Thinking on your past comments about cycles, adaptability and dynamic spaces I have been taking some pictures of the city, seeking for these so called spaces. One of my comments was that the change of a space is produced according to the culture and environment of the city. Bogotá is different from London and Basel for many aspects but I think the main one is because it is part of a developing country, due to this and to the historical background it is a city full of contrasts; so while looking for cycles and adaptable spaces I realized I had to talk first about contrasts in the city to understand how individuals behave in this society. As mention on the last post the city is divided in two; the south which is the largest area with the most population but with lower income therefore more and larger problems, and the North which is the area with much higher income, the north and south are divided by the centre area which has the most historic districts, once forgotten but now in the process of reactivation and rapidly becoming a cultural, and creative node. Different from London were people commute from the outside towards the centre, in Bogotá the general flow goes from south to north in the mornings and the opposite in the afternoon, but a secondary flow goes from north to centre creating major challenges to the transport infrastructure. In the last 10 years major effects have altered the city; due to political issues more and more people are arriving from rural areas affected by the violence, but at the same time the city has managed to redesign itself evolving from one of the most violent cities in Latin America into a city praised for its changes in attitude and infrastructure to the point of being a major actor in the last Venice Biennale. For this reason when one is looking for cycles one cannot ignore this contrasts which define the adaptability of the space.
2 comments:
I forgot to mention something very important that J remind it me; Colombia is placed on the equator region meaning that we do not have seasons , we do have all the climate regions due to the diversity and change in altitudes around the country, but Bogota does not have such thing as seasons, we do enjoy rainy or windy seasons, but quality of life does not change according to the month like in Europe basically we can do the same in January or June, citizens do alter their lifes in a daily basis, if it rains during the day things might go different from a sunny day but behaviours like the one in london were as soon as spring and summer arrive people behave and dress different are not characteristics of Bogota.
Very good topic. When we were talking about cycle or space dynamic, we should look for the reasons before. It is very interesting if the “nature” of cities is different, they may have different definitions on space or adaptability of the space. I think the category – developed or developing (economic status) could be studied further, as even though Hong Kong is also a developing city and have some contrasts mentioned by L, such as new vs old, rich vs poor, permanent vs temporary, I guess Hong Kong is still quite different to Bogotá due to the differences in cultures and histories. The categorization becomes very important but complicated because it can simplify the cities’ background making us understand them easily, but maybe we will find out that very few cities can be grouped in general due to their uniqueness.
The raise on weather / location is very good. It could be the complement or additional indicator for economic status. Obviously, the cycle and adaptability of the space are highly influenced by it, as how people behave and react to the space would be very different. I think the concerns on history; economics and geography are good and should be expanded.
Post a Comment