Not just for fun: playgrounds for spatial identity and equality

Lady Allen of Hurtwood, Adventure playground in London, 1966.

A post-war “adventure playground” in London by landscape architect Marjory Lady Allen of Hurtwood, providing children the opportunity to construct their own play space through utilizing “junk” on site.

 

THESIS STATEMENT

The thesis is a response to the monotonous playground environment in Hong Kong and the invasion of public leisure spaces by government and private enterprises. The potentials of in-situ, interactive playgrounds that adapts to multiple user groups will be explored. It will be a contemplation on the value of playgrounds and leisure culture in the urban environment. The thesis may go further to experiment on means of combining the playground with other leisure programmes to create a comprehensive play space in an architectural scale.

Playgrounds foster community participation and interaction. Different from theme parks, playgrounds are embedded in the everyday lives and therefore have a much more significant contribution to the lived and urban experience. The aim is to use playgrounds as a means to engage the community to bring character to a place. On a political level, playgrounds can promote a liberal, egalitarian/democratic way of social interactions. Interactive playgrounds also empower the people to take the design and use of public leisure spaces back into their own hands.

 

CONTEXT, CONCEPT

1. A critique of Hong Kong’s public leisure spaces

Restricted, discriminatory leisure

Jürgen Habermas once wrote about the decay of the public sphere in a capitalist society. “In the past publicity was used to subject people or the present political decisions to the public. Today the public sphere is recruited for the use of hidden policies by interest groups.“[1]

The situation in Hong Kong is proof of Habermas‘ writing. Public leisure spaces today are gradually being privatized by government and corporations, which compromised people’s freedom. An increasing number of public leisure spaces are under the management of developers/ corporations. In 2008, the ground floor plaza of Times Square was revealed to be rented out by the developer for profit, while according to Buildings Department regulation, the space belongs to “areas within private properties dedicated for public use” [2]. The incident sparked an awareness of Hong Kong’s public spaces which prompted the government to implement the Public Open Space in Private Developments (POSPD) Design and Management Guidelines in 2011. However the guidelines are poorly enforced. In addition, poorly situated/ badly designed playgrounds also impose a multitude of physical restrictions such as difficulty in access and pollution.

 

Times Square, Causeway Bay. Nominee for “The Worst Public Space”, Hong Kong Public Space Initiative Facebook Page, accessed Nov 7 2016.
(A privately owned public space. People’s use of the space is under surveillance of security guards and can be evicted if failing to comply to their rules. )

Nominee for "The Worst Public Space", Hong Kong Public Space Initiative Facebook Page, accessed Nov 7 2016.

Nominee for “The Worst Public Space”, Hong Kong Public Space Initiative Facebook Page, accessed Nov 7 2016.
(The children’s playground is so hidden that almost no one except residents know its existence. The large open space is left mostly underused.)

Sai On Lane Children’s Playground, Sai Ying Pun. Nominee for “The Worst Public Space”, Hong Kong Public Space Initiative Facebook Page, accessed Nov 7 2016.
(A playground at the back alley, facing pollution from exhaust fan and air conditioner outlets of restaurants.)

Tai Wong Street East Sitting-Out Area, Wan Chai. Nominee for “The Worst Public Space”, Hong Kong Public Space Initiative Facebook Page, accessed Nov 7 2016.
(An enclosed environment lacking furniture and play equipments.)


Monotonous leisure

Hong Kong’s playgrounds are also criticized for being too dull and monotonous. During the summer holiday in 2015, a city-wide project jointly conducted by the Playright Children’s Play Association and UNICEF found that many playgrounds in Hong Kong are underused. The group commented that the playgrounds “lacked diversity and discouraged the inborn urge of children to take on challenges and interact“[3]. Children become more reluctant to go outdoors to play and socialize. Apart from having negative impacts on children’s physical, psychological and social development, this phenomenon also leads to a decline in street activity, diminishing community ties and neighbourhood character. People become more cut off from the urban environment and are losing a sense of place.

 

2. Playground as everyday space

Playgrounds, as everyday spaces for leisure, play an important role in shaping the urban experience. Lefebvre addressed the significance of everyday spaces. “The user’s space is lived – not represented (or conceived). When compared to the abstract space of the experts (architects, urbanists, planners), the space of the everyday activities of users is a concrete one, which is to say, subjective.” [4] The value of playgrounds as everyday spaces is in their engagement with people’s perceptions, experiences, imaginations, memories etc. Some of Hong Kong’s redeveloped neighbourhoods and new towns are considered to be devoid of identity and memory. Perhaps through inserting playgrounds into them a new community identity can be cultivated in time.

In her book Everyday Urbanism, Margaret Crawford drew the connection between everyday spaces and democracy. “Activities of everyday space may begin to dissolve some of the predictable boundaries… revealing previously hidden social possibilities”[5]. Playgrounds, as a public space, “facilitates the mutual recognition of strangers,” who are people that “bear markers of difference: race, age, poverty, or culture.”[6]. Playgrounds are the sites in which people confront differences, and can potentially cultivate new interactions that break down the constraints and hierarchies of social norms. It is impossible for architecture to be the single solution for Hong Kong’s racial or social class bias. However through introducing non-discriminatory, non-hierarchical leisure into neighbourhoods, it allows people to confront such inequalities which is at least a step forward. “There is no guarantee that enlarging public space will lead to an enlargement of social imagination but the alternative is to live in a a world of private spaces where the proprietor has already sent the street people away“[7]. 

