Summation concepts in Sketchbook

- The planning of an urban system neccessitates the planning of a rural
system. Symbiotic flows between rural and urban of the economy, the
ecology, the food, and especially the people effectively draw these two
into a single rural-urban supersystem. Planner need to understand and
respond to the changing behvaiour of this supersystem.

- Entrepreneurialism is a key mechanism by which users interact with
their environments. First the entrepreneur responds to the built
environment, and then the human environment responds in turn. Through
this process areas evolve toward a mulit-layered complexity. To harness
the embedded creativity of urban spaces, planners must ensure these are
conducive to vibrant entrepreneurialism.

- Information systems are critical to the progression of a space - how
and what kinds of information are being gathered by authority-side
actors to inform high-level decisions; and how and what kinds of
information are being made available to the people to inform and
influence the market. Understanding urban evolution requires planners to
understand how information is being managed.

- Against excessive focus on technology-driven approaches, the most
significant gains in the short term will be made in the low cost low
tech fields, which are scalable.

- Intelligent intergration of users into planning and architecture
requires reshuffling the dominant supply chain. If architectural
products and entire cities are bought, built and delivered by developers
before the user enters, then their form will be dominated by what the
developers want to buy, build and deliver. Users presented with a done
deal will expend little energy thinking about how it all could have been
otherwise.

- Conflicts between long term gains and short term gains create
considerable tensions where market investors and short term flux are
present. Planning for the long term requires investing for the long
term. This may require the creation of special investment vehicles.

- Green is luxury, and green is networked. Contrary to popular green-
fetishes of self-restraint and self-sufficiency, the green of the future
will be vastly appealing, and intricately connected.

Adrian Hornsby