Reclaim, remediate, & revitalize: environmental injustice in Detroit, MI

Abstract

This thesis study investigates the effects of living in toxic communities and the relationship between humans and the natural environment. The industrial revolution brought many new forms into urban/industrial cities. With the rise of factories, automobiles, and landfills near residential neighborhoods, air, and soil pollution have become an issue. Focused on how racist and bad city planning has affected residents’ health causing cancer and asthma by allowing hazardous facilities in residential neighborhoods. During the research process in learning about toxic communities, it was found that poor people and minorities live in low-cost real estate/land, and that attracts polluters such as industrial factories. It was found in Hamilton’s research that polluters are actively trying to be in the low-priced and income communities because the locations had lower chances that polluters would get fined for breaking zoning laws. City landfills, factories, cars, and residents all play a role in the negative effects of air quality. This thesis explores how architecture and urban design are complicit in and can offer solutions to, the ongoing legacy of pollution in industrial cities. The design purpose of my thesis is to be a community asset that represents all the history of the site, remediate the environment and be a resource to the community. The goal of my thesis is to Reclaim, Remediate, and Revitalize the Oakwood Heights neighborhood of Detroit MI. My main thesis question is “How can architectural designs contribute to environmental well-being while also finding imaginative alternatives to traditional plaques for preserving memories?” How does pollution affect architecture? What does the integration of nature and architecture look like? Do you integrate nature in architecture as a precedent of building form or as an architectural component? How can architectural materials combat air immersions of smoke and smog? The goal of my research is not to solve the problem of air pollution but instead to show how we may have to make changes to architecture and lives if air quality continuously decreases. Also, the goal is to create a program that can be implemented in highly polluted areas that help combat air pollution. This topic takes us down a deep dive into how racial discrimination has affected housing and zoning. The racial discrimination of redlining and clustering, made industrial factories cluster in certain neighborhoods which caused residents to gain health issues. How can communities use architecture to visualize invisible conditions of harm, such as pollution? Rather than positioning any solution as one that assumes or seeks to recreate an unadulterated natural environment, this project explores how architecture can respond to real, rather than ideal, forms of environment. Research for this thesis was collected from secondary qualitative and quantitative sources. Structured interviews were conducted with 5 residents.