Doing more with less- Emscherpark

As architects, whose salaries often depend on new development, we are naturally in conflict with ideas of scarcity and doing more with less. "Does that building even need to be built at all?" is not a question an architect wants to hear. We would be financially foolish to refuse to design something for a client on the basis that they could actually just occupy another building rather than build a new one. However, the social responsibility that comes with being a human being (not just an architect), asks that we pose that question to our clients and offer them alternatives. 

We can do more than resign ourselves to work for an architecture-firm-turned-corporation and design whatever our clients whatever want, even if it's bad for the environment- both built and natural. In order to do more with less, we first have to realize how powerful architecture is- socially, politically, economically and environmentally and align ourselves with people outside of the architecture profession: politicians, users and city planners. To let corporations (both corporate architecture firms and clients), who have no interests besides a bottom line, decide alone what's built and for whom means there will be no spatial justice. To have architects who recognize this and aren't afraid to be political means there is a chance of a better environment for all parties. 

One example of an adaptive reuse project that encompasses these values was led by politicians, citizens, private developers and architects is Emscherpark in the industrial Ruhr area of Germany near the city of Essen. The industries that populated this area brought economic growth but destroyed the natural environment. Due to the shift towards a service-based economy, industry left the area and left vacant industrial complexes behind. Today, industrial landscape has been transformed and reimagined to include cycling trails, new housing in existing structures, and mini-parks for the community. Rather than destroy and rebuild, the parties involved reused and improved what was left behind.