In the same way as Mexico city, Sao Paulo decided on an advertising nudeness for itself. Nonetheless, the discovery came from the city-view from above. Its tighten and compact urban design reduces the sensation of skyscraper existence when walking down the street. High buildings are their own barriers from seeing more high buildings and you only realize it by reaching the top of any of them. The helicopter is the main means of transportation of the private sector, whereas the public transportation system remains stuck. By the side of one of its stuck main highways a 45 degree parapet was covered with mirror so that citizens could recover the street as a living space, beyond urban security paranoia.
Never before had the sky had such an important presence like in this city. Neither because of its clean air condition nor the small buildings. The ultimate trend to end up with public space in Sao Paulo comes from HELICOPTERS.
Helipads in Sao Paulo
There are two clearly differentiated cities: the FORMAL and the INFORMAL, and "public space" as we know it, exists only in informal favelas -where everything has a more social condition-. On the contrary, the formal city, with its fear paranoia, decides to abandon the street to occupy the heights with concrete constructions. The higher somebody lives, the more powerful one becomes. As a result of insecurity in the streets and of Mr. L.C. urbanism theories, it is hard to walk down the street. Public transportation gets stuck in endless traffic jams and the subway net is quite inefficient for this megalopolis. Consequently, the city seen from above becomes a cloud of private H-helipads with infinite helicopters buzzing around these spots.
Fortunately, the government eliminated all kinds of advertising above Sao Paulo high buildings in 2007. As a paradox, some neighborhoods loose the only reference points whose dull urban planning could once offer.
Horizontal Mexico City lead us to analyze the barrier of the second floor of the Periferico (beltway), as one of the most important conditioners of urban commuting. The advertising-less highway may even reduce the sense of an advertised landscape. As another huge spectacular, a piece of Mexican-day sky was projected over the cathedral during night, as a divine miracle! The intense Mexican little-market condition of interchanging goods made us give sky for free among the tianguis of la merced, shouting near any other seller. "CIELO GRATIS!"
SKY ECLIPSE! Projecting day-sky at night over a 10-story building:
The first gastronomic contacts with this city remind us again of this in-order chaos we lived time ago. 20 million people living above a huge dried series of lakes, make the whole city tremble and sink.
Mexico City is located near the southern end of the plateau of Anáhuac, at an altitude of c.7,800 ft (2,380 m). The horizons of the city are almost obscured by mountain barriers, and the peaks of Popocatépetl and Iztaccihuatl are not far off. The climate is cool and dry. Much of Mexico City's surrounding valley is a lake basin with no outlet, and in the past during the rainy seasons, mountain runoff swelled the lakes.
Original and current limits of lake Texcoco under Mexico city
From the time when the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán stood on an island in Lake Texcoco—now the heart of the metropolis—measures have been taken to protect the city and provide for expansion by draining Texcoco and the other lakes, Chalco and Xochimilco. In the 17th cent. the Spanish viceroys, notably Louis de Velasco, the younger, initiated important works. In 1900 a central canal was completed, this reached to the headwaters of the Pánuco River. The Caracol [Span. for snail], a 12-mi (19-km) spiral canal fed in turn by longitudinal canals begun in 1936, acts as an evaporating basin, from which valuable minerals are taken.
Drainage and artesian wells have lowered the water table so that the surface crust, formerly supported by subsoil water, can no longer sustain the city's heavier buildings, which are sinking some 4 to 12 in. (10.2–30 cm) a year. Some of Mexico's finest buildings have been damaged, among them the old cathedral (begun in 1553 on the site of an Aztec temple) and the Palace of Fine Arts. Modern office buildings have been shored up with pilings.
In addition to being built on soft subsoil, the city is located in a region of high seismic activity. Earthquakes in 1957 and 1985 caused substantial damage. Overcrowding has also become a major problem in Mexico City, and traffic concentrations, combined with the surrounding valley's atmospheric conditions and Popocatépetl's sulfur dioxide emissions, have resulted in heavy air pollution.
Measures have been taken to attack the pollution problem, and some progress has been made. Since 1989 automobiles have been required to stay off the roads one business day a week. The city's buses have been completely replaced, many major industries have had to convert to low-sulfur fuels, and the government closed the oil refinery.
It raining cats and dogs! Performance delayed! The mirror needed some repairs and improvements, both on the structure, which we had to have it completely welded by a plumber, and on the strapes. Contacts with Mexican relevant thinkers are on process to arrange interviews and meetings. Meanwhile, we decide where to give away sky by eating quesadillas, tacos, tortas, licuados,... Three sky-phenomenons are to be explored in this amazing and rainy city: PERIFÉRICO, TIANGUIS and ANCIENT CULTURES.