 

PROJECT

What?

  • Context-sensitive
    As opposed to the existing prefabricated playgrounds, the project aims to create site-specific playgrounds that contribute to creating a character of the place
  • Interactive
    The playgrounds will be open-ended and invite people to assemble/ dissemble/ stretch/ move them around etc. People have a right to decide how they use public leisure spaces.
  • Multi-target
    In additional to children, a wider social spectrum will be considered – the elderly, housewives, working class, middle class, the homeless etc. The interactiveness of the playgrounds will allow different people to appropriate it.
  • Time specific & transitory
    The playgrounds will change according to different groups of people’s patterns of usage and daily schedules. Hence their physical appearances can be constantly changing.
  • Integrative with other programmes
    Depending on the site, the playground can act as a base structure for other leisure typologies (e.g. mini-theatre, library, food carts, graffiti walls, hammocks…) to be attached/ inserted/ plugged in etc.

Where?

  • 3 sites (tentative) of different urban conditions
    old districts – dense fabric, lower income (may have more diverse users)
    new towns/ post-redevelopment areas – less humane and lack street life
    CBD – large scale of buildings and infrastructure

 

METHODOLOGY

Part 1. Research

1.1 Playground as IDEOLOGY
City-scale playground projects

Playgrounds are inherently political instruments since they direct behaviour and interactions. [8] Hence most playground projects carry ideological ambitions for the city. Through researching about such projects, an understanding on different possible political meanings of playgrounds can be gained.

  • Aldo van Eyck, 700 playgrounds, Amsterdam, 1947-1978.
  • Robert Moses, playgrounds in NYC, 1934-1960.

Aldo van Eyck, playground in Saffierstraat, Amsterdam, 1950-1951.
(https://walkonwildsideanna.wordpress.com/2014/10/14/aldo-van-eyck-the-playgrounds-and-the-city/)

20176

Robert Moses’ playground, New York.
(https://www.nycgovparks.org/parks/robert-moses-playground/history)

 

1.2 Playground as OBJECT

Types and forms of playgrounds

The next phase of research will be on the form of playground itself. Playgrounds in different contexts can very greatly in terms of form, layout, equipment, material etc.

  • Isamu Noguchi, “Playscapes”, Piedmont Park, Atlanta, 1976.
  • Marjory Allen, adventure playground, bomb site at Clydesdale Road, London, 1952.

 

1.3 Playground as COMPONENT
Recreational projects of interaction and adaptability

The last phase of research will depart from the playground look into more comprehensive recreational projects. The use of structural systems/ infrastructure to creative integrative and adaptive play spaces can be learned from.

  • Cedric Price, Fun Palace (unbuilt), 1961.
  • Rogers + Piano, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, 1977.

Cedric Price, Fun Palace, section, circa 1964. Cedric Price Archives, Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montreal.
(http://www.audacity.org/SM-26-11-07-01.htm)

 

Part 2. Site

  • Mapping of 3 urban sites of distinctive difference
    – historical context
    – demographics (income, race, living pattern etc)
    – urban fabric/ figure-ground relationships
  • Determine location and scale of playground/ architecture
  • Formulate an overall strategy for the 3 sites (so that they do not become 3 separate projects)

 

Part 3. Design

With respect to each site, the following will be considered:

  • Layout, spatial relationships, figure-ground
  • Programmatic arrangement/ combination of equipments
  • Material
  • Phases of usage

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

[1] Habermas, Jürgen. The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society., in The Cultural Reader. “Jürgen Habermas’s Public Sphere explained“. http://culturalstudiesnow.blogspot.hk/2011/09/jurgen-habermass-public-sphere.html. Published September 19, 2011. Accessed November 7, 2016.

[2] Buildings Department, HKSAR. Provision of public facilities in private developments.

[3] SCMP. Children are bored in Hong Kong’s playgrounds and much of the time they are empty, rights group claims. Published September 9, 2015. Accessed November 7, 2016.

[4] Lefebvre, Henri. The Production of Space, trans. David Nicholson-Smith, Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1991. Writings on Cities, trans. and eds Eleonore Kofman and Elizabeth Lebas, Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1996, in Neil Leach, ed., Rethinking Architecture: A reader in cultural theory (London: Routledge, 1997), 132-139.

[5] Crawford, Margaret. “Blurring the Boundaries: Public Space and Private Life” in Everyday Urbanism. New York: Monacelli Press, 1999.

[6] Kohn, Margaret. Conclusion to Brave New Neighbourhoods: The Privatization of Public Space. New York: Routledge, 2004.

[7] Same as [6].

[8] Stutzin, Nicolás. Politics of the Playground: The Spaces of Play of Robert Moses and Aldo van Eyck. ARQ (Santiago)  no.91 Santiago. Dec. 2015.

 

Additional references:

Lefebvre, Henri. Critique of Everyday Life. Translated by John Moore. London: Verso, 1991; 2008.

Heidegger, Martin. “Building, Dwelling, Thinking“, in Neil Leach, ed., Rethinking Architecture: A reader in cultural theory. London: Routledge, 1997.

Stanley Matthews. The Fun Palace – Cedric Price’s experiment in architecture and technology. Technoetic Arts 3:2, pp. 73–91, doi: 10.1386/tear.3.2.73/1.

Ku, Agnes S.. “The ‘Public’ up against the State: Narrative Cracks and Credibility Crisis in Postcolonial Hong Kong“, in Theory, Culture & Society. February 2001 vol.18 no. 1 121-144.

 

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