Shared Purpose: Collaboration for Successful Design

Dean of Parson’s School of Constructed Environments William Morrish provides an intriguing discussion of the importance of combined efforts for understanding the infrastructure of a city. Focusing on post-Katrina New Orleans in After the Storm, Morrish describes the  necessity of collaboration across the fields of design, science, and government. Moreover, he describes nature itself as an aid to quicker rebuilding. 

Morrish first explores why New Orleans was not prepared for the 2005 disaster brought by hurricane Katrina. The city’s vulnerability was not apparent until after the storm (Morrish, 2008, 6). Overall the reason for New Orleans’ problems with rebuilding may be rooted in its lack of planning. Morrish cites art historian Wolfgang Braunfels: “Anyone who planned only for necessity did not even achieve what was necessary” (9). Marketed as ”The Big Easy” the city also reflects Arjun Appadurai’s discussion of  the relationships between imagination, nostalgia and consumption: behind the tourist’s illusion of a relaxing, carefree lifestyle was a weak government making hierarchically biased decisions. The city’s politicians were acting independently when their decisions could have been improved with designers and scientists as allies. The system, with its “single functions” and “private sectors” needs to be reformulated to facilitate the complex intertwining of the designer, the official, and the “fully engaged citizenry with a strong sense of shared purpose” (12).

An example of fully engaged citizenry, where designers and citizens combine efforts is New Orleans’ Global Green/The Holy Cross Project, which added an online system per house (called “Building Dashboard”) which allows residents to see their energy, water, gas, etc. usage in real time. Imaged here is a screenshot of what the residents would see when they log on to their Building Dashboard.

Other examples of the possibilities opened by the joining of diverse minds are shown by finding a new function for an already existing object. Morrish provides the example of the bicycle-friendly retaining walls of the low-lying Netherlands (pictured above), and the use of solar panels on renovated New Orleans rooftops (12-15). The recycling of functions relates strongly to theories of sustainability (see also Michael Thompson’s Rubbish Theory). When objects and functions become cyclical rather than linear, multiple rather than singular, then a lot of time,  material – and thus money, can be saved. Often nature has already provided the object that humans can manipulate for their use, or what engineers call “non-structural alternatives”, as seen here, where shrubs have been planted to prevent runoff (16).

Perhaps the most distressing issue with non-structural alternatives, is that they often go unused because they produce less profit than fully-human engineered objects. Simple and sustainable solutions that help community and nature are often overlooked or ignored due to economic issues. Yet, as in the case of New Orleans, the fault in this kind of decision-making is seen only after human casualties and physical devastation that a disaster like Katrina could cause. And still, even after the weak backbone of New Orleans’ infrastructure was revealed, rebuilding efforts risk regression to overspecialization — even when some serious thought, collaboration, and a sense of unity would result in a better infrastructure and future prevention.

– Sonia Scarr

Morrish, William H. After the Storm: Rebuilding Cities upon a Reflexive Urban Landscape. New York: New School for Social Research, 2008.

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