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AIrplot--an antirunway
AIrplot--an antirunway
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AIrplot--an antirunway
Type
CONCEPT
To prevent construction of the third runway at
Heathrow, a drastic gesture is required to shake stakeholders out of their
respective complacency. Because this is
a matter of life and death and desperate times require desperate measures and
novel strategies. As such, we submit a “wolf in sheep’s clothing”, a Hobson’s
choice, a hyperbolic last resort; one that in an ideal world, need never be
implemented. Our solution to the problem eschews past physical clashes. We
believe that the mere truly disturbing threat of the execution of Airplot: A Table Among the Trees will
suffice to compel all sides in the debate to (re)engage in responsible
dialogue—and ensuing compromise.
What strategy then to move forward? A carrot or a
stick? An apple or a poison? A sword or a stone? Matter or antimatter?
Everlasting life or eternal damnation? As in a fairy tale, we wed opposites, coupling
the ultimate attractant and a dastardly deterrent, inextricably linked in a
timeless embrace.
DESIGN
STRATEGY
On the surface, this project is simple; what brings
people together more than the sharing of food? What frightens us more
profoundly than the threat of wholesale destruction? We propose a table in an
apple orchard. A monument in a park. Underneath, however, lies complexity.
SITE APPROACH: The adjacent car park is the most
viable entry to Airplot. An
arrangement is necessary with the car park owner to share a lease and provide
entry to the site in order to accommodate visitors and stakeholders, who care
for the orchard. The current easement rights to the northwest access could be
sold back to the property owners.
Arriving at the south end of the car park, the
visitor encounters an accessible path of crushed granite lined with tall meadow
grasses interspersed among existing and newly planted apple trees and arranged
in two offset grids. As the visitor delves further into the orchard, the path
splits; the main path, a wider track, moves to the left; a narrower path leads
to the right. Subtle directional signs direct the visitor to the Conversation
Table on the main path and to the orchard buildings along the narrow path. As seasons
turn and years pass, with the emergence of leaves, the blossoming of flowers,
and fall of foliage, a central clearing will be partially or fully in view from
this vantage. Drawn forward by this prospect, the visitor enters a broad,
graveled glade surrounded by trees. In the middle sits a massive marble slab
table. Viewed from the air the
table is a unique marker in the trees, at night it sparkles with a distinctive
pattern in the dark.
THE CARROT: The
20-metre long table is made of white and gray veined marble, undergirded by a
smooth concrete support structure. At the cantilevered east end of the table, a
bronze inlay is inscribed with “Airplot Orchard User’s Manual…,” an explanation
of tree care and why this orchard is important to us all. Tables demarcate both
sacred and mundane spaces: Knights of the Round Table, or A Mad Hatter’s Tea
Party. This table is a place for apple harvesting, communal meals,
celebrations. Or more sober commemorations, sacred rituals or
life-in-the-balance negotiations. To halt the third runway….
The west end of the table rests on top of a 2-metre
high serpentine grassy mound. This sinuous berm is an organic counterpoint to
the regular, agricultural grid of trees and along its length provides moments
for individual contemplation. This mound also punctuates the west end of the
table, where three roughly triangular bronze panels are inset in the marble
slab. In the center of these “petals” is a thick, circular glass portal that
constantly glows with bioluminescent light—simultaneously warm and ominous. At
first the viewer might not register that this glass and bronze “flower” depicts
the universal hazard symbol. The berm is graded to form a grass amphitheatre,
one that envelops the glowing portal, while providing seating facing east. The
embankment comprises fill removed from a 50-metre deep shaft drilled beneath
the western end of the table.
The orchard will be planted with young grafted
apple saplings and will require regular maintenance to become a productive
enterprise. The current sheds on site will be relocated as a group to the
eastern end of the
site, which will be cleared to allow for the siting of the buildings. Bee hives
will be maintained on site for
pollination and honey. Juice and apples harvested from the
orchard can be packaged and sold to fund
Airplot outreach as well as community needs. For safety of the users and
protection of the fruit trees, the site will require monitoring using remote
security systems and daytime site hosts.
The stick: Buried deep at the bottom of the
½-metre radius shaft, encased in concrete and ceramic, is a stainless steel
cylinder. The shaft is capped and sealed by the concrete undergirding of the
table, craned into place, and accessed by rope drop only. Inside the entombed
capsule will be placed an unnamed toxin and directly below it, a fuse of sorts,
a primed broadcasting device. This device will be activated by stored compressed
air. Throughout the site and connected to the capsule is a network of embedded
sensors, traced on the surface by cylindrical metal landscape lighting. If
disturbed or altered by drilling or bulldozing, these sensors will trigger the
compressed air into the toxin—not unlike prey entering a spider’s webbed
snare—propelling it up through the glass portal into the air and surrounding
soil. A 2-kilometre radius
area will be rendered barren, unapproachable, impossible-to–remediate—useless
to both the residents and the airport and dangerous for at least 50 years, long
enough to frustrate any attempts to construct a new runway. Details of this
design element are, understandably, to be engineered clandestinely.