1. PERIFÉRICO (Beltway / Ring road) skyview over the second level of the "periferico"
more beltways round the world: http://www.answers.com/topic/beltway-1 2. TIANGUIS (from náhuatl "tianquiztli") it used to mean "market" for the people from Meso-America. Currently, it is the Mexican word for the public itinerant flea market, which settles down in the middle of the city. The word inherits market traditions from pre-Hispanic civilizations, as well as the Aztecs and the Bazars from Middle East, which arrived to America through the Spanish conquerors. The Colony of San Felipe de Jesús or Tepito in the north of Mexico city are known to host the largest informal "tianguis" of the world.
Dating from 200 BC to around 800 AD this 'City of the Gods' once had over 125,000 inhabitants, and was the first urban center in Meso-America. But it was abandoned in the 9th century for unknown reasons. Theories include disease or volcanic activity.
Teotihuacán as an extraordinary megalopolis of its time, an exception in Meso-America, if compared to other prehispanic ruins:
- ortogonality in its urban design. (not organic, and therefore, sacred)
- rain and human waste drainage through piping
- holy temples towards SKY, and organized by its configuration.
- domestic dwellings isolated from urban context. each unit should be self-sufficient, only keeping its connection to the sky through their patios. on the contrary, Mayan houses used to profit from open space.
According to Stansbury Hagar, the ancient Mexican city of Teotihuacán, as well as Gizeh pyramids with the Nile, were designed as a MAP of the SKY in terms of urban planning; its main Avenue, the Avenue of the Dead, would represent the Milky Way.
MEETINGS about Mexico Urban Planning and conditions of SKY with Alejandro Hernández Gálvez and Iván-Ludens.
Overbooking: about how much money does your time cost? How do you to spend 18 hours by a swimming-pool in barajas city-center? 1,800 euros later, Iberia let PROJECT-SKY finally take off towards New York. 3 days of much more intensive work!
26th july: First meeting at Jose Esparza's to arrange interviews, performances, itineraries,... Then, a Bushwick expedition to cross the city and bring a 32" television to Manhattan. The performance starts... Meanwhile, a sound elevation of times square was to be written down. The television keeps on moving through china town and canal street. Rain over our plastics and cameras under umbrellas.
Citizens walk in front of a still 1975 camera recording sky and sending live image through our traveling-television. Mirror-effect for quick side walkers through the no.1 media aparatus; TV. Curious people reacted as expected, but others did not even care about the free bit of sky in the middle of the sidewalk, nor about a bunch of wires and electronic devices which were settled down beside the high-rise buildings. Stress or rain?
The television, the trolley with the wires, the video and photo cameras, and four exhausted interviewers climb up to a fourth-storey apartment in china town. JANA LEO, philosopher, architect and designer is waiting for us by her fire escape. Conversations about verticality/horizontality, condos in NYC, perversions of the city, public space and social stratification, the happiness of owning sky-views, security and streets,... she closes the security-bars of the windows and we leave.
CANAL PLASTICS provide us a piece of plastic mirror. Like in Spain, Chinese stores save lives! The prototype done 6 months ago will stay in NYC, and the new one starts a new life in a new amazing Lasarte's cover.
Dr. T and Mr. Alam will improve Mr. Beni's prototype. The performance starts at Canal St. and will walk down Broadway until Financial District. Reactions from cops, homeless, citizens, workers, brokers, ...
As the project evolves, multiple explorations with this tilted mirror are done. This is in Madrid, where as you can see, a huge development is now under construction. This will eventually obstruct the impressive view. As my mates continue in this ongoing race vs. skyscrapers they come up with this possible solution. We encourage anyone with sunless mornings to do it!
Past the all-glass rotating doors and security ; I get to a corporate looking lobby with at least 8 aluminum covered elevator doors . Having only read about these "smart" elevators and never actually ridden on one I press my destination floor. 45. An instant reply in a very generic-yet-robotic woman's voice tells me which one of them to board. Not even 30 secs. after, the door opens. I make it to my destination in a impressive time of 34 secs!!!
Doors open and I get to a very impressive view of a model-like city were cars move as if they were control remote operated and herds of miniature people move in slow motion. I immediately spotted the amount of sunless space these massive buildings create. If only we were GIANTS!
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