Fabricating site : modelling nuanced scenarios and design responses to China’s national environmental programmes

Abstract

This thesis is called fabricating site: modeling nuanced scenarios and design response to China’s national environmental programmes. It’s about a methodology to read the landscape, to represent it, and to create a site for design. China’s national environmental programmes, including the Sloping Land Conversion Program, the Grain for Green or Return Farmland to Forests Program, and Return Land to Lake Program, are endeavors by the Chinese government to stop devastating natural disasters. However, these large programs have had mixed results and because of the geographical and landscape complexity, are difficult to evaluate. This thesis shows an approach to design that takes into account large complex landscapes and those policies that influence the landscape. Each of my mappings are complex, and become more complex with each iteration. In this thesis, I mapped in order: 1) On the upstream of Yantze river, I did a rigorous, more scientific erosion mapping to understand sediment transfer that causes downstream flooding and the impacts of the government afforestation programs. 2) On the downstream, I attempted a more complex mapping of flooding and the infrastructure and land reorganizations done to try to mitigate those massive floods. 3) After that, I used a similar approach and integrated more complexities of the site, including land value, flood risk and ecology protection to develop design strategies for the area.