#entropolis

Presentation at AIA Chicago

I'll be presenting this work at the AIA Chicago office on Wednesday, February 4th at 6p.m.  The ENTROPOLIS guidebook will be released at the event and is available at-cost for 14usd.

Above: a final look at Manila

Moving forward:

The following weeks and months will be spent back in Chicago, curating the project, looking for employment, and adjusting to life back in the states.

Sunday Matinee: FINAL SHOW

3 minutes

While this project looked at one city on the island of Luzon, the Philippines is made up of thousands of additional islands, all environmentally and culturally stunning. This 2012 tourism campaign video gives viewers a glimpse of what awaits the intrepid traveler: a nation that spent “300 years in a convent, and 50 years in Hollywood.”

As for this traveler: one island down… 7,106 to go.

WEEK 7: Sunday Matinee

This episode of British television series “Unreported World” examines the exponential population growth in Manila and the living conditions that result from it. While the narration is a clear example of the exploitative “poverty porn” this project is critical of, many of the locations shown are the same ones visited for the project, and offers an intimate, albeit sensationalized, preview of the sites.

WEEK 6: Site Search & Study

[Manila City Jail]

Manila City Jail was built in the outskirts of the city by the Spanish in the 1800s and later used by the Japanese to house POWs. Today, the jail continues to operate and is now surrounded by major roadways, malls, two metro terminals, sky bridges and neighborhoods. Arranged in a series of buildings fanning around in the shape of an asterisk, the original courtyards have been invaded by the forces of the city, with homes and shops wedging themselves between the prison wings (see the webpage banner for a satellite view). Designed to hold 1,000 inmates, the prison now houses 5,000 and continues to grow. Space outside the city walls is just as scarce; in such a central location, housing demands are high and people build atop one another, cantilevering over the streets and creating fully enclosed tunnels.

WEEK 6: Transit in Manila

A recent tourism campaign promotes an image of a lone kayaker traversing an emerald lagoon in an image that resembles many a desktop background, containing the tagline: "Commuting: more fun in the Philippines."

The advertisers must have an excellent sense of humor since commuting in Manila is anything but fun. With over 2.5 million cars registered in the city and roadways that are regularly flooded, Manila is consistently ranked among the most congested city in the world.

Personal record for slowest drive: a 3½ hour taxi ride to travel 8 miles following a rainstorm.

The singular form of public transit, an aging metro system built during the Marcos regime, serves only a fraction of the city and is severely overcrowded, carrying double its daily limit of 350,000 commuters. Manila denizens started an "MRT challenge," calling upon their politicians to ride the metro system just once to experience what they endure daily.

Personal record for slowest commute: 2 hours to ride 12 miles, plus a 90 minute queue at a transfer station.

The response to this lack of public infrastructure is the "jeepney," a uniquely Filipino bus that is privately operated and made from WWII American jeeps. Although their frequent stops exacerbate traffic conditions, jeepneys have become so ubiquitous that malls have begun building formal terminals for them, effectively doubling the mall as a transit hub and convoluting its function, ala Koolhaas’ “Junkspace.”   

Although this high level of congestion is due in part to Manila’s density, it’s one of the main reasons for that density. Spending over two hours to commute 12 miles isn’t viable, and many Filipinos cannot afford to live directly in the city center. The only option then is to move within a mile or two of their workplace, and build in any space they find left: under bridges, on rafts, and in cemeteries.

WEEK 6: ZOTO Tour in Tondo

[Site visit with UP-Diliman]

With nearly 250,000 inhabitants per square mile, Tondo’s Zone One is the most densely populated area in Manila, itself the world’s most dense city. Tondo’s extreme density is due to the proliferation of informal communities, filling medians of highways and tucked under bridges, making effective in-city relocation projects, such as one currently underway by the United Nations, almost impossible within this supersaturated city.

Zone One Tondo Organization (ZOTO) was established by community leaders in the 1970s to represent the 30,000 families that were being displaced by an IMF-World Bank financed shipping port. ZOTO successfully convinced the Marcos dictatorship to invest in what became Asia’s largest in-city relocation site, Dagat-Dagatan.