Appropriating Public Space Unplanned appropriations are becoming scarce. Increasingly there is little in the Canadian urban context that promotes difference or interaction with the physical form of the public realm. In Vancouver, agitators have been replaced by adjudicators who build the city with expedient consistency. Through rigorous and decisive planning methods, the potential to re-conceive public space has almost expired. The ubiquitous point tower’s exterior spaces (the singular typology currently filling any and all remaining tracts of land in downtown Vancouver) have left little room for public engagement or interpretation. Possible easements have been contained and marked (with varying degrees of discretion) as private property, resisting any activity other than those explicitly designed for and used by the pay- ing residents. Traditional examples of appropriation can be found in Vancouver — sidewalks are often re-adapted by Chinatown retailers, entrepre- neurial street vendors and restaurateurs. But even these appropriations are mostly planned, under permit and limited to transactions of commodity or consumption. In this context, appropriation has become paradigmatic and privatized. To promote a rich urban culture there must be room for the unknown, the inconvenient and the impractical. There must be serendipitous moments where the city’s inhabitants are able to interact with physical form whose function or purpose is not deliberate and prescribed.
Construction and Chemical Composition Like the handhelds, big GlowSticks are hollow translucent plastic tubes with ten inches of concrete in the base. Six feet high, an 18” diameter base, they weigh about ten pounds. Although awkward, they are relatively easy to handle since they are bottom heavy. This lightness allows for handling by a single person. The translucent plastic tubes contain a mixture of chemical elements in a chemiluminescent reaction that emits light. When a hydro- gen peroxide solution, phenyl oxalate ester solution and a fluorescent dye combine, new compounds are formed with a substantial release of energy. As this energy subsides, it is released as light. A range of dyes produce different colours. In the handheld version the reaction is triggered when the plastic shell is bent, cracking an internal glass vial containing the hydrogen peroxide solution. Large GlowSticks arrive on site ‘pre-cracked.’ The tube is filled with phenyl oxalate ester and the dye. Hydrogen peroxide solution is added just before shipping to the site, triggering the reaction.
45
on | site 16
Made with FlippingBook interactive PDF creator