IMPLEMENTATION
AND OUTCOMES
Our
proposal is designed to be flexible, functional, and fulfilling. We envision
three possible scenarios:
1.
Greenpeace
announces Airplot: A Table Among the Trees
the winning proposal. Global publicity elicits shock and outrage. Both proponents
and opponents ask, “Who would resort to such madness? It is a dastardly deed to make the land useless for everyone….”
Eureka. A moment of international revelation. Rather than allowing this tragic
game of environmental “chicken”, an accord is reached through world-wide input
and local compromise. The runway is permanently halted. In celebration,
the design is executed, minus the toxic shaft. The orchard flourishes in the
ensuing years, fruit is harvested, honey flows, birds nest, communities heal. In
200 years, archaeologists speculate on the meaning of the table and the
overgrown forest that betrays remnants of a deliberate geometry.
2.
Airplot: A Table
Among the Trees is announced the winner. Despite the announcement and subsequent
construction, the opposing sides are unable to budge. Dialogue is fruitless.
The toxin is installed and the site is “activated.” The threat, however, serves
to deter construction--the sheep in
wolf’s clothing. The site is carefully monitored and in 50 years, the half-life
of the toxin has rendered it inert. The danger passes as does the need to build
the third runway, as during this time, new transportation solutions can and will
be discovered.
3.
The proposal is constructed. The toxin and trigger device
are installed. The wolf in sheep’s clothing: runway construction begins with
the attempt to diffuse the alert system. It fails. The toxin is released. The
land is contaminated. Citizens are evacuated. The site is abandoned, too
poisonous to sustain human, animal or plant life. This plot of land is reduced
to a small hell on earth. In 200 years, the dim glow of the solar-powered
warning beacon continues to remind even the most curious archaeologists that
earlier generations made grave errors.
The design of
this plot of land can speak louder—and longer—than words. Through its
persistence and flowering, this transformed plot of land commemorates both
fragility and possibility. Airplot: A Table Among Trees proposes,
in its own conflicted way, that by enhancing the authority of site, we can
realize, not a tragic ending, but a fruitful and harmonious beginning.
To prevent construction of the third runway at
Heathrow, a drastic gesture is required to shake stakeholders out of their
respective complacency. Because this is
a matter of life and death and desperate times require desperate measures and
novel strategies. As such, we submit a “wolf in sheep’s clothing”, a Hobson’s
choice, a hyperbolic last resort; one that in an ideal world, need never be
implemented. Our solution to the problem eschews past physical clashes. We
believe that the mere truly disturbing threat of the execution of Airplot: A Table Among the Trees will
suffice to compel all sides in the debate to (re)engage in responsible
dialogue—and ensuing compromise.
What strategy then to move forward? A carrot or a
stick? An apple or a poison? A sword or a stone? Matter or antimatter?
Everlasting life or eternal damnation? As in a fairy tale, we wed opposites, coupling
the ultimate attractant and a dastardly deterrent, inextricably linked in a
timeless embrace.
DESIGN
STRATEGY
On the surface, this project is simple; what brings
people together more than the sharing of food? What frightens us more
profoundly than the threat of wholesale destruction? We propose a table in an
apple orchard. A monument in a park. Underneath, however, lies complexity.
SITE APPROACH: The adjacent car park is the most
viable entry to Airplot. An
arrangement is necessary with the car park owner to share a lease and provide
entry to the site in order to accommodate visitors and stakeholders, who care
for the orchard. The current easement rights to the northwest access could be
sold back to the property owners.
Arriving at the south end of the car park, the
visitor encounters an accessible path of crushed granite lined with tall meadow
grasses interspersed among existing and newly planted apple trees and arranged
in two offset grids. As the visitor delves further into the orchard, the path
splits; the main path, a wider track, moves to the left; a narrower path leads
to the right. Subtle directional signs direct the visitor to the Conversation
Table on the main path and to the orchard buildings along the narrow path. As seasons
turn and years pass, with the emergence of leaves, the blossoming of flowers,
and fall of foliage, a central clearing will be partially or fully in view from
this vantage. Drawn forward by this prospect, the visitor enters a broad,
graveled glade surrounded by trees. In the middle sits a massive marble slab
table. Viewed from the air the
table is a unique marker in the trees, at night it sparkles with a distinctive
pattern in the dark.
