A Drop in the Bucket

An article in the newspaper Community Impact talks this month about the challenges Texas faces with water. With an anticipated population double in the next 50 years, it's time to start making changes to ensure that generations to come will have access to enough water to sustain the population.

Austin gets its water from Lake Travis and Lake Buchanan- both at their lowest points since 1940. With the population ever expanding it seems that more and more people are depending on less and less.

Lake Travis

Texas has a plan outlining how water should be used over the coming years, including new regulations on agricultural water and surface water rights. The ideas are in place, however the funding is not. The state not funding the water plan sends mixed-messages to residents about the severity of the problem. Travis County Commissioner Karen Huber says, "We do not have a culture of conservation, and the public needs education to embrace it. . . It takes time to make culture changes, and we need to get started." Her statement rings true not only in relation to this issue, but also several other public issues of today. Our society in general is a selfish and change-resistant people, taking what resources we need now and leaving our mess for future generations to clean up.

As architects and planners I think we have an invaluable opportunity to affect change like this at a micro level. Not only can be be proponents of the conservation policies set for by the State's new water plans, but we can educate our clients and friends about the severity of the problem, and propose collection and reuse systems that can improve the problem at a individual level. Every drop counts!

Gentrification: A Rap

Watching the PODER documentary in class this week inspired me to do some digging on what else was out there about the gentrification going on in Austin and elsewhere. I stumbled upon this "docu-music-video" about Detroit by Invincible and Finale that actually inspired the videos we saw in class. Take a listen and a look.

samples of the lyrics: 

Condos remodel my old turf
For what it's worth, soul got left in the earth

...

Locusts and buzzards circle and hover above the
Abandoned houses shattered windows with the crooked shutters
Cross the street construct a cookie cutter condominium
Lining Woodward, it's the prime meridian
You divide the city and
In the hood, wonder why you pay two times the premiums?

...

Predatory planning
Eminent domain
Mowed down Motown

...

It's interesting to hear the voice of the displaced in Detroit that inspired the PODER East Austin videos that we saw in class. Later between rap verses, there are interviewed residents of Detroit that give a testament to different circumstances. The "prime meridian" of Woodward that is mentioned could be likened to I35, and the harsh dividing line it creates between the city and the hood. 

One woman says, "If the people are involved and they feel that they are respected and their ideas and their input is respected, you have quality development."

A girl in the video (7:30ish) talks about if she had access to all of the abandoned facilities in Detroit, she'd want it to be a community space, somewhere where the kids around can be involved in something positive and interactive.

The officials in the video talk about how they were able to reshape the projects, and how they can develop new economy that is "related to and connected to the communities in which they exist." 

This is something that I think the gentrifying efforts of East Austin could learn from. The new construction going on in East Austin is mostly condos, or offices and bars that are in not welcoming to the existing residents. It's like the new construction is internalized within a greater community bubble. I think that if we could make an effort to engage the existing community with the new projects, the East Austin area could lessen the severity of the changes and displacement going on. 

http://www.thesouthernshift.com/news/2010/01/gentrification-east-austin-16-year-old-young-scholar-gabriel-padilla-does-3-part-docume