The Future (Pandemic) Park 2.0

Studio leader: Associate Professor Jillian Walliss

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In 2019, ABP ran the Future Park competition, challenging designers to consider how factors such as climate change, shifting demographics, Reconciliation and biodiversity, would influence the design of open space in Melbourne 2050. Missing from this list of considerations was the impact of a global pandemic.

This is Not Business as Usual. Across the world, academics, designers, business, politicians and the community are debating how this event will influence the way that we will work and live long-term. Not all of the changes have been bad. For example there is a renewed focus on the local and many people are celebrating the new freedoms gained from working at home. However there is no doubt that the economic consequences of COVID will be long lasting. That said, economic down turns can offer a valuable pause from market driven development to explore new ways for funding and conceiving open space and ecological systems.

This studio revisits the challenges of Future Park competition, within the context of the longer term consequence of COVID. First, as a studio group we will analyse the 100 entries received as part of the Future Park competition to identify the strategies and tactics proposed for procuring land for new open space. This will be developed into a common ‘tool box’ of approaches. Second, each student will select a strategy/tactic to explore in the Melbourne context. This will be the starting point for an open space design which explores the opportunities and challenges presented by the COVID pandemic.

Landscape Architecture 2020_summer