\u201cIf architectural design could get into the act somehow, it could help resolve \u2018the insoluble problem of the modern city\u2019… In the guise of \u2018urban design\u2019, the exercise of architecture on a very large scale might bridge the gap between the single building and its dis-integrating urban context. At that point of resolution and despair, the \u2018city as a single building\u2019 became a re-thinkable concept and mega-structure was its appointed form.\u201d – Reyner Banham<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n This thesis thus positions itself with the belief that the boundary between highways, buildings and landscape must dissolve to achieve a more integrated urban environment. A hybridized relationship shall be established and manifested in a new mega-structural form that rethinks the form, structure, tectonics, scale, programmes, space and events of the three as a holistic entity.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n With changing modes of transportation in near future and thus the need of such infrastructure to accommodate flexibility, this thesis shall project itself into the next 10-20 years.<\/p>\n Highways, instead of being just a traffic carrier, are re-envisaged as an active urban spine that not only organizes programmes and the total form but also capable of giving drama, possibilities, form and a sense of place to the city. 3.0 \u00a0WHY?<\/b><\/p>\n \u201cA city exists, not for the constant passage of motorcars, but for the care and culture of men.\u201d – Lewis Mumford<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n Highways were developed in the early 1920s as a response to the increasing use of the automobile. While it has been widely acknowledged and celebrated in the media for its efficiency and urban connectivity, it brings with it pollution, street sleepers, dark undersides, crimes as well as an incompatible scale. With its sole concern for the automobile, highway infrastructure may be a magical space for drivers and passengers but it certainly creates an undesirable urban environment for pedestrians and inhabitants. The contemporary architectural practice of dis-engaging buildings from highways is unsustainable since the results have been and will continue to be a saturated landscape of countless windowless boxes, blank walls and sound barriers lining the way. <\/span><\/p>\n Highways have always been thought of only as traffic carriers. With its scale, network and structural capacity, they shall have more to offer. <\/span><\/p>\n In addition, with\u00a0rapid technological advancements, new\u00a0transportation means are\u00a0expected in near future, implying a possible reform\u00a0of transportation infrastructural system. How can highways respond to the future filled with emerging innovations like electric cars, self-driving cars and even a car-sharing network? How can it\u00a0regenerate itself when traditional cars become obsolete one day?<\/p>\n At a time when the singularity of highways and buildings fails to match with the progressiveness and multiplicities of urban living, when architecture and infrastructure are felt to be drifting away from people and dissolving the sense of a city, it becomes crucial and urgent for us architects to devise a new urban strategy regarding the relationship between buildings, highways and landscape.<\/span><\/p>\n
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\n<\/span>![\"paul-rudolph-lower-manhattan-expressway\"](\"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2016\/11\/paul-rudolph-lower-manhattan-expressway--1024x526.jpg\")
\nPaul Rudolph.\u00a0Lower Manhattan Expressway<\/em>. 1973-1974.
\n(Source:\u00a0http:\/\/linesandmarks.com\/tag\/modernist-architecture\/)<\/p>\n
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![\"2\"](\"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2016\/09\/2-1024x466.jpg\")
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