IN-PERSON Lisbon Livable Cities. Section A

Abstract

Residents in Riyadh have been content with the maximized modern conformity in the hot and arid climate in ARMACO housing program style which is detached villas with high fence walls. The convenience of air-conditioned built forms results more inactive streets of 2km x 2km grid of 100m width straightforward highways for vehicles planned by Costantinous A. Doxiadis in 1972 with no public transportations. In this ultimate efficient urbanity, vacant lands randomly have been located in neighborhoods due to private landownership with no land tax. The intangible; ecological sensibilities related to the land which is empirical with human factors seem faded away since Doxiadis’ urban planning, while HIMA: the ancient land management system in Arabian Peninsula, conserved wilderness as well as biodiversity of land for a period of time, is disappearing as tribal culture seems extraordinary. This paper aims that the sporadic vacant lands are repositioned as sites for living labs for community discovering and conserving values of ecological values that would converge as ordinary habitats fulfilling urban ecosystem regeneration. The ecological sensibilities of Najdi architecture experimented with previous researches are applied to flesh the vulnerable peculiarities of the living structures locked in the symbolic grid. With the advancement of public transportations; metro and buses, living lab prototypes can provide places to residents walking from metro stations to home. Urban ecology will be ordinary and bring sense of human scale again back to the real-time context, if living labs function in daily observation and care of the ordinary residents.