THE CARROT: The
20-metre long table is made of white and gray veined marble, undergirded by a
smooth concrete support structure. At the cantilevered east end of the table, a
bronze inlay is inscribed with “Airplot Orchard User’s Manual…,” an explanation
of tree care and why this orchard is important to us all. Tables demarcate both
sacred and mundane spaces: Knights of the Round Table, or A Mad Hatter’s Tea
Party. This table is a place for apple harvesting, communal meals,
celebrations. Or more sober commemorations, sacred rituals or
life-in-the-balance negotiations. To halt the third runway….
The west end of the table rests on top of a 2-metre
high serpentine grassy mound. This sinuous berm is an organic counterpoint to
the regular, agricultural grid of trees and along its length provides moments
for individual contemplation. This mound also punctuates the west end of the
table, where three roughly triangular bronze panels are inset in the marble
slab. In the center of these “petals” is a thick, circular glass portal that
constantly glows with bioluminescent light—simultaneously warm and ominous. At
first the viewer might not register that this glass and bronze “flower” depicts
the universal hazard symbol. The berm is graded to form a grass amphitheatre,
one that envelops the glowing portal, while providing seating facing east. The
embankment comprises fill removed from a 50-metre deep shaft drilled beneath
the western end of the table.
The orchard will be planted with young grafted
apple saplings and will require regular maintenance to become a productive
enterprise. The current sheds on site will be relocated as a group to the
eastern end of the
site, which will be cleared to allow for the siting of the buildings. Bee hives
will be maintained on site for
pollination and honey. Juice and apples harvested from the
orchard can be packaged and sold to fund
Airplot outreach as well as community needs. For safety of the users and
protection of the fruit trees, the site will require monitoring using remote
security systems and daytime site hosts.
The stick: Buried deep at the bottom of the
½-metre radius shaft, encased in concrete and ceramic, is a stainless steel
cylinder. The shaft is capped and sealed by the concrete undergirding of the
table, craned into place, and accessed by rope drop only. Inside the entombed
capsule will be placed an unnamed toxin and directly below it, a fuse of sorts,
a primed broadcasting device. This device will be activated by stored compressed
air. Throughout the site and connected to the capsule is a network of embedded
sensors, traced on the surface by cylindrical metal landscape lighting. If
disturbed or altered by drilling or bulldozing, these sensors will trigger the
compressed air into the toxin—not unlike prey entering a spider’s webbed
snare—propelling it up through the glass portal into the air and surrounding
soil. A 2-kilometre radius
area will be rendered barren, unapproachable, impossible-to–remediate—useless
to both the residents and the airport and dangerous for at least 50 years, long
enough to frustrate any attempts to construct a new runway. Details of this
design element are, understandably, to be engineered clandestinely.
IMPLEMENTATION
AND OUTCOMES
Our
proposal is designed to be flexible, functional, and fulfilling. We envision
three possible scenarios:
1.
Greenpeace
announces Airplot: A Table Among the Trees
the winning proposal. Global publicity elicits shock and outrage. Both proponents
and opponents ask, “Who would resort to such madness? It is a dastardly deed to make the land useless for everyone….”
Eureka. A moment of international revelation. Rather than allowing this tragic
game of environmental “chicken”, an accord is reached through world-wide input
and local compromise. The runway is permanently halted. In celebration,
the design is executed, minus the toxic shaft. The orchard flourishes in the
ensuing years, fruit is harvested, honey flows, birds nest, communities heal. In
200 years, archaeologists speculate on the meaning of the table and the
overgrown forest that betrays remnants of a deliberate geometry.
2.
Airplot: A Table
Among the Trees is announced the winner. Despite the announcement and subsequent
construction, the opposing sides are unable to budge. Dialogue is fruitless.
The toxin is installed and the site is “activated.” The threat, however, serves
to deter construction--the sheep in
wolf’s clothing. The site is carefully monitored and in 50 years, the half-life
of the toxin has rendered it inert. The danger passes as does the need to build
the third runway, as during this time, new transportation solutions can and will
be discovered.
3.
The proposal is constructed. The toxin and trigger device
are installed. The wolf in sheep’s clothing: runway construction begins with
the attempt to diffuse the alert system. It fails. The toxin is released. The
land is contaminated. Citizens are evacuated. The site is abandoned, too
poisonous to sustain human, animal or plant life. This plot of land is reduced
to a small hell on earth. In 200 years, the dim glow of the solar-powered
warning beacon continues to remind even the most curious archaeologists that
earlier generations made grave errors.
The design of
this plot of land can speak louder—and longer—than words. Through its
persistence and flowering, this transformed plot of land commemorates both
fragility and possibility. Airplot: A Table Among Trees proposes,
in its own conflicted way, that by enhancing the authority of site, we can
realize, not a tragic ending, but a fruitful and harmonious beginning.
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