliminated altogether.

LIVING SPACE

(INTERIORS)
The interior of arcology residential areas would probably be somewhat modular, with reconfigurable walls and fixtures. The interior design will be as human-friendly as possible, with wide corridors, friendly colors, and many plants, murals, and artworks to please human aesthetic sense. Many mirrors and windows would also be worked into the design in order to create an illusion of space. As a general rule, single, unmarried individuals would be given efficiencies with one to three rooms, whereas families would have between three and ten rooms, depending on their size. In both instances the space allotted would depend greatly on the Arcologys exact design, the inhabitants social status, and prevailing population density.

OPEN AREAS
Arcologies are often designed with many open areas, referred to in general terms as parks, where the population can gather and/or spend recreation time. Some arcologies are built around a single enormous open area that may be up to a quarter or a half mile square. Rooftop gardens could also serve as parks in some designs. These open areas are extremely important to the psychological well-being of the inhabitants; A number of arcologies are designed to make optimum use of sunlight, with windows, mirrors, and open areas designed in such a way as to bring as much natural light into the arcology as possible.

POWER
Like modern cities, arcologies will almost certainly require their own dedicated power sources. Nuclear and solar power plants are often cited as solutions, Alternatives such as wind and tidal power are mentioned as well, especially for coastal and floating arcologies. Arcologies built as dams could also easily solve this problem. More exotic solutions, such as geothermal taps and fusion reactors, may be available for advanced arcologies.

WATER
An arcology would by necessity have to provide an enormous amount of water to its residents every day. An arcology of 400,000 residents would require nearly 1 million gallons of water per day just to meet drinking requirements. For things such as showers, janitorial needs, hydroponics and such, multiply that by 20. Unless the structure is built right next to a body of water, an in-arcology reservoirs would be an unavoidable necessity.

WATER
The reservoir may be one centralized tank, or it may take the form of an open artificial lake around which the arcology is built. It may also be decentralized between many tanks and/or "ponds" in many of the arcologys parks. Water recycling would also be a smart investment for arcology builders, to reduce the amount that has to be pumped in on a daily basis. Waste r from the arcologys human residents can be filtered and used for the arcologys many parks and farms, for example.

FOOD
Food importation would be a necessary evil for many urban arcologies. However, they can supplement their food supply with:
rooftop farms, hydroponics, micro-organic cultivation (yeasts and such) greenhouses, and/or recycling.

The residents would buy their foods pretty much like any other city resident, in inarcology supermarkets and restaurants.

WASTE MANAGEMENT
Efficient sewer and garbage management systems would be absolute necessities in an arcology. In fact has to be developed to a much higher degree than almost any other system in order to make an arcology work. It would also have to employ a veritable army of janitors. With so many people living so close together, communicable diseases are a very viable danger. Keeping on top of waste management and cleaning would be the first line of defense to prevent any potentially harmful outbreaks.

EMPLOYMENT
Many arcologies will be set up to provide jobs directly inside the arcology. Many arcologies will have their own industrial and commercial sections right in the structure, making commuting to work just a brisk walk and an elevator ride away. Manufacturing industries inside an arcology will by necessity have to be mostly non-polluting and, given the arcologys nature, will most likely be high-tech. One of the main features of an arcology would be an enormous central retail district, or mall, to cater not only to its residents but visitors and tourists as well in order to generate outside revenue.

IMPORTANT FACTORS
The factors that would affect the design of an arcology. o Fire o Evacuation FIRE Materials which resist fire but emit toxic gasses when they do burn should probably be avoided. Ceramics, brick, stone, concrete, adobe are appropriate materials for surstructures (sur=above, over) reinforced or tensioned concrete and steel are the primary players for the superstructure structural steel supports could be filled with liquid or gel to dissipate heat. Or, reinforced concrete columns might be loosely encased in stainless steel and then the cavity between filled with water.

IMPORTANT FACTORS
(CONTD.)
Installing basic fire fighting equipment throughout the structure for immediate use. EVACUATION The ultimate acceptance of support structures depends on how safe they are, even if that point of safety must be pushed to the limit of evacuation. slides would have to deal with high-volume use, and allow for rapid dispersal at the bottom to avoid untoward results. "Lifeboats" or slide vehicles could be supplied from special storage within the structure much like a magazine feeds shells to readiness. Such emergency vehicles or pods might make evacuation more controllable and accommodating for those not familiar with the ride.

ADVANTAGES
The compactness of an Arcology gives 90 percent more land to farming and conservation than today's urban and suburban sprawl. Greater attention is given to human scale in an Arcology. In it the pedestrian reigns. Distances are measured by walks and minutes. Within it the automobile is nonsensical. Therefore energy is used more efficiently than in a conventional modern city. Pollution is a direct function of wastefulness, not efficiency. The increase in efficiency and reduction of wastefulness means a reduction of pollution. One role of the three dimensional city is to stop the spreading out of suburbia and its pernicious effects: hyper-consumption, segregation, waste, pollution, and ecological catastrophe.

DISADVANTAGE
The one big disadvantage of Arcologies is that they are not readily expandable as modern cities are. Arcologies would be optimized for a certain population; it may be a few thousand or many millions. Once this number is exceeded people have to leave or the artificial ecology of the structure will start to suffer.

CONCLUSION
In nature, as an organism evolves it increases in complexity and it also becomes a more compact or miniaturized system. Similarly a city should function as a living system. Arcology, architecture and ecology as one integral process, is capable of demonstrating positive response to the many problems of urban civilization, population, pollution, energy and natural resource depletion, food scarcity and quality of life. Arcology recognizes the necessity of the radical reorganization of the sprawling urban landscape into dense, integrated, three-dimensional cities in order to support the complex activities that sustain human culture. the city is the necessary instrument for the evolution of humankind.

REFERENCE
http://www.wildapache.net/randhunt/arcology/c onsidering.htm http://www.ecochunk.com/216/2012/06/22/sust ainably-designed-floating-cities-for-a-futureworld-that-shimmers-green/ http://orbitalvector.com/Megastructures/Arcologi es/Arcologies.htm

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